DANGER: E-commerce pitfalls ahead!

As the global spend online continues to grow you surely want to benefit from consumers willing to part with their money in exchange for your products/services?

If you already have a web presence in the form of an e-commerce website you must free your mind and realise improvements can always be made, no matter how big or small, and this can be the tipping point as to whether a customer buys from you or not!

So consider these ‘danger areas’, think about how they can be afforded. The ‘danger areas’ can be easily dealt with but in order to deal with them you need to be made aware of what they are, even if they do seem very obvious you need to act on them. Some common e-commerce web design mistakes that you may want to address are:

Incomplete product details: One of the most common e-commerce danger areas. A products detail heavily influences the customers purchasing decision, so it needs to be there!

Old design: A complete turn-off for customers! Your e-commerce website needs to be fresh, appealing to your target audience and user friendly. This can be achieved with very little investment, but it’s well worth it.

Payment methods: Don’t limit the customer to a select few payment methods. Customers want choice, why limit them, they will only do business with someone else. More choice = less abandoned baskets.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO): For an e-commerce store to survive in quite a hostile competitive environment good SEO is essential to drive traffic, thus sales. Poor SEO leads to poor rankings and the loss of potential customers. A little investment can see a big return on investment.

Contact details: A bit like ‘payment methods’ detailed above, it’s all about giving the customer choice. However choosing not to provide the potential customer with contact details, in a variety of forms, can damage the credibility of a website. Be open and honest with your customers and give them a choice of how they would like to contact you.

Keep it simple: There is nothing worse for a user than having to wait for a page to load. Keeping your e-commerce store simple is vital and will ensure the potential customer has the time they need to make a purchasing decision. Bear in mind current broadband speeds and don’t overload the page with unessential detail. Keep to the key selling points and you will be successful.

These are just some of the common danger areas that you must address to make your e-commerce store more successful. The online e-commerce world is changing – it’s not just about having a store online anymore, it’s about having a great one!

Attract traffic through SEO.

Engage your potential customers with the right information.

Convert potential by giving the customer choice.

What traffic source generates the best conversion?

‘SeeWhy’ conducted a study on a sample of 60,000 e-commerce transactions to analyze the origin of the people that added items to their basket. This study shows that e-mail brings the most traffic with 56.8% followed by Direct traffic with 17.9% and 10.3% with for Search. Social Media provided only 4.3% of traffic while picking up the rear was Display Advertising which managed only 1.7%.

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‘SeeWhy’ then studied the origin of those who had completed their purchases on the site. Not surprising then when they discovered the best conversion rate is up e-mail with 67.37% followed by Direct with 23.68%. Search Engine Marketing (SEM) and Display, two sources of traffic charge, contribute 1% of the traffic conversion.

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Don’t think that SEM and Display are useless, and to remove them would be more foolish, consider them as part of your overall strategy. Just because the user didn’t buy first time it doesn’t mean they won’t the next. It makes sense not to put all your eggs in one basket.