Over 80% of online buyers research their purchase before they hit checkout. Because the online marketplace is so vast, it’s important to make your eCommerce website stand out.

eCommerce sales are directly related to how a website looks and functions. These are the elements of an eCommerce website design that convert viewers into buyers.

Great Visuals

Welcome Home (Page)

The home page of your website should be your everchanging masterpiece. It is the beginning of your site and it could be the end of the consumer experience if it’s not up to par.

Think of your home page as the hallmark of your brand and the basis of all appealing ecommerce website design. This is the jumping off point for the consumer, where they will decide rather or not they want anything to do with your company.

Homepages that feel poorly constructed will be a bad reflection of your brand and the customer experience the user can expect.

Although they may not realize, consumers often associate sloppy website design with a company’s lack of attention to detail. Bad websites often translate to missed shipments, poorly packaged, or defective items in the mind of the consumer.

Thumbnails

Creating great click thru thumbnails is a great way to direct traffic to the items you want to promote. This can include driving users to your most popular items as well as less popular items that could use a boost.

You can create thumbnails promoting sale items, new items, and item restocks. Thumbnails can also be a great tool for seasonal gifting promotions, which we’ll get to later.

Editorial

Editorial pieces can be a unique way to sell items to the consumer. Creating editorial style pieces can sell the consumer on products without feeling that they are being directly marketed to. A great example of this in practice is Violet Grey.

Violet Grey is a beauty e-comm website with a myriad of editorial celebrity content. They use the products they sell on the website to create editorial beauty shoots, include an interview with the celebrity featured.

Exclusives

Another great element of ecommerce website design is prominently displayed exclusive content. This can include behind the scenes video from your lookbook photoshoots or interviews with artisan product makers. Make sure this content is exclusive to your brand and not borrowed from another site.

Ease of Use

Creating a user-friendly customer experience is the hallmark of the ideal website. The average customer will visit three online retailers before making a purchase, so how can you ensure your customer feels best served by your online store?

Categorizing Your Items

Creating easy website navigation is important in preventing the consumer from leaving your site. If your eCommerce website sells car parts this could mean categorizing items by vehicle brand with subcategories for different models and years.

For an online clothing retailer, this could mean categorizing items by gender with subcategories for different item types. If you are a women’s only retailer, this could be categories of item types (Shirts, pants, lingerie) with subcategories for different occasions or moods (Formal Wear, Spring Edit, Lookbooks).

Seasonal Marketing

Great ecommerce website design makes room for seasonal marketing needs. Preparing for and marketing to seasonal shoppers is a great way to make the customer shopping experience easy and hassle-free.

It’s important that your website frontpage be consistently updated. The consumer should see something new and exciting to click each time they visit your online store.

Your website should always plan in advance to market to holiday gift driven purchases. This can include making Valentine’s Day gifting thumbnails for him and her, or Christmas gift ideas categorized by interest.

These visuals should be marketed to your key demographics. Product photos can be easily converted into eye-catching thumbnails by scaling them to the appropriate size and adding text in photoshop.

Mobile Optimization

It is important to make sure that your website is mobile friendly. Failing to do so can cost your company important sales and customer interactions.

Google’s recent “Mobilegeddon” update prioritizes websites that are optimized for the mobile experience. Websites that fail to optimize their sites for cell phone viewing will no longer rank highly in Google search results.

In 2015, a third of all eCommerce purchases holiday purchases were made via a mobile device. This is a huge market share that retailers shouldn’t ignore.

Additional Elements of Successful eCommerce Website Design

There are often other elements considered by the consumer before making a purchase. These are important to consider, especially since some are as easy as including more information on the product page.

Safe Payments

Security of payment is huge for the consumer. The dark web is a cesspool of online thieves selling stolen information. Much of this information is stolen from websites who have weak security systems. The consumer should know that their credit card or bank info is secure when shopping at your site. There are easy ways to introduce trusted platforms to your website. Paypal is one example of a trusted online payment that is easy to integrate into your online shopping experience.

Easy Returns

Returning the item should be an easy experience. Consumer confidence is heightened when they feel they have the ability to return something if they aren’t satisfied with their purchase. Amazon.com has capitalized on this with their Prime Member program. Returns are easy and free if the item is damaged or if the item delivered is not as described.

Professional Aids

86% of users polled said that they would pay up to 25% more for a better customer experience. Sometimes it can be necessary to use the services of a web design expert for the best web design efficace.

It’s difficult to replicate the functionality of a high-end website without proper training. Fortunately, it’s easier than ever to learn the ecommerce website design skills you need without leaving your home.

Learn Effective eCommerce Website Design Skills

It’s important to learn the important skills needed for high-end ecommerce website design. Check out more articles that will help take your brand to the next level with engaging visual content and a great customer experience.