How to turn a Browser into a Buyer!
with these Best Product Page Design Principles.
Ireland’s eCommerce Overview:
With over 2.1 million online domestic shoppers in Ireland last year, compared with 2.2 million that purchased online from an overseas supplier. Its safe to say there’s a lot Irish retailers can do to attract more traffic to their online stores. With projected growth in Irish eCommerce usage to reach 3.2 million by 2021, there are firm indicators that the emergence of the digital economy in Ireland has forced many retailers to rethink their eCommerce strategy.
For those already trading online there is the stark reality that overseas competition is winning the hearts and minds of the Irish online shopper. But why does so much get purchased online by Irish shoppers from overseas suppliers? Is it their product page experiences? Price points and offers? Logistics and shipping rates? Or a combination of all?
With Irish eCommerce consumer spend set to reach €10.1 Billion by 2020, Irish online retailers need to identify and resolve all threats from overseas competitors in order to capture the insurgence of Irish online buyer behaviour.
In this article we look at eCommerce web design, specifically, the most important page on your website. As its the final conversion point along the customer journey it’s vitally important to get right from the initial design to the final go-live version.
How to design a Product Page that will convert visitors into customers!!
Follow these 8 design approach principles:
#1. Check out your biggest competitors eCommerce stores.
Its nothing new to deep dive into your competitors store to get a sense of what they deliver in terms of an online shopping experience.
Follow the steps below to gain more insight on how your competitors market to their customers online.
When analysing your competitors homepage. Ask yourself these questions.
(All of these elements will provide a comprehensive insight into how your competitors operate online. They can highlight any weaknesses or flaws in their eCommerce processes and display.)
#2. Define the end user – Build buyer personas.
Much needed research is required to establish and build buyer personas, they help identify your target audience. Building personas allows you to push personalised content and funnel your marketing activities and messaging to a specific user audience. They also form an integral part of building a targeted product landing page, from a content perspective they define the tone and messaging highlighting a products benefits increasing the likelihood of a purchase. In designing a product page that will reflect the targeted persona profile, there must be thought put into developing scenarios and positive experiences users gain from your product. When done building a comprehensive set of buyer personas, develop a customer journey map to analyse and establish touch points that will lead your prospective customers to your product landing pages.
#3. Design with a Mobile First approach.
Designing your product pages with a mobile first approach is essential as it has become the No 1. device for product searches and will account for 54% of total eCommerce sales by 2021. There are however, many considerations to take in account when designing your mobile product page, if not highlighted in the design cycle they can cause the user to overlook important product page content like product images, product descriptions and other USP’s that drive conversions.
#4. Desktop Design: Above-the-fold best practices.
Although its imperative to design with a mobile first approach as it’s no doubt the majority of traffic to your eCommerce store will come from mobile platforms. There is still a reluctance from Irish online shoppers to complete the full purchase via mobile, so desktop is still the preferred device.
“52% of Irish online shoppers have concerns about their security when making mobile payments”
(PWC Retail & Consumer Report 2018)
With this in mind developing an intuitive desktop product page experience is just as important to ensure consistency on your eCommerce site, customer journey and also address any concerns that a browser might have about the product they are interested in. As research shows above from the PWC Retail & Consumer Report 2018 the majority of Irish online shoppers don’t have much trust in mobile payments at present. A desktop version allows you to present your product pages in ‘full-width’ with key information above-the-fold and to maximise the potential for conversions.
Key Elements to include above-the-fold:
Page Header:
Main Product page content (from left to right | top to bottom)
Left hand side:
Middle:
Right hand side:
See the illustration below that highlights key elements to be included above-the-fold on your desktop eCommerce product page. Take into account this is a wireframe layout, these elements would normally be more spaced out on a live webpage and surrounded by white space to ensure a qualitative user experience.
#5. Desktop Design: Below-the-fold best practices.
This section of your product page contains second tier information about your product, it’s still key however, to drive conversions.
#6. Carefully plan the layout and architecture of your eCommerce store.
This can be a painful task but one that will ensure you prioritise product ranges you know will generate the highest revenue. One of the best practices to get your eCommerce site indexed and crawled on search engines is to ensure they’re easy to read and that the ‘click depth’ is no more then three clicks, i.e. three clicks from the main menu on the homepage.
What is click depth? The process to which search engines crawl and index webpages.
Consider you have a general category like ‘Mens’ then a sub category like ‘Mens Trainers’ and you prioritise with ‘Top Sellers’ as a key product landing page, your are already 3 clicks into your site. So if you you want to highlight ‘Top Selling Mens Trainers’ or ‘Top Sellers’ then copy that landing page link and replicate it on the homepage in an area with high visibility, that way its only one click from your homepage. When search engines crawl your website (to index your webpages) they will be able to read links closest to or on your homepage.
It sometimes can be hard to decide where all these links should be positioned on your homepage as you might want to push more than one product range for promotion. You should consider the expertise of an eCommerce specialist to discuss your options and develop a homepage strategy that will guarantee an efficient crawl depth for all your main high value product ranges.
#7. Image Quality & Video – optimised for mobile web use.
When you walk into or by a high street fashion store you are normally greeted with spot-lighted displays with dramatic visual merchandise, music and bold video projections to entice you in to the store or indeed to explore more about whats on offer. These visual effects add to the in-store atmospherics and also increase the product appeal bringing that WOW! factor and driving a desire to make a purchase.
On your product pages you have to apply the same technique, your product imagery has to be perfect to allow for excellent visual standards but also be able to adapt for other technologies and platforms to work with them. 90% of online shoppers will be affected by the quality of the product imagery and/or video quality so creating compelling images or video should be your NO.1 concern.
Product Page image technologies that you should consider.
Most eCommerce providers like Shopify and Woocommerce have software plugin technology allowing the above to be integrated into your stores product pages.
#8. User Generated Content – customer reviews on social sites.
Driving brand awareness is your ultimate goal! But how you plan and execute your brand strategy can make or break. As mentioned before, creating a WOW factor about product brand can drive engagement and a desire to purchase. Most companies that leverage digital now use ‘social proofing’ or ‘user generated content’ as a key element in their brands’ development strategy. User generated content can be a powerful tool in developing trust and reassurance with prospecting shoppers, so having this element built into your product page can be a vital conversion tool.
You might integrate this element from your various social media feeds, possibly Instagram and Pinterest. Embed visual posts from your social followers into your product page that provides inspiration and feedback about your product value – whether it be design style ideas or other useful functionalities and features. Some brands have been really successful in developing a buzz about their product ranges, creating social communities, using hashtag groups and encouraging followers to come up with new ideas about their products through social media campaigns. If you’re targeting Millennials, this strategy will be crucial as 64% of them will seek out customer reviews and user generated content before they make a purchase.
Key Takeaways.
As user preferences and buyer behaviour change on a constant basis developing and maintaining constant sales through your eCommerce platform will lie with your product page design. Its the most important page on your website, no matter what your marketing efforts are, it can make or break your online sales if not designed correctly.
Just to recap.
eCommerce store product pages are ubiquitous. Successful ones harness all the design elements to drive authenticity and a unique shopping experience. With the use of psychological trigger mechanisms convince your browsers to ‘add to cart’ quickly lowering the chance for shopping cart abandonment.
To learn more about how to drive more conversions from your stores product pages get in touch with izest Marketing Group and lets work together to design an eCommerce store that will grow your brand online.