Web design and E-commerce key points and recommendations.

Keep ing things simple – The homepage doesn’t need to be cluttered with

unnecessary information and it doesn’t need to be extensively below the

fold either. The current site does not take advantage of homepage screen

estate effectively and a proper content strategy must take place before

moving on to design and execution. The homepage is essential because

customers instantly react to the content layout to form an assessment of

whether they would trust the platform with their money or not.

To improve upon the existing layout, the homepage experience must be

carefully planned and strategically aimed at 1) Inviting a new customer to

learn more about the brand through incentives to explore the brand’s

story. 2) Allowing an existing customer to find exactly what he/she is look-

ing for without cluttering the experience.

Simplify navigation – The site structure should be straight-forward and

easy to understand. Sorting products into their main categories, and have

these as fixed and accessible call-to-actions on the site. Within the top

level navigation lists, we must include visual transitions of sub-categories

to make filtering easier, instead of having everything under the one um-

brella. Although complete navigation can be achieved via the primary

drop-down, it is integral to allow a coherent side-navigation to it easy for

the user to sort through these products with a filter – e.g. Sort by Price/

Brand or add a keyword search field to search within a section. The cur-

rent site utilises the second menu as a horizontal bar above the product

section, a different approach would be to incorporate a proper sidebar nav

to allow better fine-tuning of results and thus improving the user journey

throughout the online shopping experience.

Device agnostic design Ensuring your online store has a user focused de-

sign and works across all devices is key to increasing conversions. The

current website simply does not react to different devices and displays

one size-fits-all version for all devices. Although creating a responsive site

is essential for any website wishing to reach all customers, more impor-

tant considerations need to be made beyond just having a page the ren-

ders well across different devices and viewports.

• Paying special attention to the placement of the search box, as people of-

ten access mobile sites in search of something specific, so make sure

they can easily get there.

• The shopping cart icon should be clearly visible and touch friendly on all

product pages. The size and dimensions of the cart should be designed

for accessibility on different screens.

• Navigation throughout the buying cycle should also be designed to be

touch-friendly. Off-canvas navigation should include clear transitions be-

tween different sub-navigations to allow for a smooth transition be-

tween different pages.

• The consumer should be invited to opt-in to receive your newsletter

across all channels, be it via QR code, on the mobile landing page or

when placing a product in the shopping cart. One strategy is to consider

offering incentives for opting in, for example by offering 10% rebate on

the next order.

• A clear and accessible CTC (click to call) button must be visible for m-

Commerce users who want a question answered, or need further infor-

mation to your products. Some customers navigate mobile sites looking

for a way to contact the brand, having a direct way to activate the phone

calling feature directly from mobile browsers is the best way to reduce

the time it takes for visitors to get in touch.

Incorporating Story telling in content strategy : Underestimating the

sales potential of the about page is a significant mistake made in the initial

launch of the e-commerce site. The page is integral in communicating the

essence of the brand by inviting the end user to understand the story be-

hind the brand. The current site fails to take advantage of this mode of

content creation and therefore is not reaping the benefits of building an

emotional connection with end-users.

Storytelling, if done in a consistent and appealing manner, can be

used effectively as a medium to build strong relationships with

clients and customers and to transform them into strong loyal advo-

cates of your brand.

Utiliz ing Quality Images : Professionally-taken images of products will in-

still trust and confidence in your customers. Conversely, if the product im-

ages are difficult to see or do not show details, they will actually have a

negative impact on what and how much customers purchase.

Product presentation is key to commanding the browser's attention and for

sales conversion. Consistency and quality of product images directly im-

pact conversion rates. This is logically consistent with the assumption that

consumers who browse products on websites want to see the products

they are considering for purchase represented by the highest quality im-

ages possible. Therefore, hiring a professional photographer to produce

high quality product images in a professional studio setting where proper

equipment and lighting can be leveraged for the best quality output. 

A Proper C EO Strategy Unlike channels like Facebook and Google Ad-

words which stop delivering traffic when daily budgets come to a halt;

proper SEO can actually continue to bring in targeted traffic based on key-

words and accelerated page ranking.

One example of how the current site fails to take advantage of an effective

SEO strategy is that the current site fails to be responsive on different de-

vices and viewports. Google recently announced a page ranking penalty

for sites that don’t render properly when viewed on mobile devices. This

change alone, will greatly boost site visibility and allow for a better tar-

geted system to drive valuable search traffic into the site.