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Feb 26, 2019 | 5 minute read
written by Kate Hassey
Unfortunately, many eCommerce entrepreneurs don’t put much thought or effort into eCommerce website design. Most create a website that looks “good enough” and call it a day. But neglecting visual merchandising is leaving money on the table.
You don’t have to have any special skills or hire an expensive website designer to create an eCommerce design that is visually appealing and professional. All it takes is an eye for detail and a few ideas to get you started.
Here are several eCommerce website design ideas you can use to turn your website into a selling machine:
Your homepage is usually the first page that customers see. It’s their introduction to your company. As such, you want your homepage to be as visually appealing as possible.
While it may seem like a good idea to fill your homepage with as much information as possible about your company, your products, current deals, and other things, you actually want to keep your homepage very simple. You don’t want to overwhelm customers with too much information.
At the top of the page, you should have a simple, intuitive menu with as few menu options as possible. Your logo should be professional but simple. Your logo is a visual representation of your company, and you want it to instill confidence when customers see it.
The colors of your homepage should be complimentary. If you aren’t sure which colors go best together, take the time to consult a color wheel to find two colors that you really like. You can also research other websites for color ideas.
The main body of your homepage should consist mostly of links to other parts of your website. For example, you could have a section on top sellers with links to those products. You could also have links to each product section. Additional options include links to informational articles, an opt-in to sign up for your newsletter, and others.
The footer should be reserved for additional information about your business and legal pages. This is a good place to put links to information that is legally necessary but you otherwise don’t want to draw a lot of attention to.
Aside from the products you sell and the layout of your website, the words on the pages are one of the most critical elements of your business. And it’s something that many of your competitors aren’t paying any attention to. While it may be tempting to write your own content and product descriptions, you could actually increase your conversions by using a professional.
First, what is a copywriter? Copywriters are writers who specialize in sales and marketing. In the industry, the words they write are known as the copy. Just a few examples of the things they write include product descriptions, website content, sales pages, emails, and others.
Copywriting is an art that takes years to master. A skilled copywriter can use the psychology of persuasionto gently close the sale on customers. In other words, they are experts at selling without sounding like they are selling.
If you are on a budget but still want to use a professional copywriter, you can hire someone to write the parts of your website that are most likely to influence sales. This could include your homepage, product descriptions, about page, and others. You can always hire a copywriter to rewrite other pages at a later time.
The images you use on your eCommerce website are critical. This is one thing that you definitely don’t want to get wrong. The right images will turn prospects into customers, while bad images can drive customers away.
You definitely want to portray all of your products in the best light. And one of the best ways to do that is to use a professional product photographer to take pictures of your products. Professional photographers are skilled at product placement, lighting, photo editing, and other things that can make your images leap from the page and capture the attention of your customers.
If a professional photographer isn’t in your budget, it’s still possible to take great pictures of your products yourself. You just need the right equipment, a little practice, and photo editing software. The equipment you’ll need includes a high-quality camera (a digital DSLR), a backdrop, lighting equipment, and software such as Adobe Lightroom to put the finishing touches on your images.
In addition to your product pictures, you also want to use professional pictures for all other images on your website. You can easily obtain high-quality images that do not require attribution and are licensed for commercial use by purchasing them through a stock photo company. There are a number of stock photo companies to choose from. Their prices and image quality varies quite a bit, so it’s worth your time to compare different companies.
One of the most important things you can do to ensure the success of your website is to test different design features to see which ones convert best. This doesn’t have to be a complicated experiment. You could, for example, simply switch out the images of one of your products to see if it increases conversions. If your sales aren’t increased with the new images or you experience a decrease in sales, you simply switch the images back.
Conversion rate optimization is a simple strategy you can use to dramatically increase your sales. The great thing about testing different design elements is that if you find something that works for one product, there’s a good chance it will work for the others as well. This isn’t always the case, of course, which is why continual testing is important.
Ecommerce website design doesn’t have to be complicated. With a little attention to detail and conversion rate optimization through testing, you can stand out from the competition and grow your sales. It could very well be the ace up your sleeve for becoming an industry leader and dominating your niche.
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