Make purchasing on your site easier

To facilitate purchases on our site we must understand what consumers want, what they need and why this is a crucial part in optimising the conversion rate into sales. Why do consumers find it increasingly difficult to buy online? Is it really as difficult as customers perceive it to be? What is contributing to increasing this opinion? What is happening in our country? Well, according to the Annual Report of the Digital Content Sector in Spain, prepared by the Ministry of Industry, Energy and Tourism, the Internet has accounted for 42,416 million euros for the Spanish economy, of which 85% is attributed to electronic commerce. Every year our sector has been growing significantly, which is a sign of the advances that are taking place in the ecommerce sector in our country.

What does it mean to make shopping easier?

We will explain the factors that influence making shopping easier for consumers. Three key factors contribute to making online shopping easy:

1. Clarity and simplicity
2. Intuitive design
3. Informative content

The table is already set. Consumers want to buy online and they want to do it directly from your brand. All you have to do is provide your website with the resources they need, making the process as simple and intuitive as possible.

Step 1: The perfect experience

Only 18% of respondents are highly satisfied with their online shopping experiences. 10% are completely dissatisfied and the remaining 72% were somewhat satisfied. So in an industry that moves so many millions of euros, only 20% are completely satisfied? How is that possible? Joanna Lord, Marketing Expert: "For me, conversion rate optimization is the way we can re-engineer experiences to better serve the consumer. In the end, that's what marketing is: rebuilding a brand story and experience towards the best service our customer demands." (via Unbounce). There is very likely room for improvement in the experience that your brand represents as well. Do you think you are not responsible for the bad experiences that customers acquire even if they do not depend on you personally? Think again. According to BrandShop, "Regardless of where the transaction happens, more than half of respondents place the brand responsible for the shopping experience."

Step 2: Create brand recall

Only 22% of respondents start their online searches for a brand or product directly on a brand website. Not surprisingly, the majority (58%) start with Google. What's more interesting is that only 14% start with third-party websites like Amazon. Think about this for a moment, respondents are more likely to start their searches on brand websites than on websites of large third-party companies like Amazon, yet they are more likely to make purchases on the latter. Your visitors are acquiring information on your website, but they are abandoning it (despite their desire to purchase a product from it) because the brand website makes the shopping experience difficult. The key to boosting conversion rates is to work with those shopping habits, not against them.

Step 3: Build authenticity

You’ve done conversion research, your visitors have been to your site and know they can make purchases on it. Now you need to convince your visitors to become buyers. 96% of respondents believe that search is a crucial part of the shopping experience and 63% of them would sooner buy from an authentic brand than one that isn’t perceived as honest. So what can you do to make sure your site is seen as an authentic provider of products? Social proof Social proof comes in the form of testimonials, consumer reviews, social media practices, the company’s own activity, storytelling or brand history, etc. Brian Solis, The Altimeter Group: “In the day-to-day shopping world, the consumer can find themselves in a state of indecision. When consumers feel unsure about what step to take next, social proof comes in to see what other consumers are doing or have already done.” Trust Signals There are signals that are important to gain the trust of our visitors, for example some of them are the privacy policy, warranty information, etc. Contact information is also an element to highlight in the form of a physical address, a phone number, other forms of contact, social media profiles, etc. Context and Content The quality of the content that we offer is very significant, such as product manuals, product specifications, benefits, extra content, etc. Context is important in terms of the price of third-party companies such as Amazon that we talked about before. The prices of competing products, the specifications of each product, a button to compare, etc. There are two things that should not be forgotten: Give the visitor the confidence that your site is credible and that the entire purchase process will go well. And reinforce the idea that if something goes wrong, your brand will be available and prepared to deal with the problem quickly.

Step 4: Make your website intuitive

Ultimately, your shopping experience and site design should be intuitive. Peep Laja of ConversionXL tells us, “What makes a design intuitive is that the user can focus on the task at hand without stopping for even a second. Intuitive design makes you think that customer service matters. Ultimately, intuitive design is all about the experience.” In essence, an intuitive shopping experience and checkout design reduces the need for the consumer to stop or think about what they are doing. The next step is always obvious and questions are answered before they are asked.

Conclusion It's time to close the gap between expectation and reality that exists in the Ecommerce industry today. Consumers want to buy directly from brand websites, not from third-party companies. Unfortunately, some brands make purchasing difficult, so some consumers turn to a more expert shopping experience like Amazon. The keys to increasing your conversion rate have to be: test, test and test, your shopping experience is an experiment that never ends, there is always something to improve and that can be optimized; simplify each step, if there is any step that is unnecessary, delete it; make sure that your website is optimized for search engines, since this is where your visitors are starting to look for information. At Línea Gráfica we are always willing as professionals to advise you on the optimization of your Ecommerce with the aim of achieving the highest conversion rate in sales. Do not hesitate to contact us! https://www.lineagrafica.es/