There’s no doubt that eCommerce is growing and providing new business opportunities. For a successful eCommerce website you have to focus on some key elements.

If you are still scratching your head and trying to find what are the key elements of a successful eCommerce website, we are here to keep you updated with all the key elements of eCommerce website that will help you to get an ideal blueprint.

With an eCommerce site, potential customers can reach you from anywhere, at anytime. But if your eCommerce site isn’t set up properly, it won’t attract visitors, and more importantly, engage those visitors enough to increase brand recognition and keep them coming back.

Considering the above factor Truconversion published an infographic with 9 key elements for a successful eCommerce website.

9 Key Elements For a Successful eCommerce Website

The 9 key elements are as follows:

1.Page Speed

Most of the eCommerce website users tend to care about the speed and loading time of a website. If the loading time of a website is high there will be a great chance to increase the bounce rate.

Increasing the loading speed of the website by 3 seconds increases the revenue by 10-12%. A site taking 3 or more seconds to load gets 22% fewer conversion. 

(CDnetworks https://www.cdnetworks.com/sg/en)

For every 1 second of page speed improvement, walmart.com experienced up to a 2% conversion increase.

Auto parts retailer AutoAnything.com cut page load times in half, it experienced a 13% increase in sales.

Low page speed not only increases the bounce rate, but it also diminishes the customer’s trust in your brand.

If your website page load time is 3 seconds,

• Bounce rate will be 50% higher
• Page views 22% fewer
• Conversions 22% fewer

If your website page load time is 5 seconds,

• Bounce rate will be 105% higher
• Page views 35% fewer
• Conversions 38% fewer

Ideally, pages should be interactive in 3 seconds or less.

2. Page Size

The second key element of eCommerce website is page size. Normally page size is measured in kilobyte. Generally, it includes all elements on a page such as images, JavaScript, CSS etc. The smaller the page size the better your site is.

According to latest research both eBay and Walmart have made an impressive performance comeback – with each site’s home page rendering primary content in fewer than 3 seconds.

Compress Images: 43% of the top 100 retail sites fail to compress images. Only 10% received an “A” grade for image compression.

Page size: Images typically comprise between 50% to 60% of a page’s total weight, making them fertile territory for optimization.

3. Reviews & Testimonials

One of the most significant eCommerce website solutions includes the addition of reviews and testimonials to your webpage. 

A successful eCommerce website design is like a community where the owners of the page, who run it, and the customers work in a cooperative manner. Customers not only purchase products from your website, but also recommend it to others to buy. These positive words of mouth can add a great value to your site.

61% of customers read online reviews before making a purchase decision.

63% of customers are more likely to make a purchase from a site which has user reviews.

Approximately 46% of online users use social media when making a purchase decision.

4. Live Chat Widget

To have a proper communication channel for the convenience of the consumers is also an important element that your eCommerce website must have.

Supposedly a customer is new to your site or even if he is a regular customer, he can still have some queries. To answer their queries you must have to keep Live Chat Widget.

According to an EConsultancy report, Live Chat has the highest satisfaction level for any customer service channel, with 73%, compared with 61% for email and 44% for phone.

5. Product videos

High quality products videos are very important for eCommerce website. A video can speak more than 1000 words of your product.

Many eCommerce sites are using videos in different ways to improve customer understanding of their products as well as make their content more engaging and intimate.

SixpackAbsExercises.com, a VWO customer, A/B tested videos on the sales, page which resulted an increased conversions by 46%.

6. Responsive Design

A responsive eCommerce website is the one that is compatible with all devices specifically be mobile friendly. The reason is, people would like to access your eCommerce site from anywhere and they can’t always carry a bulky PC or laptop with them everywhere.

Only 22% of marketers say they are ahead of the curve when it comes to responsive website design. 29% say they have ‘average’ experience, 23% say they are behind the times, and 4% say they are hopeless.

7. Mobile Compatibility

People want to shop while they are on the go, it’s been proven time and time again. If your website is not compatible for mobile, you’ll have a hard time pleasing your customer.

48% of users say that if they arrive on a business site that isn’t working well on mobile, they take it as an indication of the business simply not caring. 

(MarginMedia)

62% of companies that designed a website specifically for mobile had increased sales.

(Econsultancy)

8. Reliable Shopping Cart

Your shopping cart design is just as important as the remainder of your eCommerce site. 

A shopping cart page should also include all the important elements to fulfill customer needs, such as the ability to change quantities, select shipping options, enter promo codes, select a payment option, or continue shopping and/or adding more products to the cart. Also important: don’t limit customers to only few payment options, such as PayPal only, or only Visa and Mastercard but not American Express. 

9. Onsite Search

Nothing is frustrating then using the search feature on an eCommerce site and receiving dozens of results that don’t match what you are looking for. Make sure your eCommerce site uses competent and reliable search engine software, and allow filtering for more refined search options if you have a large inventory of products.

71% of buyers would purchase more from a website if the process to browse and purchase were easier and more convenient.

Here’s the infograph:

9 Key Elements For a Successful eCommerce Website: Conclusion

The online business world is evolving day by day and you have to be aware of the changing trends in order to make your website more functioning. All the essential elements of eCommerce website design discussed above are just to kick-start your business. 

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