E-commerce is expecting to have a global market of over $3.5Trillion by the end of 2021. This industry has flourished in the past decades and has had such a foothold in the market that it is not only being consumed but talked about as well.
“If you do build a good experience, customers tell each other about that. Word of mouth is very powerful.”
-Jeff Bezos, Founder of Amazon.com
The phenomenal growth of e-commerce websites and applications has given a kick start to the designers. The digital world has become an advent for the web/graphic designers to showcase their versatility and creative but there are particular principles and strategies suggested by the experts which must be followed in order to build great user experience for an e-commerce application. E-commerce application or web applications are more in demand as compared to the websites because the users are switching their device from desktop to mobile. For instance, think of yourself travelling in metro to your office and you want to order the groceries, you would have multiple products going through your mind, in that situation will you think about doing it on a laptop or directly go for opening the application on your phone and ordering it swiftly. Therefore, it becomes extremely essential for an e-commerce application to offer the finest user experience.
Principle and Strategies to follow for UX Design of E-commerce
To make it easier for your understanding let’s try to look at it from the perspective of a user and how he will do the shopping on your e-commerce application and meanwhile, I will discuss how you can enhance their user experience via design.
Step-1: Application/Web App Searching
To keep it simple, the user will either search for a product on Google and Google will show your page as a result or the user will directly look for your application. In both the cases, the user will sign in/ log in to your application thus; it becomes necessary to make this procedure simple and quick. Don’t ask for too many details while signing up because you don’t want your user to get frustrated and leave your application without any purchase. Further, you can incorporate sign in options via email or Google to complete the sign-in procedure swiftly.
Step-2: Entry to the Landing Page
Landing page or home page of your application needs to be expressive and communicative as the user should be able to discover the navigation tools easily. The Menu Bar is usually left-aligned, so sometimes it is good to go ahead with the general conceptions in order to not trouble the user. Further, all the brands or the products on your home page should be clearly highlighted and labelled, you can consider different typography for these brand products which are on your home page. Also, there should always be a call to action button on the product name and the image of the product.
Step-3: Product Browsing
The user generally goes for direct browsing for the product they are looking for. Therefore, the search bar has to be on the top and right in front of the user so they do not have to look for it. Further, the option to filter and sort those products to take the user to directly what they are looking for should be clear and clearly visible. The checkbox option to select those options is also a good idea.
Step-4: Product Detailing Page
Once the user found what they are looking for, they would want to look into the details of that product; therefore, the detail page is a must where all the details should be in a clear font. Headings, pricing, product size, quality, materials; consider the priority of each and every detail and highlight them using the right font type, size and colour. Further, add to cart or buy button should be clear and highlighted other than the rest of the buttons. UI Designers can use colours like red or green for the same.
Step-5: Shopping Cart
Once the “buy” button has been clicked, the user will land on the cart page. Make sure that all the functionalities are easy to follow as this is the closest that you will lead your customer to buy the product. Easy navigation and quick buying procedure will fasten up the process and will not waste the time of the user.
Step-6: Check Out and Confirmation
Last and the most essential of all the steps in the confirmation. This payment gateway has to be made carefully and with high security. Make sure that all the details that need to be filled are carefully presented. For example, the font of the less essential details can be in a smaller font size whereas the private data like Card Number, CVV Number or OTP has to be in asterisks.
6 Must-haves in your UX Design of E-Commerce Application:
- Zoom in and zoom out feature on the product image
- Add to wish list or save feature for future buying.
- Use descriptive and well-labelled tags for the products.
- Easy and smooth check out.
- Provide probable search capability feature.
- Represent offers and deals in bright colours and easily visible space on the page.