How Simplicity Boosts Sales in E-Commerce

Online shoppers and window shoppers are two completely different groups. That is what I learned in researching how to design an effective e-commerce website.

Online shoppers want to see what they are looking for and nothing else. By reducing the number of products shown on one page, web companies can put more focus on a single product. This will make the shopping experience simpler for the online shopper, someone who was “willing to wait longer and spend more money if the shopping experience is simple and fast,” as described Glen Stansberry, a Web development blogger and contributor to Smashing Magazine. One company that is known for doing a great job at this is Apple. By dedicating the landing page to a single product, Apple effectively de-clutters its websites and allows the shopper to make a purchase with less clicks.

Minimalist design is one of Apple’s great assets. Its homepage only shows three things: the header navigation, one product to showcase, and some info links below the fold. What is something you won’t see on an Apple page? Irrelevant junk. There are no unrelated products or ads, useless text, or clutter.

Another effective e-commerce site is the Lush site. It also has a simple navigation header. Just below that is a large banner slideshow that shows its current news.

 Another great thing about this simple site is its use of whitespace. It looks like the products are jumping out at you and you can’t help but click!

Something else I discovered about Lush’s site while writing this is that the design changes with the change in window size. When I made the site a half-screen window, its header navigation became a drop-down by clicking the icon with the 3 bars. How convenient!

How awesome is that?!

As much as I love window shopping at Macy’s, I would hate to shop online on its website. It is the perfect example of clutter. Above the fold, we already see two promos. Under that is a slew of banners.

This is a cute image that would have been more effective above the fold.

More banners...

Still more...

Oh my goodness...

Thank God it's over.

Let’s conclude with a list to help ease the clutter by Glen Stansberry.

1.       Only show what you need to make the sale.

2.       The less clicks a shopper needs to buy, the better.

3.       Design the site to be simple enough for your grandma to use.

4.       Reduce the number of columns used to avoid cramming content into smaller spaces.

5.       Give less options to reduce the stress of the web shoppers.

With this list in hand, any e-commerce site can become both appealing and effective.