More and more theory is being written about what an online shop should look like in order to inspire confidence in the prospective buyer. Even so, we still fall into practices that should be avoided if we want to create a successful and sustainable e-commerce. Here are 7 of the most common online shop mistakes.
1 - Hidden or complicated shipping costs
Shipping costs are under scrutiny. They are one of the things that are most scrutinised by the user because there is a negative perception that we are spending money on something "not tangible".
Therefore, the potential customer should know, as soon as he enters the site, how much the delivery of a purchase is going to cost him, so as not to be disappointed once in the payment process and get another abandoned cart.
It is very frustrating for a shopper to have gone through the whole process of adding products and entering their details only to find out that the shipping costs are way above what they expect.
Likewise, it is not advisable to have a thousand different shipping costs. Ideally (although this is not always possible), it is best to have single-digit shipping costs and, at most, offer free shipping costs above a certain amount. In the event that we have several zones, it is recommended to try to have the minimum and, in any case, to communicate it very well.
Conclusion
Shipping costs visible in the Home in a way simple to understand.
2 - Payment methods not visible from the outset
The same is true for the forms of payment.
It is clear that the more payment methods we have in our shop, the better for the potential customer, but it is also necessary to communicate this to them. from the outset. Many people, if they do not see from the home page whether they can pay with Paypal or not, will not even start the purchase process.
Conclusion
Beautiful logos in the footer of our website, in addition to generating confidence in the shop, will provide valuable information to the with what you can buy and with what not.
3 - Unclear or non-existent legal information
Sometimes, more than mistakes in an online shop, we find faults in terms of legality. No one reads it, it is true, but legal information is compulsory and is necessary for building trust. You still see online shops that are missing these pages, have only a few pages, or mix content from several pages into one.
The law dictates that you must put each specific content on a page separately (to make it easier for the user to find what they are looking for) and there are clear rules about what content should be public and accessible in the case of an online shop:
- Legal Notice
- Privacy policy
- Terms and conditions of purchase
- Cookies policy
We must not forget that an online shop is a place in the cloud where users can leave their money, so, in addition to complying with current legislation, we must also transmit confidence to encourage the buyer to go through the process and feel that they are leaving their money on a secure site.
Conclusion
We must have 4 separate legal pages and visible throughout the navigation (ideally in the footer). If we have no idea what to put on these pages, we can advise you on the different options available. You can also get an idea by visiting the legal pages of reputable online shops that have already been around for a while.
4 - Product sheets with copied descriptions
Another typical online shop mistake is the temptation to fall into the temptation to copy the content for the supplier, for example, for the product sheet. This option is just as bad as having no description, for two main reasons:
- The description of suppliers is usually a description of generalist and boring, without hook, without essence and which does not exactly encourage the purchase.
- Google will penalise us if it finds the same content elsewhere. If that content already exists, the search engine will detect that we have cloned it and will give priority to the older one, making it very difficult to position that product.
Conclusion
It's a lot of work but it's worth it to work on some of them. original descriptions, in which we express our experience and connect with the user.
5 - Obligation to register to buy
If we are not Amazon or an online shop with a similar reputation, we can't be putting up impediments or difficulties to buy. It is necessary to give all the facilities to make the process simple and convenient.
Forcing the user to a initial commitment without knowing much about us, coupled with the effort of thinking up a password and user name, will only scare off the prospective buyer.
We lose nothing by letting them buy as guests (without registration). There will be opportunities later to build a relationship with them (e.g. by asking them by email if they liked the product or offering them a promotion if they register).
Conclusion
Activate the guest purchase function with a good loyalty strategy afterwards, always respecting the freedom and, as in human relations, without being overwhelming.
6 - Store speed turtle mode
For online shops, it is essential that navigation is fluid and fast (even more so than on corporate sites). As soon as a user detects that our shop is struggling to function, they will run away from it because they will have the impression that it may hang up in the purchasing process or that we have limited technical resources.
In order to have the right page speed, especially in online shops, it is very important to optimising images of the products, do not abuse plugins, use a body search system and monitor whether the hosting with which we are hosting the website is suitable (contact us if you have doubts about how to increase the loading speed of your website).
Conclusion
Make a checkeo of all those things that might be slowing down your shop and, above all, lower the weight of the images without any loss of quality.
7 - Diffuse customer service
We have already mentioned the importance of the confidence, especially if we have a shop that has just started or has limited notoriety. If the user makes a purchase from us, it is a sign of trust on their part and you have to convey to them that they have our backing in case you have any problems.
Those shops that do not have a clearly visible contact with all the details (address, telephone and email as a minimum) will not encourage anyone to make a purchase. In fact, nowadays it is already very fashionable to online chats or even the WhatsApp icon (which may seem a bit invasive but works very well as it creates the impression that we are there if a problem arises).
Conclusion
Contact details well visible and fast customer service and effective. If you are encouraged to add systems such as WhatsApp or an online chat, you will increase the trust in your business.
We hope that this little snack on online shop errors has helped you to optimise your e-commerce business a little more. If not, you know...