How “Good Design” Will Help Your Ecommerce Business Grow Faster Than Ever
Posted: Mon Dec 23, 2024 5:14 am
The eCommerce industry is growing rapidly every year, but that doesn't mean that all eCommerce businesses are growing as fast as they would like.
Whether your sales are actively lagging or just doing well, if your business is like most, you want to grow your revenue faster. And here, good design is one of the most effective growth tools you can put into action to get there.
What does “good design” encompass? It encompasses almost every aspect of your e-commerce business’s external elements, from the design of your company logo, the look and feel of your website, your marketing brochures, to the user experience itself. Everything needs to be intelligently designed. The reason is simple: poor design will hurt your business.
So now that you’re (hopefully) convinced that intelligent, strong design is for you, here are six strategies to help you achieve it:
1. Optimize your website's loading speeds.
Your ecommerce business is only as strong as your architects mailing lists website. If visitors are confronted with inept design and slow loading speeds, they’ll leave before you have a chance to engage them, let alone make a sale. Stanford research reveals that 75% of internet users surveyed will make judgments about a company’s credibility based solely on how its website looks.
Additionally, an infographic from Kissmetrics shows that by the time your website reaches four seconds of load time, you’ve already lost 25% of your potential viewers.
To reduce your loading speeds, think about what you want to include in your ecommerce site. If it’s packed with data-intensive graphics and photos, your loading times will be longer than what you’ll see with a sleek, cleanly designed website with minimal graphics. Still, the takeaway here isn’t that you should eliminate photos and graphics from your ecommerce web design. Instead, the lesson is to use design elements wisely to maximize impact and speed up loading.
What you want from your home and product pages is readable fonts, some smart colors, fun illustrations, and excellent copywriting to explain your product. Your pages should load quickly and be highly readable.
Next up are photos: Many e-stores still have large photo sizes, and this can be problematic. Make sure to minimize the size of your photo files while maintaining photo quality.
Then there’s color: Artful and intentional use of color, white space, and text can go a long way toward achieving smart design. Add in some minimal, brand-specific graphic elements to create a website that’s a pleasure to navigate.
But overall, when you work with your website designer, be sure to communicate that fast loading speeds are a high priority.
2. Target existing customers using remarketing ads and email campaigns.
It’s more cost-effective to sell to existing customers than to acquire new ones. If you want to grow your e-commerce business quickly, focus some of your marketing efforts on getting repeat sales from current customers. Two great strategies for engaging these people are “remarketing” ads and email campaigns.
Google remarketing ads target users who have already visited your website. This means that the people who receive these ads are likely to be the most receptive to your message, because they’ve already searched for your business on their own. An attractive ad design that’s infused with your visual brand will help keep your business top of mind for your customers. Combine that attractive design with a valuable offer, and existing customers will flock to your site to take advantage.
You might also consider reaching out to past customers with an email campaign. Email is still a highly effective tool for reaching out to customers, especially those web-savvy customers who are always on their smartphones and comfortable with shopping online.
Just be careful that your email campaigns are well designed.
3. Optimize your online store for mobile access.
The way people access the Internet has changed. Over the years, the number of users accessing the Internet from computers has decreased, while more and more people access the Internet from their mobile devices. As of November 2016, mobile devices have become the most popular way to access the Internet.
When you build an ecommerce website, it’s a good idea to optimize it for mobile users. Otherwise, your site will lag and you’ll lose business. After all, there are few things more frustrating than trying to navigate a traditional desktop website from your smartphone.
Your e-commerce design should also be responsive. This means that it’s designed to visually adjust to the size/shape of the screen it appears on. And the most responsive websites not only adjust to the new screen size, but they’re also intuitive and easy to navigate.
4. Harness the power of the landing page
If you’re serious about achieving rapid growth with your online store, you need to embrace the landing page. A landing page is a page specifically dedicated to a single product or offer. And unlike your traditional website’s homepage, all of the elements are focused on a single call to action and intentionally designed to convert.
So, make each marketing offer and product available with a unique landing page on your website. You may even want to consider creating landing pages for specific target audiences. That way, people searching for your product online will be taken to a webpage that caters to their specific needs and perspectives.
When designing landing pages for your ecommerce website, remember to eliminate distractions, provide a clear call to action, and make it easy for your customer to complete the call to action.
Whether your sales are actively lagging or just doing well, if your business is like most, you want to grow your revenue faster. And here, good design is one of the most effective growth tools you can put into action to get there.
What does “good design” encompass? It encompasses almost every aspect of your e-commerce business’s external elements, from the design of your company logo, the look and feel of your website, your marketing brochures, to the user experience itself. Everything needs to be intelligently designed. The reason is simple: poor design will hurt your business.
So now that you’re (hopefully) convinced that intelligent, strong design is for you, here are six strategies to help you achieve it:
1. Optimize your website's loading speeds.
Your ecommerce business is only as strong as your architects mailing lists website. If visitors are confronted with inept design and slow loading speeds, they’ll leave before you have a chance to engage them, let alone make a sale. Stanford research reveals that 75% of internet users surveyed will make judgments about a company’s credibility based solely on how its website looks.
Additionally, an infographic from Kissmetrics shows that by the time your website reaches four seconds of load time, you’ve already lost 25% of your potential viewers.
To reduce your loading speeds, think about what you want to include in your ecommerce site. If it’s packed with data-intensive graphics and photos, your loading times will be longer than what you’ll see with a sleek, cleanly designed website with minimal graphics. Still, the takeaway here isn’t that you should eliminate photos and graphics from your ecommerce web design. Instead, the lesson is to use design elements wisely to maximize impact and speed up loading.
What you want from your home and product pages is readable fonts, some smart colors, fun illustrations, and excellent copywriting to explain your product. Your pages should load quickly and be highly readable.
Next up are photos: Many e-stores still have large photo sizes, and this can be problematic. Make sure to minimize the size of your photo files while maintaining photo quality.
Then there’s color: Artful and intentional use of color, white space, and text can go a long way toward achieving smart design. Add in some minimal, brand-specific graphic elements to create a website that’s a pleasure to navigate.
But overall, when you work with your website designer, be sure to communicate that fast loading speeds are a high priority.
2. Target existing customers using remarketing ads and email campaigns.
It’s more cost-effective to sell to existing customers than to acquire new ones. If you want to grow your e-commerce business quickly, focus some of your marketing efforts on getting repeat sales from current customers. Two great strategies for engaging these people are “remarketing” ads and email campaigns.
Google remarketing ads target users who have already visited your website. This means that the people who receive these ads are likely to be the most receptive to your message, because they’ve already searched for your business on their own. An attractive ad design that’s infused with your visual brand will help keep your business top of mind for your customers. Combine that attractive design with a valuable offer, and existing customers will flock to your site to take advantage.
You might also consider reaching out to past customers with an email campaign. Email is still a highly effective tool for reaching out to customers, especially those web-savvy customers who are always on their smartphones and comfortable with shopping online.
Just be careful that your email campaigns are well designed.
3. Optimize your online store for mobile access.
The way people access the Internet has changed. Over the years, the number of users accessing the Internet from computers has decreased, while more and more people access the Internet from their mobile devices. As of November 2016, mobile devices have become the most popular way to access the Internet.
When you build an ecommerce website, it’s a good idea to optimize it for mobile users. Otherwise, your site will lag and you’ll lose business. After all, there are few things more frustrating than trying to navigate a traditional desktop website from your smartphone.
Your e-commerce design should also be responsive. This means that it’s designed to visually adjust to the size/shape of the screen it appears on. And the most responsive websites not only adjust to the new screen size, but they’re also intuitive and easy to navigate.
4. Harness the power of the landing page
If you’re serious about achieving rapid growth with your online store, you need to embrace the landing page. A landing page is a page specifically dedicated to a single product or offer. And unlike your traditional website’s homepage, all of the elements are focused on a single call to action and intentionally designed to convert.
So, make each marketing offer and product available with a unique landing page on your website. You may even want to consider creating landing pages for specific target audiences. That way, people searching for your product online will be taken to a webpage that caters to their specific needs and perspectives.
When designing landing pages for your ecommerce website, remember to eliminate distractions, provide a clear call to action, and make it easy for your customer to complete the call to action.