Top 5 Best Practices for Online Shopping Websites

  Before we start digging in the best practices, here are some facts that you ought to know:

• Online shoppers using high speed internet connection waits to only up to 4 seconds in order for a page to load. Online shoppers using lower connections wait up to 6 seconds.

• Online shoppers who decide to continue shopping in a website they have known and have shopped before, according to Jupiter Research, appreciate easy and user-friendly site interface and navigation.

• Online shoppers need to know if your website is secured to do a transaction most especially that payments are made in your website.

Top 5 Best Practices for Ecommerce Websites

1. Put your Best Effort in Rendering your Website Pages Quicker Than 4 Seconds

Online shoppers today are always concerned about getting things in an instant. In online shopping websites, shoppers are looking for quick transactions and that begins with page loads. According to research, online shoppers today wait only up to 4 seconds for a page to load. When you don't pay attention as to how your website loads, you might be missing potential customers and that is the last thing that you need.

2. Easy Checkout Process

The online shopping checkout process is the same as following a queue in a grocery store. We don't want to follow a long queue, and most of all, we don't want to be tempted with the products displayed in the queue section because we might be spending on something we don't really need. downloadmymanual.com Some online shopping websites have a confusing checkout processes. Checkout buttons or links are not placed in the most visible part of the checkout process or customers are being lead to buy other things before arriving to the main item to be checked out. Pay attention to the quality of your checkout process if it's too long or distracting.

Also, some online shopping websites require account registration to be able to finally purchase an item. Although this is a good way for website owners to get registered members, this is considered to be a major turn off to those who actually want to buy a product right away but as a guest user.

3. Flexible Payment Methods

One thing that hinders shoppers into finally purchasing goods is the way they can pay for those goods. If you only accept cash on delivery for payments, then, those using credit cards and PayPal credits will find other suppliers to get the products from because even if they have the capacity to pay, but still unable to do it because of limitations. Lift the possible limitations and get a merchant account from PayPal because most of payment terms are fine with PayPal-whether debit, credit, cash, and PayPal credits. Lastly, PayPal provides a good amount of security to transactions as well and payment disputes can be made in case of transaction failures.

4. Online Shopping Cart

Selecting the best kind of online shopping cart that fits your ecommerce website is very important as it will aid online shoppers in heading for the checkout easily. This means that when you successfully lead customers into the checkout process, chances are good in capturing a sale. What makes an online shopping cart "the best"? There are only a few things that you would like to see in a shopping cart:

• Landing page/Products' Shelf should have pictures of the product with its corresponding Product Name, Product Code, and Price.

• When a product is selected by shoppers, more information of the product should be read by customers such as colors available, texture, weight, dimensions, and product care. The price to be displayed should already contain values for additional shipping fee, taxes (if applicable), and other fees.

• A good shopping cart lets you add an item to the cart and still enable you to shop for other items before finally checking out.

• It lets you see choose how many of the products selected you would want to buy and how many items are already in the cart and as well as total amount all the items with the necessary fees being presented accurately.

• It lets you check out using different payment options.

• Online shoppers would like to make transactions without having to log-in or register but to purchase easily as a guest. Hassle free check out leads to successful sale.

5. Search Bar

One of the online shopping facts is more than half of the online shoppers prefer searching for items using the search bar of an ecommerce website rather than use the navigation button in looking for the exact item they're trying to purchase. This only means that adding a search bar in one of the most prominent part of the website is essential for an ecommerce shopping cart. However, this leads to a web designer creating an effective 404 page to still capture the lead and not shoo it away just because he gets lost in the site because the search bar cannot find what he's looking for.

These are only a few of the essentials and best practices of creating an online shopping website, but one ecommerce website can already use these methods as a jump start to success.

Internet Marketing Techniques, Products And Payments: Online Shops

There are hundreds if not thousands of Internet shops and online markets, which cater to the hungry shopper, make his desires the carpet for their doorway to success. These are not fanciful markets with dream products but ones with real products which need real payments, and marketing techniques with a difference. There are probably more Internet shops than one could imagine. Each of the shops operates, sell products, realize payments and use modernized marketing techniques to increase their customer base.

Uniformity of the selling space

Big Internet shops or online markets are alike in one respect. They use products from different producers and stock identical items. The pricing is the same and the delivery takes place on time. The marketing techniques for online shopping of the internet shops are defined as the one, which is nearest and dearest. Even if the shop across the town gives you products, which are cheaper and will door deliver the items, the customer will choose only those shops, which he is familiar with, namely those, which are down his street. The best online brands therefore are those, which are available throughout the selling space. Selling space thus becomes the occupancy rate of the products, which are in uniform demand for online shopping.

Try out new stores

There are lucrative online shopping offers given by the merchants on goods, where you buy two online brands together; the other item being offered may not be exactly top of the barrel stuff, but if you look hard enough, you will see that there are many offers, which may be what you are looking for. The competition on online markets in some items are so fierce that a couple of companies form an alliance, ship their products together, retail their items together and as part of their marketing techniques offer a portion of the savings to the customer.

The excitement of new Internet shops is in the goods and services, which are on offer. People always check for discounts and offers and inevitably, there will be something to appease the customer.

Most super markets and online markets offer discounts, but beware of one thing. These discounted online brands may be old or 'recycled' material, meaning, the expiry date has already expired and the merchant for the commission that he is receiving promotes the item. The marketing techniques of this kind need not be always true, but holds good for most items sold at a discount.

It really does not matter because the offers are mostly on non-perishable items and the customers are aware of the fact that they offer a discount because the item is old. In order to get your money is worth; it is always good to compare products and prices. This is not possible if you are in a mall. On the Internet, you can check with other sites to see whether you can get goods of the same quality at a cheaper price or whether the other manufacturer is offering any discounts.

Utilize coupons

Every day, you will get coupons in the newspapers for online shopping on items you need. The magazines have cutout coupons, printable coupons, and downloadable coupons for online brands, which offer you, discount. Some people will only buy those items, which have discount and offer coupons.

People who ignore these marketing techniques and do not care for coupons are not crazy, they are also not dumb or lazy, and they just do not see one important marketing aspect, which everyone else does. The cost of printing those coupons is included in the rebate that the very same coupon offers!

Realize efficiency of door delivery

Internet companies with online brands have different schedules and marketing techniques. Most of them use a standard 'week for delivery' approach for stations, which are within the country, and 'more than a week' for outstations. You cannot compare the online markets to the pizza deliveryman, who delivers 'within ½ an hour'.

Even if you choose Internet shops, which are located right next to your doorstep; they will only deliver the goods after the passage of the stipulated seven days. Remember, your grocery man will send the grocery home in time and the butchers will be up to standard. However, when you are ordering a person who is a complete stranger, one who does not even know that you exist, you are singing a different tune. The online shopping companies are living to a different standard and a lifestyle, which is dictated more by online payments than by customer recognition.

Door deliveries of online brands take the strain off the walking and talking but the waiting sometimes will be too much to stand.

Choosing products

Only two or three things guarantee safety of your payments. Watch for the safety symbol displayed on the site. Make sure you choose a recognized company. Be sure that the online shopping companies are using standard protocol for payment. A number of concerns that deal with financial transactions between the customer and the banks offer secure payment methods. There are number of standard gateways, which ensure payment is safe and secure.

Ensure the Quality

Get the opinion of the neighbors about online shopping from those who have shopped with the Internet shops and online markets before. If possible, get customer reviews of the online brands from the company website. Check with a few of them and see if the Internet shops are genuine or they are just putting up a front. Find what the company policies are for goods that are spoilt or are damaged in-transit. Preferably, choose those companies and stores, which are advertising regularly and have a good viewership on the local media.

The article gives us an outline of the market of tomorrow. The author has made several points clear with respect to strategies that the shopper of tomorrow, has to follow. The author Vivian Sudhir will give you ideas if you want. You can reach him at snerfu. He is a freelance writer who writes for several agencies.