NikeStore.com last month redesigned its site, improving navigation and zoom and offering more robust reviewing features. But one web site performance expert says the site’s extensive content—both pre-existing and new—may hurt the user experience.
“The first thing I noticed at the site was that the home page was almost 1.5 megabytes in size, almost the equivalent of downloading a short song,” says Shawn White, director of external operations for Keynote Systems, a mobile and Internet test and measurement firm.
NikeStore.com’s home page features 96 separate elements, according to White’s count. That includes images and Flash—and other features such as javascript that a customer may not even see. White says the many elements on the home page may be the culprit in the longer-than-average page load times.
Tracking the site every fifteen minutes from ten cities, White says the biggest jams seem to occur between 10 a.m. and noon Eastern time. White says long page loads are often a sign that many people are trying to access the site at one time. “There is a cyclical pattern that we are gleaning from the performance data,” White says. “And for a top brand this is something they need to be concerned about. It’s not common for top brands to have these kinds of swings.”
Several trips to NikeStore.com yesterday resulted in sporadic home page load times, ranging from less than two seconds to more than 20 seconds. White says many consumers will leave a page if it takes more than six seconds to load. Pages generally loaded more quickly today.
Chris Shimojima Nike’s vice president of global digital commerce says NikeStore.com is trying to provide an innovative, interactive and robust experience. He confirms that the site has experienced some issues with long page loads, particularly in the mid-Atlantic region and in the Los Angeles area. He says Nike is still going through the “burn in” or testing phase with its server to ensure systems are functioning properly.. p>
For those willing to wait for it, the new NikeStore.com does offer a richer user experience than it did previously. Consumers can zoom in closer than before to see extremely detailed images of the stitching and texture of fabrics. Also, the e-retailer shifted navigation from the top to the left, and made it easier for users to search within categories. For example, when viewing women’s running shoes, visitors can click on tabs at the top to further refine the selection by color, size, collections, and which shoes are best for women with narrow or wide feet, or that are particularly lightweight, stable or well-cushioned.
Also, an updated ratings and reviews feature allows consumers to more precisely review products. A shopper reviewing the durability of a shoe, for example, can place a checkmark anywhere on scale ranging from non-durable to durable and can do the same for other categories such as comfort and width, rather than just grading on a scale of 1 to 5, for instance.
Other enhancements include more cross-selling during the checkout process, and visually displaying images of items as consumers place them in their carts. NikeStore.com also moved navigation to the left for the European versions of its site so that the consumer experience is the same across countries. It’s also carrying the navigation updates across its other retail sites, such as nikesportswear.com, Shimojima says.
Nike is No. 47 in the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide
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