Intelligent Design

Internet retailers who think price and selection are the driving forces behind closing sales are only seeing half the picture. While price and selection are important to consumers, they represent about 50% of an online shopper’s purchasing decision, according to Internet retailing experts. The remaining 50% is directly influenced by web site design.

A clunky, outdated site design can turn off customers at any point in the sales process and cause them to abandon their shopping carts, even during checkout. Worse, an uninspired or difficult-to-navigate web design is less apt to convert customers arriving at a retailer’s site through a search engine link or banner ad into buyers. Typically, these consumers are unfamiliar with the retailer’s brand or product line and require more marketing acumen to persuade them into making a purchase.

The 12-month turnaround

Recognizing this trend, many Internet retailers are reevaluating their site designs and planning to either overhaul their site every 12 to 24 months or at least alter the design of key pages, such as the checkout, home and product pages, every six to 12 months to keep their sites looking fresh and able to meet consumer’s rapidly evolving expectations for site design.

"Design and web site architecture are incredibly important to conversion, and when done properly in a redesign, sales go up dramatically," says Ken Burke, CEO of MarketLive Inc., a Petaluma, Calif. web design firm.

Burke recounts that monthly sales volume at one client doubled to $4 million two months after a recent redesign. A big part of the jump, according to Burke, was that MarketLive made the site more intuitive through the inclusion of navigation tools that are easier to locate and use. "Better navigation is part of a retailer’s merchandising strategy," he adds.

Meeting consumer expectations and preferences for shopping over the Internet means more than creating a site with the "Wow!" factor. It means designing sites that deliver richer, more detailed graphic capabilities, customer friendly navigation and lightning fast downloads. These expectations have been instilled in consumers by the expansion of broadband connectivity and consumers’ increasing comfort with shopping online. Hence, Internet retailers are increasingly looking at their site designs just as they would the design of a display window, the layout of their catalog or the floor plan for their store, all of which are altered, if only slightly, throughout the calendar year.

The brand and the breadth

In each of those mediums, retailers must convey not only the appeal of their brand, but also their breadth of merchandise and value proposition. The same logic applies to web site design. "There are only so many pixels to work with on a web page, so Internet retailers need to consider what use visitors will make of each page and make the space on the page work for them," says Harley Manning, senior vice president for Forrester Research Inc. and an expert in site design.

Site design experts agree that any successful site design or redesign must deliver ease of navigation, cater to the shopping preferences of the retailer’s customers and show brand consistency. Ignoring these three basic rules can result in a site design that is dated, cluttered, unappealing, and delivers lower sales.

Norm Thompson Outfitters Inc., which recently redesigned the sites for its flagship NormThompson.com, SolutionsCatalog.com, and Sahalie.com brands added several features intended to make it easier for consumers to find the items for which they are shopping. These features include gift and shoe finders located at the bottom of the home page under the "Tools" sections. The Gift Finder allows the customer to enter information about who the gift is being purchased for, such as adventurers, pet lovers, travelers, etc., the occasion for which the gift is being purchased, and the desired price range. When using the Shoe Finder shoppers can enter whether the shoe is for a man or a woman, type of shoe, size, preferred brand, and price range.

After entering the information into either finder application, the shopper is taken to a page showing suggested gift items or shoes that match the stated criteria. Customers can arrange the items by "What’s New" or "Best Sellers" to aid their purchasing decision.

"Our aim was to make it easier for our customers to find our products and to present our products in categories that reflect the way our customers think about our products," says Debbie Hess, director of Internet marketing for Norm Thompson Outfitters. The company, which last redesigned its sites more than four years ago, is gradually rolling out many of the new features of the site redesign prior to the holiday shopping season.

LampsPlus.com, which began a redesign of its site in March, has focused on making it easier for customers to find the products for which they are shopping by reducing the clutter on its home page. Prior to the redesign, the LampsPlus.com home page was structured more like a portal with more links and less of a guided shopping experience. The result was a home page featuring far too much information, says Angela Hsu, director of Internet marketing and business development for Lamps Plus Inc.

Streamlining

The new home page features a more streamlined look, a stronger visual identity, larger, clearer images, and is focused on the products and features that consumers click on. The redesign has reduced home page exit rates by double digits, Hsu adds. One potential pothole site designers must avoid is creating too many links that can divert customers from their original mission or make it too difficult to find their way back to where they started, according to design experts. "At one point we had over 100 links on our home page," says Hsu. "We kept adding without taking down less effective features."

Making it easier to find the desired product or gift suggestion can certainly deliver a boost to sales, but today’s Internet shoppers are more image-oriented than in the past. For site designers, that means delivering richer graphics, larger type, and product descriptions that shoppers can read at a glance. "Nobody likes to squint to see an image or read text," says Forrester Research’s Manning. "If text and images are larger, it encourages people to scan the page."

Bulleted product descriptions are a feature several Internet retailers have either adopted or are considering including in their site redesign, according to site design experts. As part of its redesign LampsPlus.com reduced its product descriptions to a shorter paragraph by breaking out some information into bulleted points, such as:

l Finish

l Bulb wattage info

l Width

l Height

Customers desiring more information can scroll down the page or click on a link. "We divided our product information into different areas on the page, rather than grouping it all in one large paragraph because customers tell us they want to get product information quickly," Hsu says. "We put all the key information up front and provide the option to get more information if that is what they want."

Hot topic

How to access additional product information is a hot topic of debate among web designers and Internet retailers. At issue is whether it is best to have consumers scroll down the page to access additional information such as product guides or care instructions or to have them click on a link that activates a pop-up window with the desired data or takes them to another page.

Currently, there is no hard and fast rule as to which approach is more effective. What web site designers do agree on is that pertinent product information needs to be kept above the page fold and as easy to read as possible. "Web presentation and customer absorption of data are not the same online as with a catalog," says Bob LaGarde, CEO of LaGarde Inc., which provides web design. "Retailers need to recognize that the customer experience is different online than it is on paper."

Indeed, broadband is dramatically raising consumer expectations for web site design, according to site designers. In July, more than 59% of U.S. households with Internet access had a broadband connection, up from 51% a year earlier, according to Nielsen/NetRatings. In addition, a large portion of Internet users in the 41% of households with low-band connections have broadband access through work. A symbol of how the times have changed: The New York Times is redesigning its site to accommodate broadband users, which reportedly account for about 90% of the site’s traffic.

Thanks to the steady growth in the number of Internet users with broadband access, applications such as Flash and servers capable of presenting high-resolution, three-dimensional and multi-view images of products are fast becoming standard fare in site design. Flash, which allows designers to incorporate animation, video, and enriched colors, is being used not only throughout web site design, but also applied in the shopping cart. The aim is to create a more engaging shopping cart complete with high-resolution images of the product placed in the cart and links back to the page detailing the product, in case the customer wants to review the item, and which downloads information faster. Information downloads that take more than 10 seconds can create a sense of tedium and lead to abandonment.

TJMaxx.com recently conducted an A/B test of HTML and Flash-based shopping carts and found that in the Flash version, abandoned shopping carts were reduced by 50%, according to Forrester’s Manning. "A Flash-based shopping cart takes about 200k in memory to run on a computer, which is nothing for broadband," Manning adds.

Harnessing computing power

High-resolution graphics can also be run off servers capable of parsing the image into multiple views. The technique is replacing the old method of scanning images through PhotoShop and then cropping the images before placing them on the web site. Photo cropping can reduce the quality of the image and make such an image unsuitable for magnified views.

Zoom capabilities are most frequently associated with LandsEnd.com, which was an early adopter of the technology. The clothier has benefited greatly from using the technology because it enables customers to see the weave of a particular fabric. Such detail can greatly influence purchasing decisions, because it simulates handling the item in a store.

"Larger, more detailed images enhance the shopping experience, especially for such high-end items as home fashions, clothing and jewelry," says Manning. "Placing an image on the server and allowing it to serve up the desired detail is part of what computers were meant to do."

Still, designers must be careful not to overwhelm customers with slick media presentations, as they can result in clutter and turn off some customers. "You have to remember the audience," asserts LaGarde. "A game player will expect a more dynamic site, but a senior citizen may prefer better and more readily exposed navigation tools."

In either case, customers want the option not to view Flash-based presentations, if for no other reason than they may be in hurry and do not want to sit through it. They also expect any graphical enhancements to be seamless and not interfere with the shopping experience.

IRCE 2008 Conference Multi-Media CD-ROM

Brand identity

For all the fanfare that can be incorporated into design, retailers still need to pay close attention to their brand identity, especially as they operate multiple sites. Waterford Wedgwood, USA Inc., which recently launched a U.S.-oriented site for its Wedgwood brand (Wedgwood.com), emphasized brand consistency in the site’s design with that of the Wedgwood brand outside the Internet. The company used the same fonts for type, color (blue) for border and background shading, and styling that appears in the Wedgwood catalog, stores, and on the company’s web site for customers in the United Kingdom.

"Our site is a branding and marketing tool," says Jennifer Korch, director of Internet marketing for Waterford Wedgwood USA. "We are constantly balancing all our retail and direct sales efforts with that of our brand identity to create synergies between them."

The Wedgwood site, which hosts the company’s full product line of 1,800 SKUs, provides informational pages that deliver ideas on how the china can be used for everyday dining, in addition to direct sales. "We want to make the product relevant for more than just use on holidays or formal occasions," adds Korch.

LampsPlus.com addressed brand consistency in its site by using a template for each page. Prior to this, the retailer had pages within the site created over several years with different visual layouts.

The only rule

Given the complexities of web site design, retailers are certain to test several variations of the site while in the design stage and even after the new design is up and running. It is not surprising then that many design experts see the process as evolutionary, rather than as a project that can be left idling in neutral for 12 or more months once it is completed.

"There is no rule on how often a site needs to be redesigned or tweaked," says David Fry, CEO of Fry Inc.

Other than to say the job of site designer is never done.

Peter Lucas is a Highland Park, Ill.-based freelance business writer.

10 steps towards better online merchandising

Conversion rates at online retail stores—the rate at which visitors become buyers—slipped last year from 2.6% to 2.4%, according to Forrester Research. There are many reasons for the slippage, and they can be reversed with some sound approaches to web site design and content, says web design company Molecular Inc. Here’s what Molecular suggests:

1. Provide an online version of your print catalog/local flier

According to Forrester, 73% of online consumers have browsed online versions of print fliers and catalogs. Of those users, at least 30% say these tools are "very" or "extremely" useful. Molecular believes such fliers are successful because they provide a familiar way to shop online to less sophisticated web users and retailers know how to design catalogs and fliers to sell.

2. Guide users towards what’s important—don’t overwhelm them with options

Customers still need a simple and clear mental image of the store. Too many options on a site can cause customers to feel confused and distracted.

3. Refresh, renew, revise

Customers perceive the web as constantly changing, and they expect to see the latest content and information each time they visit a retailer’s web site. Sites that rarely change give customers the impression that the inventory is stale and provide few incentives for customers to return to the site.

4. Test alternatives and measure results

Test alternative designs, layouts and feature sets online as well as offline—not just in usability labs and focus groups, but also live.

5. Ask customers what works and what doesn’t

The majority of customers are less likely to provide unsolicited feedback, thus having "Contact Us" on a web site isn’t enough. Don’t wait for feedback; solicit it.

6. Being channel agnostic is a path to mediocrity

Channel agnostic means ignoring the benefits of the various distribution channels, including the store, catalog, call centers and the web. Differentiate among channels by explaining to customers the benefits that each channel offers. But that does not mean retailers can’t guide customers to specific channels. Cost structures, copy placement and return instructions can all serve to direct customers toward preferred channels, but don’t penalize customers for using the "wrong" channels.

7. Encourage word-of-mouth

Word-of-mouth is one of the most effective ways to distribute products and services on the Internet. According to Jupiter Research, 69% of consumers who receive a web site recommendation from a friend pass it along to at least two to six friends.

8. One size does not fit all

Shopping carts are technically infinite in size, but tend to behave the same whether customers choose to purchase one item or 20. If a customer has only one item, don’t ask whether multiple "ship to’s" are needed. The online shopping cart and checkout process should be adaptive.

9. Knowledge equals power (and profits)

Good retail salespeople are invaluable to a retailer because they develop a rapport with customers, make suggestions and notify them of sales and new merchandise. Retail web sites should act the same way by allowing customers to look back at all their previous orders, personalizing customers’ visits and offering suggestions based on previous purchases.

10. Bring the personalized offline experience to your online channel

Retailers should re-create the best parts of the store experience online, including the services of a great salesperson. Give your online customers the same personalized shopping experience as they would find in retail stores by delivering an experience tailored to their individual needs and preferences.