With the ever-increasing popularity of online shopping, ecommerce websites have become a crucial avenue for businesses to reach their customers. However, even in 2023, many online retailers continue to make avoidable mistakes that hinder their success. In this article, we will discuss the common reasons why many ecommerce sites suffer from poor conversion rates and explore why rectifying them is vital for sustainable growth.

1. Banners not Built for Mobile-Responsiveness:

As mobile devices dominate the digital landscape, it is crucial for ecommerce sites to have mobile-responsive designs. Unfortunately, it is still quite common to find ecommerce sites that are designed and optimised for desktop view only. Neglecting mobile-responsiveness not only leads to a poor user experience but also negatively affects SEO rankings. Ecommerce sites must ensure that their banners are appropriately scaled and visually appealing across different devices.

2. Lengthy Product Descriptions:

While providing detailed information about products is essential, overly lengthy product descriptions can overwhelm and confuse customers. In the age of short attention spans, ecommerce sites must strike a balance between offering relevant details and presenting them in a concise manner. By using bullet points, icons, and graphics, retailers can effectively communicate product features and benefits.

3. Unhelpful Product Filters:

Efficient product filtering is vital for enhancing the user experience and helping customers find what they are looking for quickly, especially for brands that have many SKUs & product categories. However, many ecommerce sites still make the mistake of implementing unhelpful or confusing filtering options. To rectify this, online retailers should analyze their customer data, understand their target audience's preferences, and implement intuitive and relevant product filters to help customers find the correct product easily.

4. Lack of Recommendation Engines:

Personalized product recommendations based on customer behaviour and preferences have proven to be highly effective in increasing customer engagement on your website. By implementing algorithms that provide tailored suggestions based on the user's browsing data, we can encourage new customers to learn more about our brand, products and ultimately provide them more reasons to make a purchase. Google Analytics provides various metrics that can help measure customer engagement on your website. Some key metrics to consider are: Time on Page, Pages per Session, and Session Duration.

5. Absence of Social Proofing:

Social proofs such as customer reviews, UGCs, certifications & publications play a huge role in building trust and credibility for ecommerce stores. By showcasing positive feedback and experiences from satisfied customers, ecommerce sites can instil confidence in potential buyers and encourage them to make purchase decisions.

In Z21, we love to encourage businesses to take online stores as an equivalent of your offline store. There should be clearly categorised products on the shelf (product filtering system), store promoters (website recommendation engines, product description, FAQ), eye-catching banners to showcase the latest collection as well as a POS with a good variety of payment options. Ultimately, a good user experience on an online store leads to higher satisfaction, increased conversions, customer loyalty, positive brand perception, and a competitive advantage in the market.

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Click HERE to read about a few Shopify apps that we use (and love!) in 2023. If you need a quick audit on your online store, let’s chat! 

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