Wordpress has been hailed in blogging platform circles for a number of years for it’s excellent open source contribution to the world of bloggers. Not only is it free and open source while being very simple to modify, it is also capable of executing impressive levels of functionality using it’s vast plugin library. E-commerce is not something you’d normally associate with this sort of platform – we already know that Magento is a very complex adaptation of open source code to create shopping cart software, so surely Wordpress is already the best at what it is?

http://www.instinct.co.nz/e-commerce/

The WP-Ecommerce plugin for Wordpress developed by New Zealand team Instinct is a ’state-of-the-art e-Commerce platform with a focus on aesthetics, web standards and usability. It is both free and priceless at the same time.’

It certainly picks up on the Wordpress focus towards simplicity, usability and multi-platform integration. My question as a new potential user is regarding the depth of the software. The lack of apparent support suggests that it is on the whole fairly easy to use. There has also been little said about the platform’s backend, which will be fundamental in its ease of use.

I’ll have a review of it once I make progress with its development.

In order to achieve a greater rate of conversions, a bold and clear ‘add to cart button’ should be added to each product page and it should be made to stand out from the rest of the content so that it is easy to locate for any shopper. Use reds, blues and images to display it so that is is easily noticable to the user.

It is also important to use the correct terminology. Using terms such as ‘buy’ or ‘order’ may scare the user into thinking they are commiting to the purchase right now, whereas ‘add to cart’ or ‘add to basket’ acts as a nice first step in the buying process where the user may only still be browsing.

The example above, taken from PFT Central shows a good usage of an ‘add to cart button’. It stands out using a bold red color, and by using button styles it looks ‘clickable’. The terminology is good and the small trolley icon is good for people who may not speak or read English. It is easily noticable on the page and the use knows exactly what it means so this is how I would reccommend doingthis type of button.

An annoying thing when shopping online is when you go to add a product to your cart and it tells you that you must be registered first. This means there’s an extra step in teh buying process which could seriously deter customers. Also customers don’t want to commit all their details to a website while only potentially ‘window shopping’.

The smart way of getting registration details is during the checkout stage where it can be disguised as simply adding shipping and billing details which the customer will accept as compulsory. This data can then be saved as an account for future visits. Doing it this way will speed up checkout processes, reduce cart abondonment and will ultimately increase sales. This really is such a simple tip that so many e-commerce web designers get wrong.

Once again it is Amazon who can boast the benchmark for e-commerce usability. Checkout the ‘proceed to checkout’ page of Amazon who give the customer two clear choices and even let the customer know that they will create a password later – saving them from worrying about it now when all they want to do is make a purchase.

It is important to have a virtual shopping basket or ‘cart’ viewable at all times so users feel like they have it ‘with them’ whilst they are browsing your site, and it also keeps them aware of what’s in there and that they can add or remove items at will, just as in real life.

The Amazon shopping basket is great example:

The blue colour makes it stand out perfectly and its slim design makes in non-obtrusive. The details are kept brief and important showing quantities, prices and a product title which when clicked upon takes you to the product you’re buying – a nice touch. A very important feature is the ‘edit shopping basket’ button which is nice and clear and assures the user that they can always add or remove items nice and easily.

The two ‘Proceed to Chekout’ buttons are also very prominent here and are located near the shopping basket because it’s likely that you’d want to check what’s in your basket before checking out.

One final point I’d like to make about shopping baskets is to keep the name consistent. Don’t go switching between cart, basket or trolley at will as it could confuse less experienced users. The basket is there to reassure and to be convenient to users, following these guidelines and taking a page out of Amazon’s book will help you on your way.

When displaying search results to a users, it’s a good idea to make them aware of how the results have been organised, and of how many results have been displayed. If your search is quite vague such as ‘RAM’ and returns say, 100 results, you wouldn’t want all these products displayed on one page in no order at all. You may want to have it in order of cheapest to most expensive, or perhaps from highest rated to lowest? If you arrange these result son separate pages, it also makes it easier for the user to look through instead of being overwhelmed by too many products at once.

Dabs.com has done this perfectly with their search facility as shown below:

As you can see there’s an option to sort the results by many different filters which is great for a user who wants the latest, cheapest or highest regarded items available. sorting it alphabetically even allows you to find the exact brand. Also notice the ‘items per page’ dropdown box – allowing users to change how many results they have to browse through. This is a very well implemented and easy to use way of displaying internal search results for e-commerce websites.