Do you want to create an online store (WooCommerce, Prestashop, or Magento e-commerce site) or do you want to optimise the conversion rate of your merchant site, and therefore your turnover? This article is written for you.
Here you will find some tips that are often common sense, and that has been proven in terms of conversion optimisation. Good reading!
Your targeted natural referencing strategy will allow you to bring you traffic and visitors, the optimisation of your product sheets will allow you to convert them into customers. What would be the point of making your brand new WooCommerce merchant site appear in a good position in the Google search engine thanks to your SEO strategy, without converting your visitors into customers?
Online sales have become popular (e-commerce, mobile commerce, voice eCommerce). But although the e-commerce industry is growing rapidly, many e-commerce sites are struggling to boost their traffic, but also, and most importantly, their conversions. Most of the eCommerce platforms focus on optimising their shopping funnels to boost their sales (e.g., carts, payment validation pages).
This is a great idea, but… the majority of visitors don’t even reach these pages! Many potential customers decide whether they want to leave your online shop or purchase your product while they are browsing your product pages. It is therefore very important for brands to create attractive and lead converting product pages. Yes, but how will you tell us?
Analyse your product sheets
Spend some time on your product page to analyse the different elements that make them up and identify those that need to be worked on.
Do you want to offer a good user experience to your customers? For this, you must first understand what your customers are getting when they are browsing your product page. Start by checking the following points on your eCommerce site:
- Do web pages load quickly? The performance of an e-commerce site is today a major SEO criterion
- Is the product page clear and readable?
- Does the product page provide enough details to guide your customers so they can decide and possibly purchase the product they are looking for?
- Is the product enhanced by beautiful, quality photos or videos?
- Ergonomics and user experience (UX) are they good?
- Does the design of the page and more generally of the site reflect your brand and your marketing positioning?
If any of these points are not optimised on your product landing page, you should spend time and optimise your product pages accordingly.
Use professional quality product photos
Would you trust a store or catalogue that features poor-quality product photos? The answer is probably no.
The photos and visuals on your product sheets enable your customers to make their very first impression of your brand and your product, and a first impression matters! Photos have the power to attract them… or to repel them. It is often by looking at the photos of your products that your customers will decide whether the product is good, or even decide to buy. The weight of these images must of course be optimised for the web because we will not see more in this article, the loading time of the pages is of crucial importance.
So, use well-exposed, high-quality, consistent images on your product pages. Remember, unlike a “physical store” purchase, your customers cannot see, touch, smell, or feel your products when they shop online. That is why you should show product images, 360-degree views, or videos from several angles. You can make use of a background remover to make the image look better.
Did you know, more than 63% of consumers say good images are more important than product descriptions before making a purchase!
The emotion and the situation are also powerful triggers for purchasing. Putting a product in a situation helps your customers make an emotional connection by visualising a product as their product. Do not lose sight of your objective: to sell on the internet, and to sell you have to reassure, convince and seduce!
A word of advice: invest in professional product photography or optimise your eCommerce product images to encourage more customers to buy your products.
Provide detailed product content
Beyond the product images, the technical characteristics of the product are essential on a commercial site, especially if your product is technical!
Almost 90% of buyers consider product descriptions, FAQs, Videos, etc to be extremely important. An effective product page on an online sales site should provide at least a level of information and detail on the following points:
- A relevant and catchy product title
- A clear and readable price
- The product description
- Detailed technical characteristics
- Maintenance and care instructions
- Brand information
- The origin of the product if this is important in your market (eg Made in France, product traceability, local product, etc.)
- Its size, dimensions, capacity
You will also need to optimise the content of your product page for search engines (META Description, Title SEO, Structured data, Customer reviews). It helps you rank higher in the SERPs (search engine results) and hence generate more traffic. The WordPress – WooCommerce couple will help you complete this task wonderfully!
Writing a unique product description for an online store can be difficult, but it pays off in the long run. You should always keep the following points in mind:
- Your product descriptions should be short and easy to read.
- The page should showcase the product and the brand.
- Optimise the product description of your product by keyword.
- Use clear structure, titles, and bullets to improve presentation.
- Include technical specifications.
Optimise your e-commerce page for mobile
Mobile e-commerce, or mobile commerce, is growing faster than e-commerce in general .As of December 2017, 82% of online shoppers in the United States are shopping online using mobile devices. 35% of them are exclusively mobile online shoppers. This figure is sobering, right?
More than that, that the mobile compatibility of your web pages is today a major and official SEO criterion for Google (positioning of your website on the search engine).
If the product pages of your e-shop are not mobile-friendly, you risk losing traffic, sales, and… revenue. You will understand, you cannot ignore the mobile. Your website and your product pages must be “responsive” and mobile compatible! Taking into account mobile issues will bring you the following advantages:
- A better user experience for your customers
- A smoother purchasing process and the possibility for your customers to prepare their purchase and to buy on mobile or computer (laptop or “Desktop”)
- A simplified payment in the case of a mobile application
- The best SEO and optimised positioning in the search results (SERP)
Build trust with customer ratings and reviews
Confidence is essential during an act of purchase. This need for reassurance is even stronger when making an online purchase. Product ratings and reviews show previous experience of buyers and positive reviews build trust, and that trust increases conversions. They can take any doubts your potential customer might buy your product and help them make a buying decision.
Many buyers prefer to read reviews, FAQs, from someone who used or purchased a product before purchasing a product. However, 85% of consumers today trust online reviews and reviews as much as personal recommendations .Rightly or wrongly, but it is a fact!
This is why it is important to put “social proof” such as reviews and testimonials on the product pages of your eCommerce site .Even if some reviews are negative, you don’t have to worry too much. A healthy ratio of positive and negative reviews helps customers believe they are genuine. Of course, too many bad reviews are a red flag that hinders sales. But in this case, they constitute an opportunity to improve the quality of your products and your customer relationship.
When a customer leaves a negative review, it’s your job to reach out to them to resolve their issue. Listen to them, ask them questions, and help them meet their real needs. They will often be grateful and understanding.
Once they’re happy, you can politely ask them to edit their comment. Solving customer issues can help build your loyalty and credibility. It works the same in “real life”, right?
Upsell and cross-sell
A product page is built to promote and sell a product, but it is also an unmissable opportunity to promote other products.
You can recommend relevant complementary products or other similar products to your customers when they are on a product page (eg Our customers have also ordered). This can help you engage them and encourage them to make more purchases and thus increase your merchant site’s average cart.
Give your product an engaging title
It is crucial to give your product page a catchy and engaging title. After all, the title is the first thing anyone visiting a listing will see. These few words have the magical power to attract and capture the attention of your visitors.
You should also be careful that the title stands out. Increase the font size and place it at the top or centre of the page, above the waterline. You can also try using a colour that contrasts with the other elements around it, including the background colour.
People don’t just look at your product visuals before making a purchase. They also place a lot of importance on the title of the product. Getting both is the perfect recipe!
Optimise the loading times of your product page
The speed with which your web page loads is of paramount importance. In fact, according to an Akamai study, a 100-millisecond increase in your page load speed can reduce your conversion rates by 7%!
While you need to maintain visuals on your eCommerce product page to make it appealing, your goal should be to make the page as light as possible. It is possible, but it is a profession. For this, you need to choose the right e-commerce provider.
To test the loading speed of your pages, you can use Google Page Speed Insights. It will not only give you an overview of your page loading speed, but also possible optimisation points. Here again, your e-commerce web agency will be able to help you interpret them and bring you all its expertise.
Create an emergency to trigger the purchase
One of the best methods to improve the conversion rate of your eCommerce product page is to “create urgency.” You need to harness the power of FOMO. Rest assured, this is not witchcraft but the acronym in English of “Fear of Missing Out” or in French “fear of missing out on a good deal”
It is about making your customers believe that they are risking losing a great opportunity to get a good deal. One way to do this is to advertise a limited-time sale. You need to make sure you let them know that they are going to miss the sale if they don’t order now.
You can do this for example by adding a countdown indicating the end of an offer. Another way to do this is to let your customers know that there is a limited amount of product left. This might give them a boost in making the purchase, as they risk “losing the product” if they don’t
Readability of prices and shipping costs
You need to show the price of the product that your customers are about to order. However, one point where most eCommerce sites fail is the correct display of shipping and delivery charges.
Very few eCommerce product pages list pricing and shipping information seamlessly right from the product page. Usually, shipping and VAT charges are added later. This can discourage your customers and online shoppers and leads to a high cart abandonment rate.
So be transparent from the product page. If you can, on the amount and the calculation of delivery costs. It will help you gain the trust of your customers. To make the offer even more attractive, you can offer free shipping to your customers.
Display your return policy on product pages
Your goal should be to be as transparent as possible with your customers. A great way to do this is to describe your return policy on the eCommerce products page.
Your customers should know what action they may have to take if they want to return the product. This helps reduce fears about problems that might arise after the purchase. It is an essential criterion of reassurance that can trigger an act of purchase!
The FAQ (frequently asked questions)
It is natural for your customers to have questions about your products when they visit your e-commerce site. While they can ask you questions by email, phone, chat, or Chatbot, an FAQ page with answers to frequently asked questions from your customers is a plus!
There you are, almost there! All you have to do is keep a close watch on your Google Analytics statistics and why to use A / B Testing. Google Optimise is your best ally for this.
If you have reached the end of this article, you most likely have an e-commerce project (e.g., optimisation, creation of a WooCommerce e-commerce site).
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