3 Ways to Optimize Your eCommerce Store for Mobile

3 Ways to Optimize Your eCommerce Store for Mobile

Reading Time: 8 minutes

Who could have imagined in the 80s that today, we’d be wielding devices that serve as a gateway to endless shopping adventures and possibilities?

That’s why, for eCommerce store owners, phones are more than just a gadget—they’re the frontline of customer interaction!

We’ll unveil 3 powerful ways to optimize your eCommerce store for mobile users: 

  • Speed
  • Simplicity
  • Seamless user experience 

These aren’t just buzzwords; they’re the pillars of a thriving mobile strategy that turns visitors into loyal customers!

What Is eCommerce Optimization?

At its heart, eCommerce optimization is about creating the best eCommerce experience possible for you and your customers. 

It involves fine-tuning various eCommerce features, such as: 

  • User-friendly web design
  • Intuitive navigation
  • Effective search engine optimization

This optimization process includes ensuring your eCommerce platform speaks the language of your target market. It involves optimizing product descriptions, ensuring your brand values shine through every pixel, and setting up an automated sales tax system for hassle-free transactions.

Why Is Mobile Optimization Relevant for eCommerce?

Optimized Mobile Content

Mobile optimization is the secret ingredient for all eCommerce websites. 

Its sales accounted for 72.9% of total eCommerce sales in 2021! 

Without a mobile-optimized eCommerce site, you’re essentially turning away business. 

It’s like having a brick-and-mortar store with a “gone for lunch” sign that you keep forgetting to take down—not exactly the brightest eCommerce strategy!

Mobile optimization ensures that every aspect of your eCommerce store functions seamlessly on mobile devices. This involves responsive web design, where your site adjusts beautifully to any screen size and faster loading times to engage those on-the-go shoppers.

Mobile users tend to have a higher cart abandonment rate than desktop users, making a quick, intuitive mobile experience even more valuable.

Moreover, search engines love mobile-optimized sites. This translates into better search results and more visibility for your store. 

Statistics show that 70% of mobile searches lead to online action within an hour, emphasizing the importance of optimizing for mobile searches.

Over 50% of internet traffic comes from mobile devices. If you want to start selling online, ignoring mobile optimization is a critical business oversight!

How Do You Optimize eCommerce Content?

Optimizing your eCommerce content is about strategically enhancing it to drive business success.

79% of online shoppers say they won’t return to a website if they’ve had trouble with load speed. That’s a big chunk of potential customers!

To optimize your eCommerce content, focus on tailoring your site to meet your target audience’s specific needs and preferences. Use engaging product descriptions, high-quality images, and user-generated content to enhance product pages.

Ensure your eCommerce store consistently reflects your brand image and values across all pages. 

Remember, content optimization is a powerful tool in the eCommerce industry, capable of turning browsers into buyers and clicks into sales!

Streamline Mobile Navigation and Layout

Navigating some mobile sites feels like finding your way through a maze blindfolded. 

Not fun, right? 

When designing your eCommerce site, consider mobile navigation and layout as your customer’s lighthouse, effortlessly leading them to where they need to go.

Simplicity and ease of use are king. 

To optimize your eCommerce site for mobile, streamline your navigation and layout. 

This means a clean, uncluttered design with intuitive menus and accessible product categories. 

Simplify your user interface to ensure that even new customers can easily find what they want.

Most eCommerce website builders offer responsive design templates, but it’s up to you to customize them for your online store. 

A well-organized mobile layout significantly enhances user experience, encouraging potential customers to explore more and, ultimately, make a purchase.

7 Tips to Streamline Your Mobile Site

7 Tips to Streamline Your Mobile Site

  • Minimalistic Design: Go Marie Kondo on your site. If something doesn’t spark joy (or sales), it doesn’t need to be there. A clutter-free interface not only looks good but also enhances usability.
  • Hamburger Menus: These little three-lined icons are a small business’s best friend. They tuck away all your navigation needs neatly, ensuring customers don’t have to wade through a sea of links.
  • Thumb-Friendly Design: Most people use their phones one-handed. Place your navigation menu, call-to-action buttons, and essential links within easy thumb reach.
  • Clear Call-to-Action Buttons: Your “Buy Now” or “Learn More” buttons should stand out like a flamingo at a penguin party—impossible to miss and attention-grabbing.
  • Predictive Search: Implement a smart search bar that anticipates what your customers want, making their shopping experience smoother than a silk robe.
  • Category Filters: Filters are your secret weapon if you sell various products. They help customers narrow down their options without the headache of scrolling through endless items.
  • High-Contrast Colors: Use colors that pop and make reading effortless. No one should have to squint to see your “Add to Cart” button.

Keep It Simple and Intuitive

Imagine a new customer landing on your site. 

They shouldn’t need a map and compass to find your product categories. 

Companies like Apple and Nike have mastered this art. 

Just look at their mobile sites; you’ll notice clean lines, minimalistic design, and a navigation bar that’s as easy to use as a light switch.

Take a cue from Spotify. 

Their mobile layout is a symphony of good design—it’s intuitive, visually appealing, and makes finding your favorite tunes a breeze. 

Or look at Airbnb—their mobile site is so user-friendly, you could probably book a dream getaway with your eyes half-closed!

Streamlining your mobile navigation and layout is more than just making things look pretty. It’s about creating an easy, enjoyable experience that smoothly leads customers from browsing to buying.

Enhance Mobile Loading Speed and Performance

Imagine two shoppers: Speedy Sam and Waiting Wendy. 

Speedy Sam visits a site that loads quicker than he can say “add to cart.” 

Meanwhile, Waiting Wendy ends up on a slow site, twiddles her thumbs, gets frustrated, and finds it hard to locate the product she’s looking for. 

Who is likely to actually make a purchase? 

Speedy Sam, of course!

Speed is a game-changer for eCommerce stores. A one-second delay in mobile load times can impact conversions by up to 20%.

Use optimized images, leverage browser caching, and minimize redirects to enhance your mobile site’s loading speed and performance. Choose an eCommerce platform or website builder known for its performance efficiency.

Remember, the faster your eCommerce site loads on mobile devices, the more likely you will retain and convert visitors into customers. 

Prioritize speed optimization in your marketing strategy to ensure a smooth and quick shopping experience for your users!

Boosting Your Site’s Need for Speed

Boosting Your Site's Need for Speed

  • Optimize Your Images: Think of heavy images like anchors slowing your site down. Optimize them for the web so they load faster without losing quality. Tools like TinyPNG are great for this task.
  • Leverage Browser Caching: This step is like giving visitors a shortcut to your site. It stores parts of your site in their browser, so it loads faster the next time they visit!
  • Minimize Redirects: Every redirect is a pit stop on the road to your site. The fewer there are, the faster the journey.
  • Choose a Speedy Ecommerce Platform: Not all eCommerce platforms are built for speed. Platforms like Shopify or BigCommerce are known for their zip. Think of them as the sports cars of the eCommerce world.
  • Use a Content Delivery Network (CDN): This is like having multiple delivery trucks for your site’s content, ensuring it reaches your users quickly, no matter where they are.

Real-World Speedsters

Great eCommerce website design means prioritizing the optimization of your mobile site’s speed. 

It’s about creating a smooth, quick, and enjoyable shopping experience. 

After all, in the digital shopping world, the fastest sites get the prize—happy, returning customers!

Think Amazon—a site so fast, you can buy something in the time it takes to sneeze. Or Zara, whose lightning-fast load times make online shopping as swift as a catwalk strut.

Improve Mobile Checkout and Payment Processes

Checkout—the final hurdle where your customers transform from browsers to buyers. A smooth checkout process is like a well-oiled slide; it should be so effortless and fun that your customers can’t wait to zoom down again.

The Art of Simplifying Checkout

Simplifying Checkout

  • Fewer Steps, More Smiles: Cut down on unnecessary fields and stages. Remember, every additional click is like asking your customers to do one more pirouette—some might decide to sit this dance out!
  • Offer a Buffet of Payment Options: Variety is the spice of life, and this holds true for payment options, too. Whether it’s credit cards, PayPal, or Apple Pay, offering multiple payment gateways is like offering a buffet—there’s something for everyone.
  • Security Is Cool: In the world of online payments, security is not just important; it’s reassuring. Use reliable payment processing systems and showcase those security badges proudly. Let your customers know, “Your money is safe with us!”
  • Automated Sales Tax: Nobody likes to do math while shopping. Automated sales tax calculation ensures a hassle-free experience for both you and your customers!

2 Checkout Champions to Learn From

Take a leaf out of IKEA‘s book. 

Their checkout process is as sleek and straightforward as their products! 

Or look at ASOS. 

They turn shopping sprees into a breezy affair with their quick, easy, and secure checkout. 

These companies understand that a great checkout experience is like a cherry on top of the shopping sundae.

Optimizing your mobile checkout process isn’t just about getting those sales over the line; it’s about creating a delightful, trust-building experience that leaves your customers thinking: 

“Wow, that was easy! I’ll be back for more.”

Is SEO Important for eCommerce?

How to optimize eCommerce content

Absolutely! 

SEO is the neon sign that guides customers to your online store. It’s crucial for the visibility and success of your eCommerce business.

By optimizing your site for organic traffic, you’ll increase the likelihood of appearing in top search results, attracting more potential customers to your platform. This is especially vital for eCommerce sites that depend upon search engines to drive new and returning visitors!

3 Essential Mobile SEO Factors for eCommerce

3 Essential Mobile SEO Factors for eCommerce

SEO is the secret sauce that makes your website irresistibly clickable.

It’s what stands between blending in and standing out in the vast ocean of online stores. 

Here are three mobile SEO factors that are essential to your eCommerce site:

  1. Responsive Design: Ensure your eCommerce website is mobile-friendly. A responsive design enhances user experience and improves your site’s ranking in mobile search results.
  2. Site Speed: Online stores with faster loading times keep visitors engaged, reducing bounce rates. Optimize images, leverage caching, and choose an efficient eCommerce platform to keep your pages zipping along.
  3. Local SEO: If you sell in person or have a physical location, local SEO is your best friend. Optimize for local search terms and ensure your business details are accurate across all sales channels. This step will help attract customers both online and to your brick-and-mortar business!

The 3 Best SEO Tools for eCommerce

3 Best SEO Tools for eCommerce

Just like a master chef needs the best ingredients, a master of SEO needs the best tools. 

Here are 3 Swiss Army knives of SEO for your eCommerce toolbox:

  1. Google Analytics: It’s free, powerful, and indispensable for understanding your eCommerce site’s traffic. Track organic traffic, monitor user behavior, and gather insights to tailor your SEO strategy.
  2. SEMrush: A comprehensive tool that offers detailed keyword analysis, competitor insights, and SEO audit features. Perfect for eCommerce businesses looking to gain an edge in search rankings.
  3. Ubersuggest: Known for its user-friendly interface and robust SEO features, Ubersuggest helps with keyword research and site audits while offering valuable insights into improving your search engine visibility.

Uplevel Your Mobile eCommerce Experience!

It’s time to turn your online store into a mobile masterpiece that captures hearts and sales! 

Embrace the power of streamlined navigation, lightning-fast loading speeds, and a checkout process smoother than a silk scarf with our eCommerce strategy.

Schedule a call to start transforming your eCommerce site, or visit our Blog Hotte Spotte for more exciting and, most importantly, helpful marketing tips!

User Experience (UX) Design: Improving Website Conversions for Your Business

User Experience (UX) Design: Improving Website Conversions for Your Business

Reading Time: 10 minutes

Have you ever had the frustrating experience of visiting a website that won’t load, or is hard to navigate? No one likes to click on a website and discover that it doesn’t work. User experience, or UX, is an essential part of eCommerce and your conversion rates. How your website flows will help to determine the number of users you have and how many actions they take on your website.

Brands that succeed in eCommerce often succeed in design-led strategy, as well. Design matters, because it’s a form of communication. Design is a part of user experience, and conversion rates are heavily impacted by it. This impact is so significant that your website design and your conversion rates typically change in direct correlation with one another. So, if you upgrade your website design, you will likely see an uptick in your conversation rates, whereas, if you ignore website design, your conversion rates will probably slowly plummet. In fact, 58% of customers say that a good website design will make them more likely to purchase from the website.

For many companies, the goal of eCommerce is to get as many sales as possible. To reach this goal, one key thing you can do as a business owner is to make your website as simple and as smooth as possible. A focus on user experience is one of the best ways to achieve this (we’ll refer to this as UX from here on out).

What Is UX Design and Why Does It Matter?

So, what is this magical UX? Simply put, UX is the tools and the items that make a given customer’s experience on your website better. Its purpose is simple. If you want customers to return, you should give them what they want. UX will help you do that.

UX encompasses everything that helps you optimize your site for visitors and bring them to your website in the first place. This includes transitions, navigation, loading speed, and everything in between. Effective UX matters because it will make your visitor’s experience on your website much smoother and more positive. Especially effective UX will answer your visitors’ questions before they’ve even left the website, and will answer ones they didn’t even know they had. The best UX will draw visitors in based only on their brief understanding of your website in their search results. As a diverse and multi-faceted tool, UX should cover every aspect of your website and its outreach.

The most essential thing about UX is how it can affect your conversion rate optimization (CRO). There are many types of CRO, but UX is most concerned with how you optimize the user’s experience to make your completion rates better. UX has so many benefits and so much potential, and one of the biggest areas where this comes in clutch is in giving your visitors an optimal experience.

What About UI?

Chances are, if you’ve heard of UX, you’ve also heard of UI. Since both relate to your website’s design and productivity, it’s sometimes easy to confuse the two. UX is the tool that transforms how your website functions. It covers your website’s loading speed, how customers can navigate through it (flow), and other things like how customers interact overall with your website. UI, on the other hand, is the tool that transforms how your website looks. UI is mainly related to design. It works to add images, place pieces of text in a logical place, and complete other tasks like where you put your dropdown menu.

Although these two parts of website optimization often work together, we’ll focus mainly on UX in this article. Having good UX will ensure that customers can also enjoy the excellent UI experience of your website.

What Is the Impact of UX Design on Website Conversions?

Because the ultimate goal of UX is to increase your conversion rates, good UX will push up your conversion rate optimization. Through the power of UX, you can revitalize your website and transform it into something fresh and user-friendly.

What UX Changes Will Increase Website Conversions?

More specifically, UX impacts your website conversions through a variety of techniques. These techniques are what will make your website’s UX stand out. One is to change the flow of your website so it’s easier to use. For example, if you mention a topic or product, make sure to include a link to it. This will help customers be able to find that product without searching high and low across your whole website. Spending time searching for something is often a purchasing deterrent for customers; they are more likely to buy your product if it is only one click away.

Another way you can implement UX to increase your conversion rates is by making your website flow intuitive. Fill your homepage with relevant information by including your newest products or blog posts and adding basic information like who you are or your contact information, depending on what kind of site you run. Customers should not have to search your website to know who you are or to find what they came for. Instead, it should be right in front of them.

Since UX is all about making website navigation seamless while simultaneously providing valuable information, giving your visitors a smooth and memorable visit is essential. If users can find everything easily and follow your business’s message, they will remember your website as a reliable and positive source. These kinds of changes can make a massive impact on your conversion rate. And it’s all done through UX!

How To Conduct a UX Audit of Your Website

Improving your conversion rates correlates with improving your UX. If your UX is good, customers can buy products without running into major technical issues or getting lost on their way to the shopping cart. So how do you figure out where customers are having trouble?

If you want to conduct a UX audit on your website, you should check things like

  • The conversion funnel. This is the process from when a customer enters your website to when they either purchase something or leave it behind in the cart. If you can find the moments when customers tend to abandon products, then you know where to begin improving your UX. For example, if you find that most customers are leaving the website without even adding something to the cart, you may want to explore making your brand’s reliability more obvious or making website navigation as a whole simpler.
  • The website design. Sometimes the problem isn’t that customers are abandoning products halfway to the purchase button, it’s that the website design is so unconventional that they have a hard time even beginning to look for products. In this case, the best option is to give your website a makeover. Try a new layout, new color scheme, new homepage, or all of the above. This is a task relegated to UI, so if you struggle with this, you might want to try the UI branch of website overhauls.
  • The site navigation. If your customers are having a hard time finding what they want on your website, then you may need to improve your website navigation. Whether it means adding a dropdown menu or making your website optimized for mobile devices, there are plenty of ways to improve this feature of your business through UX. Sometimes all you need is something intuitive like a search bar. That way customers can simply search for what they want.
  • The checkout experience. Customers may become frustrated and leave products in the cart if they are having a hard time checking out. We’ve all had that annoying moment when we put in all our information, but something is wrong and the order won’t submit. Often, customers who don’t have luck the first time around won’t give the purchase a second try. Instead of losing a customer at the last second, improving your shopping experience and checkout process will guide customers to make that purchase. You can also eliminate any confusing buttons or unneeded steps. Make the checkout process as simple as possible and request as little information as possible. The easier the checkout, the more customers will choose to purchase from you.

A simple audit of your website can help you identify these problematic areas. After you’ve completed your audit and improved your website, the next step is to watch and see the difference in your conversion rates. With better UX, customers will begin to find what a resource you offer theme! After this, you can continue making improvements based on the new customer data that you glean.

Analyzing User Behavior and Identifying Pain Points

Once you’ve completed the audit of your website, you may be wondering how to know exactly if your user is running into other difficulties. Your audit will reveal some of the main problems in your UX, but are there others that customers consistently meet? Even if your conversion rates go up, that doesn’t mean that your website is perfect. Where, you might ask, are customers across the board running into problems? What you’re wondering about is called a pain point.

So, what is a pain point? For a user, a pain point is anything that causes frustration or negative emotions when using your website. It might be something simple like the loading speed of your homepage, or something more complex like having trouble finding specific products. So how can you identify and overcome these pains so that your website doesn’t cause customers frustration?

To identify a pain point, you can look at some different areas. For example, one way to start figuring out where your customers run into trouble on your website is to take surveys and ask questions. Make sure that you ask people from different demographics, age groups, and product preferences. Look over your interviews and surveys more than once. Get fresh opinions on what the interviewee might have meant. Ask questions that imply as little bias as possible, and be ready to take the hit if you get negative responses back. Finally, give all of your data a fair look. If you don’t examine the data in detail, you probably won’t get the answers you want from it.

These steps will guide you to finding the common pain points that your customers experience. But now that you know what they are, how do you overcome them?

Overcoming Consumer Pain Points,

Fortunately, these problems meet their solution in UX. They may seem overwhelming, but there are several simple steps you can take to make the process of UX changes on your website manageable.

So, now that you know which problems you face, it’s time to form a plan to defeat them. However, it can be overwhelming to even know where to start, especially if you are dealing with multiple problems at once. First, you should choose only one or two problems to tackle at once. Rank them in order of importance, and start with the top two.

Then, take your top problem and break it down into manageable steps. For example, if you are dealing with problems in how fast your website loads, you can break it down first into figuring out what slows your loading, and then correcting that first on the home page, then on the next most commonly visited page, and so forth until you have finished your number one problem. And your tool for fixing slow loading? UX, of course!

Next, you will need to make sure that your changes have fixed the problem. As frustrating as it can be, sometimes the changes don’t always make the problems go away as you anticipated. So, to make sure that your changes are doing their job, test them. If your customers are not experiencing any improvements in their experience, then it’s time to try a new solution. However, if your changes are making a big difference, then you can move to the third step.

This step is to measure your results. No solution is ever perfect. As you learn more about how customers respond to the changes you’ve made, you can continue to fix small problems until the whole system is working very smoothly.

Through this process, you can overcome pain points and make your website run smoothly. A UX audit will begin this process; beating pain points through UX will complete it. 

Key Elements of a High-Converting Landing Page

Another area where UX will be your best friend is in how you create your landing page. UX helps a landing page function so that it will meet your customers’ needs and give them an easy, smooth journey throughout your website. The most important thing to remember about UX is that it aims to give the customer a valuable experience. Your landing page is the place where you need to demonstrate this most clearly.

There are multiple ways that you can make an excellent landing page. Some key aspects of one that UX specifically targets are:

  • Aim for a fast loading speed. Your website needs to be able to load quickly not just on laptops and desktops, but especially on tablets and mobile phones. These are the most commonly used devices for website skimming. So, aim high and make loading speed one of your top UX priorities.
  • Include stand-out CTAs. Your landing page should include stand-out CTAs that make a clear point. Often, people briefly glance through a webpage and then evaluate whether or not to continue taking action based on the landing page. So, your CTA is your main pitch to convince your audience to embrace your product or service. Remember to make  your CTA link to what it says it does: this link is what brings customers into your base. UX can help you perfect the flow of that link and make it easy for customers to keep engaging with your company.
  • Provide all of your contact information. This one is huge to help customers trust you. If they see that they can contact you through email, phone, and an actual physical address, they are much more inclined to believe that you are a real company and trust you. Also, customers may need to contact you about your products. If you include contact information, this makes it much easier for them to have their questions answered.

These are just a few of the steps you can take to create a usable and logical landing page. If your customers’ first impressions of your page are that it is trustworthy and easy to use, then you can expect heightened conversion rates.

Best Practices for Mobile UX Design

Since one of the best ways to design an effective website is to optimize it for mobile use, there are a few steps you can take to make your mobile website succeed:

  • Remember that most people have slow internet speeds. This means that you’ll need to have a website that will load fast on little data. One way that you can achieve this is to only load the essential portions of your content at first, and then let it continue to load other pages as the user navigates through your website.
  • Keep any forms that customers will have to fill out short. Typing on a mobile device is a lot harder than typing on a laptop. We’ve all had to fill out forms on our phones, sighing as we do. Bless your customers by keeping your forms short!
  • Make your website friendly to common gestures in phone usage. These include things like tapping, swiping, and pinching. If these are the easiest ways for customers to navigate through your website, then you will not need to instruct them on how to use your website.
  • Set up your mobile website to be cohesive with your desktop version. Customers should be able to expect a uniform experience throughout the different versions of your website. You can do this by keeping the layout very similar to your desktop version and keeping your UI design aspects consistent. This also keeps your brand’s trustworthiness higher.

Making your webpage friendly to mobile users is a key step in increasing your conversion rates. Because so many users navigate websites on their phones, it’s very important to make mobile engagement easy and seamless.

UX is one of the best ways to reach more customers and increase your conversion rates. By making your platform user-friendly, you will create a seamless experience that consumers find attractive. UX lets you do this through mobile optimization, landing page improvement, and resolving pain points. Overall, UX is an essential tool for any eager business developer to increase the function of their website.

Improve Your Website Conversions With Effective UX Design Strategies!

Here at Hit Your Mark, we harness the power of UX to improve your website conversions. By implementing effective strategies and marketing techniques, we will broaden your range of customers and increase your conversion rates. Our experts are trained extensively in digital marketing and have insight into even the most complex digital marketing challenges and needs. Through our attention to detail, we engage in comprehensive performance marketing, email marketing, content creation, and overall project management. Contact us today for a consultation and the opportunity to work with a company that executes plans with transparency and trust.