Beginners Guide to Ecommerce Web Site Design
A Web Hosting Article Contributed by Frances Rhea
Guide for a Successful Ecommerce Web Site Design
Creating a successful ecommerce Web site design is harder than you would think. Many people new to ecommerce have the impression that you create a simple Web site and add a shopping cart into their Web site design. This is not necessarily true. Implementing an effective ecommerce Web site design can be expensive.
Support for Credit Cards
It is impossible to avoid online credit card transactions. Send me a check or money order will not work. Your visitors want your product now not later.
There are many ways to implement credit card processing in your ecommerce Web site design, some free, some not.
Goals of an Ecommerce Web Site Design
Your Web site should be designed to lead your visitors through your site. Your sales text must not contain any spelling or grammatical errors.
Use common phrases that people would use in a search engine when looking for your type of product. This will ensure that your visitors can find your Web site. Obtaining Web site traffic through search engines takes lots of work and your ecommerce Web site must know how to make use of this tool to succeed.
Cross Browser Compatibility for Your Ecommerce Web Site Design
There are lots of browsers currently in use. Internet Explorer, Netscape (Mozilla) and Opera are the most commonly used. The problem is that what looks good in one may look bad or crash other browsers. Make sure that you design your Web site to work in the major browsers.
Images on Your Ecommerce Web Site Design
All of the images you use should be original or scanned images. Optimizing your images is important so they download quickly. Create thumbnails that have a link to the larger view of the image. Most graphics software supports compression for Web-based graphics.
Make sure that the HTML for your image contains 'alt' tags. This is a textual description of the image. Search engines use this content, and so do visually impaired visitors.
Your Ecommerce Web Site Design Navigation
Site navigation should be simple and be able to access any information within 3 clicks anywhere in your Web site. Avoid javascript and special menus if possible or provide a text link alternative.
Pages Your Ecommerce Web Site Should Contain
You know you need a main entrance page and product pages with a shopping cart built in, but there are a few other pages that are useful.
The "About Us" page provides a summary of your business and commitment to your customers. It should also have contact information for your business.
A Privacy policy tells your visitors what you will do with the information they supply you when they purchase. If nothing, tell them that.
Most companies have repeated questions. Add these questions to your FAQ to promote customer confidence while saving you time. List the questions with each question linked to the answer by a bookmark.
A positive client testimonial is great advertisement. Ask client permission to publish their comments on your site.
