5 Tips on How to Make your E-Commerce Buttons Stand Out

“Add to Cart” and “Buy Now” buttons are the first step in a customer committing to buy. You need to entice customers to click the button, so make sure they are effective. Here are some tips:

1. Words, Language and Urgency. Effective words and language will make a huge impact with website visitors. Make the words direct, simple and short. Preferably use familiar phrases such as “Buy Now”, “Add to Cart” or “Add to Basket”. Some may include the price, such as “Buy Now for $9.99 only!” for extra pull. If your website runs in different languages, make sure to that the texts on the buttons will change according to the chosen language.
   Use phrases to instill urgency, “Buy Now” and similar phrases can be powerful especially if used in conjunction with a store promotion.
2. Placement. An effective button should be placed clearly from any clutter to make it stand out and get more clicks. Make sure you have enough white space around the button and surrounding elements.
3. Font, Size and Color. To ensure that visitors can notice the buttons, it is important to consider color. Make the button obvious, but not so garish that is conflicts with the site’s colour scheme. For font types, generally you should use Sans Serif typefaces, such as Arial, Helvetica or Tahoma, as they have good spacing between letters and they are easier to read on screen. You may opt for bold font style or in capital letters.
4. Prioritize. If there is a secondary option and therefore two buttons under one product (for example, “Read More” “Add to Cart”), ensure that “Add to Cart” button has priority. How? There are a lot of ways, but the most common are the button’s color and size. Make the “Read More” button in less bright or smaller, while the Add the Cart’s color should be bold and large.
5. Icons and Images. Icons such as for shopping carts are good visual cues and are widely understood. Use unique buttons that have intuitive icons, and have them follow your site’s branding to create a stronger impression.

Three Simple Rules for Improving E-Commerce Sites

Just found this choice post from Dr. Bonny Brown, who is director of research and public services for Keynote Systems, Inc.

Based on his advice, here are three tips for improving your e-commerce offering:

• Poor user experience leads to bad satisfaction. For example, ensure that out of stock items are labelled as such earlier on, to prevent irritation. And capture your errors, preferably with e-mail alerts - customers will be instantly turned off if they see errors or become frustrated with how a site functions.
• Follow the leader - sites like amazon.com are top for a reason, they behave and are optimised for customer satisfaction and higher sales. The process for developing our own e-commerce platform is based on looking at what is working on big online retail sites and making it possible for smaller retailers to achieve the same.
• Get customer feedback - you’ll be suprised what you find when you start asking and listening to what customers say. Make it easy for them to interact with you on your site and find the time to sit down with customers and watch them use your site. What you think is obvious might not be. You may be suprised where customers get stuck, what you thought was easy to use might not be so, and this will be harming your potential sales.

Image credit: silicon.com