The key to great usability for an web store is familiarity. People have already been buying goods online for decades now, they expect to visit a certain process unfold when shopping on the internet, and when an artist makes radical departures from the status quo, tears may ensue (regardless of how good the designer's intentions may be). Does this mean an artist is locked into reproducing the same kind of shopping interface again and again? Certainly not, but conforming to certain standards will probably help the user.
This article analyzes the usability of components commonly found within most shopping website (e.g. the cart, the checkout process, etc). The concept isn't so much to be prescriptive and lay down hard and fast rules, but alternatively to explain what will probably be most familiar to shoppers. Creativity and deviation from typical is an excellent thing on the net, otherwise things would get pretty boring. But being alert to the de facto standards on shopping websites lets you make informed decisions when going for a novel direction https://www.complasinternational.ie/.
The Login box - there is some variation in how shopping websites handle user log ins. Some sites require a person log in before creating a purchase, whereas others permit guest accounts. The most obvious basics will be a username and password field. The sole pitfall here will be labeling the username field 'Email' ;.'Username' may be the more ubiquitous label, it can help cut-down on possible confusion that could arise if there were say a newsletter subscription box near by.
All the choices to be manufactured within this interface element relate with naming; would you call it 'Register' or 'Sign-Up'?, should you label your commit button 'Go' or 'Login'?, can be your password recovery link called 'Password recovery' or 'Forgot your password?" ;.Whatever labels you choose, you must favor brevity, generally nothing longer then three short words https://earsense.ie/.
After a person logs in, there is a way to reclaim some precious screen real estate by removing UI elements which aren't needed anymore. Showing the shopper's name helps to personalized the service and thus ensure it is a bit more friendly (nb. you can opt for 'Welcome John Smith' as opposed to 'Logged in as: ...'). This is also a good place to exhibit the 'My Account' and 'Logout' links since both these functions are logically linked to the shopper's account.
In addition, a 'Logout' link is somewhat redundant since closing the browser window serves the same purpose (assuming the session has expired), but a logout feature may help alleviate any security-related concerns a shopper may have.
The product search mechanism - the textbox for product searching is pretty straight-forward, but product browsing can go in a number of directions.
This works great if the category hierarchy is flat, it saves space plus you realize the UI wont behave unexpectedly if the merchandise list gets long. But what when you have sub-categories (e.g. Fishing->Hooks, Fishing->Knives, Fishing->Bait, etc)? Sure make use of a dash to indicate a sub-category, nevertheless the drop-list option would start to reduce a few of its eloquence.
Categories and sub-categories can be treated just like site navigation, which will be essentially what it's (i.e. product navigation). Common approaches are to use CSS fly-outs or in-place expanding panels (much like Windows Explorer) https://heelboy.com/.
As an added touch, I love to put a reset icon close to the search button. Allowing the consumer return the searching mechanism to its initial state without having to go all how you can the browser refresh button or press the F5 key.
The shopping basket - the structure of a shopping cart is becoming fairly standardized these days. You have the merchandise name with a hyperlink back to the full product description, the buying price of the average person product, and the quantity the shopper desires to buy.
I love to include a small bin icon so shoppers can simply remove items from their basket which they no longer want. You might put in a sub-total at the end of the shopping cart, but I don't think this really is necessary since the consumer is likely to be shown a sub-total throughout the checkout stage.
Another feature which improves usability is feedback messages. It's important to let the consumer know when something happens as a result of these interaction with the machine, as an example; showing a short message when a product is added or removed from their cart https://www.pro-demo.ca/.
The product details page - one of many biggest decisions here is whether to really have a product listing page along with an in depth product description page. If you were just employing a listing page for products, you'd show short descriptions along side each product. The alternative would imply that a shopper has to click a product's summary to be able to see its full details.
Generally I decide this based on how much information will probably be shown with a product. If it's only expected a few lines will be for each product's description, then the product details page wont be needed. However, this could have significant SEO consequences since each product doesn't have it's own name appear in the browser page title-bar. It could be argued that the summary-on-listing page interface is more efficient when it comes to usability since a shopper gets all the data they want with fewer clicks.
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