Nielsen Norman GroupEvidence-Based User Experience Research, Training, and Consulting
NN/g has conducted extensive independent research (usability testing, eyetracking, and diary studies) to help organizations improve their ecommerce initiatives. Our latest e-commerce research series include 874 research guidelines based upon the study of over 200 e-commerce sites. Except for the diary studies, all studies were conducted as direct empirical observation of users' actual behavior as they engaged in online shopping. We sat next to users, one-on-one, and asked them to think out loud as they performed specific tasks (507 tasks in total). This research approach provides deep insights into why users behave the way they do and results in findings that are not available from other methods.
In our new research, we observed 507 e-commerce task attempts and measured a success rate of 72%.
Long listings might need pagination by default, but if users customize the display to View All list items, respect that preference.
Sites have improved, and we now know much more about e-tailing usability. Today, poor content is the main cause of user failure.
Finding addresses and location information on company websites has gotten dramatically easier, but users increasingly turn to search engines first for this task.
Making users suffer a drop-down menu to enter state abbreviations is one of many small annoyances that add up to a less efficient, less pleasant user experience. It's worth fixing as many of these usability irritants as you can.
Several usability findings lead directly to higher sales and increased customer loyalty. These design tactics should be your first priority when updating your website.