Ecommerce User Experience Vol. 07: Selling Strategies

5th Edition

Part of Series: Ecommerce User Experience

The best way to sell products online is not to bully or trick shoppers (as some retailers attempt to do), but to build long-term, positive relationships with them. Attract and convince new customers, help them discover products they’ll love, and provide support throughout their buying journey, and beyond.

In order to compete for customers, you’ll need to deeply understand and anticipate their needs. Learn which ecommerce selling strategies actually work, and which ones only annoy or disrupt shoppers. In the ever-changing retail landscape, factors such as free shipping, flexible return policies and easy reordering matter for first impressions and earning repeat business. 

This 331-page report contains 102 recommendations based on our user research. Discussions and 344 screenshot illustrations supplement the findings.

 

Topics

• How ecommerce UX continues to change and evolve
  • The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic
  • Sophisticated new approaches to social media
  • Improved strategies to upsell and recommend products
  • The expansion of augmented reality (AR) shopping tools
• Promotions
  • How to promote products and sales without harassing or pressuring customers
  • Helping customers apply promotional codes and coupons
  • Leveraging influencer audiences and social media fanbases
• Pricing, checkout, shipping, and returns
  • How to justify prices
  • Where and when to communicate pricing
  • How to show additional charges and fees
  • The importance of clarifying shipping costs
  • The value of free shipping
  • Alternative strategies for retailers that can’t offer free shipping
• Selection, availability, and delivery time
  • Showing inventory availability
  • How to handle backordered and sold-out items
  • Explaining shipping delays
• Providing answers, support, and assurance
  • How to anticipate product questions and provide the right answers
  • Educating customers about complex or technical products
  • How to offer and design a product finder quiz
  • Product comparisons
• Product display and positioning
  • Promoting popular or new products throughout a site or app
  • When to offer samples (for example, upholstered furniture)
  • Which retailers should consider emerging trends like augmented reality features or livestream selling
• Driving incremental and additional sales
  • Different types of related product recommendations
  • Helping customers find products that go together or are part of a set
  • Avoiding fake personalization
  • Encouraging bigger purchases without resorting to unethical dark patterns
• Supporting gift buying
  • The importance of offering gift cards and registries
  • Adding personal messages to gift purchases
• Enabling an omnichannel retail experience
  • Helping customers move between digital stores and physical locations
  • In-store and curbside pickup processes, and how to explain them to customers
  • Email, text message, and push notifications
• Loyalty and repeat customers
  • How to design for returning customers 
  • Loyalty and reward programs
  • Gamification to encourage loyalty
  • How to easily encourage returning customers to make repeat purchases
  • Auto-fill and auto-ship options

Research Method

The information in this report is based on five separate rounds of ecommerce studies for this and the previous four editions of this report. These studies included a mix of the following methodologies.

• One-on-one usability testing
• Diary-based longitudinal studies
• Eyetracking
• Expert review

Representative users tested 350+ ecommerce websites. The studies took place in the United States, the United Kingdom, Denmark, India, and China