Setting up the design of an e-commerce website involves a greater effort than any conventional business website. The web design steps for a typical e-commerce website today are centred around usability and speed. Business owners must know that it's important for any online store to offer a fluid experience to its users. A portal with minimal style elements can become more successful than its better-looking counterparts, simply on the basis of its user’s journeys. 

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An e-commerce website with sub-par design offers a bad experience to users. It raises the chances of potential customers leaving immediately and never returning. Fortunately, there are several key guidelines can be followed to create stunning and highly functional e-commerce websites. Read on to get a better idea about some fundamental e-commerce website design tips. 
 
Tips To Follow for Designing E-commerce Websites 

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1. Simple design works great - Business owners and designers should understand that people visit e-commerce portals to browse, search and purchase products. So, a site with a simplistic design makes things easier for the customers. Some very successful international-standard e-commerce sites feature very minimalistic design. Just remember that no visitor likes unnecessary complexity when they need to purchase products. 

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2. Focus on user experience - Your design goal should be focussed on giving customers the best possible experience. They should find it incredibly easy to load up your site, search for what they want and checkout without any hassle. To achieve this, designers have to look at perfecting all aspects including design, navigational ease and usability. Better user experiences translate to higher conversion rates. 

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3. Obstruction-free purchase experience - A typical page displaying products on our e-commerce website should do just that. Do not introduce unnecessary elements that distract and confuse the user. To start with, avoid hitting users with annoying pop-ups during their shopping journey. In addition, business owners should not include any branding information on their category or product pages. Use the About Us or Home page for those purposes. 

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4. Use high-quality images - Most users view websites on high-resolution displays capable of displaying vivid detail and even imperfections. This is why e-commerce business owners should try to use only high-quality images. Try to find a balance between image size and quality to ensure pages do not take a long time to load. Images used on every banner, every product listing and category page must be high-quality. Pixelated images create an instant negative reaction among customers.  

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5. Display your pricing transparently - All e-commerce users prefer transparency about prices and they expect nothing less from e-commerce portals. So, any web design methodology you follow must enable a prominent display of product prices. Customers should not have to put in any extra effort to discover the prices of items. Do not leave the price breakdown for the checkout page. Include the entire breakdown within your product page, including shipping and taxes. This kind of transparency helps to improve the purchase experience of buyers. 

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6. Include a cart button - A dedicated shopping cart button is a bare necessity for any e-commerce website. Most users prefer to have it as it makes the experience easier. All of your web design pages should have the shopping cart icon right at the top corner for instant access. Customers should have to scramble to find it at any time. A View Cart button can significantly raise your chances of making conversions from your e-commerce portal. 

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7. Easily accessible and usable navigation - E-commerce websites have to offer peak navigational ease to visitors. Clearly laid out menu bars, drop-down sections and sidebars are necessary to let shoppers find desired products with ease. Whilst making your site navigable is the objective, menus should not have too many options. At no point should a shopper face issues with navigating between category, product and checkout pages. 
 
8. Keep the search bar prominent - Most e-commerce shoppers want instant access to a search bar function on e-commerce platforms they visit. It is one of the first things they want to see on loading up your page. Keep in mind that a large chunk of shoppers already know what they want to buy, and are ready to search for it.To make the search bar as prominent as possible, keep it on the top of all pages. You can centre it on your pages or keep it on any side, but it should be visible at all times.

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9. Implement search filters - Keeping you search bar easily accessible is only part of the equation. Your e-commerce website search should feature advanced search filters to further improve user experience. This is something that most e-commerce platforms offer and it leads to more conversions. The web design should let users filter products using parameters like price, size, availability, colour and business. 

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10. Use a simple grid layout - A grid-type layout works great for e-commerce website category pages. Most reputed e-commerce platforms use clean and simplistic grids for displaying product listings. There are some considerations if you are designing with a grid layout. Each grid row should have no more than 3 or 4 product listings, as the site has to look presentable. Having 5 or more grids can work for a desktop layout, but most users now shop on their mobile devices Use some white space to avoid shoppers accidentally clicking the wrong products. 

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11. Ensure a seamless checkout journey - E-commerce business owners must create a smooth and hassle-free checkout experience for customers. Some functionalities that an e-commerce website must provide include guest checkout and instant checkout that requires only fundamental shipping/billing information. The entire checkout process should be simple for all users, regardless of whether they are logged in or not. Fast and effortless checkouts help build the trust of customers. The design of checkout pages should be intuitive and simplistic. 

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The above-mentioned tips can be incorporated into an e-commerce website design strategy to boost a business chances of online success. Approach a reputed web design consultant to gain further clarity.

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