Common e-commerce mistakes
- Luke Telford
- 15 April 2010
Photo credit: avolore, sxc.hu
So many promising e-commerce sites have been tripped up by a simple and almost unnoticeable mistake. Here are 4 ecommerce errors to fix when reviewing your site.
1. No 'About Us' page or privacy policy
Why is this a blunder, I hear you ask? You have all the stock and a functional site design, but visitors aren’t being converted to customers at the rate you’d like. The more information you share about your company, the better. This not only reassures customers that you're credible, but it also helps them justify their purchases, which is vital for any e-commerce site to encourage.
2. Frustrated Customers
Marketing blog Servant of Chaos
recently offered a great insight into customer service. Everyone talks about addressing negative customers’ comments, and promoting the positive comments by those you’ve impressed. This creates a split that obscures the
customers in between: the frustrated ones. These customers want something to change, and they're more likely to tell you so. You're shooting yourself in the foot if you ignore these customers. Trying to win over your detractors is like repeatedly
pushing a rock up a hill. Instead, make a bigger effort to help your frustrated customers--they're most receptive to becoming positive customers. If you resolve their problems, they’ll recommend you, and that’s the ultimate goal in Web 2.0
e-commerce.
3. Non-existent products
Make sure that all links on the homepage lead to products that are actually in stock. Any superb impressions you’ve made on your customers on the homepage will be quickly shattered if the link they click on turns out to be a dead end. This is especially true of recommendation systems. These are a great idea for remedying the 'out of stock' syndrome, but make sure they don’t lead to products that are out of stock! Double tragedy.
4. Multiple browser testing
There is more than one internet browser available, so your site should be tested on as many as possible. if you limit testing to only Internet Explorer 6 or Firefox you have no way of knowing for sure if all of it will be displayed correctly to all prospective customers
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