You want to make a good first impression when you meet new people. The same goes for visitors to your website. You want a website that encourages visitors to take the next step: buy or contact. In other words, you want your leads to convert to customers.
Web Design is one of the key factors that can impact on the buyers and their decisions. It takes between 50 and 500 milliseconds (ms) for users to form an opinion about your website that determines whether they’ll stay or leave. That said, you have about 50 ms to make a good first impression with your website. Shallow, aren’t we?
Those first impressions are 94% design related. Great design will get people to trust you and stick around.
This also means that you need to hit that sweet spot between usability, alluring graphics and interesting functionality.
Add value proposition
Can web design improve sales? Yes, it can. Results of the research showed that the first impression is influenced by the value proposition and visual appeal.
A value proposition is a promise of value to be delivered. It’s the primary reason a prospect should buy from you. It’s not a slogan or catchy phrase.
You have to present your value proposition as the first thing the visitors see on your homepage but should be visible in all major entry points of the site (category and product pages).
What is the end-benefit you’re offering in one short sentence? It can mention the product and/or customer. Make it an attention grabber. A specific explanation of what you do, your offer, for who and why it’s useful.
Images communicate much faster than words. Show the product image, or an image reinforcing your main message.
You need a value proposition and you need to communicate it clearly on all the main entry pages: homepage, product pages, category pages, etc.
The key question we like to ask our clients is why? If you don’t state why users should buy from you, you will lose most of them. Explain the key benefits or advantages to your products clearly under their specifications.
Differentiate your website
Are you chic, silly, savvy, smart, classic or what? What makes you different from the competition? Does your website communicate this clearly through typography, design and images on your website?
If you want to differentiate your website and increase sales with web design, focus on using high-quality visuals. When you have blocks of text on your page and nothing to break them up, you risk pushing your audience away from engaging with your site. Walls of text can feel overwhelming, which causes users to bounce from your website.
Good website design includes high-quality visuals that help enhance the user experience. Don’t try to save money on web design. We’ve seen how web design can result in a significant conversion boost.
These visuals can range from HD images, content entry animations, ongoing background animations with immersive interaction, mouse hover animations, etc.
Contact information
Even though it seems like a small thing, putting your phone number
and email address on the top of your site usually boosts conversions. Add contact page to your main navigation menu.
It’s a trust thing. People want to know that they can reach you. It’s a simple fix that adds a lot of value in most cases.
Show the “real” organization behind your site; show full office address, phone number, and staff.
Consider adding live chat and display it on the bottom right corner of your website or eCommerce site. Live chat can boost your online sales by up to 40%! There are many chat widgets on the market, available to implement on most CMS platforms.
We, for example, like to use the Facebook Messenger chat widget, which is integrated with our page’s messenger. It’s very neat for those who have their Facebook page up and running!
Free Shipping
Charging for shipping is a conversion killer. At this point, the majority of companies offer some form of free shipping – and pretty much every
eCommerce site competes with Amazon Prime. Free shipping can help convert your website visits after all.
If all the things are pretty much the same between you and your competitor, you can offer small value add. That includes free shipping, free setup, cancel anytime or no credit card required. The value adds can also be customizable product or service.
Here are the four strategies to help with lower shipping strategy.
- Establish a Baseline: Compare conversion with and without a
free shipping offer. - Create Thresholds: Increase the minimum order value required
for free shipping, and test the improvement in margin. - Set Restrictions: See what kind of improvement you’ll get by
offering free shipping only on select products where it is
profitable. - Enact Price Increases: Increase all your product prices to
compensate for the loss you take on free shipping and see how
your profit compares.
Communicate what makes your offer unique and how you solve potential customers’ problem.
Display reviews and testimonials
People use reviews, a lot. Even while they’re shopping in brick and mortar stores they read online reviews. Probably you’re doing it too. That should be a good enough reason for you to start gathering reviews and testimonials from your customers.
Customer reviews will add social proof to your website. Make sure to allow every product on your website to be reviewed. This will provide more opportunities for your consumers to offer positive feedback. A positive review environment will increase your potential sales by anywhere between 40% and 250%. That’s a median of 150%!
Asking for a review on multiple channels, and integrating them to be available to visit from, or including them on your website or product pages is a huge win!