Shopping Carts: 5 Usability Problems

The usability of a shopping cart refers to the efficiency with which a user can achieve their goals on a website. Many of the larger online shopping carts, like Play.com and Amazon.com, are continuously striving to make their buying process as fluent and as effortless as possible. Knowing you can buy a book or film in just 3 or 4 clicks encourages you to return to the same, reliable website.

Having read numerous articles and white papers dedicated to best practice shopping cart design and usability; below I have highlighted five potential design problems in shopping carts that I'm sure many users have encountered.

1. Shopping carts that ask a user to register before knowing if the product is available or not.

It could be quite irritating for a user if they have spent 10 minutes entering their credit card details, home address, telephone number etc etc. only to find out during the checkout process that the product they want to buy is out of stock.

Many shopping carts enable you to present users with live stock availability before the user places their product in the shopping cart.

2. Suggesting the user buys similar products before adding the main product to the shopping cart.

It's often helpful when a website recommends additional products you may want or need after adding your main product to your shopping cart.

However, I think you'll agree that it could be slightly confusing if these additional products were offered to you before even adding the main product to your shopping cart? You press "Add to Cart" and suddenly you're offered batteries, or insoles or travel cases. Many users would be left feeling confused, wondering if their product had been added or not, or if they'd pressed the wrong button.

Best practice guidelines would indicate offering your user the extra products after the user has finished shopping and they're entering the checkout process.

3. Shopping carts that ask a user to register before they have even added a product to their shopping cart.

Asking for a user's personal information before they have even added a product to their shopping cart is not a good move.

Customer registration can offer some big advantages to you as a merchant including recovery for abandoned shopping carts, customer loyalty and email contact. However, many users may be browsing a number of websites, adding products to numerous shopping carts for the main purpose of comparing prices and features. If a user has to register personal details before using the shopping carts, a large percentage are likely to abandon the website.

4. Requiring a user to delete and add the same product to shopping carts just so they can change its colour, size or variation.

Editing a shopping cart should be as simple as possible and shouldn't require the user to delete anything from the shopping cart.

If a product comes in different colours and different sizes don't make them delete it from their shopping cart if they want it in a different variation. Users should be able to select from within their shopping carts the different options.

5. Websites that do not clearly show the user the contents of the shopping carts.

Have you ever been on a website and added the same product to your shopping cart 3 or 4 times because you're not sure if it worked the first time?

Many users that can't see the contents of their shopping cart in the same browser as the one they are shopping on can often feel confused about whether or not their item has been added successfully.

As a merchant it is understandable that you don't want to take your user away from the page they are shopping on every time they add something to their shopping cart. Best practice guidelines therefore indicate displaying the contents of a users shopping cart in the same browser, in the right hand corner for example.

To summarise, the design of the entire shopping experience is of utmost importance. These 5 potential design problems highlighted are five of many common problems found on shopping carts.

Ecommerce Website Development – exceeding expectations

Ecommerce stands for commerce conducted electronically, meaning over the Internet. It represents one of the most advantageous types of commerce, both for the buyer and seller. Lately, a large percent of the business owners have started to run their line of work online, turning for assistance to web designers. Many of them are interested in ecommerce development, considering it far better than traditional trading methods.

Due to the fact that we live in a competitive world, it is important to have all the attributes possible. The Internet and its specialists present us with well-informed ecommerce development solutions, helping to the growth of the business and online promotion. Aside from the constant updates, there are also plenty of other options for ecommerce websites, including presentation of existing market trends and efficient promotional tools.

The success of a business is assured by its constant promotion and unique approach for various business types. Experts apply their skills into providing solutions tailored to every business, trying at every step to fight the competition. They ensure only the highest standards of quality, especially when it comes to ecommerce development and other kinds of web applications.

The complexity of the techniques used by specialists when it comes to ecommerce development cannot be denied and this is why many business owners resort to their services. They constantly develop and provide solutions to their clients, designs business specific websites and helping clients to attain their goals.

Specialized in diverse applications, these experts can help one with database development, including business design and effective ecommerce solutions. They start from the bottom and work their way up, offering the perfect web system, suitable for every business. Their customized database applications are easy to use and implement, appealing to a lot of customers.

Database applications are extremely important for the success of database development, especially in case of data tracking, combined sources of information and constant updates. If you are interested in succeeding, then you should go for a team trained to work with powerful database applications, such as SQL server and Access. You can always benefit from the knowledge of true experts, particularly in the case of database systems.

Their database development experience is highly significant when it comes to database services such as: database design, table creation and domain assistance. They can also help you purchase or renew a domain name, not to mention set up your own domain email. With a customized database application, you will have the possibility to handle the information as you consider right and define your business.

The services and technologies used by website designers are recommended to anyone looking for database development solutions and not only. They provide useful solutions and update your website constantly. For them, it is important to promote the right image while supporting the customer throughout the entire period. The development team is always ready to ensure a positive online presence, coming up with new and innovative ideas on a daily basis.