Forum Moderators: buckworks
One of the key design tasks is the home page itself. (Oddly enough, I was about to post this when someone else posted a link to Jakob Nielsen's analysis of home page real estate. I trust his findings, though I'm not sure about his recommendations.) Like the cover of a catalog, the home page is the most visible and valuable real estate on the site. And like catalogs, there is no consensus on what works best - one sees successful catalogs use everything from a single magazine-quality scenic photo to a jumble of a dozen or more products with screaming prices and hooks to interior pages.
Once or twice in the last year I have set out to find some great examples of ecommerce home page design, and I was surprised and a bit disappointed. The "design winners" from direct marketing publications often seemed to be recognizing artistry over marketing effectiveness (though without seeing each firm's sales stats I have no way of knowing for sure). And looking at the home pages of major catalogers produced few similarities in approach and nothing that made me go "Wow! There's an approach I'd like to emulate!"
So, here's my question - has anyone stumbled across any good resources specifically about designing an effective home page for an e-commerce site? Articles, site reviews, etc., are the sort of thing I had in mind. And, without turning the thread into a URL-fest, does anyone have any personal favorite sites particularly in the area of an effective home page? (If you just say "Land's End", for example, we'll probably be able to track down the URL. :))
A Yahoo style portal in principle, but not in practice (i think Yahoo is way too cluttered).
Definitely some sort of "what's new" feature. Also links to your main sections, and perhaps a description of what each section is for.
A welcome message cant go wrong either.
Of course, this is really only applicable to general site. Niche sites with only one focus may do better to have a more visually pleasing intro (ie, a site for a new movie).
It is really all down to your industry and existing branding.
Scott
Nah, most profitable commerce sites skip the small talk.
We focus on several things on our main page:
1) Creating trust (800#, been in business a zillion years, best brands, etc) Note that catalogs don't have to worry much about creating trust because they're often dealing with repeat customers. Besides catalogs, unlike websites, are very expensive to create and mail, which eliminates most scams.
2) Showing our hottest products
3) Telling why a customer should buy from us and not some other seller of the same product...easy returns, order by toll free phone, fast delivery, etc.
Other verbage on our main page is mostly key-word rich to help search engine positioning. That's another factor mail order cats don't have to worry about.
A) The loss leader something that the customer can compare you with your competition (SEO so that product is #1) and always be the cheapest.
B) The Big Mover the product that you sell the most (SEO so that product is #1) you don't need to be the cheapest for this due to the fact it's your biggest mover.
C) The repeat customer, to get the repeat customers you need a mechanism to keep them coming back, email list, newsletter and the best of all BOOKMARK MY SITE.
D) Good Navigation -> Multi point entry (top bar, side bar, footer). easy drill down category then product, customers hate trying to find products, so be the sales man and give them what they want straight away and offer them related products/services.
E) USP (unique selling point) why they should buy from you
F) Backup and Support make them believe in you
we tend to work with database driven sites so updating the main page as trends change is easy, but always try to give the customer the latest and greatest deals you have to offer, once they become a repeat customer that's the money.
DaveN
