Essential Elements of Shopping Cart Design for Every Ecommerce website

As an online merchant, you might have an ecommerce website with the most effective design and all the sophisticated components, yet if your site fails to convert, then it could be due to the shopping cart design. Shopping cart design is a crucial area that can make or break your ecommerce marketing efforts. Following some of the best practices in shopping cart design can do a lot to improve your bottom line.

These are quite simple and basic, so there should not be any qualms about not including them in your shopping cart. Some of the best shopping cart design practices are highlighted below:

Include clickable thumbnails of your product

It is always a good idea to include a clickable thumbnail of your product in the shopping cart. It gives customers the assurance that they have picked up the right product.  Besides given them the peace of mind, it raises their level of comfort and aids them in proceeding ahead with purchasing the product.

Do not include any hidden charges

It is always important that you provide the customers with actual charges of your product. Some online stores ask shoppers to enter their credit card information much before they are provided with the total cost of the product. Actually, customers should know what the final cost of the product will be including the shipping cost and taxes. If possible, include a shipping cost estimator on the individual product pages so customers can calculate the individual shipping costs applicable to the product they have purchased.

Do not insist that all customers should register

Many customers believe that if they register with a site, they will get more spam. They might abandon the shopping cart and leave if you insist that they register before they can proceed ahead with the purchase. The right way out of this scenario is to allow them to register as guests and complete the purchase. The customers are most likely to come back and register if they like the product and provide you with a repeat order. Therefore, minimize the information that is required for purchasing a product from your site except the bare essentials such as credit card information and shipping address.

Show a progress bar throughout the shopping process

It’s best to provide a progress bar to let customers know where they stand during the checkout process. Even if the checkout process is two steps long, it provides the customers the assurance that they are moving forward towards the final step in the purchasing process.

Provide a brief summary of the purchase

Most customers would like to see a brief summary of what they have purchased before hitting the ‘buy’ button.  The summary should ideally consist of product thumbnails, cost of each product, shipping and tax, and other details on a single page. This provides the final assurance to the customers that their purchase is in order and their information has been correctly recorded.

The author of this article is James, who is a qualified professional working with a leading web development and design company. He has considerable experience in the field of Ecommerce Website Design and shopping cart development. His in-depth knowledge in the field has helped many online store owners discover the right solutions to their problems.