How can I make it easier for people to buy from my website?

It’s crucial to think of your website as a sales funnel. People hunt down what they want to buy and you need them to flow neatly down into the buying page, then get them to press the buy button.

When optimising that process the best thing you can start with is for you to buy something from your website.

You will notice bumps or things that are awkward. Write them down.

Now get one of your friends who is a little less computer savvy to buy something from your site.

Take notes of the areas that aren’t smooth and especially the questions they ask you.

Take notes of the things that stop or slow them down from buying.

Those are things that need to be smoothed out in the buying process to make it convert better.

From my experience there are six key areas where sales get lost and here are suggestions and areas I think you should focus on:

1. Try a one-page checkout form. Instead of having lots of screens and a big user name and password sign-up process try a one-page form where you enter your billing details and your credit card and buy straight away.

   That is so much simpler and faster for people who are buying something simple. If there are major repeat orders by the person they might want to log in but if they are buying something once there is no need to do a big sign-up process.

2. Put the buy now/add to cart buttons on your home page. Many people think that might be a little too salesy, but you are underestimating your customer.

   They might have already been to the manufacturer’s website and are just looking for someone to deliver the product to them. Put the buttons up front on your home page, next to your products.

3. Make your button obvious and bigger. Change the colour and make your button two times bigger than any other button on your pages. It needs to be super easy and simple for customers to see and use.

   A lot of sites blend their buttons in with the page and you just can’t figure out how to buy the product. Make it big and bold.

   You can read a little more about colours and websites on my previous post.

   You can see the buttons on our new life insurance site are big, simple and right up front.

4. Ask for less information. Put less fields in your add to cart/checkout form and make it super simple for customers. One button and the least amount of fields possible is the way to go. 
5. Put all of the information the customer needs to make a decision on one page. Expecting a customer to browse your site hunting down the information they need loses sales.

   You expect them to browse, find information then browse back to the page to buy the product. The more clicks and the more pages they have the read the less chance you have of a conversion.

   You will lose customers. Think of the customer as a six-year-old moving around a website, they already had enough trouble getting to your website.

   It was literally a fluke that they arrived on your website and the page loaded. Think of all the potential roadblocks in place that could have stopped that customer from buying with you.

   Remove as many as possible and sales will increase. Put the important and crucial information they need to make a decision up front and on the pages they need to easily read it and make a decision.

   You can use modals and pop-ups to keep your page clean but at least have the information there on the page.

6. Simple ways to pay. If you accept credit cards is it super easy to complete the payment? Can you make it easier?

   If you accept EFT is it easy to understand what the customer needs to do to pay?

   Smooth it all out and consider referencing other websites that already do it well, like Deals Direct or OO.

   Those sites take thousands of orders every month and need the best conversion they can get to make a decent margin.