Retail Web Design and the Human Experience

Online retailers are always looking for how to best provide an enjoyable online shopping experience for their customers. The online competition is fierce. With so many options, how does a retailer make sure to retain its customers, acquire new customers, and continue to increase conversions? In short, a retail web design must provide a human experience. Web designers must go beyond basic usability to create a user experience akin to human interactions.

I came across the following quote in my research:

If there’s any object in human experience that’s a precedent for what a computer should be like, it’s a musical instrument: a device where you can explore a huge range of possibilities through an interface that connects your mind and your body, allowing you to be emotionally authentic and expressive.

Jaron Lanier

Although completely digital in nature, the online shopping experience can still be a part of creating this human experience, as long as the website goes beyond merely selling products. A web design for an online store has to tap into this authenticity, expressiveness, and exploration as Lanier mentions above. But what exactly does this mean?

In his article on ReCode.net, RK Parthasarathy explains that online shoppers today “want an informative, interactive purchasing experience, not just a transaction…they want to experience a human connection.” This human connection is what keeps customers coming back, and it is intertwined with the usability of a website but also goes beyond.

Websites have to provide the little extras that play a big role in taking a retail web design to that next level of user experience: all the pieces that put a user in control, provides an experience involving both “mind and body,” and connects them with real-world experiences. The following are some of the more important pieces for providing the human experience in retail web design:

Demos and Quality Views

One of the first ways to improve the usability of a retail web design is with the nature of the product photos. Of course, high quality photos are a given. But what about interactive features such as 360-degree views and image zoom that really put the user in charge? In addition to the interaction aspect, these user-controlled views also help a shopper feel more confident in what they are buying. After all, in a store, they can pick up the item and feel it in their hands. Providing images of every side of the product as well as a close up view helps to provide a more tangible experience. Customers can view the product up close and personal.

Even with straightforward products, such as the t-shirts on the Grunt Style website, a zoom option improves trust in the quality of the items. On this site, customers can zoom in on every aspect to inspect it as they would in a store.

Another excellent way to provide that human experience is to show the product in action. In fact, this bonus feature can help even in-store sales, since shoppers can look up the demo no matter where they are shopping for the product, especially if you provide them with a QR code to scan.

Or a demo can be placed directly on the product page, like Chico’s does for their women’s clothing. On the product page above, one of the thumbnail images includes a Play button. When clicked, a video of the model walking and turning around in the clothes provides customers with a visual of how the cardigan looks on a live model in motion.

Luxury Items

The second aspect, luxury items, has to do with what products you sell. Now, not every item that you sell may be considered luxury, but you need to offer enough to entice online shoppers to choose your site rather than a competitor’s…and make them feel like you care about making them happy. Provide a new and interesting human experience that they could not have unless they go online to your website.

Luxury items could be anything from items you can’t find unless you travel the world to pre-release or online-only sales. Unique items, name brands offered at a discount to die for, or anything else that adds that touch of value, of luxury, to your online store will help to provide a unique experience for customers.

A great example is Farfetch. This website provides items from over 300 boutiques from across the world, so it’s all quite unique. Plus, the web design itself is very appealing and provides a fresh experience for all of those shoppers tired with the same old online store look. Lots of filter buttons allow shoppers to fine tune their search, much easier than if they were in a store!

What I love so much about the Bold and Noble website is that not only do they provide luxury items, but the entire website is a one-of-a-kind online shopping experience. The web design itself is very beautiful and the images are sharp, high quality, and include close up images of the artist’s handiwork. Plus, the tone is very straightforward, conversational, and tells a great story about a human experience, providing that emotional connection that is so necessary for online shoppers. In fact, let’s explore more of this in the next section…

Emotional Connections

Every color, image, and piece of content on an website should evoke an emotional response from shoppers. Remember, humans want an emotionally authentic experience online. So (just as on Bold and Noble in the section above), set the mood of your brand with a unique style and match it with your tone, which can be conversational, humorous, cheeky, or whatever will further create that emotional connection between you and your customers. And, this is a good place to remind you that you have to really know your audience to know how to create authentic emotions.

As a shoe retailer, this brand sets itself apart by using a bold tone of voice. They aren’t shy in making sure their customers know that their shoes are made by renowned craftsmen, but they also keep it short and simple and conversational. This tone of cool confidence provides its customers with base of trust, especially with the human-like voice. And they keep the same tone of voice with every aspect of the site: feedback, suggestions, explanations, and more.

This bakery website sets the tone for user experience beautifully. Full screen, high resolution images of its mouthwatering baked goods along with ingredients scattered across textured table tops help customers make the connection that these are homemade delicacies, not baked from a package. Personally, I would prefer that the chef image on the homepage include the chef’s face, but at least they do show images of the chefs on the about page with full bios so that customers can match a real person with the work put into every baked good. Even the text on each page sends the message that eating these baked goods is a delightful, luxurious human experience.

Try Before You Buy

The “try before you buy” feature is growing in popularity lately, especially in the clothes and accessories venues. After all, one of the benefits of shopping for fashion items in stores is that customers can try the items on before buying. Online fashion stores are finding that providing a “try before you buy” offer makes them much more competitive with brick and mortar stores. This offer allows online stores to provide that tangible, human connection that is often missing in online clothes and accessories shopping.

Bungalow Clothing is one such store that gives customers five days to try the high fashion clothes for free before returning them. This company plays it smart, too, by including prepaid envelopes and having no membership fees nor styling fees. The personalized styling profile really takes this “curated dressing room” feature beyond a simple try before you buy user experience. Customers can truly have a unique shopping experience without leaving the comfort of home, and one that can’t be found elsewhere.

The above invite-only online shopping app provides users with a Try button for their browser. Online shoppers can then use the button to try out a product for 10 days before returning it in the pre-paid envelope. Many high-end online retailers have jumped on board with this app to help provide that tangible experience for their online customers, taking a simple online shopping experience to one with a “range of possibilities.”

Online stores don’t have to offer a true try before you buy option to give a similar experience, though. Asos.com provides the oh-so-luxurious offer of free or almost free shipping worldwide. And they have easy and free returns, so it’s almost exactly like a try before you buy experience – except that a money exchange happens in the process. Customers can even take it to the next level by paying a mere $29 annual fee that includes Premier services such as 2-day shipping and early access to sales.

Seamless Experiences

A seamless experience between web, mobile, and store makes customers feel confident in a brand, no matter where they make the purchase. Customers’ trust of a retailer is wrapped up in the brand look – if they see that same look online as they do in the physical store, they will trust the online experience just as they trust the brick and mortar experience.

If your brand is one that wants to provide that same human experience across every media and location, then make sure to look the part. Walmart.com is one that definitely does this right using the same colors, fonts, organized design, messages, and tone from store front to websites to mobile apps. What I love about the Walmart app are all of the possibilities for fine-tuning the experience to my own preferences, so that I can shop on mobile, the website, or in the store exactly how I want.

La Garconne is an interesting example because it was first an online store and then opened its first brick and mortar after it became highly successful online.

The store still provides the same clean, no-nonsense, lots-of-white-space look that the website does, so shoppers can have the same shopping experience in store or halfway across the world from their PC at home. The important thing to remember with this seamless aspect is the trust. Customers trust a brand that remains similar both online and offline because a seamless experience spells authenticity in the minds of consumers.

Easy Shopping

Making your site easy to shop is a vital aspect to gaining those needed conversions – and this is an integral part of creating a positive user experience. Think about this: when customers go to a store, they can ask clerks questions or pay by simply walking up to the checkout counter. But the downside to a storefront is that a clerk may not be available or checking out takes too long on a busy day.

So, offer a convenient shopping experience online to mimic a physical store experience on its best day. How do you do this? With simple organization including filters, an easy checkout, visible contact information or Live Chat, quick and free shipping, painless returns with a money back or store credit guarantee – or anything else that improves usability and makes online shopping a positive experience.

The Forever 21 website provides excellent organization with categories broken down. What always draws me back to the website is that they include a category for their clothes on sale. For those shoppers like me who go straight to the sale rack upon entering a store, an online store that provides a discount or sale category is one that provides one of the experiences most important to me in a physical store front. Plus, customers get their actual money back, not in-store credit, when making returns, another big bonus for many customers.

The stunning product photos alone make shopping on this high fashion, ecologically and socially-conscious clothing line website enjoyable. Even better, it also provides free International shipping. Shopping filters make it easy to search for specific items. Yet their best interactive feature by far is the profile that customers can create, since the customer is now in charge of his or her own user experience.

Social Shopping

One of the best ways to provide a powerful human experience through online retail shopping is to include a social feed that creates a bandwagon effect. Everyone is talking about your online store, so it must be great – an experience that we just can’t miss!

Social media has become a huge part of our daily lives and ingrained in the human experience for a great many people. In his article on InternetRetailer, Zak Stambor breaks down a report done by Epsilon Data Management, LLC. He explains that the report shows that “retailers’ social media posts and pages have a greater influence on the stores and brands consumers buy from than any other channel, including search engines and retail websites.”

Those sponsored Facebook ads, sponsored Tweets, promoted Pinterest pins, and even the YouTube video ads are all an important part of making a connection with customers, promoting expression, and providing that human experience.

Making that connection between website and social media can be further enhanced with some simple design tweaks. The Eden website places social media icons in the header of their website for easy access. This not only gives customers more than one option for staying in touch but also reinforces the legitimacy of the brand in the mind of new customers.

Another important aspect to the social interaction: don’t forget to include reviews, specifications (especially for electronics), and even shopping guides as these are all part of the social shopping experience as well. Reviews on the actual product page, made by other customers, is one of the best moves you can make. And specs help a buyer know exactly what the product does and features.

Even shopping guides, such as what BestBuy.com provides, suggest what type of device a customer will need for their intended purpose, providing a similar experience as what customers would expect when talking to a store clerk to explain their needs for buying a certain device. Once again, it’s an aspect that puts a user in charge of their own experience.

Cyberspace and the Human Experience

It’s quite the odd concept, especially for realists: a human experience occurring within cyberspace. However, although it’s not necessarily a flesh and blood thing, digital experiences have become a huge part of most lives today. And providing this human experience digitally is a very important part of the success of a retail website.

A positive, impactful user experience plays a major role in returning customers and future purchases. So make sure that your web design gives customers this human connection and even puts the consumer in charge of their own experience. Go beyond basic usability rules and provide the human experience that online shoppers crave.

Source: vandelaydesign.com