It’s kind of strange to realize it, but online shopping still doesn’t seem to feel as accessible as real-world shopping, especially when a friendly ecommerce checkout page is conspicuously lacking or inadequate. There’s the obvious barriers that are unavoidable: customers can’t touch, run, or try on a product virtually; slinging your personal details about online always carries a small risk, and so on.
The thing you have to remember about your target market is that they want to feel comfortable with the experience. You should have everything be visible and easy to manage. Don’t throw a bunch of confusing popups in the customer’s face or make them wonder how to go through the steps correctly.
1. Show what currency you take up front. Whatever credit cards, PayPal, or Bitcoins you accept, have all the little icons there together so the customer knows ahead of time that their money’s good here.
2. Make your instructions clear. And being “clear” doesn’t always mean going along with whatever the interface gurus dictate as the fashion this week. Simple steps, simple instructions, and tooltips along with each field the customer has to enter. Keep things minimal – trying to sell more things to the user while they’re trying to buy something already is just obnoxious. In terms of simplicity, a friendly ecommerce checkout page should look as close to the Google search home page as practical.