As every successful business owner knows, it’s important to meet your customers where they are. In today’s world, that means creating a top-notch mobile shopping experience. The majority of e-commerce traffic comes from mobile devices, so optimizing your sales page for mobile is crucial to keeping your business thriving and accessible to your audience.
Below, a panel of Young Entrepreneur Council members share tips for creating a great mobile-first e-commerce experience. Follow their tips to ensure your customers will love shopping with you, no matter what device they’re using.
1. Implement Sophisticated Search and Filtering Functions
The quality of an e-commerce store’s search makes a huge difference to the shopping experience. Browsing is challenging on mobile because no one wants to scroll through hundreds of products on their phone. Sophisticated search and filtering are easily implemented with tools like Elasticsearch and decent metadata, so there is really no excuse for clunky or inaccurate search results. —Justin Blanchard, ServerMania Inc.
2. Display Trust Marks
Trust marks are designed to indicate that your information will be transmitted and stored safely. Consider putting logos of security software to assure customers that your website is protected and legit. —Daisy Jing, Banish
3. Eliminate on-Page Distractions
For mobile-based shopping, it’s extremely important to eliminate as many distractions as possible. The more options to choose from, the less likely the user is to complete their check out. Have a header with a menu, a product image and description, a price and a checkout button. Don’t overcomplicate the sales process. —Zac Johnson, Blogger
4. Optimize Your Text With Large Fonts and Short Sentences
Mobile screens are hard to look at for long periods of time. Make sure that you reduce a user’s strain by using images and videos and by optimizing your text. Use larger fonts for body text and keep the sentences short and conversational. A small change like this can substantially boost a user’s mobile experience on your site. —Blair Williams, MemberPress
5. Consolidate Your Design
Trim copy, exclude some images and use carousels. Consolidate the design of your mobile pages to hide unnecessary information or make it available only if users click for more. Between pop-up modals, expanding sections and other neat mobile web features, you can minimize the user’s need to scroll while highlighting more of the key points that are likely to keep them engaged and convert the sale. —Firas Kittaneh, Zoma Mattress
6. Make It Easy to Use
Most of the time your customers are accessing your website or app from their phone so that sales channel needs to be as seamless as possible. Dig into it, because if you don’t, you can be sure that your competitors are. —Andrew Schrage, Money Crashers Personal Finance
7. Enhance Your Page Speed
Faster e-commerce sites offer a much better user experience and help you rank better in the new mobile-first index. Speeding up the experience will help you keep the visitor on your page longer, which eventually increases conversions. And in fact, those who have spent more time on your product page are likelier to buy your product from retargeting ads. —Kelly Richardson, Infobrandz
8. Reduce Your Cumulative Layout Shift
Focus on reducing your cumulative layout shift (CLS). Not only is CLS an SEO ranking factor coming in 2021, but it is also a huge annoyance for users when a page suddenly changes as they are trying to click on things. Imagine — your client is about to tap on the buy button, then your branded web fonts load just to move that button-down 20 px and instead they’ve removed the item from their cart. —Nick Reese, Elder Guide
9. Optimize Pop-Up Plugins for Mobile
Be sure the pop-up plugin is optimized for mobile devices and isn’t impossible to close out. If a customer has to take the time to figure out how to close a pop-up, they will click out of the site and likely not return. —Diego Orjuela, Cables & Sensors
10. Include Store Location Information
If you have retail locations where your products are sold, make sure a store locator is easily accessible on a mobile device. Customers may come to your website on the go in search of a store location. Having this information available can change the customer experience. Additionally, they are more likely to return to your website due to their positive initial experience. —Lisa Curtis, Kuli Kuli Foods
11. Keep Product Pages Lightweight and Concise
Keeping product pages as lightweight and concise as possible is essential for mobile e-commerce sites. You just don’t know the size of the screen someone is using to look at your online store, so it’s got to look good everywhere. Add different versions of the pages for mobile users that are still useful. Test out the mobile versions before deploying them to ensure they work properly. —Josh Kohlbach, Wholesale Suite
12. Prioritize Content and Progressive Disclosure
The key to good mobile UX is content prioritization and progressive disclosure. When making your e-commerce mobile platform, make sure that you feature the most important content. Focus on keywords, images and product features. As users decide to go forward, then disclose other necessary details with the help of “learn more” buttons or other links. —Syed Balkhi, WPBeginner
13. Add Mobile-Friendly Opt-Ins
Adding mobile-friendly opt-ins to your site is a great way to promote more engagement and subscriptions. Your mobile users will not get the same value from your offers if they appear large and distorted. Creating separate advertising campaigns for mobile users can help keep customers happy and your numbers positive. —Chris Christoff, MonsterInsights
14. Integrate Apple Pay and Google Pay
It’s not just about the experience — it’s about not needing a desktop. People do not and will not shop in the future if they cannot complete the transaction. Our phone is a new computer and our laptops are about to get disrupted. —Solomon Thimothy, OneIMS
15. Keep the User Experience in Mind
When creating for mobile users, keep the user experience in mind. Those on mobile have less patience and surface area to work with, so if your site doesn’t live up to their expectations, you’ll lose a conversion. Make sure your site is up to speed by using a speed tracking tool. Get rid of any content, forms, navigation or other components that slow it down, as this will cause people to bounce. —Stephanie Wells, Formidable Forms
