As with any e-Commerce web site, the number- one mission for online retail sites is driving customers to the shopping cart. And preferably, with as little friction as possible to avoid losing their interest along the way. As more and more retailers are discovering, the oft-dismissed category page can be a surprisingly critical factor in that process. It’s easy to brush it off as an interim step, but case study after case study shows that a well-designed and optimized category page can have a surprising effect on sales, upsells, and even impulse buys.
The primary task of your category pages is to sort and organize — making it possible for customers who don’t know the exact product they want to browse “strategically” by product type, brand or other defining characteristic. This functionality allows them to explore a number of options that meet their broader criteria to find the best match — or matches. It’s basically the e-Commerce site equivalent of a “qualified prospect list,” which is one of the reasons it offers so much potential. Many times, customers identify several options they like. In all cases, however, your priority on this page is to tempt the buyer to click through to the product pages.
Precisely how you do that will vary according to your merchandise and your customer base, which is where continual testing and learning should come into play. But there are general principles that always apply.
Advertisement
Here are four simple ways to sharpen your category pages.
1. Go visual
Experience suggests that at the ‘category’ stage, customers respond far better to highly visual displays of product, rather than text or ‘features’. Rich and strong imagery seems to work at a more emotional, more visceral level, which is important at this point. Plus, an array of images makes it far easier for customers to scan your offerings, whether they’re searching for a specific item, or browsing for something that strikes a chord.
It means that the moment visitors land on a category page, they should get strong visual impression, with the best product images you can muster.
In general, larger images seem more effective than thumbnails, but testing will reveal the optimum strategy. Some questions to consider:
- Product in use? Or product alone? The brass hinge on a china cabinet?
- Emphasize the product, or what it produces? (The types of holes, cuts, or patterns a tool can make? The skillet, or the crisply seared sea bass? Or both?)
- Three columns across? Or a vertical scroll of larger images?
- The same image as the product page? Or one crafted just for category use?
Yes, intuition and gut feel can go a long way. But testing is more reliable.
2. Offer search
Your category pages should offer a search capability for two reasons.
For one, category that displays too many choices can seem overwhelming, and actually inhibit buying, because there’s just too much for a customer to decide. A search function can make the category page far more manageable. “Four-slice toasters.” “HD Video cameras.”
What’s more, search will simplify things for customers who are hunting for a very specific size, brand, manufacturer, feature, or option.
Note that you should continually review customers’ search terms and requests, to look for patterns that might inform your choice of categories, placement and featuring of products, or even unmet demand in your product line. Learn, then test.
3. Let them sort and filter
This is a cousin of ‘the search’ option above. This is also important for narrowing down vast categories into more relevant selections, and for letting a customer prioritize their main interests. You can let them sort the category by price, for example, from low to high, or vice versa, to make it far easier for a customer to settle on his preferred price point, or to get a feel for the hierarchy of brands in the market place.
It’s also useful to allow customers to filter results, for qualities or attributes important to them, such as by color (“The wedding theme is Aqua”) or by country of origin, local suppliers, or USB 2 compatible.
Again, it can be revealing to track the sort criteria for insights into what is important to your customers. It can also pay to test and experiment with other sort and filter options — to see if there is any correlation to sales. Or to click-throughs.
4. Serve up product views fast
As we’re seeing in the field right now, some sort of quick-view capability on your category page can get more products added to the cart, directly from your category page.
The feature allows a customer to scroll down your category page, and simply click a product image to launch a pop-up that works much like a product page. Bigger picture, colors, specs, options, description, and an all -important ‘Add to Cart’ button.
The advantage here is that you this can get a product into the cart very quickly, on the spot, without loading a new product page. It’s low-friction.
Or, if the product isn’t quite right, your customer can close the pop-up and immediately return to your category page, at the same spot, to continue browsing. There’s no to reload the page or find the previous spot again.
Some tactics to test: Try offering category pages with, and without quick views, to track the uplift in actual sales. And experiment with the contents of the pop-up. Size of image? Multiple views? Color swatches, or actual product in color? Mention promotional pricing? Experiments will trump hunches every time.
Overall, it’s smart to treat your category pages with the same care and finesse you’d devote to landing pages. Your category page is the first thing a customer sees when they’ve expressed interest in something. They’re looking, they’re receptive.
The key is to figure out how to get them happily involved in what you’re selling. Test and try.
