What to do, and not to do for the best User Experience
In many ways, the online shopping experience resembles that of travelling to a bricks and mortar shop.
You want to have a good time with no problems. Once you’ve found what you need, you want to be able to swiftly go to the checkout line so you can get on your way.
Having to deal with a sluggish cashier, missing or out-of-of-of-stock products, unfriendly workers, or a crowded car park is something you want to avoid. You only care about getting the groceries you came for and getting out of there.
Retailers know this and have invested a lot of time and money to make it easy to get about the shop, ensure the items you want are available and create short and pleasant lines at the checkout.
Although comparing user experience design to going to the grocery shop is a bit corny, the two situations are comparable. Our customers are those who come to our website and buy the goods that are on the site.
The things that annoy or could be improved for shoppers are easy to find at the stores, for those who frequent them. We may not have the foresight to identify potential irritations for our designs and user interfaces before users do.
The Do’s
1) Provide consistent user experiences no matter what device they’re using
Visitors access your website from a wide range of platforms. Regardless of what device they use to access your site (desktop or laptop), they may use any of them to access it: tablets, smartphones, gaming consoles, or even watches.
An essential component of user experience design is ensuring that your site’s visitors get the same experience no matter what device they are using to access it.
In other words, it doesn’t matter if a visitor is seeing your site on their phone or desktop at home; they should be able to discover what they need with no problems. A consistent user experience across all of your devices encourages your users to stay on your site.
2) Ensure that navigation is readily identifiable and straightforward to utilize
Understanding that consumers are looking for content is critical to creating a positive user experience.
There is a need for the data that you are making available on your website. They get there by using the navigation on your site to get the information they need swiftly.
Create an intuitive navigation system that is simple to understand and intuitive to use. Build your navigation so that visitors can go to where they want to go with the fewest number of clicks, whilst still being easy to scan and identify where they need to go.
3) Verify that all of the links and buttons work correctly
When you go to the supermarket to get something for supper, and it’s out of stock, it’s a real pain. Clicking on a broken link or a visual element that appears to be a button doesn’t make users of your website or application feel the same way.
When people are looking for information, they want every link to take them to the location it claims to take them, not to a 404 error page or somewhere else entirely.
Users may become frustrated and quit your site if you utilize visual components that resemble links or buttons but aren’t clickable (such as underlined text that isn’t links or elements with a call-to-action that aren’t hyperlinked).
The Dont’s
1) Dont’ overcrowd the screen with irrelevant media
Again, if I’m shopping for baking supplies in the grocery store, I’d like them easily accessible in the baking department. Disinfecting wipes next to the flour is not what I’m looking for, and neither is grilling utensils dangling from the shelves.
The same is valid for visitors to your website or those using your interface. They’re looking for the information they requested, and they don’t want anything else in the way. They don’t want adverts or advice to buy a new phone when they’re looking for t-shirts on your site’s store.
2) Don’t induce a lag in the response time of your visitors
Web users have short attention spans and low levels of patience, so if they have to wait for your site to load, they will grow impatient and eventually quit your site.
Don’t forget to factor in your site’s loading speed while making design decisions for it. A slow loading site is caused by large graphics, jQuery and animations, and loading resources from external sites.
Optimizing your site’s loading time and making critical design decisions can keep people on your site longer.
3) Don’t make several items compete for the attention of the reader
Confusion and uneasiness may be avoided by not overcrowding your site with distracting features that compete for the user’s attention.
When designing the user’s flow around the screen, employ visual hierarchy to make various items less competitive.
By minimising the number of call-to-actions on the screen, decreasing or moving adverts, and using headers correctly, you may help them out. Also, keep flashing and animated elements to a minimum. In addition, the attention remains on the content itself by avoiding displaying distractions to users (such as modal windows) and other items they must shut to view your material.
Stonethro, bringing you one step closer to a faster Shopify store