With more than 30% of online shopping done on our mobile phones, the retail app is an investment that can contribute a huge chunk of revenue to your business. You may have any type of business but if you are really planning to expand your wings, then along with an e-commerce website, you need to invest in a mobile app too.
Though a retail app is a great extension of any business, not all retail apps can skyrocket your revenue, especially if they fail to meet user expectations. A well-built app built around articulately designed UI (User Interface) and UX (User Experience) along with sound go to market strategy can help you cash in conversions and sales as expected.
To make things more convenient, here is a checklist that you can follow, to attract more user clicks and buys from your m-store:
#1. Design for different platforms
Be it designers, developers, entrepreneurs or marketers, all have understood the fact that designing an e-commerce store for tablets or different mobile devices requires an in-depth understanding of mobile layouts. However, what a lot of the native and / or web app developers often ignore is fluid responsiveness.
Basically, design can be divided into two categories –
- Fixed Designs – Such layouts have fixed elements that work brilliantly on Android devices.
- Fluid Designs – Fluid designs offers a lot of liberty and flexibility in designs.
The layout of fixed design may or may not adjust to all types of device screens. While an app may look great on a particular device, the topography and elements may not adjust appropriately on another device with a different dimension.
It’s a tried and tested fact – what looks good sells better. In other words, aesthetics matters more for retail apps than quality. Therefore, by instrumenting fixed responsive design, your content runs the risk of being jagged or distorted on different types of mobile devices or tablets.
The fluid design, on the other hand, is a great solution. With this type of design, all the elements like graphics, text, and topography follow a simple rule of screen size percentage. In other words, the element adjusts according to height and width of the available screen, keeping the aesthetics of the design intact.
Though using high-resolution images may not be possible always due to lesser response time required by the app, but it’s advisable to accommodate it especially for retina display in Android or Apple along with SVGs (Scalable Vector Graphics) which is a standard adoption for graphics and logos.
#2. User-friendly filters, categories, and sorting
Make the design user-friendly. Filtering or sorting is an integral part of UX design and user workflow and is important to all e-commerce apps or websites to maximize their revenues. Therefore, e-commerce product list usability should be a reference point to understand how to design and sort a product list.
Sorting logic and filtering is an important element for UX design as well as user workflow. Sorting products and product categories is an effective way used by all e-commerce stores or websites to accelerate sales and revenue. Therefore, effective designing techniques play an integral role in optimizing different products in e-commerce websites and ecommerce apps.
Here are six practices advisable for retail apps –
- Design category specific filters
- Place important and most relevant categories and filters on the top
- Allow multi-filter option for the same search
- Include thematic filters
- Minimize the applied filter list to cover the unapplied filter options
- Display the filter menu properly for user convenience
The above-advised practices are findings of sound user behavior research and if implemented while the development process of a website, will bear its fruits.
#3. Attention to the product page details
The product page showcases the products for sale. It includes important details like product description, pricing, and product image (preferably a 360 degree upselling and cross-selling display). It is like a catalog providing all the important information that would allure a prospective buyer to actually take a positive step.
Page responsiveness, high-resolution images and loading time are the areas to put special attention. Use of high-quality images is advisable. In addition, work on the navigation to and from the product page. Remember, better-designed product page with more visual information leads to better sales.
Along with effective elements in design, the product page also has upselling and cross-selling displays. Upselling refers to the display of the same product under other brands or offers. Cross-selling refers to the displaying of related products on the product page, example, featuring hair display sports gears on your sports shoe product page.
#4. Two taps rule for checkout
Marissa Mayer advocated the two tap rule and since then has seen a multitude of reactions both in and against the checkout concept. While it is true that the importance of gathering information cannot be replaced, but a simple step to buying should not be deferred with a number of clicks. As a matter of fact, Amazon makes billions with their controversial “one click patent”.
However, over the years “the two tap rule” has proved to be a good yardstick to navigate from product to cart and cart to checkout.
#5. Payment gateways for online payment option
With online banking and the concept of plastic money becoming the preferred medium of payment while shopping online, COD (Cash on Delivery) has taken a back seat. However, sharing bank card details (both credit or debit) can have security concerns. One way to ensure easy and secure payment options to buyers is by integrating trusted gateways or wallets like Paytm, Stripe or PayPal.
An advantage of inducing such secured payment gateways is that it helps you control the UX transactional stage which allows you to personalize the page. Also, an integrated payment gateway is an in-app page. In other words, integration of such payment options offers a sense of security to users, thus, indirectly contributing to greater sales for the retail app.
The final takeaway
There is no denying that UI and UX play pivotal roles whether a buyer will make the purchase or not. Therefore, offer great looking, user-friendly, responsive app along with app security, to make sure steady conversion and sales for your app.
