Ecommerce Website Design

Ecommerce websites are designed to sell products.  Users have to be able to easily find what they want and purchase it and the site has to instill confidence so the shopper trusts that the site acurately represents the product and the site owners will deliver the product as descibed and not rip them off in any way.

Features of Ecommerce Websites

There is no standard definition of what an Ecommerce Website must have and each one differs based on the on what is being sold and how the company handles the orders but here is a list of some of the common features of this type of website:

• Homepage which can feature products that are on special or the store owner wants to promote.
• Navigation
• Search for customers to be able to find the product they want.
• Products Listing Pages where categories of products are displayed in a list with a small image and short description so shoppers can easily evaluate whether an item is what they are looking for.
• Product Detail Page that more fully describes a product.
• Product Reviews
• Security - the site should implement security features to ensure a shopper that they are not getting defrauded and that their credit card informatoin is safe.
• Shopping Cart
• Customer Account Pages where customers can track their orders and get other information about thier accounts.

The above is by no means comprehensive.  The first step in designing an Ecommerce Website is define the goals and purposes of thesite and then plan the information architecture and site map which will include determining the features, pages and sections of the Ecommerce Website.