The main element to great usability for an web store is familiarity. People have already been buying goods online for decades now, they expect to view a certain process unfold when shopping on the internet, and when a designer makes radical departures from the status quo, tears may ensue (regardless of how good the designer's intentions may be). Does this mean a designer is locked into reproducing the same kind of shopping interface again and again? Definitely not, but conforming to certain standards is going to help the user.
This information analyzes the usability of components commonly found within most shopping website (e.g. the cart, the checkout process, etc). The idea isn't so much to be prescriptive and lay out hard and fast rules, but instead to explain what is going to be most familiar to shoppers. Creativity and deviation from typical is a good thing on line, otherwise things would get pretty boring. But being alert to the de facto standards on shopping websites allows you to make informed decisions when having a novel direction https://www.complasinternational.ie/.
The Login box - there is some variation in how shopping websites cope with user log ins. Some sites require that a person sign in before creating a purchase, whereas others enable guest accounts. The most obvious basics would have been a username and password field. The sole pitfall here would be labeling the username field 'Email' ;.'Username' could be the more ubiquitous label, it helps cut-down on possible confusion which could arise if there were say a newsletter subscription box near by.
A lot of the choices to be made through this interface element relate solely to naming; would you call it 'Register' or 'Sign-Up'?, in case you label your commit button 'Go' or 'Login'?, is the password recovery link called 'Password recovery' or 'Forgot your password?" ;.Whatever labels you decide on, you should favor brevity, generally nothing longer then three short words https://earsense.ie/.
Following a person logs in, there is a chance to reclaim some precious screen real-estate by removing UI elements which aren't needed anymore. Showing the shopper's name really helps to personalized the service and thus make it a little more friendly (nb. you could choose 'Welcome John Smith' in place of 'Logged in as: ...'). This really is also a great place showing the 'My Account' and 'Logout' links since both these functions are logically linked to the shopper's account.
Incidentally, a 'Logout' link is somewhat redundant since closing the browser window serves the same purpose (assuming the session has expired), but a logout feature may help alleviate any security-related concerns a shopper may have.
The item search mechanism - the textbox for product searching is pretty straight-forward, but product browsing can go in several directions.
This works great if the category hierarchy is flat, it saves space plus you realize the UI wont behave unexpectedly if the product list gets long. But what when you yourself have sub-categories (e.g. Fishing->Hooks, Fishing->Knives, Fishing->Bait, etc)? Sure you could utilize a dash to indicate a sub-category, nevertheless the drop-list option would start to reduce a number of its eloquence.
Categories and sub-categories could be treated the same as site navigation, which will be essentially what it is (i.e. product navigation). Common approaches are to utilize CSS fly-outs or in-place expanding panels (much like Windows Explorer) https://heelboy.com/.
As an added touch, I prefer to place a reset icon close to the search button. This lets an individual return the searching mechanism to its initial state without having to go all how you can the browser refresh button or press the F5 key.
The shopping basket - the structure of a shopping cart software is becoming fairly standardized these days. You've the product name with a hyperlink back to the full product description, the price tag on the in-patient product, and the number the shopper wants to buy.
I prefer to add a tiny bin icon so shoppers can very quickly remove items from their basket which they no longer want. You could also put in a sub-total at the end of the shopping cart software, but I don't think this is necessary since an individual will undoubtedly be shown a sub-total throughout the checkout stage.
Another feature which improves usability is feedback messages. It's important to let an individual know when something happens consequently of the interaction with the system, for instance; showing a quick message when a product is added or removed from their cart https://www.pro-demo.ca/.
The item details page - among the biggest decisions listed here is whether to really have a product listing page in addition to a detailed product description page. If you were just employing a listing page for products, you'd show short descriptions alongside each product. The choice would mean that a shopper must click a product's summary to be able to see its full details.
Generally I decide this based on how much information is going to be shown with a product. If it's only expected that a few lines can look for every product's description, then the product details page wont be needed. However, this could have significant SEO consequences since each product doesn't have it's own name come in the browser page title-bar. Maybe it's argued that the summary-on-listing page interface is more efficient in terms of usability since a shopper gets all the info they need with fewer clicks.
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