If you sell products online via an ecommerce website, one of the biggest challenges you'll face is convincing new users to take the plunge and buy from you for the very first time. It's common for e-shoppers (particularly those who are accustomed to huge online stores like Amazon and eBay) to be a little uncertain when using an ecommerce website that they've only just discovered; at this early stage, they probably have no idea whether or not you're able to provide a satisfactory service, and more cautious users may even worry that your online payment system isn't secure enough.

For this reason, establishing trust should be a key priority for any ecommerce website owner. If you don't do a good job of presenting yourself as a reliable and trustworthy retailer, the people who stumble upon your website may be very reluctant to actually purchase anything.

But what's the best way to earn customer trust? Here are a few quick tips for helping customers to feel confident when using your ecommerce website:

Use reviews to demonstrate your reliability.

One of the most popular ways to instil confidence in online consumers is to show them reviews from people who bought the same item(s) from the same website in the past.

 

Most ecommerce websites allow users to leave reviews, usually in the form of a star rating (one to five) and a few comments about the purchasing experience. If you want to do something a bit more in-depth, you could go further and allow users to rate different aspects of your service separately, like this:

 

 

However you choose to present them, populating your product pages with reviews from previous customers will really help new customers to feel less like they're venturing into the unknown.

 

Of course, the one drawback of this system is the possibility that customers might leave negative reviews, thus potentially making newcomers even more reluctant to purchase anything from your website. Fortunately, there are a few different ways to combat this problem. Some websites allow sellers to post public responses to customer reviews, meaning that anyone on the receiving end of a one-star rating has the opportunity to explain what happened and possibly redeem themselves in the eyes of future visitors. Alternatively, you might consider implementing a review moderation system that allows you to decide which reviews actually get published on your website (this is a good way to prevent people from posting abuse or lying about your company).

 

Still, if you provide a satisfactory service, you can probably depend on your customers to be kind in their reviews. And even if you do occasionally receive unflattering feedback, your site will probably still look more appealing to new customers than if you had no reviews whatsoever; a site with fifty positive reviews and five negative reviews will generally be seen as a better bet than a site offering no information at all on the experiences of previous customers.

Choose a trusted, well-known payment system.

For most of us, buying something online is now just as humdrum and as commonplace an activity as popping to the corner shop for some milk, and yet we're still very careful about giving away our financial information online. We're right to be cautions, of course - in 2014, fraud losses on UK-issued cards totalled roughly £479 million - but that caution can be hugely problematic for honest ecommerce retailers who need people to have faith in the concept of online payment.

 

The most straightforward way to convince customers that your checkout is secure? Use a well-known payment gateway like Sage Pay or PayPal. People tend to recognise names like these (in the case of PayPal, they may even have an account already set up), and this will help them to feel at ease when they're entering their card details on your website.

 

If you decide to use a different payment gateway, be sure to do your homework first. Find out whether or not the payment provider is trustworthy and reliable, and make absolutely sure that payments will be handled over a secure connection (HTTPS). 

 

Show the human face of your business.

There are many reasons why consumers are generally more comfortable spending money in brick-and-mortar shops than on ecommerce websites, but one big reason is the lack of human faces. When you buy a book from your local Waterstones, the payment is handled by the person behind the till; they answer to a supervisor or manager, who in turn answers to someone at head office. There's a sense of accountability that's often absent when purchasing online, where it's easy to feel like you're buying from a machine with no human oversight.

 

Happily, this feeling is easy to dispel. It's a good idea to a 'Meet the Team' page to your website (here's ours) in order to introduce your customers to the people behind the machine; if you've got time, you may also want to consider sharing some photos from around the office on your blog and/or social media accounts.

 

 

 

This is a great way to demonstrate that your online business is every bit as 'alive' as any high street shop, and that there are real people dealing with each order and reading each email.

Ensure that your website is functional and modern-looking.

A visitor's trust in your website will erode very quickly if they're encountering problems like these as they navigate the buying process:

• Broken links that lead to 404 error pages
• Pages that load slowly...or not at all!
• Non-intuitive navigation (i.e. you've made it difficult for the user to find what they're looking for)
• Missing (or low-quality) images
• Poorly-written site copy that's rife with spelling/grammar mistakes

If you're raising any of these red flags, it will massively affect consumer confidence - after all, if you've made mistakes on your website, what's to say that you won't make mistakes with the orders you ship?

 

On a related note, it's important for any serious ecommerce retailer to invest in a clean, modern-looking website design. Your website is your shop floor, and if you don't make it look appealing, people will be markedly less inclined to stay and browse. This isn't just an aesthetic issue, either; a poor-quality design can be difficult to navigate, and if it looks particularly outdated, people may even get the impression that you're no longer in operation - they might think you've abandoned your online store entirely and moved on to pastures new, leaving the site to gather dust in some forgotten corner of the Internet.

 

We'd also recommend opting for a responsive website design, as this will provide mobile and tablet users with a far better purchasing experience. Millions of people now regularly use portable devices to shop online, so you're potentially missing out on a big chunk of the market if you stick with a non-responsive design.

Make yourself easy to contact.

Nobody's perfect, and even the best companies make occasional mistakes. It would be fantastic if you could eliminate all issues within your business, but in the first instance, it's more important to ensure that customers can easily report and resolve their issues when they arise.

 

So here's what you need to do: list your company's contact details PROMINENTLY on your website (e.g. in the site header, or on a contact page that's linked from the main site menu) and make sure that those contact details are up to date and active. You should ideally list as many different contact methods as possible; some people will want to send you an email, while others may prefer to speak on the phone. You might also consider listing office opening times, in case anyone is expecting you to answer the phone at 8pm on a Saturday.

 

Offering a live chat option is another great way to be there for your customers, but don't make this commitment unless you're actually prepared to answer all the chat messages that come through!

In summary...

In the lead up to Black Friday and Cyber Monday, Sage Pay released some interesting statistics and information concerning the way in which consumers would be shopping this year, highlighting the psychological motivations which urge people to buy into the frenzied purchase of Christmas bargains.  In collaboration with Professor Vince Mitchell and psychologist Dr Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, they gave us an interesting insight into the psychological reasoning behind the spending habits of the British public, a few of which we will discuss in further detail below:

Fear of Missing Out: Triggering Primal Impulses

With Sage predicting £1.7 billion to be spent this year, it’s clear that the increase in Christmas sales is not simply due to the fact that everyone’s feeling a little more charitable during the festive season. ‘Fear of Missing Out’ is an important factor in urging people to part with their money in cases where they would normally abstain from buying, which plays on our primal hunter-gatherer instinct to prioritize our survival of over that of others. While the conscious, logical mind knows that the prospect of getting a brand new television over the next person is far from being a life or death situation, 39% of shoppers said that the concept of getting the best deal was what urged them to buy. Consequently, 60% of shoppers admitted that they later regretted buying a bargain due to lack of need or use for the product, which demonstrates just how easy it is to play on people’s instincts in order to override the voice of reason which would usually prevent them from taking action.

Types of Customers: Why One Size Doesn’t Fit All

While there are some shared instincts inbuilt into every human, there are also many individual personality traits which retailers should consider in order to target certain types of shoppers. Dr Chamorro-Premusic split these into a list of categories, which highlight the recognizable characteristics presented by certain types of spenders:

• The Hyper-Maximisers: Have a detached relationship with their money, spending it on things they need rather than want. Furthermore, they put a great deal of energy into finding the best deal and being careful with their money.
  
  
• Old School Savers: Careful with their money and unlikely to splash out, they are put at a disadvantage by their slow adoption of technology.
  
  
• Old School Spenders: Impulsive and carefree with money, focusing more on the short-term than the long-term. They are more likely to pay in cash.
  
  
• Click and Collectors: More likely to spend on utilitarian needs rather than hedonistic wants, although such purchases are not typically price-sensitive. More likely to use technology for convenience rather than saving money.
  
  
• Carefree Clickers: Use technology in their purchases for the experience’s sake rather than to save money, and are more likely to splash out on a treat than on essentials.
  
  
• Cash Flashers: less likely to go cashless; their relationship with the cash they spend is both conspicuous and carefree.
  
  
• Sanctioned Indulgers: Members of this group are careful with their money, but tend to spend it on indulgences and associate it with emotional benefits. They are not particularly open to new financial technologies.
  
  
• Hunter-Gatherers: Risk-averse savers and budgeters who use the latest gadgets to help them in this quest. They are likely to enjoy this process of hunting for bargains and use technology to save money.

Online Ease: Why Cyber Monday is Likely to Outperform Black Friday

With Sage predicting £828 million to be spent on Cyber Monday this year, it’s interesting to consider how the popularity of online shopping could cause the in-store Black Friday deals to become somewhat obsolete. Apparently 71% of us prefer shopping online simply out of convenience, but it also seems to be an environment in which we are more willing to make larger purchases and spend impulsively. 43% of UK shoppers said they experienced feelings of guilt when handing over cash; a process which is eliminated by the ease of online transactions. Professor Mitchell noted that “in the online world, the reality of things such as money can get distorted, removing the guilt we associate with face-to-face spending”. With many of the negative experiences associated with in-store shopping removed, it is hardly surprising that online sales are progressively out-performing those seen on the high street.

In conclusion, Sage noted that while the Christmas shopping scramble is an important time for retailers, they should also remember to consider long term loyalty when targeting their customers. While impulse inspiring deals can prove to be profitable short-term, a universal model won’t keep customers coming back. Retailers should be catering to different types of customers by selling and promoting in different ways, in order to alleviate feelings of remorse and secure a sense of loyalty. Business should also keep in mind their capabilities and resources before attempting to keep up with larger corporations, in order to ensure that any action taken is good for their business as opposed to being detrimental to their reputation.

All information provided by http://www.sagepay.co.uk/ 

Twitter: https://twitter.com/sageuk

4 ecommerce optimisation tips for online retailers

Every page should have its own unique title tag.

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The recommended maximum length for a title tag is just 55 characters, so the meta description is a good way to go into greater detail about the page you're optimising.

1. Target multiple audiences