Why do we visit the shopping sites we do, and what keeps us coming back to them?

When you are looking online to purchase an item the first thing everyone does is go to the likes of Amazon.co.uk or the first site that usually comes up when you google whatever product you are after.
So what keeps us coming back to those sites to make future purchases? Is it the good prices? The layout? Or even the loading time of the pages?

Speed Of Site 

Studies show that 53% of mobile site visits are abandoned if a page takes 3 seconds to load, this means that if any site is having a hard time loading, the shopper or viewer is more than likely to just close it down right away an additional study was taken to show the difference between sites that loaded in around 5 seconds compare to those that took as long as 19; Sites that load in 5 seconds or less averaged around an extra 70% longer session spent on the site as well as 25% higher ad view-ability meaning more ad revenue for these sites.

Design

The design of a website can be something that draws in customers simply because its easier to follow and the colour scheme is more aesthetically pleasing than another, for example if you look at the website for Apple.com it is very smooth and easy on eyes. "People don't care about your branding users that already knew what they wanted to buy didn't look at the branding elements of the page hardly at all, including the company logo. "Users ignore a lot of the branding on these pages," said EyeQuant's CEO Fabian Stelzer. Meaning that the consumer is more likely looking for an item that suits the purpose of their online shopping need.

Things To Avoid When Creating An Online Store:

When you are creating an online store the things you should avoid are pretty simple, you need to well.. keep it simple and not over complicate the shoppers experience as well as having an easy to use navigation system or filters in place for the buyer to use. You should also avoid having too many ads on your site, this can cause a negative experience on the site for the user and they will avoid it in the future if a paywall system is set up or if they are bombarded constantly with every other click.

Key Ingredients To Creating A Good Online Store:

When it comes to creating an online store that will actually be successful these are some points you should keep in mind.

• Ease of use
• Load time of webpages
• Mobile compatibility
• Product design and the colour scheme
• Ad placement
• Filters/Categorisation 

Three sites that got it right

Ebay.co.uk - Everyone knows about Ebay and its easy to use navigation and all round user friendly site, it has a great search function as well as many filters to help you find what you need. As well as having a customer feedback score which lets you know more about the person you are potentially buying an item from.

Amazon.co.uk - Amazon is without a doubt one of the most successful companies in the world today. A key part to the success of the company is that of the availability and wide variety of items you can purchase on the site, customer reviews accessible with a touch of a button as well as being able to track your delivery and even the refund policy they have in place making every purchase a little more secure.

Apple.com - Apple are one of the biggest brands in the world, they are one of, if not the most popular company in the world for phones. The layout of the Apple website is very well laid out in a way that you can just glace through it and still find where you need to be, it has very easy navigation as well as a very slick design overall making the shopping experience more enjoyable.

Overall there is a lot to take in when thinking about creating an online store and there is always something to improve even the best of sites out there. Everyone has something that they would personally do different on their own site but is up to you to choose how you want to lay it out and set out to attract the customers accordingly.