A good user experience (UX) is critical for ecommerce apps. Research shows that around 70% of online shopping carts are abandoned before checkout. This often happens because the app is hard to use or looks confusing. When shopping on a phone, people don’t want to struggle. They will quickly leave if an app doesn’t work well.
So, it is important to focus on the UX and UI of your e-commerce mobile apps. This post will share 5 key principles to make e-commerce apps better at getting sales. Following these tips can boost how much people buy and keep them coming back. Whether starting from scratch or improving what exists already, using these strategies will prepare your business for the future.
If you are looking for a reliable e-commerce app development partner, Progressive UX should be at the top of your list. They provide exceptional e-commerce app development services for your business. They have helped major companies and small businesses design apps their customers love to use. Using customer research and app data, they create simple, fast apps that drive more sales and give the best user experience.
What is UX and UI?
UX (user experience) design is about creating products that provide meaningful and relevant experiences to users. UX designers consider things like user needs, tasks, functionality, and usability. The goal is to design intuitive, easy-to-use experiences or mobile apps for e-commerce.
UI (user interface) design is about how the app or website looks and feels. UI designers determine layout, interaction, branding, and visual design, such as colors, typography, images, and icons. They bring the UX to life visually.
Together, UX and UI design ensure that apps are simple and delightful to use. UX ensures apps solve the correct problems, while UI ensures those solutions are aesthetically pleasing and user-friendly.
Many companies are providing outstanding e-commerce app development services. You can contact one of the best companies, Progressive UX, for your next app development project.
How Does a UX/UI Make E-commerce App Development Better?
Shopping used to mean purchasing necessary items. But now, it aims to be a pleasurable activity. People aren’t just buying products – they’re treating themselves to the enjoyment of discovery, exploration, and fulfillment that an app can enable.
A great shopping experience is effortless and engaging. It removes friction from tasks like browsing, searching, or checking out. Users can fluidly interact at their own pace through intuitive and logical organization and well-made interfaces. Quick load times keep the fun flowing without waits that disrupt the mindset.
Customization and personalization also boost enjoyment. Remembering account preferences, shopping histories, or preferred stores means shoppers constantly receive tailored and relevant content without repeating themselves. This one-to-one interaction fosters connection and satisfaction that retain loyalty.
Top 5 UX/UI Design Principles for E-commerce App Development
E-commerce apps must offer excellent user experiences and user interfaces to thrive. This involves thoughtful design that puts people first. Following key principles guides building shopping apps customers truly enjoy.
The most significant factor in an app’s success is providing a high-quality user experience. Users will quickly abandon an app if it is difficult, frustrating, or time-consuming to use. Good UX design focuses on understanding user needs and ensuring the app addresses them intuitively and streamlined.
Here are the top five essential UX/UI principles to implement in your mobile apps for e-commerce. With a user-centered process, each principle unites to form remarkable mobile e-commerce experiences.
UX/UI Principle 1: Make it Easy to Use
Usability is one of the most crucial aspects of app design. Users always want to easily navigate an interface and complete their desired tasks without frustration. If an app feels unintuitive or unclear, people will quickly become overwhelmed or confused and abandon the experience altogether.
That’s why simplicity and clarity are so important. Menus, buttons, fields – all elements must be logically organized and appropriately labeled. Context should be continuously provided to orient users. Nothing extra should be included that doesn’t directly support the core functions.
Usability testing helps identify points of friction to streamline the app. With an intentionally designed experience that puts users first, people can easily accomplish their goals within the app.
Example to Understand it Better
Take the Amazon mobile app as an example. As the largest online retailer, Amazon set the standard for shopping apps with features like one-click checkout, personalized recommendations, exclusive deals, and Prime benefits.
The Amazon mobile app for e-commerce makes it extremely easy to shop through intuitive navigation and clear labels. Product pages have large click targets, easy-to-read reviews, and one-click purchase buttons. This usability allows customers to fluidly browse options and checkout with minimal taps. Studies have found that Amazon’s interface reduces cart abandonment compared to competitors.
Problems that Hurt Usability
Some common usability issues include unclear navigation, small buttons that are tough to tap, and confusing labels or instructions. Form fields should be obvious and filled out correctly, and the workflow should be logical from one page to the next.
Tips for Good Usability
- Use consistent layouts so people know where to look
- Include placeholder text or hints to guide users
- Add progress indicators so people know their place
- Test with real people to see what’s unclear
UX/UI Principle 2: Keep it Simple
Designing for mobile brings unique challenges due to limited screen space and contexts of on-the-go usage. Users interacting with apps on their phones have very short attention spans and aren’t looking for complications.
They want the experience to be easy. That’s why simplicity is so vital for mobile app design. Extra details or lengthy multi-step processes need to be stripped away to avoid frustrating users and causing them to abandon the experience prematurely. The focus should be distilling each screen and feature down to only the most essential elements required to support the core task at hand.
Clutter and complexity are the enemy when people only have moments before their attention shifts. Simplicity keeps the experience streamlined, and users engaged.
Example to Understand it Better
For instance, Target’s mobile app for e-commerce keeps the shopping experience simple and focused. Product pages display only the most important details like size, color, price, and buy options without distractions. This pure design allows shoppers to make quick purchase decisions. Target reported a massive decrease in bounce rates after streamlining their mobile experience.
Areas to Simplify
Product pages often include too much text or unnecessary options. Checkout should collect a few critical bits of shipping info. Account screens sometimes ask for more personal data than needed.
Ideas for Simplicity
- Use large tappable targets instead of small boxes
- Limit fields on forms to name, email, password
- Remove non-essential steps like registration for guest checkout
UX/UI Principle 3: Organization Matters
Information architecture provides the logical framework for any experience, both digital and physical. In the context of e-commerce app development, it involves categorizing content and features into groupings that users can easily comprehend.
Through proper labeling, classification, and overall organizational structure, information architecture in e-commerce app development aims to lessen confusion by transparently conveying how different elements relate to each other.
This approach allows users to understand the e-commerce app development experience as a whole and intuitively find what they need within it. For e-commerce apps, clear information architecture is key to navigability.
In e-commerce app development, information architecture provides the context that orients users and streamlines their ability to complete tasks through a rational framework they can grasp immediately. This helps users feel in control rather than bewildered by the lack of structure in the e-commerce app development process.
Example to Understand it Better
Given the example of the Sephora mobile app for e-commerce. Sephora organized its vast selection of beauty products into logical categories like skin, hair, and makeup that match how real customers think. Intuitive filters and explore functionality help people discover new favorites. Their customer-centric IA contributed to Sephora doubling mobile sales in just one year.
Problems with Bad Organization
Incoherent menus, unclear headers, and inconsistent naming breed frustration for shoppers. Without clear signposts, they might feel lost. Duplication or lack of distinction between similar items further makes things confusing for the buyers.
Tips for Good Organization
- Map categories, sections, and their relationships clearly
- Use affordances like folder icons to denote containers
- Provide a site map to reference at any point
- Audit regularly for alignment with customer language
UX/UI Principle 4: Consistency is Key
Consistency provides predictability that makes using an app much simpler and more intuitive. When visual elements like buttons, typography, and interactive behaviors are applied uniformly throughout the experience, users don’t need to relearn each new screen.
They can leverage their existing knowledge gained from prior contexts. This transfers to quicker understanding and navigation.
Consistency also aids e-commerce app development workflows. Reusable components abstracted into style guides, and design systems enable swifter updates by reducing redundant work. Changes can roll out across the entire app simultaneously.
Overall, consistency provides a cohesiveness that ties different sections into a single logical experience for users and developers.
Example to Understand it Better
For example, with a unified design system, Walmart’s mobile app for e-commerce maintains brand familiarity across different store departments that are accessible from their app. Components like menus, buttons, and typography feel the same on every page. This consistency improved the shopping flow for customers on Walmart+, building loyalty through usability and recognition.
Examples of a Design System
Common components include buttons, typography styles, and color schemes. Responsive layout patterns keep the experience stable on varied screen sizes. Brand guidelines establish a cohesive look and feel.
Tips for Implementation
- Version components, templates, and styles in git/code
- Use a living style guide for easy reference
- Build modularly to swap components freely
- Collaborate easily through shareable design libraries
UX/UI Principle 5: Make it Fast
Slow load times and laggy responsiveness cannot be tolerated. Users have little patience for delays and won’t wait for more than a few seconds before abandoning an app altogether. Performance impacts both the user experience and perception of the brand.
Apps that feel sluggish or have ponderous interactions will immediately seem unprofessional and negatively reflect on the company behind the interface. Users want mobile apps for e-commerce to feel fast-loading, snappy, and lightweight on their devices.
Optimizing for speed through techniques like component caching, lazy loading, and image compression is essential. It ensures users enjoy a smooth experience without impediments that could hinder conversions or damage the user’s trust in the brand. Fast performance delivers a high-quality initial impression.
Example to Understand it Better
Let’s take the example of the popular The Wish mobile app for e-commerce. It maximizes speed, a top priority for its users seeking insane deals. Browsing products loads in a flash as lightweight images stream endlessly. Simple product pages reveal key details briefly without delay.
Users face minimal friction, adding tempting impulse buys to their carts in seconds. Checkout is just as rapid, ensuring the thrill of the hunt and steal isn’t ruined by poky aesthetics bloated with excess. Wish recognizes speed, maintains momentum in shoppers, and keeps them absorbed in the thrill.
Common Performance Issues
Big or blurry pictures drag apps down. Long lines of computer code also bog apps down. Websites that host apps can cause delays in getting info. Caching reuses info already loaded, so it’s quicker next time. But bad caching means redundant slowdowns.
Test and Improve Performance
- Audit with Lighthouse and similar tools
- Optimize images, videos, and assets
- Prioritize rendering core content first
- Implement efficient caching strategies
Why It’s Important to Follow These Principles?
Following fundamental UX/UI design principles is crucial for creating successful and enjoyable mobile apps for e-commerce. These principles have been developed based on years of research into how people navigate and interact with technology.
They ensure designs are intuitive and optimized for usability. If principles like simplicity, clarity, and consistency are not at the top of the mind, products run the risk of confusing and frustrating users. This leads to abandonment and lost revenue opportunities.
Users now have higher expectations of how easy solutions should be to use. Not adhering to principles spells wasted time and effort for both designers and users alike. It also impacts a brand’s reputation if its solutions feel poorly crafted. Sticking to best practices allows focusing design efforts on true user needs rather than non-essential facts.
Principles provide direction to prioritize the right user experience goals from the beginning. They guide the building of engaging, delightful products that retain and attract more users in the long run. Following principles is key to developing solutions people find genuinely pleasing to use.
FAQs:
1. What is e-commerce app development?
E-commerce app development is the development process of a mobile application with the specific intent to support online buying as well as transactions. It mainly focuses on providing a seamless shopping experience, integrating payment gateways, and offering features that enhance user engagement and sales.
2. Why do I need e-commerce app development for my business?
The importance of the development of an e-commerce app is that it enables your business to reach customers directly through their mobile devices and makes the process of shopping pretty convenient. They enhance sales, engagement, and personalized promotions and notifications.
3. How much does e-commerce app development cost?
The cost to develop an e-commerce app will vary greatly, depending on complexity, the number of features, and different requirements for design. Such options of platforms, integration needs, and custom functionality will have an impact on the final cost, which may range from a few thousand to several tens of thousands of dollars.
4. How long does it take to develop an e-commerce app?
Generally, the timeline to build an e-commerce app depends on the complexity, features, and design of the app. Nevertheless, it could take anywhere from 3 to 6 months to get a fully functional e-commerce app. It takes more time if you add the time for testing and optimization.
5. What are some of the most important features that should be included in an e-commerce app?
These key features for e-commerce app development would include easy navigation, secure gateways for payment, product search along with filtering, user reviews, ratings, push notifications, and even inventory/order management system integrations. These are the features that make the shopping experience all the more enjoyable and drive user satisfaction.
Conclusion
The 5 principles shared help make shopping apps better. Things like easy use, simplicity, and speed matter. Customers will leave fast if an app is confusing or slow.
Following these tips improves the experience for people. It helps them shop quickly without frustrations. Good design keeps people on an app, not makes them exit. Consistency and organization additionally aid customers. They know what to expect from page to page.
A design method ensures all these good tactics stay over time. Updates happen smoothly through reusable parts. Performance must never be ignored, too. Speedy apps indicate a quality product and company. Addressing each area maximizes an app’s ability to attract and retain buyers.
Feel free to get in touch with Progressive UX for your e-commerce app development project if you want help applying these rules or have other questions.
