Mobile Shopping Matters for Jewelry Brands
A hot-of-the-presses report titled “Adobe Analytics Holiday Forecast 2020” predicts that 42% of shopping will be done from smartphones this holiday season. Furthermore, the report states that “smartphone shopping dollars will grow by 55% YoY this season” and that “$28.1B more will be spent on smartphones this year”.
If your jewelry brand’s website isn’t optimized for an ideal mobile browsing and shopping experience, then you could potentially be missing out on critical sales. If your website is built on Shopify, then you’re likely ahead of the game, since many Shopify themes are fully responsive, meaning they adjust for any screen size or resolution. It may be too late in the year to completely overhaul your website, but you can make some small changes that will immediately improve the mobile experience. Keep reading for some top tips.
Increase Page Load Speed
Did you know that, as page load speed increases from one to three seconds, user bounce rate also increases by 32%? If the website visitor needs to wait one second too long for the page to load on a mobile device, that person will be more likely to abandon the page immediately. The difference between someone staying on your website and leaving can be the blink of an eye. To analyze the speed of your website, you’ll want to check out Google’s free tool: PageSpeed Insights. When you enter your URL into the tool, Google will provide you with a performance score and then make important recommendations about how to decrease load time. You’ll likely need a web developer to help you make these critical changes, but the updates may mean the difference between a sale and a lost customer.
Add a Sticky Search Bar
Can visitors to your website easily find the search bar? By implementing a “sticky” search bar at the top of your mobile ecommerce website, you can help customers find exactly what they’re seeking no matter where they are on your website. According to CXL, there’s a massive opportunity in site search optimization. Author Tommy Walker writes, “Due to the increased level of purchase intent from searchers, they’re known to convert up to 5–6x higher than the average non–site search visitor.”
People who are actively searching your website already know what they want; if you’re not making it easy for them to search, then they’ll just leave and search your competitors’ websites. This is especially true during the holiday season when people are more than likely shopping for specific gifts rather than browsing.
Optimize Your Images
Just because an image is optimized for desktop viewing doesn’t mean it will work as effectively for mobile shopping. Your photos are consuming a lot of bandwidth, and they need to load quickly – or you risk losing your customers. Optimal size for images will vary from one site to another, but you can work with an experienced web developer to understand how you can display the best-quality images at the smallest-possible size. A web developer can also help you understand the differences between various file formats – like .jpg vs. .png – and guide you through best practices for image compression.
Simplify Mobile Checkout
If your mobile checkout process is too complicated, then you’ll likely find that many of your mobile customers are abandoning their carts. First, you’ll want to make sure that you have both desktop and mobile versions of your checkout process. Keep your checkout forms short and sweet; the less information a customer has to enter at checkout, the more likely they’ll keep moving forward and actually click “Purchase”. You’ll also want to always give your customers the option to check out as a guest. If they need to register or create an account in order to make a purchase, they may decide it’s too much work and abandon their carts.
Buttons and Calls to Action
Did you know that your buttons and calls to action may be displaying differently on your mobile site? When buttons are too small, people may struggle to touch them on their smartphones. In addition, they may be completely missing the calls to action that are inviting them to shop, explore, and learn more. At the same time, you don’t want your buttons to be too big, or they’ll completely overtake the mobile experience, competing with your content and products.
Strategically using color on your mobile website and surrounding your buttons with white space can also help them stand out, so they’re easier to notice. Like with any calls to action, you’ll want to always use strong verbs to encourage the user to take action; however, on mobile, you may even want to add extra interest by mixing in colorful verbs like “Upgrade” and “Explore”.
Have you noticed that more of your sales are coming from mobile checkout this year? What have you done to optimize your mobile experience? Making some small changes and claiming some quick wins can boost your sales and keep your customers happy.
Links mentioned at the beginning of this episode:
“Ecommerce sales cross record $5 billion on Thanksgiving”
“Ten things I wish I knew when starting my Ecommerce business”