When customers visit your e-commerce store, there’s a good chance they’re looking for something in particular. Whether it’s a square hardcover photobook, a photo calendar or a photo mug, if they can’t easily find it they’re not likely to buy it from you. Research shows that nearly 55 percent of online visitors spend fewer than 15 seconds on a website*, so you have to give them what they’re looking for quickly! Creating a logical structure for your e-commerce store filled with personalized photoproducts is a key to driving sales and creating a great shopping experience.
Let’s have a look at the example of photobooks. How to categorize them? There are 2 different approaches to setting a category:
1. By the template – the user enters the store and selects the template at the beginning. Afterward, they select features, like book type or size.
2. By the type of the book – the user chooses the book type and size at the beginning, to know the price, and afterward chooses a template.
There are advantages and disadvantages to these two approaches.
1. Setting a category by the template
Advantages
When looking for photobooks, users usually enter keywords in search engines related to the content of a book, for example wedding photobook or travel photobook. If we are using such categorization in our shop – there is a great chance that users will directly enter our product pages. We put the emphasis on the purpose of the book, not its parameters, such as size, cover option or binding.
Disadvantages
The price in your e-commerce store must assume some basic data because the choice of the size of the book, number of pages, or the type of cover are associated with a variable value of the final article. This calculation after the creation of the product must be very clear to your customers, so they aren’t surprised by the final price in the basket.
2. Setting a category by the type of the book
Advantages
The price in your e-commerce store is generated automatically when choosing an option for a photobook – your customers know exactly what they pay for. This option works well when we have a small selection of sizes and covers and the template is only an addition. The main emphasis is put on the parameters of a book, not on its purpose.
Disadvantages
The customer has to choose what he wants, but sometimes he won’t know exactly what that is. Changing his mind will cause project abandonment, without the possibility of returning to it. This solution requires an exact explanation of the differences between books. This is troublesome when one company produces a plethora of different covers and sizes, because then the choice becomes difficult. Example: three kinds of sizes multiplied by four types of cover options (hard, soft, leather, fabric) in several colors. All combinations should be displayed at the beginning, and then there is only one choice left – a theme.
Is there an alternative? Can these two alternatives coexist? Yes, they can, but this is the most difficult solution.
If I want to order a photobook. I always know what kind of a photobook it will be whether it be travel, wedding, for children, etc. I would be browsing by theme. That’s what I would do with a store front if I wanted to see what sort of products you have and if your offers match my needs. I prefer to search like this, but this is only one of the many ways to categorize products in your shop. Almost every solution is ok as long as the choices aren’t overwhelming.
It might seem like a small thing, but my ultimate advice for you is: the fewer clicks before your customer will find what he/she is looking for, the better.
PS. Read more about dedicated photobook software that can help you boost the conversion in your online store.
* blog.hubspot.com/marketing/chartbeat-website-engagement-data-nj
Katarzyna Michałowska
Reader. Writer. Communicator. PR & Marketing Specialist at Printbox. Learning from only the best and writing killer copy.
