Volume 43 - Best Practices for Mobile Retail Sites, Part 2 - August 2010

In last month’s newsletter article we acknowledged the increasing interest in using mobile phones to shop for products, check for product availability, compare prices, and read customer reviews. We conducted an internal competitive test with ten Smartphone users in our lab here in Irving, Texas to find out what the user experience was when it came to mobile ecommerce websites. For testing purposes, we had each user complete a set of tasks using an iPhone.

Last month we focused on effective Homepage presentation, navigational browsing and category browsing. This month provides a look at mobile website search functionality, and product listing and detail pages.

Search

Provide a prominent and persistent Search feature at the top of the page.
From the Homepage, some of the users started to look for a specific item of clothing by using the Search feature. Users were easily able to locate this option when it was located at the top of the page, which is where they expected it due to the standard placement on PC sites in the top right corner of most sites. Users also appreciated when the Search feature appeared at the top of each subsequent page because this made it easy for them to locate and use the search field when they did not find the product(s) they were looking for. On those sites where it did not appear at the top, users struggled or could not locate this option and felt forced to browse by category.

       Fig 1: Amazon                 Fig 2: American Eagle (AE)

The Search feature on Amazon’s mobile site was placed at the top of the page and was easily located by users as viewed in Figure 1. However, the AE mobile site, Figure 2, had an advertisement at the top of the page which occupied a large amount of space and consequently pushed the Search function below the page fold, where most users overlooked it.

Search Results

Provide users with the ability to narrow their search results and ensure internal search engines are optimized the same as your PC site.
When searching mobile sites, users tended to enter much shorter search terms due to the following factors:

• The keyboard is less functional. Users are often in a hurry when they are using mobile websites.
• The screen is smaller which renders the search field area smaller; the smaller the perceived area to type in, the fewer characters are used.

As a result, users often generate a large number of results, which can be overwhelming or require too much time for users to browse. For instance, when searching for the term ‘black dress shoes’, Sears returned 32,000 results and Amazon returned ‘10+’ pages, with no indication of the total number of pages. Whereas they would click through a bigger list on a computer; in a mobile environment, they are less likely to do this.

Fig. 3: Overstock.com

Users appreciated the ability to refine their search results on Overstock.com. The ‘Refine’ button (Figure 3) allowed users to choose characteristics to filter their search results down to an amount which was not overwhelming.

                Fig. 4:                                               Fig. 5:
Urban Outfitters Mobile Site             Urban Outfitters Full Site

Additionally, the search results on a mobile site tended to be less relevant than those provided on the traditional website. For instance, a search for ‘black dress shoes’ on Urban Outfitters’ mobile site returned results for black dresses (Figure 4) while the same search on the PC website returned results for shoes (Figure 5).

Results Listing Page

-- Pricing
Show the price for each item and if it is on sale, include how much you will save by purchasing this product.
Pricing information proved to be one of the most influential factors when users were viewing product information. They also appreciated seeing any savings they might incur by purchasing the item on a particular site; however, they did think it should take up more space than necessary, as was evident on the Sears mobile site (Figure 6).

Fig. 6: Sears

-- Product Description
Include a brief description and a picture of the product.
A brief description of the product on the search results page, often provided in the title, was sufficient for users to determine if the product would meet their needs. Users found information about material, manufacturer, and style the most helpful.

-- Product Ratings
Display customer ratings as well as the number of ratings.
Users indicted they often relied on product ratings when making a purchasing decision and they were more likely to buy products with a higher rating. As with a traditional website, the more ratings which were available, the more weight the ratings carried.

-- Product Availability
Inform users of the methods which they can use to purchase the product.
Users appreciated sites which indicated which products were ‘In Stock’, available online only, available in the store or available both in the store and online.

Product Detail Page

Provide users with short, succinct Product Detail page with the following information and options appearing above the page fold:

• Product Description
• Ability to select size, color, quantity, etc
• Reviews
• ‘Add to Cart’ button

Additionally, provide users with multiple product images so they can view products from all sides.
Users often overlooked key elements of the page when viewing Product Detail pages that required scrolling through multiple screens or unreasonably separated different elements of the checkout process (Ex. ‘Quantity’ drop down above the page fold and ‘Add to Cart’ three screens down, separated by promotional offerings). Users often overlooked product descriptions, user ratings or the ability to modify color, quantity, or size when pages required extensive scrolling.

Fig. 7: Overstock.com

When the ‘Product Description’ link was located above the page fold as is shown in Figure 7 above, it was noticed by users more often which resulted in them exploring the information provided.

Fig. 8: Target.com

Users also stated the need to view multiple, detailed images of the product they were interested in purchasing or browsing. Users indicated if that seeing all unique angles of a product, as well as getting a good detailed view of the fabric was essential when browsing or purchasing products online. Additionally, this was their experience from using a full site. Target’s mobile site provided users with this option (Figure 8).

The information provided in this and last month’s article was part of our Webinette series and was presented in April. If you would like to find out about our upcoming presentations, please visit our website.

- Lorie Whitaker, Usability Analyst