The Ways in which Three E-Commerce Websites Provide their Goods to the Consumer - Example

The purpose of this analysis is to compare the ways in which three e-commerce websites (1SaleADay.com, BensOutlet.com, and TigerDirect.com) provide their goods to the consumer. This will be achieved by measuring the following 8 specific metrics: website functionality, website information, ease of use, redundancy, purchase process, browser functionality, graphics simplicity, text legibility. Lastly, 1SaleADay.com’s checkout process will be analyzed and reported on. Part I: 1SaleADay.com 1SaleADay.com specializes in offerings in the following sectors: technical instrumentation, family/household items, watches, jewelry, and flash sales. Flash sales are time sensitive/low inventory items that are offered at deep discounts as a way to bring customers to the site to see if there are flash sales posted they may be interested in. Website Functionality In this aspect, 1SaleADay.com’s website has little to improve upon. Due to its limited product offerings and its simple yet extremely effective 6 tab approach (Figure 1.0), the website offers simple navigation at the expense of wider range of product offerings. Figure 1.0 Informational Links Because the product offerings are so limited, there is not very much information that can be transmitted to the user concerning other product offerings that the website has that might also fulfill the needs of the customer. Additionally, there is one tangential problem and that is the way in which the products are actually described to the customer. Instead of using stock descriptions, i.e. copying and pasting the marketing language from the original package, 1SaleADay.com instead chooses to write its own product description for the product. This choice detracts greatly from the legitimacy of the website as well as the product itself as the product descriptions are poorly and unprofessionally written. Ease of Use Firstly, because 1SaleADay.com does not offer a broad range of products they are able to simplify their product offerings without needing to go into a complicated listing of drop down menus. Instead, the website is able to market the given product range in easy to navigate and visually appealing tab system. As such, the consumer feels familiarity with the site and comfortable with navigation, even if it is their first time navigating. Redundant Navigation The page does not offer redundant navigation. This would be an issue with a larger website that offered a plethora of goods and services; however, as is the case with 1SaleADay.com, they only offer four different genres of sales. Ease of Purchase One of the largest barriers to e-commerce is a website that requires customers to jump through layer after layer of hoops in order to complete a transaction. Confirming payment details, accessing an outside payment transfer service, confirming payment intention and terms are all steps that detract from the ease of purchase. As such, it is vitally important that a website offer a hassle free way of quickly paying for the goods the customer wishes to purchase. 1SaleADay.com falls short in this respect as it has too many impediments in the way of a fast and easy transaction. This shortcoming will be discussed in greater detail in Part IV of this analysis. Multi-Browser Functionality Whereas some e-commerce websites focus on IE, Firefox, and Chrome (i.e. the most widely used web browsers), 1SaleADay.com has gone a step further to ensure full functionality with mobile version as well as functionality in lesser used browsers such as Safari and Opera. Simplicity in Graphics The most distracting part of the website is the fact that the colour scheme does not seem to be connected. This takes away from the experience and something that could definitely stand to be corrected in any future iterations of website design; as too many bright graphics distract the user from the overall experience and can be agitating to deal with. Legibility of Text Upon analysis of text legibility of 1SaleADay.com’s website, there were no issues found. Additionally, this factor usually becomes an issue with the aforementioned browser compatibility. However, because 1SaleADay.com was compatible with all browsers tested, no issues were found. Recommendations: Firstly, the colour scheme should be changed to something less busy and distracting. Additionally, the marketing language used detracts from the product and should be re-written. 1SaleADay.com should also strongly consider reducing the number of steps and length of check out process. This lengthy checkout process will be discussed in greater length in Part IV of this analysis. Part II: BensOutlet.com Website Functionality “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication” or so the saying goes; nevertheless, it is an ideology that BensOutlet.com has fully embraced. The home page of BensOutlet.com even further simplifies the approach that sites such as 1SaleADay.com have taken. Upon entry into BensOutlet.com the customer is immediately greeted by all products offered (usually 80-100). These products are displayed in columns and rows. The only drawback to this type of product display is that it can be a bit overwhelming when so many products are available to the customer at one time. Informational Links Much like 1SaleADay.com, BensOutlet.com does not offer much if any further detail as to other product listings. This is due to the fact that the product listings are limited and usually sell out within a short period of time; therefore, having links of comparable products to the one that is currently being viewed by a customer is next to impossible. Ease of Use BensOutlet.com has an exceedingly simplistic and fool-proof user interface. Because items sell out rapidly and are replaced with new items, BensOutlet.com has a unique inventory availability graphic beside each item denoting stock levels. This serves several purposes, but most importantly it provides to the customer a sense of urgency for those items that are nearly sold out; thereby, generating further sales. Redundant Navigation The redundant navigation available to the user on BensOutlet.com is limited. In fact, the only redundancy that is exhibited in the site is the “Products” and “Home” tabs – both link to the same information. However, this lack of redundancy does not necessarily weaken the customer experience. In much the same way as 1SaleADay.com (albeit to a slightly lesser degree), BensOutlet.com does not require a high degree of redundancy due to the fact that the products are limited and displayed in a user friendly manner. Ease of Purchase Exhibiting a clear improvement over 1SaleADay.com, BensOutlet provides users with a faster 3 click check out experience. More importantly though, BensOutlet.com does not require its users to register unless they so choose. In this way, a hurdle is removed from the check out process and the headache of having to remember another username and password is cleared. Multi-Browser Functionality Like 1SaleADay.com, BensOutlet.com also offers browser functionality in all of the high traffic browsers as well as the lesser known browsers as well as mobile browsers; allowing customers on all platforms to adequately view, navigate, and make purchases. Simplicity of Graphics BensOutlet.com employs the columned product listing on a very simplistic yet elegant grey-scale background. This provides a welcomed visual break from the brightly coloured and gimmicks of other sites while at the same time drawing attention to the product that is being sold and not a gaudy background. Legibility of Text In the same vein, the simplicity of the product display as well as the excellent organization of the offerings lends all of the onsite text to be legible. This trait carries over to mobile devices as well. Recommendation: One of the only improvements that could be recommended would be to find a way to simplify the home page so that the user is not overwhelmed with 100 choices at once. This could be accomplished by breaking the product offerings into categories or offering different page links. Part III: TigerDirect.com TigerDirect is a website that specializes in the sale of assorted computer componentry and peripherals. As such, it has a very specific niche market it is appealing to; unlike the two websites which have already been discussed. Although TigerDirect offers very low prices and doubtless has a high revenue potential as it has been in business for over 10 years now, there are a multitude of things wrong with the customer experience. Website Functionality In short, the page works, loads quickly and makes an attempt to point the customer towards the product offerings; however, one is immediately distracted by the amount of data that reaches the eyes. Instead of providing a clean and precise segue onto the delineated offerings of the website, there is a full-on visual assault of nearly everything all at once. Informational Links With respect to the customer being able to easily find which product they are looking for – it is possible through either drop down menus or icons along the bottom of the website homepage. However, sandwiched between these are distracting banners and sales advertisements that are so bold as to be obnoxious (See Figure 2.0 (popup) and Figure 3.0 (homepage)). Altogether, there are six banners on the homepage. Figure 2.0 Figure 3.0 Ease of Use Again, due to the sheer mass of information greeting the customer upon first entering the site, the ease of use is diminished. However, with a little patience, the user can find a way navigate to the desired information. This is made possible mainly through the web sites fantastic redundancy. Redundant Navigation If TigerDirect fails the test when it comes to ease of use and/or ability to direct the customer to the product offering, it more than makes up for this deficiency in its overall redundancy. The TigerDirect homepage gives 3 different options for the user to navigate to their desired sub-category. If anything, this might be too confusing as the customer doubts themselves in the initials stages as to whether they are going about locating the desired information the correct way. Ease of Purchase Like BensOutlet.com, TigerDirect offers 3 click checkout with the PayPal option. However, if one does not select the PayPal option, there is no choice but to set up a TigerDirect account and proceed with the checkout from there; thus adding steps the process. Multi-Browser Functionality As with the other websites analyzed, TigerDirect offers full functionality with the most popular web browsers as well as the less popular ones tested (Opera and Safari). However, due to the overall complexity of the website, it is not amenable to display on mobile platforms. This fact alone is somewhat discouraging as the type of product the website specializes in is technology so it comes as a bit of surprise that they would not have taken the time to ensure that their website features well on handheld systems as well as desktops and laptops. Simple Graphics The graphics and sales banners are too much and greatly distract from the ability of a shopper to easily and quickly navigate to the item they are looking for. In addition to the multiplicity of banners on the homepage, there is the issue of the encoded popup that greats the user on first entrance into the homepage. This overuse of certain marketing tools has a negative effect on overall sales as it tends to aggravate the user. Legible Text In much the same way, the text of the website is legible; however, the ever present distractions of pop-ups, banners, and rapidly scrolling product specials greatly detracts from the user’s overall ability to digest whatever information they may be reading with regards to a specific product. In short, the distracting nature of the website adversely affects almost every aspect of the user experience. Recommendations: The banners must be toned down and reduced for the site to maintain legitimacy and not distract the prospective customer, Secondly, the scrolling advertisements change faster than the consumer can read and comprehend the text of the offer (less than every 5 seconds); this also must be rectified. Lastly, TigerDirect should implement a Guest Checkout option for those that do not wish to register for TigerDirect or use PayPal. Part IV: Checkout Experience – 1SaleADay.com Of the three website discussed, 1SaleADay.com could most greatly benefit from an improvement in its overall purchase process. Firstly, when a customer decides that he/she would like to purchase an item from the online store, they must click on the “Buy It Now” button. Then the user is sent to a sign in page which offers two sets of options: Sign in or Sign up. Presuming the user is not a guest and has used the site before, this leads the consumer to the next step. Surprisingly, once the user is logged in, rather than auto-populating the address and billing information from the website records, it requires that the customer manually input the information. At this point, the purchaser is doubtless frustrated at such a laborious process for something as simple as making an online purchase. Once the billing and shipping information has been populated, then the user must select button to proceed to a different page and from that page select the final order confirmation. All in all, this is a five step order process which is highly tedious. As such, this could easily be reduced by two, even three, steps should the website administrators so choose. Furthermore, it is the belief of this analysis that such a long and tedious order process doubtless frustrates users and most likely detracts from overall sales levels. Sites Referenced www.1SaleADay.com [Accessed July 20, 2012] www.BensOutlet.com [Accessed July 21, 2012] www.TigerDirect.com [Accessed July 21, 2012] Read More