Converting Leads to Sales- or How to Wisely Design Filters for Your Online Store
Clay Shirky was presenting a very interesting issue at the Web 2.0 Expo in New York when he claimed that “It’s not information overload. It’s filter failure.” While we indeed appear to be suffering from an overload of unwanted data coming through our internet connections, perhaps we can approach the problem from the perspective of one particular solution: better information filtering.
Today more than ever, the web is flooded with unwanted information – spam in the story of inbound information flow, as social networks are the stories of outbound information flow. Information flooding is indeed creating major setbacks in our online life – it consumes our time and makes our work less efficient, our shopping experience less fun, and our online experience less enjoyable. But instead of assuming that the problem is information overload, the problem can actually be viewed as a filtering issue.
Once we’ve concluded that this is a filter failure rather then information overload, we can approach the task of finding the right filtering solution that will handle the entire mass of unwanted of information.
Designing newer filters doesn’t mean simply updating the older filter mechanisms.
There is a need for innovation in the filtering process, which will also involve rethinking of social norms.
In the world of eCommerce, filters are foundations of every shopping experience. If you have an online store with 10,000 items, having a 3-click shopping experience will make your website a winner and a top convertor. Otherwise, your clients will spend at least 2-3 minutes just trying to find what they wanted – in the worst case scenario they will abandon their shopping cart after 15 seconds.
Organizing website structure is a top priority, especially when you are dealing with high volume inventory where the filter system is so vital.
Here are 5 Dos:
- Categorize – Divide your store items into clear parent categories, preferably by product type. For instance, in a fashion store you might want to divide your products among categories called Shoes, Clothing, Bags, and Accessories. Or you can create categories such as Men, Women, Children, and Dogs.
- Sub-categorize – Once parent categories have been set, think about the sub-categories to be included under each parent category. This will help you narrow down the number of items in each category, and will enable the placement of a higher resolution filter.
- Refine search tool – The ability to narrow down the number of items in one page view is crucial. Most viewers are willing to view around 9-20 items, but this is as far as most shoppers would go whilebrowsing without losing patience. By providing a “refine search” tool (which can be placed as in a left navigation menu or a central one), shoppers will be able to narrow down their search by specific parameters, such as brand, size, color and style.
- Diversity – The refine search tool should be applicable for every main category. Every category should have its own “refining attributes”. This will help ensure well-designed filters.
- Give them what they want – Buyers love to search by price, popularity, on sale and newest items. Give them this possibility by offering these filter parameters in your product search.
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