Congratulations! You're a OEM or distributor that has finally built an awesome website. After years of working to get your products moved from paper catalogs to the digital realm, you've managed to tick that task off your list and accomplish the unthinkable; listing your products online for the entire world to see. Now, you just sit back and profit, correct? Well ... Not exactly. Not if people can't even get the products they want to buy. The truth is there are people out there just screaming for you to take their money. They are waving it in the air, fully aware that you have what they want, and they want to exchange fistfuls of dollars for your product. But when they come to visit your website and are unable to find the product they are looking for, they aren't going to stick around too long to finish a purchase or request. They are likely to return to the search engines and find a company that has made product navigation a cinch on their website, and they buying experience as easy as it can get. But don't worry! You can do that too (if you haven't already). Whether you are a distributor sitting on 500 stock items to sell, or an OEM manufacturing specific parts for customers, there are still many ways you can present your product information so customers can get what they need easy. At Ecretiveworks, we get that there are different types of people at different stages in the buying cycle looking for products in different ways. While it's always difficult to please everyone, it's not so difficult to make finding your products easy for everyone. Here are a couple of options you can consider for your website when thinking about navigating your customers to your products:
Local Left
One way to present your products or services is by using a "Local Left" navigation. Our
Ecreative main site is an example. What this allows you to do is organize products or service by large, identifiable categories, before you begin breaking them down to specific products or services. You'll notice in the screen shot above, that is someone gets to our site first they'll see we offer Website Design and Website Marketing services. Let's say a visitor needs a new website design. If they click on Website Design they will be taken to a sub-page that has all other relevant services they may be interested in on the local left, plus the Website Redesign information we provide. This method allows for both cross-promotion of similar services within a category, while keeping relevant information in a handy left navigation location. Perfect!
Configurator
Sometimes for visitors, getting to the product or service they are interested in isn't always that easy. And it's through no fault of yours! Sometimes, people just aren't sure what they want. They may have a general idea, or know they need a particular product with a specific color or diameter, but that's all they have as a starting point. Offering the option of a configurator, or a product selector, may be appropriate to help people get started. In the example above from a site we designed for
Freelin Wade, you can see they offer a "Tube Finder" for their customers. Here, they can start by selecting a Color, then a Tube Type, and down the line, with as much information as they may have. They can then browse all available products that meet that criteria, reducing a product list of over 5,000 to just 10 that meet their criteria. A handy way to focus a user's search to the right information. Cool!
Filtering and Sorting
Similar to the configurator, but perhaps with more "browsing" opportunity, a filtering and sorting option for a product website can be helpful, too. One example would be on a site like
House of Batteries, a custom battery pack manufacturer and battery distributor. With as many battery options as there are out in the world, it's helpful to provide clear options to limit those results. In this filtering example, options include many top-level identifies a customer would be aware of, like Battery Manufacturer, Battery Chemistry, Battery Voltage, and more. As the example above illustrates, if a customer knows they need a 9 volt Duracell Battery, they can filter through available products by selecting these options, and the updating product list below brings up specific products to meet that criteria. Again, it's a clear way to allow the user to use the knowledge of the product they DO have, in order to get to the product they need. Nice!
Faceted Search
Finally, another option that has gained traction recently is to implement separate filtering options through a local left navigation format, what we've identified as Faceted Search. This is what you've seen and are familiar with in sites like eBay, Amazon, or Best Buy, where a user may start with a search ("HDTVs") but is then allowed further options to refine their products based on local left filtering options. You can include options like TV Display Side, Model Year, Refresh Rate, Brand Name, and much more, in order to get to a specific product you wish to purchase. Ecreative has begun work on implementing this popular option on client websites as well, and early previews have been positive in how easy and intuitive it makes a user's experience in searching for a product. Wonderful! But these aren't all! Implementing a strong site search option, cross selling, product numbers, and much more, all help customers find the product or service they need on your website in an easy, timely manner. So review your own website, and ask yourself if you think it's a cake walk to get to a particular product or service you have listed. If it's not, Ecreative can help.
Contact us today and we'll help you explore options for product navigation.
