Best eCommerce UX tips for Black Friday

Black Friday is one of the biggest shopping days of the year, so ensuring that your eCommerce UX (user experience) is smooth is an essential part of getting the most from the sale. Here, we will share some UX tips for Black Friday.

The importance of Black Friday & UX

With Black Friday coming up soon, the importance of optimising your eCommerce site to maximise sales is probably taking up your thoughts. Black Friday (and Cyber Monday) are two of the busiest days for eCommerce and mark the beginning of the festive shopping season. In some areas, these days are even more important than Boxing Day, which is another huge sales event for both eCommerce and brick and mortar stores. There are some things to keep in mind when preparing your Black Friday discounts; read on to learn some of the most important tips for a great sale!

Maximise mobile usability

More and more people are using mobile devices over and above a desktop computer. This is a quick and convenient way to do your shopping, however, you probably don’t have a dedicated app. Once you have maximised the usability of your desktop site, don’t delay in making sure the mobile site works just as well. This means checking that images look the same and that text is laid out in a pleasing and readable fashion. While this might take up some time, it will definitely be worth it.

Avoid using automatic carousels and sliders

While it might be tempting to have automatic carousels and sliders as the landing page of your site, these are not actually very user friendly and can damage the UX and drive users away. Especially during Black Friday, when time is of the essence, users will rarely sit through a carousel, or click through the images. Use more attention-grabbing, click through imagery for your best deals instead.

Review your checkout process

The checkout process of your eCommerce site should always be at the forefront of your mind. However, this becomes especially important during big sales events such as Black Friday. If your checkout process is not smooth or suffers from broken links, then users might not stick around to complete it, or may not be able to even if they want to. A straightforward and easy checkout process helps to optimise the user experience and could lead to more sales for your site, not to mention reducing the amount you will need to be on hand to deal with issues on the day itself.

Consider auto-suggestions

During Black Friday, many users will be moving between sites to buy several items. Keep them on your site by adding auto-suggestions. These make it easier for users to find the items they are looking for quickly, and can even encourage them to search for other items easily. Users in a rush will be more likely to stay on your site if you increase the convenience of their shopping experience. This simple way of improving UX could increase the amount you sell overall.

Check traffic

Even if your eCommerce site is usually busy, Black Friday is a completely different kind of hectic. If you have marketed correctly and attracted a large number of customers, then your site will be subject to a huge uptick in traffic. Check ahead of time that your site is equipped to deal with this increased volume of customers so that users do not experience unexpected downtime. Due to the often time-sensitive nature of Black Friday deals, users do not want to be held up by a site slowing down, they might just go elsewhere.

As you can see, getting your UX right on your eCommerce site is a vital part of preparing for Black Friday. From ensuring your mobile site is usable to reviewing your checkout processes and doing away with automatic sliders, these tips will give you the best chance of getting great results on Black Friday.

If you want help with your Black Friday preparation or any other area of eCommerce or user experience, get in touch with Factory Pattern. We have a wide range of experience and services on offer, so let us know how we can best help you to get the most from your eCommerce site all year round.