Optimize Your E-Commerce Site: Essential Pages for Converting Customers
Gregor (グレゴール) S.
Co-Founder / CXO at PixoLabo | Innovating Global Digital Strategies for Startups, Companies, and Product Brands
26 Essential Pages for Your E-Commerce Website
When you think your online store is ready to launch, ensuring you have all the right pages in place is imperative. Your e-commerce website needs more than products and a checkout page to succeed in today's competitive digital marketplace.
In the competitive landscape of online retail, the effectiveness of your e-commerce site can significantly influence your bottom line. As a business owner, understanding the essential pages for your e-commerce website is crucial for driving traffic and converting visitors into loyal customers. This blog post explores the key components that enhance user experience and boost conversion rates.
By optimizing these essential pages, you can create a seamless shopping journey that engages potential buyers and encourages them to complete their purchases. Join us as we delve into the fundamental elements that can transform your e-commerce platform into a powerful sales tool.
Whether you're building a new store or upgrading an existing one, having the right combination of pages can make the difference between converting visitors into customers and losing them forever. From your homepage to your return policy, each page plays a vital role in creating a seamless shopping experience that builds trust and drives sales.
Key Takeaways:
If you're new to the world of online retail and are looking to enter e-commerce for the first time, you'll need to learn a lot. What's required in order to get a new online business off the drawing board and into production is not immediately apparent.
One of the most common errors we see is the belief that simply listing your products and adding a payment gateway will make your online store successful. While products and payment options are important, you have to consider other essential pages for your e-commerce website.
Importance of Essential E-Commerce Pages
Having the right pages is fundamental to your success when building your e-commerce website. Your website needs to include specific pages that serve as touchpoints throughout the customer journey. Studies show that 88% of online shoppers won't return to a website after a poor experience, making it vital for you to implement all necessary pages that guide your visitors from browsing to purchasing.
Engaging the Target Audience
The importance of connecting with your audience cannot be overstated in e-commerce. Your necessary pages should speak directly to your target market's needs and preferences. Research indicates that websites with well-structured necessary pages see up to 32% higher conversion rates. You need to ensure each page serves a specific purpose in your customer's shopping journey.
Enhancing User Experience
The quality of user experience directly impacts your bottom line. Your necessary pages should create a seamless navigation flow, making it easy for customers to find what they want. Statistics show that 94% of first impressions are design-related, highlighting why your pages must be functional and aesthetically pleasing.
This attention to user experience extends beyond mere aesthetics. Your necessary pages should include clear calls to action, intuitive navigation menus, and mobile-responsive designs. When you implement these elements correctly, you can reduce bounce rates by up to 40% and increase the average time spent on your site.
What Pages Make Up an E-Commerce Website?
Essential pages for your e-commerce website are the home page, product page, shopping cart, and checkout. But there’s more to an e-commerce website than these.
Over the years of designing e-commerce websites, we put together a master site map of every must-have page that you should include in an e-commerce website. We identified 26 essential pages for your e-commerce website that are very important for any online store to have.
Essential Pages for Your E-Commerce Website
General E-Commerce Pages
1. Homepage
Your store's homepage is its digital storefront. It should showcase your best-selling products, current promotions, and brand story. This page should also provide clear navigation and compelling calls to action to guide visitors toward making a purchase.
The homepage can include promotions, branded lifestyle imagery, and featured products or categories. Value propositions should be clear, such as what makes the brand or products unique, and you should highlight any brand guarantees, such as free shipping.
While the homepage is generally the first page your site visitors will see, remember that people don't always enter through the homepage and may arrive via direct links to other pages.
2. Category Overview
Behind every successful e-commerce store is a well-organized category structure that helps visitors find what they want. Your category overview should present your main product collections intuitively and visually appealingly.
Further organizing your products into logical groups helps visitors navigate your store more efficiently. To enhance the shopping experience, you should include clear category descriptions, relevant subcategories, and featured items.
3. Category Page
The Category page is the list view of products for a specific category or subcategory, usually displayed in a grid layout. It often includes filters so users can drill down and find what they want.
This page's purpose is for users to browse many products at once. This is different from the Category Overview, which focuses on promotion and wayfinding.
4. Product Page
Sometimes referred to as the Product Detail Page, this is the specific view of a product with the full product details and pricing. The main call to action is the add-to-cart button.
Adding reviews, related products, and user-generated content from social media to this page can help drive customers to add-to-cart.
5. Search and Search Results
E-commerce sites should have search functionality, especially for sites with a wide range of products. Usually, the search field is part of the navigation menu. If not, you should always place it in a prominent position at the top of the page.
Make sure to consider how the Results page displays the results. This page often follows the Category Page template or could have a unique design. Implementing 'suggested search' surfaces products while the customer is typing to remove the need to go to a dedicated search results page.
6. Login/Create Account
E-commerce sites with account functionality allow customers to save data such as order history and payment information. They can enable other interactions, such as wish list management, the accrual of rewards/loyalty points, and special access to deals.
The login/create account form can be an individual page, modal, or dropdown. Make sure creating an account is accessible from the login fields (and vice versa) so that when users realize they don't have a login, they can quickly access Create Account.
7. Mini Cart
The 'mini cart' is technically not a page, but it's a must-have view to include on your e-commerce site. It's essential to provide visual feedback when the user adds an item to their cart, and the mini cart does just that.
The mini cart is often a dropdown or flyout coming from the cart icon in the navigation menu or a modal on the page. To keep it informative, recap all items and update the cart subtotal.
A mini cart is also an excellent opportunity to get the user to keep shopping by showing how close they are to free shipping and presenting related products.
8. Cart Page
The shopping cart needs to list everything the user has added and allow the user to make changes.
It's good practice to show the estimated shipping cost and the promo code field at this point. This way, the user can get a good idea of their final cost without going too deep into the checkout process (for shipping estimates to work, the user may have to input their zip code in advance).
You don’t want cart abandonments to happen on the last step of the checkout when customers discover the cost of taxes and shipping and that their promo code doesn't work–it's frustrating for both the store and the customer.
The cart page can also be an opportunity to upsell related products.
The Checkout Flow
The following checkout flow pages are some of the most critical must-haves in an e-commerce site, as these pages are where the conversion (the sale!) happens.
9. Log In/Guest Checkout
After a user reviews their cart is the perfect moment to prompt the user to log in (if not already logged in) for a quicker checkout experience by using the saved information.
The user may not want to deal with creating an account or remembering their password, so provide the ability to checkout as a guest, which will require them to fill out all their
10. Shipping
The shipping page within the checkout should include the form fields needed to gather the shipping address. In addition, there's often a checkbox that allows you to use the same shipping address for the billing address.
11. Payment
The payment step includes form fields for entering payment information. It may also consist of fields for entering a billing address, especially if it's different from the shipping address.
This step can also include entering gift cards, rewards points, promo codes, or paying with rewards points or store credit.
12. Checkout Review
A checkout review is an important step to review all purchased items, the shipping info, payment method, discounts, and extra costs like taxes or express shipping.
Make sure it’s clear that this is a review step and that the main call to action is to submit the order.
13. Order Confirmation
Once the customer submits the order, please send them a nice thank-you message and confirm that they submitted their order successfully. In addition, it is helpful to display the order details and information on how to modify the order if the user catches a mistake after submission.
If this was a guest checkout, prompt the user to create an account to save all the information they just submitted.
Stores may use confirmation pages to display a message other than a thank you. However, as the system processes the order, something could go wrong, and the site will need to return an error page instead of confirmation to explain that an item sold out by the time the buyer submitted the order.
Account Pages
14. My Orders / Order History
Now, your customers expect easy access to their previous purchases. A well-organized order history page allows them to track deliveries, reorder items, and manage their shopping experience efficiently. This feature can increase repeat purchases by up to 30%, making it simple for customers to find and rebuy their favorite products.
15. Individual Order View
This page is like the receipt for a given order. It should include complete details for that order—from what was bought to where it was shipped. Depending on the e-commerce platform and its integration with shipping/fulfillment software, orders may also include a tracking number.
16. My Profile / Account Settings
Whether labeled as "My Profile," "My Settings," "Account Information," and so forth, this page includes all the primary account fields, such as name, email, and change password details. It's common to show any additional information collected from the user, such as demographic information.
The customer's Account is also a great place to offer them access to their saved Wishlist items. Unfortunately, most companies incentivize account sign-ups by only allowing a customer to save an item to a wishlist if they have an account.
Rewards and loyalty program details can also be included on the profile page, allowing customers to see their rewards balance, learn how to earn rewards, and apply their rewards to their orders.
17. Payment Settings
The Payment Settings (or Manage Payment) page lists saved payment info (gathered from previous orders) and allows customers to update or delete that information.
18. Addresses
The Addresses page lists saved shipping addresses (collected from previous orders), which can be edited or deleted.
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Footer and Content Pages
19. Email & SMS Sign up
Email and SMS are critical lifelines of e-commerce. They guarantee return customers and allow marketers to market to interested prospective customers.
E-commerce sites should make it easy for interested visitors to sign up. This doesn't have to be a dedicated page – you can opt for a simple field in the footer or a pop-up modal. Provide an incentive for signing up, like a free shipping discount, and give a short overview of the type of emails they'll get.
Remember to consider the confirmation message that comes after submission. This message can also be on a separate page or loaded into the modal/footer area.
20. Returns
On your returns page, clearly outline your return policy and procedures. Include shipping instructions, time limits, and condition requirements. A transparent returns policy can boost customer confidence and reduce support queries by providing all necessary information upfront.
The best return pages explain the return/exchange process clearly and address common questions and concerns.
21. Shipping
A big question in online shoppers' minds is the shipping time and cost, so an easy-to-find shipping information page (often in the footer, like returns) is essential. Also, include information about international shipping policies and any particular holiday shipping schedules.
22. Help / Contact Us
Give your customers a centralized place to find ways to contact customer support, whether with an email address, phone number, form, or live chat with a Help or Contact Us page. Many sites combine FAQs with Contact Us to answer questions that may have come up many times in the past (and also to save time).
Don't underestimate the importance of the Contact Us page—customer service is a huge driver of business growth. Making customer service accessible and easy will provide a superior user experience and encourage people to spread the word about the store and brand.
23. Store Locator / Where to Buy
After implementing your online presence, a store locator helps bridge the gap between digital and physical shopping. This tool helps customers find your nearest physical location, driving foot traffic to your brick-and-mortar stores.
Your store locator should include interactive maps, store hours, contact information, and available services at each location. Studies show that 73% of shoppers prefer to visit physical stores after researching products online.
24. Feedback Page
Locator pages should be complemented by a robust feedback system where customers can share their experiences. This valuable tool helps you improve your services while building trust with potential buyers.
Further, your feedback page should include multiple feedback channels, such as product reviews, service ratings, and suggestion boxes. When properly displayed and managed on your site, customer feedback can increase conversion rates by 270%.
25. Store Details page
As you drill down from the Store Locator page, provide complete details about a particular store, like a map and business hours.
26. Terms and Conditions, Privacy Policy, and Web Accessibility Policy
As with all sites, don’t forget to include the legalese.
If your site is compliant, it is essential to include an accessibility statement. This statement serves as an acknowledgment and commitment to accessibility, provides customers with information about the accessibility of the company's content, and shows customers that your business cares about them.
Designing Attractive Pages
For your e-commerce success, creating visually appealing and functional pages is essential to reduce bounce rates by up to 40%. Your website's design directly impacts user experience, conversion rates, and brand perception. A well-designed e-commerce site can increase sales by up to 200% while maintaining professional aesthetics and user-friendly navigation.
Professional Website Design
The foundation of your e-commerce success lies in professional design elements that reflect your brand identity. Your website needs to incorporate responsive layouts, consistent color schemes, and high-quality images that load quickly. Studies show that 75% of users judge business credibility based on website design alone.
SEO Optimization
Behind every successful e-commerce site is robust SEO implementation. Your pages need proper meta descriptions, title tags, and keyword optimization to rank higher in search results. Properly optimized pages can increase organic traffic by up to 150% and improve your visibility in search engine results.
You should also focus on technical SEO aspects like site speed, mobile optimization, and structured data. Mobile-optimized sites experience 88% more conversions than non-optimized ones. Your URL structure, internal linking, and content hierarchy play vital roles in how search engines understand and rank your pages.
Cost Considerations
To establish a successful e-commerce website, you need to understand the financial investment required. Your budget should account for initial development costs, ongoing maintenance, and potential future upgrades. The total investment varies significantly based on your business requirements and chosen platform, typically ranging from $5,000 to $20,000 for a basic to medium-complexity site.
Average Development Costs
Along with basic e-commerce functionality, your website development costs will typically fall into different tiers: basic sites ($2,500-$3,500), medium-complexity sites ($4,000-$7,000), and custom solutions ($10,000+). Your specific requirements and chosen platform will determine the final investment needed.
Factors Influencing Costs
Development costs for your e-commerce site depend on various elements:
Any modifications to these core elements will impact your final budget.
Due to the complex nature of e-commerce development, you should consider these additional factors:
Any unexpected technical requirements may increase your overall investment.
E-Commerce Platforms Comparison
Despite the many options for building your online store, choosing the right e-commerce platform is vital for success. As highlighted in this comprehensive guide to essential e-commerce pages, your platform choice will impact how effectively you can implement these necessary features.
Shopify:
Hosted solution
Monthly fee
Built-in features
WooCommerce
Self-hosted
Free plugin
Customizable
Shopify vs. WooCommerce
Shopify offers a complete hosted solution for your online store with built-in features, while WooCommerce provides unlimited customization options as a WordPress plugin. Your choice depends on technical expertise and specific needs - Shopify excels in ease of use, while WooCommerce offers more control over your store's functionality.
Other Notable Platforms
Platforms like BigCommerce, Magento, and Wix each offer unique advantages for expanding your options. BigCommerce provides enterprise-level features, Magento offers robust customization, and Wix delivers user-friendly design tools for your online store.
But before making your final decision, consider that 73% of e-commerce businesses prioritize platform reliability and scalability. Your choice should align with your business goals, technical capabilities, and budget constraints while ensuring you can implement all necessary pages and features for your online store.
Wrapping Up (Your Sales)
The successful implementation of these 26 crucial pages on your ecommerce site will significantly enhance your online store's functionality and user experience. By incorporating these pages, you create a comprehensive shopping environment that guides your customers from browsing to purchasing.
Attention to these fundamental elements will set your store apart from competitors and provide visitors with a seamless shopping journey. As you build or upgrade your ecommerce site, ensure these pages are not just present but optimized to serve your customers effectively.
The above list covers everything needed on a core level, but an e-commerce site may need much more based on the type of products it sells and the unique goals of the brand and the store. Consider additional pages and features like the About page, Blog, Wish Lists, Careers page, and more.
Successfully implementing these 26 crucial pages on your e-commerce site will significantly enhance its functionality and user experience. Incorporating these pages creates a comprehensive shopping environment that seamlessly guides your customers from browsing to purchasing.
Investing in these essential elements is not just about improving design; it is about optimizing the entire shopping journey to drive conversions and foster customer loyalty. Don't hesitate to contact us for more information on effectively integrating these pages into your e-commerce strategy.
FAQ
Q: What are the vital pages every ecommerce site must include?
A: The 12 must-have pages include Home, Category Overview, Category Page, Product Page, Search & Search Results, Login/Create Account, Cart, Guest Checkout, My Order, Returns, Store Locator, and Feedback page. Each serves a specific purpose in creating a complete shopping experience.
Q: How does a Category Overview page differ from a Category Page?
A: The Category Overview page serves as a landing page for broad categories like Men's or Women's clothing, while the category displays specific products within those categories. The Category Overview page may be unnecessary for businesses with only one category.
Q: Why is a Guest Checkout option important for an ecommerce site?
A: A Guest Checkout option caters to customers who prefer not to create an account or store their information. This feature can reduce cart abandonment rates by providing a quick and convenient purchasing process while still offering the option to create an account later.
Q: How should the Returns page be structured?
A: The Returns page should clearly outline the return and exchange process, including timeframes, conditions, shipping instructions, and refund policies. This information should be presented in a simple, easy-to-understand format to build customer trust and confidence.
Q: What role does the Search & Search Results page play in user experience?
A: The Search & Search Results page helps customers quickly find specific products without browsing through multiple categories. It should include filters, sorting options, and relevant product information to enhance the shopping experience and save customers time.
Q: How can the My Order page benefit both customers and businesses?
A: The My Order page allows customers to track current orders, view order history, reorder previous purchases, and manage order modifications or cancellations. It reduces customer service inquiries and provides valuable data on purchasing patterns for businesses.
Q: What elements should be included on the Product Page?
A: The Product Page should feature high-quality images, detailed product descriptions, pricing information, size/color options, availability status, customer reviews, and a prominent "Add to Cart" button. It should also include related products and shipping information to help customers make informed decisions.
By Gregor Saita
Gregor is a Co-Founder and Creative Technologist at PixoLabo, an award-winning AI web design agency. As someone at the intersection of design, marketing, AI, and technology, Gregor provides digital strategy to clients and organizations in the B2B, startup, e-commerce, and corporate sectors. He enjoys helping clients identify problems, translating them into plain language, and empowering the PixoLabo team to execute stunning website solutions that strengthen brands and help companies succeed.