Ecommerce Deal Breakers

So what is a deal breaker? Simple, these are the things in your cart that shoppers fret about, thus causing them not to make a purchase. So while every shopping cart, product and website is different, there are some very common factors which cause your shoppers to leave. Let’s address them and some of the solutions you can use to set your shopper’s minds at ease.

We are going to address these issues in a common navigational flow, so that you get a feel for the entire process.

Step 1 Landing Page:

Certainly many people do land on your main page, but usually not as many as your other pages combined. So treating only your main page with some TLC will certainly do nothing for the majority of your customers.

Landing Page Factors:

• Trust: Is your phone number (preferably toll free) highly visible and easy to find?
• Navigation: Can your shoppers easily navigate your shop to other interests and products?
• Text: Does each page have enough text near the top of the page for shoppers to scan and determine that this is where they should be?
• Images: Are your images, descriptive, fresh and professional?
• Load: Do your shoppers have to wait and wait for your pages to load?
• Presentation: Does your site work and display properly in all browsers?

Step 1/2 Product Page Marketing:

Many brick and mortar stores spend high dollars to hire the best salesmen they can, they do this to improve sales and be successful. But what about your ecommerce website? You are not going to have the individualized opportunity to make the sale. So let’s eliminate some of the common stresses and frustrations your shoppers experience.

• Is your price clearly marked?
• Are options easy to use and find?
• Are your description and images detailed enough for shoppers to make a decision?
• Is your return policy and payment methods posted clearly and easy to understand?
• Can they contact you easily from the product page to ask a question?
• Do you have live help of some sort?
• Is your add to cart button clear and noticeable?
• Is your product information above the fold on your pages, or do your shoppers have to continuously scroll?
• Is your price fair and competitive?

Step 2 Shopping Cart Summary Page:

This is a very difficult page to measure the genuine abandonment because so many people will check shipping prices here or return many times with additional items. However, I suspect that this is likely the most crucial deal breaker of all.

• Can I clearly get the shipping cost without giving you my information or creating an account?
• Do you display a secured seal, phone number and other trust factors here?
• Do you have a “Checkout Now” button above the fold as well as below?
• Do you use pictures of the products within your cart summary?
• Can I change my quantities and remove products easily and logically?
• Is this page fast enough to deliver the data, such as a shipping quote, before I become impatient and leave?

Step 3 Checkout:

If you have been thinking about abandonment and conversions at all, this is likely where you spent most of your time. While I agree this is a very large factor, I would also say that most of you are probably losing them well before checkout.

• Is the text and information sorted properly and easy to read?
• Are your payment, shipping and other options clearly noted?
• Do you force shoppers to reconsider by making them create an account?
• Do you tell your shoppers how long the shipment will take in your checkout?
• If your checkout is several steps, do you control the flow and keep shoppers on track by removing distractions and highlighting the necessary action areas?
• Is your checkout secured with SSL? Do you have a broken lock?
• Do you bother your shoppers in checkout with pop up offers and other things to get them off track?

Step 4 Checkout Success:

• While this may seem obvious, you would really be surprised… But do you thank your shoppers after checking out?
• Do they get an order summary, shipping and customer service information on your checkout success page?
• Do they receive a TEXT email (for maximum deliver-ability) with their receipt and order information following checkout?
• Do you welcome your shoppers back with a coupon or loyalty program?

While this is certainly not meant to be a bible for your usability, it is rather intended to make you think and consider the fears, stresses and reasons shoppers leave your site. I find that many shop owners have never checked out on their own site…. and many more stumble to describe the navigation needed to direct me to a certain product. Certainly, you and your staff should know your website inside and out. Just think, if it’s hard for you can you imagine your shopper’s frustration?

Google Anchor Links

If you have doubted the need for fresh, related content on your store pages…. You better rethink your position! Google has improved the search results snippets to include “jump to” links to the page’s specific area containing the related content.

We have seen Google recently making huge and innovative changes in sitelinks and snippets, but in fact this most recent innovation may be the most valuable yet. We have discussed here many times, Google’s “full text” indexing and ranking ability… Now Google has sought to put that very ability to work for searchers.

Imagine that a shopper is searching for the specs on a gadget they wish to buy, with this type of anchor linking you have a unique opportunity to grab and better convert these topical and information seeking searches. Let’s face it, even if you rank for these type of searches, your product pages are designed to sell… Thus very likely the information for this type of search is buried. So much so, that even if they land on the page, they leave never finding the information they are seeking. While this is for good reason, and I do not suggest clouding the ability to shop with this type of information… Now you can include it in a less obtrusive manner, link to it with anchors and discover a entirely fresh conversion opportunity in information gathering searches.

Let’s say for example you search Google for “good cholesterol level”. You are met with a very unique opportunity in the search results…..

Google Jump to Sitelink

This content or sitelink as we say, not only takes you to the most relevant page… But the most relevant location on that page too!

I know, how can I do that? Well, Google has posted the means to get your site coded and correct anchors set in place for these type of results in a recent post on Webmaster Central Blog. Essentially you will need to relearn a bit of html in order to help Google index you in this manner. Creating page anchors for static pages is really not difficult, but including them in your dynamic pages can be a far greater challenge. Here is a really easy tutorial from W3Schools to get you started.

Eye tracking? Heard of that? Know how it affects you and your store’s sales?

Eye Tracking

Eye tracking is defined as  research to track where a user’s eyes look while reading, then analyze the data to reveal behavioral patterns. In essence eye tracking is a core part of usability & accessibility.

So we know that you can drive thousands of visitors to your website a day and not make a dime…. These issues related to the usability of your store are the most common reasons for poor conversions and sales.

We are going to specifically go over some big issues for shop owners in the realm of eye tracking today. I promise to revisit the full usability side when I finish Steve Krug’s, “Don’t Make Me Think” 2cnd Edition.

Recent behavioral eye tracking studies have identified some very useful metrics regarding eye tracking and how user’s navigate your online store. We learn more and more everyday about the user interaction and emotional responses to our content and pages. What I’m covering here are just some basic, fairly unconsidered facts, to help you gain some insight in to your shoppers habits and needs.

Eye Tracking Tips for Ecommerce

• Heading Tags – I have said this before and I’ll say it again… Visitors read text first upon hitting your page about 1 second is spent scanning for text to identify the page as relevant or irrelevant to the visitor’s query or need. Yes, that’s right you have about 1 second to get them interested! Heading tags are a perfect way to grab the attention of these text scanning machines we call visitors. Keep your heading tags, short, logical and highly relevant to engage shoppers more quickly.
• Eye Movement Patterns – Your visitors will averagely read/scan your pages in a particular order (shown below from Eyetrack III). Notice where the user starts his quest to determine if your page is useful… Top Left. Ask any search marketing professional and they will tell you this is one of the most highly effective advertisement areas of a page. While I certainly don’t want to see you with PPC ads in your store, utilizing this space properly is key to visitor engagement.

Basic Eye Tracking Path of Average Visitors

• People scan the first few words of a paragraph and then quickly make a decision to read it or move one. Back to high school with this one. Remember that English teacher teaching you to use a power sentence to start your paragraphs. Creative and visual writing skills have never been more important…. The first sentence is the hook.
• Keep it short! We know from that same high school English teacher that a paragraph is a container for a single thought. In keeping with that shorter paragraphs actually are less daunting and encourage better reading.
• People naturally seem to migrate top and left when seeking navigation. Right hand navigation has its place indeed, many blog surfers have come to expect right hand navigation from the reading they do… This has not yet, however, transferred in to the general reading and shopping ranks. Topside navigation while interestingly more effective according to the study can be a real nightmare for shoppers to navigate in ecommerce applications. In essence the top navigation is only going to work for your simpler menu options… Not 50 categories and children fly outs. So, standard left hand navigation is still going to be more effective and engaging in your online store.
• Categories are the key to every store’s navigation, but also the biggest area of confusion and bottlenecks for shoppers as well. On one hand we know that the fewest number of clicks to get to paying you is most effective, we also know that logical and clearly categorized navigation will yield a better average order value. The biggest issue is when  a shopper is forced to browse through page after page of product index. Most times these products, say numbering 80 can be just 4 pages. However, we also know that the click through drops about 50% from page 1 to page 2 and by the time we get to page 4 only about 3% of the shoppers remain… The rest bailed. So shorter product indexes, ideally one page with your most popular products first will keep the shopper more engaged and on track.
• This I found most interesting, smaller fonts seem to engage readers. So those of you running those 14px fonts are actually encouraging scanning as opposed to reading! The standard is a 10px font, and I would recommend never larger than a 12px. If your visitor profile demands it, then get a text sizer tool for your pages.
• Textual ads within your store will be far more effective than graphics. Aside from the entire banner blindness issue, people are just more willing to click text ads. So just having a neat and crisp “Free Shipping” heading tag will do the trick nicely.
• I have been telling shop owners about the power of color psychology for a while now….. But here you go. In this study a HUGE contrasting red font containing information was completely missed 86% of the users tracked! BAM@!
• How about product pricing? This can really be a heated topic…. But here we see the nuts and bolts of how those numbers came to be .99 and what they should more effectively be .47 or .49 to catch price scanning eyes.

The basic point of this is to establish one thing in your mind… You have no idea what your shoppers need until you ask them. Doing a simple usability study with friends will reveal problems you would have easily missed.

Never stop improving your store, solicit the feedback of your shoppers. Most importantly whether you pay for a usability study, conduct a small usability study on your own or ask for feedback… YOU MUST LISTEN!

Remember, it’s not about what you think… It’s about making a living.

Google Gadgets

More Google tools and Gadgets…. We know you love them! Our main focus here at PRO-Webs is of course ecommerce. Product reviews have always been such a challenge… But no more as Google Friend Connect has a gadget for that! You can see the new gadget installed directly to your right… Pretty cool, flexible and definitely beginner level installation and configuration.

Let me just walk you through adding Google Connect Reviews to your Zen Cart

1. Go to Google Friend Connect and login with your Google user account
2. Top left click the blue link “Set up a new site“
3. Now choose “Friend Connect for standard web sites” link from the main content section.
4. Select “Continue“
5. Enter the name of your site and its url (EG PRO-Webs Store & http://pro-webs.net/store/)
6. Download 2 files and upload them to the root of the directory in your url (EG /store/)
7. Click “Continue“
8. Click the “Test to finalize setup” button
9. Left had side menu choose “Social gadgets“
10. Scroll down the list for “Ratings and reviews” & Click “Get this gadget“
11. In the drop down labeled “Scope” choose page
12. Customize text in the “start with this text” review area field if you like
13. Customize Ratings header if you like
14. You have the ability to allow anonymous posts, your choice…. But I recommend you do not.
15. Customize gadget size options including number of ratings and width
16. Customize color scheme as you like
17. #4 Generate code & select and copy it all from the box
18. Put it in a dynamic element in your Zen Cart. Mine is in the “Editable Sidebox” a simple to use module from the Zen Cart addon repository.

Nice and easy… Just like we like it! Check out or review gadget!

Got Usability?

A great long explanation here is really not necessary… Usability is a simple concept. Web pages should be accessible to all. It’s like handicap parking spaces, or the volume control at the drive in…. Wider seats. No matter the issue, brick and mortar businesses have accessibility requirements (laws even) and you have a responsibility with your online store too!

Navigation Usability Tips

• Logical category navigation which is most if not all above the fold (No scrolling)
• Vertical navigation such as “Shop by Application”
• Mouse overs for links and menu items to help shoppers navigate
• Consistent menu locations, site wide
• Search in top right
• Breadcrumbs to show the user where they are
• Clear navigation back to your main page
• TEXT… Averagely, users will spend 25 to 30 seconds on a page and most of that time they READ!
• Shopping cart link and contents top right (VERY easy to find)
• Short well documented checkout steps
• Contact or Live Help easy to find

Layout Usability Tips

• Logo top left ( Web users have just come to expect it )
• NO left and right scrolling, 1024 by 768 pixels is still as big as you want to go
• Important information and navigation above the fold
• Good contrast of text to background, but not blinding contrast
• Avoid loud or moving backgrounds
• Drop down & fly out menus should be short, as many shoppers still have short screens
• Simple sells!
• Use proper visited and active link styles
• Use common navigation locations (Top & Top Left) for best results and click through
• You can encourage vertical scrolling by straddling an image in the fold area
• Add to cart buttons should be very easily identified, not blended in with the rest of the page & buttons
• Do not require account creation or login to add to cart or check shipping
• Easy to use shopping cart options >> Add, remove, refresh etc.
• Offer product list sorting options
• Limit the distractions in your checkout, turn some stuff off and make the sale
• Offer similar or related items on product pages

Content Usability Tips

• Introduce your site on your main page
• Write copy for a high school educational level
• Have the most important information just a click away from your landing pages
• Use bulleted or number list over run-in list when you use 4 or more items
• Have a clear descriptive lead-in, opening paragraph  sentence
• Use a True Type font
• Limit extravagant styles and colored text
• Use a clear and easy to detect style format to identify links
• Use fonts 10 pts and above only
• NEVER use moving text
• Don’t type in all capitol letters
• Limit text in graphics as screen readers do not see this
• Use descriptive link text and the link title attribute
• Properly map your text with correct & descriptive heading tags
• Great detailed product images and even greater accompanying descriptive text
• Use proper “alt” tags for your images, screen readers need this as well
• Bold text is NOT necessarily easier to read
• Most important content is at the top of the page

Other Usability Tips

• Have others navigate your site and buy things– Hard part, LISTEN to what they say and react
• No auto starting music, talking customer service or videos
• Be very cautious of your page’s load time and limit graphics accordingly
• No pop ups, not ever
• Customize your 404 page, help users find their way back and feel like the site isn’t a mess
• Phone number VERY easy to find, no exceptions
• Test your site in other browsers, including mobile devices and screen readers

Interesting Facts

• Shoppers will spend less and less time on your homepage after each visit
• Only 23% will scroll on your homepage
• Shoppers will will spend 45 to 60 seconds on interior pages
• Most time is spent reading
• Shoppers spend 25 to 30 seconds on your main page
• Studies showed vertical lists can improve usability by 47% over run-in

Inspect Your Design

Website design and usability are paramount influences for online shopping. If your store looks 1997 or relies on inferior website design methodology it may be holding you down. Existing shoppers are used to the site and its quirks, but what about new customers?

What impression do new shoppers get from your shop? What have you done cause them to come back?

Take some time and deep introspect to research your competitor’s websites… Not so much to “Be Like Mike”, but rather to be better. What seems to work well on their store? What have they done really well? How does this research stack up with your shop? What have you learned and what are your going to do about it?

Many ecommerce shops will phase in new site designs every two years or so to stay current and fresh. There are always new techniques, innovations and software applications to assist in the development of something that catches attention and is highly functional for users and business owners alike.

Redesigning your store in a hasty and unplanned manner will only lead to dysfunction and dissatisfaction. Build your new store on a test or development account so you can test the links and the new functionality of the shop’s design. Have friends, kids, grandmas and colleagues test your development site to catch any flaws in the design. Make a promise to yourself that you will not discount even suggestions or concerns from your tester, which you deem dumb or untrue…. You will never see things like they do. Suggest you give them each a product to search for and buy, testing your search, navigation and very important checkout. There is nothing worse than launching a new site design that is riddled with errors and broken links.

The use of flashing text, unprompted sound or multicolored text should be avoided… Think about the user. The text may certainly get noticed, but generally for very wrong reasons. Simple, compact text and easy to read will provide the best means for shoppers to understand what your shop is designed to provide.  You may have both visually challenged and portable device customers that may use technologies that have space constraints. Many new site designs keep these limitations in mind… Sadly, many do not.

Anytime you are developing a new or redesigned  ecommerce shop enlist the help of several trusted individuals who are willing to tell you exactly what they think of the store. Honest feedback is important and invaluable when considering something with as much potential as an online store. A traditional businessman wouldn’t dream of constructing a building without consulting an architect… So why should online business not strive to enlist the help of web professionals in ecommerce development techniques, design, usability and website appearance?

First Impressions

E-Commerce landing pages should be like front doors… friendly, easily accessible and an inviting for the customer to enter. That’s exactly how you want your store visitors to perceive your landing pages. You are selling products and/or services on your e-Commerce site, and you need to have a landing pages that invite shoppers in to take a look. We have some tips that you can consider as you build your own front door to make it as friendly and inviting as possible…. and of course successful.

Once the visitor clicks on your well-placed ad or search result, he enters your landing page, your front door. His eyes go immediately to the area above the fold and to the upper left hand side of their screen. Put information there that you want your visitors to see first and be convinced to investigate further. Write headlines and titles that pop. Don’t add fluff and garbage words; make sure the visitor knows exactly what you are about. Your message should be clear to the shopper, and it should define the value of your products or services. Remember that pictures always speak louder (and frequently more effectively) than words, but that studies have shown visitors overall will start with text above the fold. Neglect nothing, your store is your 24/7 sales associate.

Simplify, Simplify, Simplify. Content on your pages needs to be organized so it’s easily followed and navigated. Columns help visitors browse your pages, and they help search engines identify who you are. However, research suggests a single column produces more conversions than multiple columns on a page. Take a look at the composition of your page and minimize columns if at all possible. Keep your copy very easy to read and understand. If your visitor has to wade through a forest of language that is difficult to follow, you will lose him. White space is also your friend. Pages that are overly busy provide very poor navigation and site flow, along with overwhelming your visitor as well.

You will also lose your visitor if you require a sequence of clicks on too many pages to make a purchase. If I’m shopping at an online store trying to purchase an item and find the checkout process lengthy or otherwise frustrating, I’m likely to leave and go somewhere else… Face it, click and gone is very easy. There are too many options in the world of commerce to have to put up with being challenged when trying to make a purchase as well. Try to make buying your product or service as fast and simple as possible; preferably, one click from the landing page should get the customer to the page to complete a purchase. No eCommerce site is likely to reach 100% CTR (Click Thru Rate). But your CTR will increase if you make the process simple…. Increasing the number of click thrus clearly increases the conversion percentage as well, by reducing checkout abandonment and bounce rate.

Finally, it’s very important to remember you are promoting your brand. Some of the tips and ideas you gather will need to be individualized for your particular store. You won’t want a page full of energy if you determine a less forceful approach is desirable. Likewise, don’t create a calm and pastoral page if you want an edgy feel. Your brand needs to be compatible with the tone and aesthetics of your pages; each needs to complement the other for maximum appeal for shoppers.

If you always keep the “front door” concept in mind as you create your landing pages and continually improve your store, your chances for shoppers to become customers will improve.

One of the singular most important things you can do for your online store is define a clear easy to follow navigational structure. The benefits are really astounding. Today I will cover a few common mistakes, and some very easy and logical fixes. You will see that the results can come very quickly… So in a couple of days you will be able to tweak any obvious flow issues still existing or that you may have created.

First things first, if you are running a Flash or Java menu while they look cool, the search engine’s spiders cannot effectively follow the links out from them. You don’t necessarily have to get rid of them, just make some hard links with great anchor text somewhere, like in the footer.
The rule of thumb seems to be 3 clicks… Anything more than 3 clicks from your main page is going to have to have serious promotion and flow of it’s own to develop properly. People just don’t statistically click that far out without becoming sidetracked. So its just good practice to stay within 3 clicks when possible. I generally like to use a “landing” or “category” page type scenario from the main page, this helps your shoppers find the location in your store containing the most relevant information for what they are seeking. I would advise against tricking users in to clicking into areas, I really think if they click once and find what they thought they would…Then they are far more likely to click again.

Linking all of your products from your main page is not recommended. Google itself recommends less than 100 total URLs on any single page. Yes… Perhaps they should improve GoogleBot, but until then you want a good crawl. There is much navigational value in the “landing” page or “category” page setup, not to mention these types of pages will likely have higher Ad scores in your PPC (Pay per Click) campaigns as well. These “Category” pages which are likely linked from your main page navigational menu, act like little web stores all of their own. Give them rich textual content, unique Meta and title information and tight relevant content to reflect the category’s product line. You will start to see these pages ranking for their content without your main page and this is exactly what we want. A little on page attention and they will gather some organic backlinks for themselves too. If you really want to boost this process, submit these pages to some deep link directories for their page’s theme using concise yet keyword rich anchor text. Remember to vary the titles and descriptions a little to make your scope broader and more effective. Stay away from the reciprocals… Building links is hard work, why would you do the same work for less than full link value?

Another very serious consideration and issue with e-commerce platforms is the amount of products or listing in any given category. When you have too many products in a category and users are expected to click that next button 14 times you might as well just hang it up because they won’t! Properly organize your categories so that there is never more than 2 pages in your product view this will help to keep your shoppers on task. Many time web surfers and shoppers alike will be put off by too much information or opportunity.

A nice way to improve your crawl efficiency from the search engines is to either convert your Google sitemap or create a sitemap html static page or a user sitemap if you will, then link it in the footer of your main page or all pages. It is also helpful for misdirected shoppers as well as spiders.

A very good measure of your shop’s health statistically is time on site, and bounce. Good navigation can improve both of these metrics significantly and quickly. It makes perfect sense… They are likely to be more engaged when less frustrated.

Now that you have a nice clear navigation, be sure to make a new Google sitemap. If you choose to create or is you already use a user type sitemap scenario… DO NOT BLOCK IT! Its not a whole lot likely to rank for anything, but you will receive no value from it at all if Google cannot crawl it.

I know seems like a fairly simple concept, but I visit many shops where it is clearly overlooked. So, even if you think you have your navigation nailed, take a look at your logs and see what files Google and Yahoo are grabbing when they crawl. Use a heatmap and check out how your users navigate your store. My favorite is to choose a couple of products and ask test shoppers to find them without using the search function. It’s worth your time and it can pay the bills!

I thought I would write a little color psychology post today. This may be terminology many of you are not familiar with, but it is in fact an increasingly strong marketing tool. I have had a small bit of training here, as it was relevant in my past life. =-) I have been known to make frequent references to colors and prime page real estate… These are in my estimation areas of huge behavior marketing advantage. So today we will investigate some color psychology and some quaint cultural differences to help you design your pages and stores to perform better.

What is color psychology? Very simply, certain colors invoke certain emotional and physical responses with shoppers due to culture and environment. For example, it is very effective to use bright green in your checkout buttons as it naturally says “Go” to the majority of the Western world.

In my former life I was a restaurant manager for many, many years. It’s no accident that food menus and brochures are generally styled in warm shades, while beverage menus cools shades and blues. They simply market better that way by creating the proper physical and emotional responses. Cooler shades make us think of those cool drinks and cooling ourselves off, while warmer shades lend to hot food and warm bellies. We will cover the emotional and physical responses for the normal American culture… This is a generalization of American’s common responses to different colors.

1. Grey – Can signify neutrality, humility, and respect, but be careful if your market includes older adults as this can bring thoughts and feelings of death, depression, and old age. I think personally that grey is best as a secondary or ancillary color and not a main color part in your design.
2. White – Is a clean color invoking feelings of pureness, spiritually and security. White is a very good non-color to use for an American audience. White has a deep association with mourning in some eastern parts of the world..
3. Black – Is your power color, it will send the message of elegance and prowess very loudly. Be very cautious not to overdo the “blackness” and appear to be sporting your arrogance. Black is also best used as a secondary color in your site design.
4. Blue – Blue is a very steadfast and dependable color to use, it brings about emotions like harmony, tranquility and has an overall calming effect on Americans. This is a great main color scheme base for your design. However, I found is that in Iran, blue is the color of mourning.
5. Red – Can actually make a person’s respirations and blood pressure rise according to some studies. It floods us with very strong emotions related to love, sex, passion and ambition. Depending on your store’s theme this can be a powerful effect.
6. Pink – Has by far the best overall calming response and is thought to be the truest color of love, relationships and femininity. Again however, depending on your shop’s venue pink might just be the color for you.
7. Green – Makes people think of life and living things, nature, youth and money. Green tends to signify an “action” response in Americans… Use green to get shoppers to “do” something. However, green also a color of disgrace in China, but in some western countries such as Great Britain and Ireland it is notably lucky color. Overall green is a very pleasing color and the darker the shade the more conservative the emotional response. Green is a great color for your overall store design.
8. Purple – Is a color of deep spirituality, sensuality, creativity, wealth and prosperity. Purple can add a certain hint of mystery and is best used in small parts of your design scheme. The darker the purple the lesser the emotional response. It is also the color of mourning in Thailand.
9. Yellow – Makes people think bright sun shining days and optimism, but can also bring about occasional thoughts of cowardice and weakness. Interesting studies have found that babies cry more in yellow rooms. Yellow has other physical responses as well, it speeds your metabolism up and helps bring creativity and creative thoughts. Yellow would best better served as a less prominent color in your web site design. The more golden or deeper the shade the better the response. Accessibility not: Yellow is the brightest and hardest color for human eyes to focus on.
10. Brown – Is stable, dependable, and earthy. Brown makes people think of reliability and friendship. Brown is thought to be natural or organic in its essence. Brown is the color of mourning in India. Shades of beige are specifically very neutral and safe, thus making Beige a great prominent color for your ecommerce store.
11. Orange – Brings about intense feelings of energy, balance and enthusiasm. I personally love the color orange and I wear it and use it very often. Orange has a mixture of the best elements of yellow and red emotional responses. The powerful excitement of red with less intensity and a very small hint of the calming effect of yellow… Without putting anyone to sleep. However, I would recommend orange as a secondary color in your web site design.

The next time you redesign or begin to lay out a new store… Research some colors for your specific market. You might just find that the right color combination will have people will staying on site longer and converting better. Below are some great resources for color psychology and emotional color responses for your review.

• Wiki on Color Psychology and Symbolism – They have a nice breakdown, and a great deal of cultural information.
• Colors for Marketing – Some nice market tips here for research and cultural information.
• Psychology in Color Marketing – Commerce tips for color scheming and more.
• The power of color in direct marketing – Added 9/14/2008 Nice piece on color marketing and natural association.