• What is website merchandising?
• Benefits of website merchandising
• Assess your merchandising needs
• Boost revenue with personalization
• Master your website merchandising

Just as in brick-and-mortar stores, website customers expect their online shopping trips to be tailored to their every need. They want beautiful product images, enticing product descriptions, and helpful guidance. Good website merchandising provides all of that. It lets shoppers explore, discover, and decide what they want, easily buy it, and then perhaps come back later because the experience was so enjoyable.

What is website merchandising?

With website merchandising — strategically presenting online content to encourage conversion and sales — shoppers can find items they’re seeking while also discovering new treasures along the way. Online merchandising practices cover:

• Presenting an inviting “storefront” (home page)
• Organizing product categories intuitively
• Making your site easy to navigate
• Using professional-quality images
• Providing easy-to-read copy with just enough information on product detail pages
• Showcasing bestsellers and popular items
• Making AI-aided personalized recommendations, including suggesting cross-sells and bundles
• Using consistent branding in the site design

Benefits of website merchandising

The advantages of smart website merchandising include:

• Improved product visibility: Easy-to-navigate categories, optimal product placement, featured collections, and reliable, intuitive search functionality can help a retailer maximize sales.
• Higher average order values (AOV): Cross-selling suggests complementary products that enhance the item being viewed, while bundling offers a package deal on multiple related items. For instance, if a shopper is looking at buying a camera, suggesting the addition of a case, memory card, and tripod is a proven way to increase the order value.
• Better conversion: When shoppers are presented with detailed item descriptions, high-quality images, relevant personalization and recommendations, and user-generated content (reviews and ratings), you’re facilitating conversion.
• Stronger loyalty and retention: A well-merchandised website enhances the shopping experience, leading to higher customer satisfaction. According to Salesforce, after a positive shopping experience, 89% of customers are more likely to make another purchase.
• Omnichannel success: finely tuned website merchandising can also help streamline the customer experience in a retailer’s other channels, creating a consistent, seamless brand experience.

Assess your merchandising needs

Ready to revamp your website merchandising? To identify areas that may need improvement, ask these questions:

Is our site easy on the eyes?

Is the design clean and attractive? A visually appealing website keeps visitors interested. Use high-quality images, inviting layouts, and plenty of white space. For inspiration, check out the Nike, Apple, Alibaba, and Walmart websites, which have been crafted to grab and hold shopper attention.

Are our products grouped well?

Intuitive product grouping and categorization are crucial for a seamless shopping journey. Organize your products in logical categories and subcategories, for example, themes, seasons, or use cases. For Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Black Friday, create promotional pages and bundles to promote cross-selling and upselling. Use menus and navigation to help shoppers browse.

How’s our branding?

An online selling space is obviously different from a retail store, but as a professionally branded element, it should feel similar. You want your logo, color scheme, typography, and visual elements to be cohesive. A consistently recognizable look online helps build shopper trust and loyalty. By applying the principles of online retail merchandising, you can also improve your brand reputation. Then, when your customers think of your company, they’ll remember how easy it was to find and buy what they were looking for; how glad they were to buy and be able to use the product.

Do we understand our shoppers’ needs?

When customers opt in, you can monitor what they do on your site, then use AI-enabled merchandising analytics to get a sense of what they want and then strategically provide it to them. This involves:

• Tracking how customers navigate your site, which products they view, and what they buy
• Testing merchandising techniques to see which ones resonate best with your prospects
• Monitoring your conversion, AOV, and customer retention
• Using your analytics to help determine strategies
• Revisiting and refining what you’ve implemented

Is our search bar in good shape?

A powerful search feature is essential for competing in the digital landscape because it lets shoppers find what they need fast. To streamline, you can optimize your search functionality for speed and accuracy and implement autocomplete suggestions, filters, and facets.

Boost revenue with personalization

Companies that use personalization have been found to gain 40% more revenue than those that don’t, so for many online retailers, it’s something worth rolling out. By tailoring the shopping journey explicitly to each visitor’s needs, you can increase engagement and customer satisfaction.

You can:

• Use behavioral targeting: By tracking and analyzing customer behavior, you can identify patterns and interests. Then you can dynamically display relevant products and offers. For example, if a shopper browses a particular category, you can present  limited-time discounts for those items.
• Present customized content: For instance, send email with product suggestions based on earlier purchases. You can also customize your home page or landing pages for shoppers by displaying content that matches their interests.
• Personalize product recommendations: By using AI and machine learning to assess purchase history, browsing patterns, and earlier interactions, you can display the products that are most likely to interest each shopper. For example, if someone often buys lots of sporting equipment, you can suggest new arrivals and bestsellers in that category.

Master your website merchandising

If you’re an online retailer in search of winning website merchandising, we at Algolia can help. As a Gartner Magic Quadrant company for search and product discovery, we offer cutting-edge tools for streamlining your user experience to increase sales, potentially by substantial amounts. From improving the search and discovery experience for Zeeman to boosting Lacoste’s sales by more than 150%, we have an impressive track record.

Dreaming of website merchandising that delights your shoppers? Get in touch and let’s make that a reality.