Ecommerce Home Page Best Practices: 11 Ideas to Get More Conversions From Your Store's Home Page

• Showcase your value proposition
• Gain visitors’ trust
• Guide people to the right products

Fail here, and you severely limit your chances of converting a potential customer either right away or in the long haul.

So how can you design an ecommerce home page like this that converts? We’ll answer that for you in this guide as we dive into ecommerce home page best practices and look at examples of what the best brands include on theirs.

Let’s dive in 👇

SEE MORE: Ecommerce Landing Page Examples & Templates

1. Start with the end goal in mind

Begin with asking yourself: what action do I want my ecommerce landing page visitor to take?

This could be anything from directing buyers to:

• Take a quiz
• Shop your bestsellers
• Check a limited-time collection
• Subscribe to your newsletter

Having a clear answer here is essential for planning your above-the-fold primary call-to-action. Like this from Chewy:

To make the most of the value this above-the-fold real estate offers, you can use the multi-banner approach, too—the same as Pilot Coffee Roasters’ home page does:

The key, however, is only to present the most compelling offers in these banners so you don’t lose your visitors’ attention.

A few more never-ignore pointers to keep in mind as you explore the multiple banner approach:

• Design. Use bold banners with large text and high-quality product images to hold visitors’ attention and entice them to click.
• Don’t overdo it with multiple banners. It’s best to keep them under five, so you don’t confuse visitors.
• Make sure the banners are dynamic. Each should pause for enough time to let the visitor read the banner’s content. Also, make certain site visitors can swipe them.

2. Provide a clear value proposition above the fold

Both the image and copy you use here will help drive home your store’s value proposition. The aim? Tell prospects why they should buy from you by sharing what’s unique about your product.

Considering buyers have numerous options, it’s critical you nail showcasing your value prop to retain their attention.

Soggy Doggy’s headline and accompanying text do a great job at this:

The headline leads with solving a pain point that their target buyer has “soggy paws stop here.” The subtext then explains their value proposition of absorbing “5x more water than regular doormats.”

See how smartly they answer the ‘why should we buy from you’ question that readers’ have.

You can also lead straight with your unique value as Talo Brush does:

Or, use video to showcase your product’s value proposition as Spongellé does:

But you have to be smart about leveraging video to tell a story around your value proposition.

3. Make sure key functions are easy to find

Aim to build critical features such as the search box, navigation bar, product categories, cart, and more where users expect them to be instead of putting them in new places.

The reason? Design for familiarity, a UX design fundamental. The idea is to leverage prevailing expectations to design a user-friendly home page.

For instance, visitors expect to find the search box and shopping cart on either side of the site header. So that’s where you should put them on your ecommerce home page:

As for your navigation bar, make sure you take a clean, clutter-free approach to it.

Case in point: FrankBody’s home page:

And if you’re thinking it’s important you share all your product categories on your home page, think again. You don’t want to be overloading visitors with so many choices that they end up making no decision at all (technically known as decision or choice paralysis).

4. Make your shipping policy clear

Clarify your shipping policy, whether you offer:

• Free shipping complete
• Free shipping for a limited time
• Free shipping after spending a certain amount
• Free shipping for specific areas (e.g. within the US only)

There are two reasons why you need to do this.

One, buyers are always looking to learn shipping details. So don’t make them look for it and possibly frustrate them in the process 😬

Plus, if you only share shipping charges or any other hidden fees at checkout, you’re likely to lose your buyers’ trust who feel cheated on.

Two, 68% of online shoppers in the US say they don’t purchase over half the time when brands don’t offer free shipping. In fact, free shipping can:

• Improve average order value by 97% and
• Reduce cart abandonment by 18%.

Translation: if you offer free shipping, make the most of it by announcing it.

So how to tell people you offer free shipping? Use a sticky bar in the header:

If you want to trigger FOMO by offering free shipping for a limited time, make sure you tell that to your visitors too.

Di Bruno Bros uses a dynamic sticky bar that first reads “free shipping over $100.”

Then, it says “ends soon” to prompt buyers to act immediately:

5. Consider a quiz or survey to segment and guide visitors

Think about the sort of mindset people are likely to be in when coming to your home page:

• Browsing
• Unsure what they're looking for
• Relatively low purchase-intent

So, you need to help guide these visitors to the right place.

Product recommendation quizzes are an effective way of doing this. They can engage people while getting to know them better for the purposes of audience segmentation and targeted marketing.

Take Warby Parker, for example. The brand lets visitors shop directly with the “Shop Men” and “Shop Women” buttons.

But, it also leverages a quiz to assist others in shopping:

The quiz also helps Warby Parker capture leads. This way, they can nurture those who didn’t convert right away with email marketing:

Undersun Fitness leverages the same approach. In fact, its Fitness quiz has a whopping 27% (!) lead capture rate.

6. Showcase social proof and reviews

Nothing will help you gain visitors’ trust better than social proof, including customer reviews and product star ratings.

In fact, testimonials from previous customers can help increase sales and conversion rates by as much as 34%.

Meaning: you’ve got to share customer reviews. Plus, highlight them the right way, so visitors see them without even scrolling.

RXBAR does this well.

The brand shares what media publications have to say and its star ratings above the fold—right after their value proposition banner:

Solo Stove does the same.

Except, it uses the area to make other selling pointers, such as telling users about free shipping and returns:

Lady Boss, too, takes such an upfront approach.

It adds social proof to the banner itself by sharing that 50 million shakes have been sold and the brand has been voted #1—that’s a strategic way of using numbers-based social proof to convert:

One other way to share more social proof is sharing what the media is saying about you.

Thistle does this better by having an interactive corner that shares quotes from what others are saying about them:

Add such a section further down your ecommerce home page to reinforce social proof throughout.

7.  Showcase trust badges

Again, this helps you gain potential customers’ trust by indicating they can trust you with their money and banking details. These also tell buyers you’d deliver on your business promises.

So, how can you show such trust signals? Showcase the following on-page trust badges on your ecommerce home page:

• Free, easy returns
• Virus software logos
• Customer testimonials
• Money-back guarantee
• Safe, encrypted checkout
• HTTPS and SSL certificates
• Logos of brands that the customer already trusts
• Payment logos like ShopPay, Visa, Mastercard, or PayPal
• Ratings from third-party sites (Capterra, G2, Trustpilot, etc.)

While there are tons of trust badge examples we can explore, let’s look at one in-depth: Casper’s home page.

It starts with the header region—sharing warranty and risk-free trial details:

Scroll a little, and you see a dynamic customer review section featuring four testimonials—all pausing to give the visitor reading time:

Next, Casper showcases its awards to confirm the comfort and that its mattresses offer is widely commended:

And finally, there's two more hits at displaying social proof: sharing what Vogue says about Casper and posting a satisfaction-guaranteed badge:

Heads up: Make social proof prominent!

Candle Delirium, for example, nails its entire home page design, but then waits until the end of the page to show social proof:

This is not really advisable since few visitors will scroll right down to the very end of the page unless they're looking for something very specific.

8. Capture non-purchasing visitors as leads

If you follow all these ecommerce home page best practices, you’d see a solid sales conversion rate. But, the truth remains: not everyone will make a purchase right away.

So what can you do about potential buyers who aren’t ready to buy?

Capture them as leads and nurture them toward a purchase via owned marketing channels—like email and SMS.

Cuddle Clones, for instance, tries to catch abandoning visitors with a two-step discount popup:

Alternatively, do what Your Super does on its home page: add an on-page, embedded message sharing a discount—an effective tactic to get visitors to subscribe:

SEE MORE: How "Your Super" Used Product Bundles to Hit $70 Million in Ecommerce Sales

9. Design for mobile-first

In 2020, 55.4% of consumers used their phones to shop online. This number is expected to grow, with estimates saying mobile consumer spending will hit $728 billion by 2025.

The takeaway: Make sure your ecommerce home page is optimized for mobile devices or be prepared to lose interested shoppers.

Here’s how:

• The font size should be readable
• Improve page load speed
• Make sure no elements overlap each other
• Condense navigation for a clean, clutter-free look
• CTA text should be short and readable, and button size should be clickable

Let’s review Chobani’s home page and see how it’s focused on mobile-first.

The top of the page on mobile’s above the fold area uses dynamic header images to hook visitors in. Users can easily swipe with the arrows:

Instead of cluttering the header bar with options, the home page has three vertical lines on the right side that open the available pointers.

It's all very organized, structured, and easy to navigate:

Chobani also plays it safe with its mobile popup by positioning it toward the end of the sreen—giving visitors a choice to explore as needed with the top pointing arrow and an “X” to get rid of it altogether.

Should a visitor choose to open this popup, there’s a clean popup design asking for a person's email address with an easily clickable “sign up” button:

You can also use a traditional popup as Spongellé does on its mobile home page. The key, however, is to make sure:

• The popup is readable.
• The form field size makes it convenient for visitors to add their details
• The exit cross to remove the popup is clickable

The rest of Chobani’s home page features high-quality images with minimal copy and CTAs. As for the footer section, it’s also mobile-optimized, as is evident by the clickable social icons and limited footer options.

10. Display contact information

Since an ecommerce home page aims to gain trust, positioning yourself as authentic by sharing contact details is crucial.

It’s why all leading ecommerce stores and the examples we’ve shared so far display contact details prominently.

Meowbox even goes on to share its contact number right in the home page’s header:

Or you can share the same in the footer. Alternatively, add a contact page and share it in the footer as Sweaty Betty does:

Whichever way you choose to go, just make sure that it's obvious how to contact you. This provides peace of mind for potential buyers—they know if something goes wrong, your support team is just a call or email away.

11. Show targeted messages for better conversion

Lastly, plan to engage site visitors with the right message at the right time. Share targeted CTAs such as discount coupons and upsell offers based on a variety of factors.

Glossier, for example, tracks visitors’ location to tell them whether the brand can ship to them:

Examine.com goes down the segmentation route.

For example, it has a home page site message popup that shows to unidentified visitors:

 The answers people give can then help Examine direct them to the most appropriate section of the website and make more relevant offers.

Design your ecommerce home page today 

With these ecommerce home page ideas, you’ll be sure to bump up your conversion rates in no time. Plus, grow your email and SMS lists with those people who aren't ready to make a purchase right away.

Remember:

Always aim to be clear in your value proposition, earn visitors’ trust, and direct them to the most appropriate part of your site possible—this is a great rule of thumb for getting the most out of those visiting your home page.