Summary of Jam Session:
In this session we did 5 critiques. Larry Knopf – Watch store. Dan Frey – Italian based food store. Christie Burke – Hair products. Derrick Longson – Electronic heaters/coolers. Christy Winfrey – POD bathroom/bedroom products. Additional Topics covered: Members area, Collection critique, Product page critique.
Housekeeping:
0:00:00 – Alex is BALD!
0:02:00 – New Members – Please make them feel welcome in the Facebook group, and if you are new, please do an introductory post letting the group know where you are based, what you do etc, so existing members can better help you
0:02:45 – Members Area – Will be released by the end of this week, at the time of this recording! There will be search functionality to easily navigate to previous calls for Tech Tuesday, Jam Sessions, FB Friday, Copywriting Critique Sessions, discussing certain topics, niches etc. There will also be in depth training videos that have yet to be released!
Critiques:
Critique 1
0:15:00 – Critique number 1 is for Larry Knopf store, wu90watches.com. This is a new store in the watch niche, selling casual to luxurious watches. Looking to secure their first few sales and needing feedback from the team on how they can get the ball rolling.
Homepage: Matt kicks it off with how Larry can optimize his navigation. Moving the Blog and About links out of the main navigation and moving them to the footer. Font size across the site needs to be increased for readability. If you are going to Instagram on your store, ensure that it is shoppable and does not take customers away from your site. This can be very distracting and your customers may not return.
Collection Page: Showing 3 products across is the magic number for collections. The images are a bit bigger which is better for this store because the products are very detailed and a customer can see more clearly what they are looking at. Next we take a look at the filters, there should be more than just 2 filters. Customers should be able to filter by bands, dial size, color of face etc.
Product Page: When clicking on a different variant it jumped down the screen. This is not prototypical, you need to have a static image box, so when a customer selects a variant the image changes but the page does not scroll down. Also, because there is only 2 variants. Use color swatches instead of dropdowns. Now taking a look at the description, it should be broken up and put behind a relevant tabs, we use an app ‘Easy Tabs’ for this. So you do not force your customers to read every last detail if they do not want to. If they want to read your shipping details they can click on that tab.
Critique 2
0:56:20 – Critique number 2 is for Dan Frey’s store, medeaterraneo.com. This is an Italian based food store, selling pasta, delicacies and oils.
Homepage: The banner is taking up 90% of the estate above the fold and offers no value. Team recommends shopping this banner in half and moving the collections above the fold.
Product Page: Clicking from the collection page to a product page, the product image was different. This can be a disconnect, and customers may think they misclicked. Always show the same image from collection to product page. Next, the ATC button needs to stand out above everything else, changing it to a color that will pop more than any other colors used on the store. Also, remove payment icons from the homepage and put them on the cart. Customers would rather see value propositions about the product than what payments you accept at this time.
Critique 3
1:20:00 – Critique number 3 is for Christie Burke’s store, burlybands.com. This is a unique store that sells hair ties for thick, heavy, curly hair.
Homepage: Team speaks about the main value proposition may not be the biggest benefit the product offers. Your value proposition should be what differentiates you from your competition and is your greatest benefit.
Product Page: Because there is only 1 product on this store but sell different quantities (pack sizes), they should all be on the 1 product page. It would be easier to put all your effort in optimizing the one page and customers don’t have to go to another page if they want to buy a different quantity size.
This critique was mainly focused on the stores value proposition. They have a unique product, now they need to display that value as best they can.
Critique 4
1:44:10 – Critique number 4 is for Derrick Longson’ store, https://ews-products.com/. This store sells a variety of indoor/outdoor coolers, heaters, outdoor TV covers.
Homepage: The team points out that the homepage is only meant for two things, to build trust and have clear navigation. On this homepage we see all the 4 collections listed on the homepage with no value proposition. After Derrick and his team implement the best practices from the Optimization Handbook, they will see many wins.
Critique 5
1:44:10 – Critique number 5 is for Christy Winfrey’s store, olivebranchfarmhouse.com. This store sells designs on bedroom/bathroom products, as well as canvas art.
Homepage: The white text on the light green is hard to read, team suggests changing to black for better readability. Also, making the Search more prominent with the borders and placeholder text being black, not faint gray. Next, the collects within the navigation needs to be grouped and organised more clearly.
Product Page: Removing the payment icons from under the cart and replacing them with value propositions. Payment icons belong on the Cart page and beyond, not anywhere else. There is a disconnect in the product tabs as there is nothing under Reviews, then there is reviews further down the page.
This critique was focused on the homepage and the product page. The main fixes on this site is navigation, hierarchy of focus and sorting out the colors for better readability.
Noteworthy Topics:
0:02:45 – Members Area – Everything you need to know about the upcoming Members Area
0:31:40 – Collection Practices – Team discuss some best practices and tips for filtering on the collection page
0:37:25 – Product Page – Deep dive into a non prototypical product page, what they can do better!