Internet Marketing Company

On previous posts I’ve tried to provide e-commerce designers collections of checkout buttons or progress bars. This time I thought they will find useful to look at the Continue Shopping collection.

102 website have been looked at during the analysis. There was no surprise regarding the name of the button: 85 websites are naming the button “Continue Shopping”. Only a few of them will give a different name like return to shopping or back to shopping.

I’ve looked at some specific elements – what is the button color or where is the arrow (if any) pointing . I tried to identify a pattern that would help designers developing a more usable checkout page, but that seems to be not possible, simply because business rules need to be into consideration when you decide on this button/link. However, I would advise on two things:

A. if you want to use an arrow in your button/link the arrow should be positioned on the left side of the button and it should point to left. You need to provide a strong sense of direction to your visitors. Usually, when you will click on the continue shopping button you will be taken to either the home page, either to a previous page (which actually means going back).

B. always name this call to action button Continue Shopping

You can view the collection after some statistics:

1. Button Color (there is no rule you need to follow here). You need to take into consideration branding colors and what you want to achieve on that page. Business objectives should be taken into consideration when you choose the color: i.e. do you want to force users click on this button? Then you can use a strong contrasting color. Is the order value in the cart reached from a business point of view? The button should be “lost” on the page and focus should be made on the Checkout Button.

Note: link buttons color is white. All % are rounded to integers.

Black – 4%

Blue – 19%

Brown – 4%

Green – 7%

Grey – 27%

Orange – 3%

Red – 4%

White – 33%

Yellow – less than 1%

2. Text Color. Again, choosing the color of this should follow defined business rules. Depending on what you want users to do next, increase or decrease contrast on the text. However, the text should be easy to read. Do not use the same color for the background and the text (i.e. white text on white background).

Black – 17%

Blue – 16%

Brown – 2%

Green – 3%

Grey – 7%

Orange – 4%

Red – 5%

White – 47%

Purple- less than 1%

3. Call to Action Text – there is no doubt here. You should use Continue Shopping, not resume shopping or just continue

Back to Shopping – 3%

Continue – 2%

Continue Shopping – 85%

Keep Shopping – 3%

Resume Shopping – less than 1%

Return to Shopping – 6%

Shop More – 2%

4. Link or Button ?- Should you use a link or a button? The answer, again lies on your business model. If you want to be pushy with customers to continue shopping, then you will display a button. If you want them to checkout then have it as a link. Some etailers will use multiple text links pointing to various pages on your website. The purpose is to improve the page usability (less clicks to reach the destination).

Buttons – 84%

Links – 18%

5. Arrows or no arrows ? Arrows are used to provide sense of directions. Use them, but not enforce it too much.

Use arrows – 44%

Don’t use arrows – 56%

6. Arrow pointing to left or right? Definitely, left.

Left – 25%

Right – 17%

Down – 4%

Note: % is relative to the 102 websites

7. Arrow position. The arrow should be positioned on the left side of the button.

Left – 29%

Right – 16%

For web designers, numbers are not saying much (just kidding…), so here is the collection:

Pitstop Media is a Vancouver based company, providing Internet marketing services to companies of all sizes, from start-ups to corporations. Need to convert more visitors into customers. We also offer landing page optimization services.