In the lead-up to Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and the Christmas sales, most eCommerce brands focus all their time and effort on product launches, ad campaigns, and discounts and offers.
The big thing most of them neglect is how their website performs.
November and December are the busiest times of the year for eCommerce brands, with big surges in traffic, higher user expectations, and tougher competition.
To make the most of it, your website performance and user experience need to be in top form.
Even small UX issues or a few extra seconds of load times can cause users to lose interest and spend their money elsewhere.
In this article, we’ve shared eight practical ways to prepare your eCommerce site for the busiest shopping period of the year.
Starting with one of the biggest reasons eCommerce websites miss out on sales, a clunky checkout page. 👇
1. Test your cart and checkout experience
Over 70% of online shoppers abandon their carts before checking out.
Why? Poorly designed or clunky checkout processes kill interest, leading to customer drop-offs and lost sales.
To test your checkout process, start by going through the steps of your cart and checkout pages as if you were a customer.
Don’t just skim it. Go slowly, step-by-step, like your customers would.
Ask yourself:
- Is the process confusing or slow?
- Are there too many clicks to complete a purchase?
- Are all costs and fees clearly shown before checkout?
Ultimately, this exercise should help you identify your users’ friction points and frustrations by manually testing your checkout process.
Here’s a short checklist of checks you should complete:
- Make sure totals, taxes, and shipping fees are clear and accurate
- Test discount codes and promotional offers work properly
- Check that autofill on the address and card fields works
- Confirm all payment gateways are connected and work correctly
- Remove unnecessary steps or distractions
- Ensure order confirmation emails are clear and correct
You can also use tools like Hotjar or Microsoft Clarity to watch how real users move through your checkout.
Small moments of hesitation will show you where people get stuck, and fixing those micro-frustrations now could prevent hundreds, if not thousands, of abandoned carts and missed sales over Black Friday and Christmas.
This simple checkout page used on the Nike website is a great example of a clear, clutter-free checkout page with three simple steps for completing a purchase – delivery options, payment, order review… that’s all you need!
2. Improve your site speed
Slow-loading pages kill user engagement.
The optimal page loading speed is 2 seconds or less, and every second of additional delay can reduce conversions by up to 20%.
Where possible, you should aim to keep all page load times under two seconds by:
- Compressing large images to under 100KB
- Switch .jpg and .png images to .webp format
- Enable caching and lazy loading
- Remove plugins and scripts that don’t serve a purpose
You can use Google PageSpeed Insights or the Google Lighthouse tool to find out your Core Web Vitals scores and what’s slowing things down.
A fast website will rank higher in organic search results, keep users engaged and browsing for longer, and increase your conversion rates.
3. Check your mobile experience
More than half of all eCommerce sales now happen on mobile devices.
If your website isn’t designed for mobile and feels awkward or clunky to use, you’re almost certainly losing potential customers.
Before Black Friday and Christmas, it’s a good idea to check how your website performs on every device, from smartphones and tablets to laptops and desktop PCs.
Open your site on different devices and check that:
- Pages resize correctly, and all content is visible
- Navigation menus are easy to use
- Buttons and links are fully visible and easy to tap
- All text, from headings to small print text, is easily readable
- Product images resize correctly and are clear
- That the checkout process is smooth and functions well on mobile
When things are awkward or confusing to use, mobile users will drop off quickly.
Ensuring the mobile user journey is as simple and touch-friendly as possible will make it easier for people to find and buy your products.
4. Stress-test your hosting
None of your other optimisations matter if your server can’t handle the traffic you’re getting.
During Black Friday and Christmas, some eCommerce sites can easily see double or triple the traffic they usually get.
Check with your hosting provider to see what your site’s traffic limits are and whether your plan supports automatic scaling. If you’re running on shared hosting, you can update, even just temporarily, to a higher tier or dedicated plan to ensure your website can handle the increase in traffic.
With some hosts, like Cloudflare, you can add virtual waiting room functions to avoid overloading your server and carefully manage your traffic.
Another good idea is to simulate heavy website traffic and stress test your server capacity. Tools like Loader.io can help with this.
Testing in advance will help you find and address weak points now, rather than when hundreds or thousands of people overload your site on your busiest day of the year.
A 503 server error on Black Friday is a problem nobody wants.
5. Make finding products effortless
When people land on your site, they should be able to find what they want in just a few clicks. Whether it’s items you have on sale or specific products they’re interested in.
Confusing menus and messy product categories are engagement killers. They frustrate your customers and push them away to other websites and retailers.
To improve the browsing experience on your website, focus on:
- Simplifying menus and category structures
- Using clear, descriptive and logical product names
- Improving search filters for product options/variations
- Enabling predictive search suggestions
- Highlighting key offers or sale sections
- Keeping banners clear and easy to understand
Your website shouldn’t feel like navigating a maze. Browsing your product range should be quick and predictable.
If your menus are confusing or sale banners and calls to action don’t stand out, people might not even realise what’s on offer or how to find it.
You should aim to have all product pages within three clicks reach whenever someone lands on your website.
Every extra click increases the chance of users becoming frustrated, and you losing a sale.
Always reduce friction wherever you can.
6. Put big offers front and centre
Like the last point around product visibility, you should also make your sales and offers immediately visible when someone lands on your site.
People always look for the best deals around Black Friday and Christmas, so don’t make them hunt for them… put them front and centre!
Make sure you:
- Place your biggest offers at the top of your home and landing pages
- Add countdown timers and banners to your pages
- Use bold calls to action with clear offers, e.g.’ 50% off until midnight!’
- Leverage urgency with stock counters… but only when it’s genuine (fake urgency is actually an illegal UX design practice)
Keep your offers, pop-ups, and banners simple and easy for users to interact with.
Too much text or making people jump through hoops to get a discount code will distract, frustrate, and overwhelm them.
The goal is to make visitors stop scrolling and take action, so the easier that process is, the better!
7. Simplify your layouts
Your website’s layout directly impacts how people browse and buy. If it feels cluttered or confusing, visitors will leave before they reach the checkout.
Keep your design clean and easy to follow. Use clear headings, bold calls to action, and plenty of white space so the page doesn’t feel crowded.
When reviewing your layout, focus on:
- Making key actions obvious and easy to find
- Using high-quality product images and short, clear descriptions
- Keeping navigation simple and consistent across all pages
- Showing accurate prices upfront
Avoid anything that distracts people from buying.
Annoying pop-ups, autoplay videos, or too many competing links can break people’s focus and complicate the user journey. Instead, guide users toward one clear next step, like browsing a range of products or adding items to their cart.
You should also use social proofing to build more trust with your customers.
Add social proofing and reassurance at logical steps with:
- Customer reviews and testimonials
- Product star ratings and comparisons
- Clearly shown secure payment options
- Accurate delivery and return information
A tidy, well-structured layout makes shopping feel effortless. And when your site is easy to use, you’ll have fewer abandoned carts and more sales.
8. Double-check your tracking
Double-check that your conversion tracking, remarketing, and website analytics are firing and recording data accurately.
Black Friday and Christmas are the ideal times to gather valuable insights into how customers use your website, what motivates them, and where they encounter issues.
Accurate conversion tracking will also help you identify where your users are coming from, which campaigns drive the most traffic and conversions, and which marketing channels you should focus on.
This information will help you make more informed marketing and UX decisions in the future.
Plus, with audience tracking pixels set up, you can run effective remarketing campaigns to re-engage previous customers or people who didn’t convert on their last visit.
Make sure you check your tracking across:
- Google Analytics (GA4)
- Microsoft Clarity
- Google Tag Manager (GTM)
- Meta Pixel
Want to make sure your website is ready for the festive period?
Still unsure about how your website and user journey will perform over the Black Friday and Christmas sales?
There’s still plenty of time to find out and get things ready for the busiest time of the year.
Through a detailed UX Audit, we can identify what’s helping your users buy and what’s quietly getting in their way. We can then create a clear action plan for optimising your online store’s user journey and conversion rate potential.
Ready to uncover the areas holding back your sales?
Get in touch to book your comprehensive UX audit.
