How to improve the conversion rate of an e-commerce website?

Improving an e-commerce website's conversion rate is not about adding more pop-ups or artificially shortening every page. Conversion improves when users understand the product faster, find the information they need to decide and encounter less friction between discovery and payment.

In 2025, French e-commerce reached €196.4 billion in revenue and 3.2 billion transactions according to Fevad. The average order value nevertheless fell to €62, a sign of a mature market where buyers order more often but remain sensitive to price and the quality of the experience. An e-commerce web agency should therefore work on value per visit and journey quality, not traffic alone.

Why does good traffic not guarantee a good conversion rate?

A website can attract qualified visitors and still lose the sale for very concrete reasons: insufficient product information, unhelpful filters, unclear sizing, costs revealed too late, slow performance or an overly complex payment process. SEO and campaigns then do not have an acquisition problem, but a conversion problem.

Before changing the design, identify where the loss occurs: category, product page, basket, account creation, delivery or payment.

Start with the quality of category pages

A category page should help narrow down a choice. Filters, sorting options and the information shown on product cards should match the criteria people genuinely use to decide.

Web design should make comparison easy without overloading every card.

Turn the product page into a decision page

An effective product page should answer the main objections: use, dimensions, material, compatibility, delivery, returns, care, warranty and availability. The most important information should appear before secondary details. This was a key challenge on Aleria's website, which presents a custom saddle with 19 adjustable parameters in a simple way, using a configurator that shows the result and price in real time.

A solid structure can include:

• product name and main benefit;
• genuinely informative photos or videos;
• price and variants;
• stock and delivery time;
• reassurance elements;
• use-oriented description;
• technical specifications;
• delivery and returns;
• contextual FAQ;
• genuinely relevant complementary products.

Make fees and delivery times visible before checkout

Discovering an extra cost after adding a product to the basket creates avoidable friction. Delivery conditions, free-shipping thresholds, timeframes and return terms should be accessible early enough.

The website should also avoid absolute delivery promises when they depend on stock, destination or carrier. For more detail, see the information that reassures customers most before an online purchase.

Reduce abandonment caused by customer accounts

Forcing account creation before purchase can slow down checkout when it provides no immediate value. Depending on the business model, guest checkout followed by optional account creation after payment can be smoother.

The right choice depends on purchase frequency, retention strategy, business constraints and the real benefits linked to the account. These levers are detailed in our article on how to reduce cart abandonment through a better web experience.

Optimise checkout without removing useful information

Checkout should avoid unnecessary fields, poorly explained errors and unexpected steps. It should also preserve trust: the order summary, selected delivery method, total price, payment method and return information should remain accessible.

A campaign landing page only makes sense if this quality continues all the way through payment.

Treat mobile as a specific journey

On mobile, filters, galleries, variant selectors and payment fields become more sensitive. An interface that works on desktop can become painful when users have to close several overlays or horizontally scroll through a table.

Tests should cover:

• search and category;
• filtering;
• variant selection;
• add to basket;
• quantity changes;
• address;
• delivery;
• payment;
• confirmation page.

Use content to reduce objections

Size guides, comparisons, usage advice or care content can remove barriers that do not fit comfortably on a product page. Internal linking should connect this content to the relevant categories and products without multiplying identical links.

Measure every stage of the funnel

Tracking should distinguish product views, add-to-basket events, checkout starts, delivery selection, payment and purchase. Errors and abandonment by device are often more informative than one overall rate.

KPIs to monitor include:

• add-to-basket rate;
• basket-to-checkout rate;
• abandonment by stage;
• conversion by device;
• revenue per session;
• average order value;
• return or cancellation rate when available.

Prioritise tests instead of changing everything

An effective CRO approach formulates a precise hypothesis, changes one variable and measures the impact. Major changes should be based on data, customer feedback and observation of user journeys.

E-commerce conversion checklist

• Categories can be filtered using real buying criteria.
• Product pages answer the main objections.
• Fees and delivery times are visible before checkout.
• The basket remains easy to edit.
• Checkout limits unnecessary fields.
• Mobile has been tested through to payment.
• E-commerce events are measured correctly.

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