Key features of a good online shop
Written by: Gonzalo Pérez Gasca
In Spain, e-commerce has evolved from being an alternative channel to becoming a strategic driver of growth, fuelled by the uptake of mobile technology, the maturity of logistics and the growing influence of marketplaces. Against this backdrop, brands and retailers seeking sustainable growth and profitability are looking to take control of the customer experience and their margins
At Aktios, with our e-commerce platform, we have been supporting companies in Spain and Latin America for over a decade to scale their online shops quickly and efficiently thanks to our modular architecture and native integrations (ERP/CRM/PIM/POS), balancing three main objectives: (1) increasing conversion rates and average basket value, (2) customer retention, and (3) operational efficiency.
This practical experience, combined with a clear evaluation framework, enables us to identify quick wins across nine structural levers, prioritising them by their impact on sales, margins and customer experience.
The nine levers we have identified are as follows:
Discovery and navigation
Product Detail Page (PDP)
Trolley and checkout
Content and value proposition
Merchandising and commercial proposition
Technical performance and stability
Accessibility and inclusive design
Analytics and experimentation
Retention, CRM and post-purchase
When all the above aspects are taken into account and addressed appropriately, we can have a very positive impact on our online shop, achieving increases of 15–35 per cent in conversion within a few months
Pillar 1. Discovery and navigation
Objective: the user must be able to find what they are looking for in ≤ 3–4 interactions from the home page or any landing page.
Key aspects:
Scalable information architecture: define coherent categories, subcategories and attributes; ensure consistent naming conventions.
Advanced search function: with error tolerance, synonyms, autocomplete with results (products + categories + content), and the option to include business-specific rankings (top sellers, margin, availability).
Contextual filters by attributes: these are truly decisive, such as condition, size, colour, brand, price, availability, special offers and all other factors that may influence the user’s decision.
Sorting: with various options, such as by relevance (default), description, price, new arrivals, rating or favourites.
Internal linking: include breadcrumb navigation, featured categories, seasonal themed collections and special offers.
KPIs: Search engine usage rate, CTR on search suggestions, ‘no results’ < 3%, time to first click < 6s, refinement rate (filters).
Quick wins:
Index and display differentiating attributes such as: PDO/origin for food, material/type for fashion, and compatibility for electronics.
Add active filter ‘tabs’ and a visible ‘clear’ button.
Implement typo tolerance and local synonyms.
Pillar 2. PDP and product differentiation
Objective: to maximise clarity, trust and desire, whilst reducing uncertainty.
Key aspects:
Visual hierarchy: ensure the title, price, variants, primary CTA (sticky on mobile) and benefits in bullet point format are always visible.
Rich content: gallery with zoom/video, comparison with other models (where applicable), size charts (where applicable), downloadable technical specifications, brand/origin storytelling.
Availability and delivery: estimated delivery date by postcode, total cost and collection options such as express delivery or nearby collection points.
Social proof: verified reviews, Q&A, moderated UGC (User-Generated Content).
Differentiation: badges (eco, local, special offer, etc.), certifications, origin, ingredients/materials, usage guides.
Cross-selling: design bundles, add complementary items and suggest substitutes; rules based on affinity and basket contents. Recommended products that are similar to or related to the selected product.
KPIs: click-through rate to basket, percentage of users who expand the product gallery, scroll depth, ratio of queries/concerns resolved, ‘add to basket’ rate by variant.
Quick wins:
Sticky CTA on mobile
Shipping and returns costs visible before checkout
Interactive size guide
Variant comparison tool showing price differences per unit.
Pillar 3. Shopping basket and checkout (minimal friction)
Objective: the user should be able to make a payment easily, securely and quickly.
Key aspects:
Editable shopping basket: always display quantities, variants, vouchers and the delivery cost estimator where applicable. Persistent shopping basket, i.e. automatic saving of the current basket contents.
Checkout: on a single page or in 3 clear steps, with autocomplete, guest checkout, and social login/OTP (One Time Password).
Payments: include all possible methods such as cards, PayPal, Bizum, Apple/Google Pay, BNPL (Buy Now Pay Later) where relevant; seamless 3DS2.
Real-time feedback: easily visible errors per field and validation messages.
Full cost transparency: include taxes, delivery, surcharges and any other additional costs.
Trust: quality seals, returns policy, customer support via chat/WhatsApp and SLAs visible where applicable.
KPIs: abandonment by step, checkout time, error rate per field, 3DS success rate, conversion by payment method.
Quick wins:
Guest checkout by default
Save cart
Shipping calculation before personal details
Autosave for forms.
Pillar 4. Content, trust and value proposition
Objective: to communicate the ‘why us’ message, reduce perceived risk and strengthen the brand.
Key aspects:
Clear USPs: delivery times, returns policy, extended warranty, assembly, sustainability.
Comprehensible policies: returns, exchanges and warranties with examples and clearly defined timeframes.
FAQs: organised by category and on product detail pages (PDPs).
Social proof: use cases, verified reviews, press coverage, awards.
Editorial content: buying guides, comparisons, recipes/tutorials (where applicable).
KPIs: time spent on the policies page, click-through rate (CTR) to warranty pages, support enquiries, tone of reviews.
Quick wins:
‘What sets us apart’ mini-module on the homepage and product detail pages (PDPs), with 3–5 bullet points and links to evidence.
Pillar 5. Merchandising and commercial strategy
Objective: to boost margins and average basket value without damaging the brand.
Key points:
Promotions: with clear expiry dates and terms and conditions; avoid constant noise.
Bundles and packs tailored to use/occasion; impulse items in the basket (complements).
Recommendations: incorporate sections such as ‘often bought together’, ‘customers also bought’, ‘recently viewed’.
Rules based on availability and margin, not just popularity.
Pricing: psychological rounding, honest anchoring (RRP vs. usual price), discount vouchers.
KPIs: Average order value, voucher redemption rate, % of orders with cross-sells, net margin per order.
Quick wins:
Seasonal ‘gift finder’
Collection landing pages
Real savings vouchers
Carousels with limited items (less is more).
Pillar 6. Technical efficiency and stability
Objective: To make web pages lighter so that users are less likely to leave, and to improve search engine rankings.
This is measured using the so-called “Core Web Vitals”:
LCP (Largest Contentful Paint). Loading speed of the main element: < 2.5 s.
INP (Interaction to Next Paint). Site interactivity following user action: < 200 ms.
CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift). Visual stability of the page whilst loading: < 0.1
Key aspects:
Responsive images: which adapt to current needs and the size of each screen.
Next-gen[1] and lazy-load[2] images, and prefetching of critical paths[3].
JS: split by path[4], avoid over-hydration (i.e. making too many parts of the page ‘interactive’ when unnecessary, as this adds weight and slows things down) and limit third-party scripts.
Consistent caching/CDN to deliver content faster; monitor errors (Sentry) and downtime (uptime or the percentage of time the website is available).
Technical SEO: canonical tags, hreflang (to show the correct version to each user, for example based on country or language), sitemaps, structured data. All of this helps to improve the quality of organic traffic
KPIs: Core Web Vitals in the field (CrUX), error rate (percentage of sessions or views with errors, for example a button that doesn’t work), uptime, % of healthy SEO traffic.
Quick wins:
Compress images
Remove unused scripts
Serve fonts with `font-display: swap`
Preload the first CTA.
[1] Image formats (such as WebP, AVIF, etc.) that offer better compression and quality than older formats such as JPEG and PNG.
[2] Delaying the loading of images or content until the user actually needs them.
[3] These instruct the browser to download resources (such as CSS, fonts or images) that are prioritised and necessary for the current page, which it might discover later in the loading process.
[4] Instead of loading the entire engine on every page, only the section required for each screen (home page, product page or checkout) is loaded.
Pillar 7. Accessibility and inclusion (WCAG 2.2)
Objective: to enable any user to make a purchase, whilst also improving SEO and conversion rates.
Key aspects:
AA contrast: font sizes and line heights; visible focus (an element on a web page is currently selected for potential interaction); keyboard navigation.
Labels and descriptions for input fields and multimedia; appropriate ARIA roles (which define a component’s function).
Error announcements[5] and field-specific help[6]; native semantic components[7].
KPIs: open/closed WCAG issues, keyboard success rate, feedback from users of assistive technology (AT).
Quick wins:
Check colour/contrast,
Skip links (internal links that allow screen reader and keyboard users to jump directly to the main content of a web page, bypassing repetitive navigation and other introductory elements)
Legible and accessible error messages.
[5] Reported errors. These are issues identified by an accessibility checker that prevent or hinder people with disabilities from interacting with web content.
[6] Field help. This refers to the additional information or instructions provided alongside a form field to guide the user.
[7] Native semantic components. These are HTML elements that have a function and meaning predefined by the browser or operating system. They provide structure and meaning to the content, which is essential for assistive technologies.
Pillar 8. Analytics, experimentation and attribution
Objective: to make decisions based on business data, not just clicks.
Key aspects:
Event map from search to order confirmation (add_to_cart, checkout_step, payment_success, error codes).
Funnel dashboard by device and source.
A/B testing to prioritise the roadmap; ‘ship small, learn fast’ approach.
Attribution: a mix of models and a focus on margin per channel.
KPIs: conversion by segment, uplift per test, CAC/LTV[8], incremental net margin.
Quick wins:
Define missing events.
Funnels by step.
A testing schedule with hypotheses and sample sizes.
[8] The relationship between Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) and Lifetime Value (LTV)
Pillar 9. Customer retention, CRM and post-purchase
Objective: to increase the number of orders per customer and lifetime value.
Checklist:
Loyalty programme: keep it simple with points or tiers; personalised promotions (e.g. based on RFM).
Automations: welcome messages, abandoned basket reminders, post-purchase (reviews, upselling, care/usage).
Subscriptions (if applicable) and reminders; proactive customer service.
Logistics: proactive tracking, easy returns, clear refunds.
KPIs: 30/90-day repeat purchase rate, post-purchase NPS, review rate, items per order.
Quick wins:
Email/SMS series with 3–5 touchpoints,
Self-service order portal[9]
Personalised recommendation engines in newsletters.
[9] A section where customers can manage their orders and their relationship with the shop without having to contact customer support. For example, it includes features such as: real-time order status, downloading invoices, changing the delivery address or method, cancelling orders, returns, reordering previous items and managing subscriptions.
Conclusion
There are numerous actions that can be taken in relation to each of the key levers of an online shop, and we recommend implementing them by prioritising them according to their difficulty and the potential benefits to be gained from each.
For example:
Quick wins (0–6 weeks): copy, badges, sticky CTAs, visible costs, filters, auto-suggest, image optimisation, guest checkout.
Projects (6–12 weeks): semantic search, price comparison tools, bundle engine, checkout redesign, loyalty scheme.
Initiatives (>12 weeks): performance refactoring, new CMS/design system, catalogue and taxonomy, advanced data layer.
Furthermore, for all of this, it will be crucial to identify the metrics you wish to improve and define the improvement targets for each one before starting any activity.
At Aktios, we can help you identify the key areas for improvement in your online shop and recommend the actions likely to have the greatest impact on sales, conversion rates and customer retention.
We offer a quick and free assessment[10] in which we review functional aspects (search engine, purchase facilitators, communication, homepage, PLP, PDP, shopping basket, commercial proposition) and usability aspects (navigation/search, conversion, product details, shopping basket/checkout, accessibility).
As a result, we provide you with a scorecard for each area (1–10), a comparison against best practice, and recommended actions.
Click on the following link and request your evaluation:
[10] Aktios reserves the right to carry out the review based on the applicant company's sector, type, and size.
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