As a consumer, I do a lot of online shopping. An ecommerce site that I frequent often is AE.com (American Eagle clothing). Just recently, I went through the purchasing process on this particular site and in the following I will document my experience.

First thing I noticed immediately after landing on the page, is its simplicity. First of all, the company uses a strait forward sans serif font that is very easy to read.  Color also helps in the design of this website, the company’s chosen PMS color, which is a navy blue and white make up the majority of the design and give it a very structured look. Navigation appears at the top of the page under the company’s logo. Navigation is easy to understand, as described in Chapter 1 of Steve Krug’s “Don’t Make Me Think”, unmistakable words are used (i.e., men, women, jeans, shoes, clearance). A search bar appears in the top right corner. As a test, I typed in “jeans,” a dropdown list displays a significant amount of options that could aid a consumer who might be looking to purchase jeans.

So what about the negatives, well, I definitely noticed a few in scanning the landing page. First of all, above the company logo there appear to be a lot of links that include jump pages to affiliating stores, account setup, rewards, etc. I can see how this would be confusing to a newcomer visiting this particular site. If I were redesigning this site, I would move these links to the bottom of the page. Also, in looking down through the page, there are multiple links that take you to the same place. This will cause the potential buyer several seconds of thought, “Don’t Make Me Think,” describes the importance of avoiding those wasted seconds.

Moving onto the buying process. So, I navigated the navigation to a particular pair of jeans that I wanted to buy. The product page gives me a lot of really useful information including price, product details, etc. I am prompted to choose a wash, quantity and size, all very self-explanatory. Now, I can add the product to my shopping bag, and I do. A dialog box appears, stating that there is an item present in my shopping bag and I now have the option to checkout. In clicking on checkout, another dialog box appears that gives you the option to sign into your account or checkout without signing out. I chose the later, for time saving purposes. Now, I am prompted to fill in shipping and payment info. Finally, I am able to review and place my order followed by a confirmation via email. The ecommerce portion of this website is a great representation of unity in both design and fluidity of actions.

My reaction to this site is mixed, there are some elements that work very well, and some that don’t. I like the overall design of the site, including the color and font choices. I also really like the ecommerce portion of the site, it was very easy to use and didn’t require much thought. However, there are some things that I came across, that made me think, and as Krug says, it’s crucial to avoid that.