Products Appearing as Variation - Colour Variation
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Chris
Seeing as more and more people browse on mobile and only scroll so far, and how some products have many colour variations. I was wondering if it's worth condensing this so people aren't having to scroll past the same item too many times, and can find what they're looking for sooner, then see if there's a colour they prefer.
A lot of sites seem to show products as variation and to a degree we do this already with the master colour, although on the product page it just shows an image without the colour name nearby.
This could help customers navigate the site far easier, having far fewer individual listing loading at any one time, i feel customers search for a product and then see if there's a colour they prefer.
The solution would likely require the master colour to shift when it sells out to one that is still in stock.
I imagine this whole suggestion is a potential nightmare for someone but... sorry.
Neil McQuillan - CEO Citrus-Lime
When items are colour grouped we set the canonical to the first product activated in the colour group this addresses the SEO issue.
Not using a 'swatch style' gallery is intentional. Whilst it would be perfect for low value items when customers are shopping for higher value items or clothing colour is a key part of the purchasing decision, and pushing colours off the search page means visual search doesn't work.
e.g. Rather showing both colours it would 'hide' the secondary colours at the customer research phase. In context you can see several bikes here which vary only by colour and we built it in the manner we did because the research we did suggested showing all colours at the search level lead to better conversion rates - https://www.balfesbikes.co.uk/collection/specialized-turbo-levo-4
It also means you cannot do things such as this which maybe quite useful. https://www.balfesbikes.co.uk/bikes/electric-bikes/blue
Neil McQuillan - CEO Citrus-Lime
So basically I would want swatches for low value items and all colours for higher value and clothing items.
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Chris
Neil McQuillan - CEO Citrus-Lime Interesting counter. At what point do you tend to see scrolling fatigue set in? How many clicks is too many? Do you have any examples of how to organise a lot of similar products that have lots of colour variations?
I do like Balfes website. The new search and the work they've done on collections is superb. 👌
I also like how the filters load open on department and category to better allow customers narrow things down further. Although this obviously does not happen on mobile.
Is there potential to allow navigation by colour or size more prominent for the high value items and clothing? Is there an example of someone already doing this?
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Neil Jeffs
I couldn't agree more. Swatch style gallery views look much more professional. Clogging up the site with 8 different colour variations of the same water bottle cage is not a good customer shopping experience.
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Chris
Neil Jeffs Yeah for some brands it can get a little silly. Fjallraven Kanken!!!
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Scott
This used to be an issue with google shopping and search results, but I dont think that applies any longer due to search result pages not being indexed... as it would be good if there is no downside SEO or Google wise...
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Chris
Scott 100% agree. I feel like I read or heard somewhere that it isn't a problem anymore and there's chat about sending all the traffic to a master listing since people often don't search for the insane colour names that brands give their products.... Salomon Quest 4 Gore-Tex Womens in Shopping Bag/Black/Cork... I mean seriously?!?