Ecommerce landing page: why paid shoppers leave

A paid shopper clicks because one specific item caught their eye, and their first question on the page is whether this is that item. Stores often send ads for one product to a general collection page, or to a product page whose first photo shows another color, or a model wearing it with other pieces. The shopper cannot see a match, so they search the page for the item, then the header, then leave. The owner sees the ad as working, because the clicks arrive, and the page looks fine in the editor, where the owner already knows what they are looking for.

• Does the product in the first photo match the product in the ad?
• Is the price visible before the visitor picks a size or a color?
• Are sold-out sizes labelled in words, not only greyed out?
• Does the delivery cost appear before the cart?
• Is the header cut down to the links a paid shopper needs?

Paid visitors arrive with one product in mind. They checked the photo in the feed, and they will check it again on the page. If the first picture is a collection grid, a lifestyle shot of a model in another color, or a bundle, the visitor has to hunt for the item they clicked, and many stop hunting. Wrong: a banner that says 'New season essentials' above a row of six products. Right: the ad's product photo, the product name and the price in the first screen, with the other products below the fold.

Put the ad text into the test. The report compares what the ad promised with what the page shows, so a claim such as 'in stock today' or 'free delivery' that the page does not repeat will show up. Compare the color and the cut on a phone too. A studio photo in the ad next to a catalogue photo on the page can read to a shopper as a different item.

A product page that asks for a size, a color and a bundle before it shows the total makes the shopper do arithmetic before they know the cost. Wrong: the price appears only after a size is chosen, and every size except one is greyed out with no label. Right: the price and the add-to-cart button show from the start, and unavailable sizes are labelled as such in words, such as 'Medium, sold out'. A greyed-out option with no label looks to many shoppers like a broken dropdown.

Watch the first two taps. A shopper who presses the size selector and sees nothing change, or who has to scroll past the reviews to find the button, leaves on the page they are on. Delivery is another gap. If the delivery cost appears only at the cart, a paid shopper who expected free delivery from the ad leaves there, at a step with its own problems.

A paid shopper who does not know the store needs three answers before buying: what it costs with delivery, what happens if the size is wrong, and whether the store is real. Those answers belong next to the button. Returns details tucked into a footer link are hard to reach on a phone. A short line under the button, such as 'Free returns within the window shown at checkout', helps only if it is true for your store.

Keep the menu out of the way. A header with ten categories gives a shopper who came for one jacket nine other places to go. Keep the logo, the search and the cart, and remove the rest from this page. In a test, a visitor who opens the category menu and then writes that they forgot the jacket shows exactly where the attention went.

Product photos get replaced, sizes sell out and campaigns change their offer. Any of these can break the match with an ad that is still running. Rerun the same shoppers after each change to the product page or the ad copy, and check the sizes that were sold out last time. One paid campaign pointing at a mismatched page can spend a budget before anyone notices.