Creating a Shoppable Wine Website

You’ve had a website for a number of years (at least I hope your winery has a website) and now you want to add an ecommerce store. Here are the key elements to creating a shoppable wine website:

Product Information: Ensure that you have great product pages with rich product information, the product price and the ability to add to cart. Make sure the shopper has everything they need to know about your wine. If your customers are asking the same questions about your wine and that information isn't included on your product page, respond by adding it. Go the extra mile to establish trust by including customer ratings and reviews and enable social sharing. (For more info read our post on The Anatomy of a Great Wine Page)

Professional Wine Bottle/Label Images: The images of your product often make or break the sale. People like to see pictures of the wine they buy. (While we don’t have hard numbers, we can definitely say products with images outsell products without images). Professional crisp images are far superior to pictures taken with a consumer grade digital camera and reflect positively on your brand.

Shipping Rates / Policies: Shipping cost is the number one deterrent to buying wine online. Be upfront with your customers about shipping rates. Try something like Inman Family Wines where they show their shipping on the left side of their product pages. Also ensure that you have the standard shipping policy, privacy policy, and terms of use pages.

Contact Information: Have your contact information everywhere. (We recommend including your phone number right on your website header like WineTasting.com). Build trust by having both contact us and customer service pages (customers like to know how to contact you if their is a problem with their product).

Frictionless Checkout Process: No online shopping experience is complete without a shopping cart and allowing customers to checkout easily. Build a frictionless checkout by reducing forms to only necessary information and enabling guests to checkout without registering. (For more info read our post on
Reducing Friction Points in Checkout)

Before you launch the ecommerce portion of your site, ensure you have all the necessary elements to make your customers feel comfortable. Inspire confidence and trust by providing all of the information they’ll be looking for without having to search for it.  Try purchasing wine from your own site and ensure the experience is optimized.

P.S.  One of my favorite "shoppable" wine sites we've launched recently is the Inman Family Wines site.