The lines are now closed and the votes are in…  Let’s see how the people chose…

Most people chose A.

The official site to complete an ESTA on is D. If you completed a form on D it would of been free and would be guaranteed to be processed. If you completed a form on any of the other three you would of had to pay approximately £30 – £40. These 3 sites are typical of many that are charging people to complete ESTA forms.

Official Sites Versus Unofficial Sites

The results here reflect reports that more people are paying to complete ESTA forms from unofficial sites. It’s important to note that the people who complete the forms and end up paying for them are not stupid. They are victims of well worked campaigns combined with efficient design.  Here are some design related reasons I believe people are paying to complete forms on the unofficial sites rather than for free on the official site:

Colour Schemes/Look & Feel

A lot of the unofficial sites appear have utilised ‘American’ colour schemes (reds and blues), flags and American imagery:

Whereas the official site is prodominently green which most would not immediately associate with America:

It’s possible that some people are electing to use the ‘unofficial’ sites as the appear to have more synergy with the USA, and therefore people think that they look more official.

Calls to Action & Usability
There are clear calls to action on the unofficial sites. Well placed and noticeable buttons labelled:  Click Here, Instant Download, ESTA Form or Continue, help make it easy for the site visitor to complete what they want to do, in this case fill out an ESTA form.

The buttons and links are placed in a combination of places some at the top of the web page, some at the bottom but they all have at least one call to action that appears on screen as soon as the page appears on screen.

However, the official site has no clear call to action; you have to work really hard to discover what you have to do next.  In fact (as illustrated below) you have to scroll about 1600 pixels down the page (i.e. well below the fold – if you consider that the average screen displays 1020 pixels) before you even see the apply button! Ordinarily we’d recommend that calls to action appear both above and below the fold.

It’s possible then that some come to the official site, but lose confidence as it’s not immediately apparent what they need to do.

Assurance and Confidence
Here, both the official and unofficial sites do pretty well. Most of the sites in this example use checklists or step by step examples . Each help to give an impression of transparency and encourage confidence in the site.

Example1:

Example 2:

Conclusion

One of the most important things to learn from this example is the importance of call to action and usability. Although  27% chose the official site based on a snapshot. Had the test been based on visiting the sites it may have been even less, seeing as visitors have to scroll down nearly twice the length of the screen to even find the apply button.

Every site needs a call to action whether it is to fill out a form, generate a phone call or submit a vote. The clearer the call to action is, the better the site will convert.

Similarly, consideration needs to be given to site look and feel. Use of colour and imagery, and theming to meet visitor’s expectations of how a site should look are key.

Suggestions for the Official Site

If I was tasked with redesigning the form on the official site, I’d look specifically at the following areas:

1. The essential difference between the official site and the others is that it is free to complete the ESTA form. Yet this is not mentioned on the the official site . The first thing I would do is alert the visitor that the form is free to complete on this site.
2. I would also address the call to action. I would place an apply now button close to the top of the page with enough white space around it for it to stand out.
3. I would also look to address the design / colour scheme in order to reflect an outsider’s perception of “America”

A friend recently asked for some advice on how to go about creating an online store. There are a lot of e-commerce solutions out there, which can make choosing the right one difficult. 

However, before you rush off and research a load of options, make sure you can answer the following questions - 

1. How many products is the site going to sell? How will these products be organised?

It’s important to have a clear idea of how you want to organise the products on your site, and indeed how many products you want to sell; as many e-commerce solutions are priced based on the number of products you want the solution to handle.

Ordinarily, we’d recommend creating a wireframe for the site, prior to selecting an e-commerce solution. A wireframe is a simple visual representation of the site and how the pages relate to one another.

For example, lets imagine that we are planning to launch a website selling socks. It’s conceivable that you’d have four top level categories:

Men’s

Women’s

Children’s

Baby’s

Then within each of these top categories you will have further sub-categories – e.g.

Children’s – Boys

Children’s – Girls

Again, from here you may have further categories e.g.

Children’s – Girls – Knee Socks

or

Children’s – Girls – Ankle Socks

Clearly it will take time to get all of this down on paper, but once you’ve planned your site out, it will be much easier to implement, and of course, you will have a much clearer idea about the sort of e-commerce system you are going to need.

2. Are the number of products for sale likely to change frequently? How regularly are you going to have to edit and update the site?

If you are going to regularly add and/or delete products, then you’ll be well advised to look for a solution will allow you to update yourself, rather than a fixed solution which can only be amended by the e-commerce provider.

3. What expertise is available to you? Do you have or know anyone  with the technical abillity to help out? Do you need a system that can be used with little or no trainning?

Any e-commerce solution will require some training to use . However, work to your strengths – if the person who will be responsible for managing the system is not particularly technical, make sure you select a user friendly, intuitive solution.

4. How much control do you want over the look and feel of the site?

Some e-commerce solutions allow only very limited customisation – as such you may find that you do have as much say in how your site and the products you sell are presented. If you have a particular look and feel in mind – make sure the solution which you select is fully-customisable.

 5. What payment methods do you want to use?

There are many different payment options available – these are often referred to as Payment Gateways. Your choice of payment method is very important, because you are asking your users to submit sensitive financial information – they need to be able to trust the payment gateway. Therefore using well known, trusted and established companies can be of benefit. As such we would also recommend offering more than one payment method, so your customers have a choice. 

 6. SEO considerations

Fortunately most e-commerce solutions generate search (and indeed user) friendly urls -  e.g. www.sockz.co.uk/childrens-socks/girls/knee-socks.html rather than www.sockz.co.uk/product3/category1/sub5.html – but make sure your chosen solution generates search friendly urls; you’ll be saving yourself a lot of heartache in the future.