blume magazine: Functional e-commerce design for user-focused online shopping
While designing and building the website and online store for blume magazine, I wanted to use a design ethos that put the content we publish and the products we sell at the forefront of the user experience. This led me to develop a minimal aesthetic for the website’s design, and apply simple, stripped back functionality when creating the online shop. The aim was to simplify this area of the website, as users go there with the single aim of browsing and purchasing products.
Developing a consistent user experience between the shop and the online magazine also presents an interesting design challenge. Between these two areas of the site, users normally have competing goals. In the online magazine, users will browse, hang around and ‘consume’ content, whereas in the online shop, users generally want to spend as little time as possible when completing purchases.
In order to provide a joined up experience across the website and prioritise core user needs, I ensured our online shop mirrors the rest of the website in its minimal approach and content-focused design. This aesthetic suits the shop well, and extends to the user-focused copy. The writing style here is intended to present the user with only the most necessary information at each point in the shopping user journey.
The result is a consistent user experience across all channels, especially when users are driven towards the shop from email or social media campaigns. The overall goal is to present the user with the most important information at each touchpoint in their journey, at the right time and in the most appropriate format.
