E-commerce sites offer huge potential for online sales, but you can’t just throw up a website and expect customers to flock to your product. Too many e-merchants fail to recognize the importance of providing the best e-commerce site possible. With some simple (and some not-so-simple) adjustments, an e-commerce site can improve its profitability significantly.

Here are the top 5 problems with e-commerce websites that can make a huge difference:

1.Wasting the customer’s time -- Time is the most important commodity in online shopping. You want your customers to be able to find what they want and buy it as quickly as possible. Dynamic pages with changing content may look interesting, but they also make pages take longer to load. When customers have to wait for pages to load, they often give up and go to a faster-moving site. Additionally, some e-commerce sites make the mistake of wasting a customer’s time during the checkout process by requiring registration or asking for unnecessary info. Once a customer decides to buy from your site you should make the checkout processes as fast as possible with as few clicks as possible. Otherwise, the customer may fail to complete the sale out of frustration.

2.Lack of compatibility with more than one browser -- While 80% of the market uses Microsoft Internet Explorer, failing to design your e-commerce site to work with other browsers is passing up a huge opportunity. You immediately knock out at least 20% of your potential customer pool, maybe more. Making your website work with a variety of browsers usually only requires a few minor tweaks, but it can make a big difference in the amount of traffic you receive.

3.Poor overall web design -- When a website is not well organized or looks unprofessional, many customers will immediately look elsewhere. Online shoppers have high standards these days when it comes to how your e-commerce site looks and functions. Your products should be easy to find and displayed nicely. Customers should be able to search for what they want and find it. Likewise, shopping cart use should be a streamlined process. Any hitches in the buying process from start to finish will cost you customers.

4.Poor customer service options -- All e-commerce sites should make it easy to get questions about products and purchases answered. Too many sites make finding contact information and accessing company policies challenging for the customer. If customers can’t find the information they need to feel comfortable about a sale, they will probably abandon the sale. Make sure all of your merchant policies and contact information are prominently displayed on multiple pages of your website.

5.Under estimating security concerns of customers -- Many websites fail to recognize how apprehensive some shoppers are to enter their sensitive information into unknown e-commerce sites. Displaying the Comodo HackerProof Trust Marks on your website can counteract customer anxieties by assuring them that your networks are secure from hacker intrusion. Using the Comodo HackerProof trust mark is a proven way to increase the conversion rates on your website, and you don’t have to pay for the service until you see real results.