Too many choices (also known as choice paralysis) can quickly overwhelm users and cause your conversion rates to plummet. Fortunately, there are ways to fix the problem. If you ask most people whether they like having a choice, the answer will be yes. How can options possibly be a bad thing?
That delay in decision making can prove damaging on an ecommerce site because it tends to result in users giving up.
That delay in decision making can prove damaging on an ecommerce site because it tends to result in users giving up. They are paralysed by the decision, and so, they decide to go away and think about it. That will significantly reduce the number of people who eventually make a purchase.
Worst still, choice paralysis isn’t just limited to product selection. Users can be equally paralysed trying to choose between navigational elements such as product categorisation. They are forced to think too much and so they can also give up here.
1. Limit choice, so you limit choice paralysis
It can be hard to limit the variety of products or complex options they offer on their sites, but there is some strong evidence to support your cause.
Researchers in California ran an experiment in a local grocery store. They set up a stall in the store selling jam. Some days the booth would sell six flavors of jams, while on other days it offered 24 varieties. The results were significant.
2. Make the options distinct
When confronted with 24 varieties of jam, the challenge isn’t just about the sheer quantity. It is also about assessing the differences between each choice.
The more options there are, the more similar they often are, and the decision becomes harder to make. Even a choice between two items can be difficult if those items are incredibly similar. The difference is too subtle for a customer to make an obvious decision.
But there is another factor at play here. Our inability to make a decision is not just about the number of choices. It is also about how clear those choices are from one another.
3. Simplify the choice
Some online transactions are complicated by their nature. Maybe you’re buying a car that involves an excess of choices about everything from paint color to financing. Or perhaps you are buying insurance online with their vast variety of conditions, levels of coverage, and excess.
The solution to this challenge is to break the choice down into more manageable chunks. A series of smaller, better defined decisions is easier for us to process.
4. Encourage quick decision making
We all know what it feels like to start overthinking a decision. We reach a point where we can no longer see the choices clearly, and even when we do make a decision, we are not happy with it. The longer we take to make a decision, the less confident we typically are in the outcome.
As a result, we want to encourage users to make a decision fast. The faster somebody can make a decision, the less likely they are to suffer from choice paralysis and the more likely they will go away happy.
The faster somebody can make a decision, the less likely they are to suffer from choice paralysis and the more likely they will go away happy.
5. Make the choice for the users with good default options
We ask users to make a ridiculous number of choices that are entirely unnecessary for the majority of them. This is because we become obsessed with edge cases.
Even though we know that the majority of users will make a particular choice, we worry that other people might want to choose something different. For example, we show all our product categories even though 80% of customers purchase from the top three. Or, we display an entire country list when the majority of people buy from our native country.
The problem with this approach is that the user experience for the majority suffers, to cater to the minority. That is not just bad for the experience of users; it is terrible for sales.
