E-commerce usability - good for users but watch the fraudsters

"98 percent of shoppers check for some kind of security before making an online purchase, almost four-fifths would trust a site which had simple, clear payment features regardless of its level of security."

IT Pro have highlight a survey conducted by paypoint.net which suggests that four-fiths of user are more likely to trust a site with a simple, clear payment facility regardless of the level of security implemented on the site.

This is a big thumbs of for usability and the ROI gained by ensuring you have a usable checkout process but there needs to be an education process with users to help them recognise a secure shopping process. Mastercard and VISA are helping to ensure this with thier 'SecureCode' and 'Verified by VISA' schemes but with the overhead of making users remember yet another username and password.

Watch this space, with the integration of payment gateways such as google checkout we may be able to offer users a simple and secure website which increase ROI and keep customers safe. If only google would allow you to integrate thier service directly into a bespoke website.