Art.com, owned by Walmart Inc., recently launched a redesigned website.
“The focus of the redesign was to make it exceptionally easy to find and buy what you want,” says Frank Barbieri, president of Art.com.
On its homepage, Art.com condensed its navigation from 12 menu items to seven to be more visually pleasing to the shopper, he says. The art and home decor retailer also shrunk its Art.com logo and search bar, in favor of lifting the hero image so it ends above the fold, or where the screen cuts off. Now, Art.com’s homepage has a hero image centered on the page as well as other pieces of art to view and click on above the fold, rather than one image encompassing the entire screen when shopper is on a desktop.
“Redesigning this hero [image] gives us the opportunity to raise more content above the scroll, so that our customers can more immediately engage with our catalog and start shopping,” Barbieri says. “We also want to use this space for storytelling and brand value comprehension.”
Art.com’s product detail page features larger product images (right) compared with the old website (left).
Art.com’s product detail pages also now feature much larger product images that take up more real estate on the page. Additionally, the search bar and navigation menu are now present on the product page when it was not before. “We now show a great big preview images, easy to understand and everyday low-priced tiers, consistent pricing options and one-click framing selection,” Barbieri says.
Shoppers on the mobile web also will benefit from a rearranged homepage. The hero image is no longer the main feature—changing to a rectangle from a square. This saves space for Art.com to showcase more art pieces, which it does in three panels below the hero image. It also moved its promotions to the very top, rather than below the top navigation, and added a search field above the hero image instead of solely the magnifying glass icon at the top. But the magnifying glass, as well as other navigation items have moved to the bottom of the screen.
“We added a search bar because search can be the fastest route to discovery for visitors with high intent to convert,” Barbieri says.
Art.com chose to incorporate on the mobile web more recognizable and intuitive icons, such as a hamburger menu, a heart for favorites and a magnifying glass for search because “if our customers have to think about how to navigate, they’re more likely to disengage,” he says.
The new site launch, however, was more than just a redesign, Barbieri says.
The art retailer is, for the first time, offering free shipping and free return shipping. Art.com decided to offer these services after hearing customer feedback about art-buying anxiety. Now, shoppers can purchase items without worrying they’ll be stuck with a piece of art they don’t particularly like, Barbieri says. It also began offering complementary design advice from art specialists on its site.
Art.com hosts its website on a public cloud via an ecommerce platform, Barbieri says, without revealing specifics. Most of the site’s functionalities are custom built since the nature of Art.com lends itself to lots of customized products; there are 6 trillion possible combinations a shopper can create, Barbieri says.
Art.com’s mobile app users get an additional feature: augmented reality. This feature, although not new with the launch, allows a shopper using Art.com’s mobile app to see how art pieces will look on the wall of her home via her smartphone camera before she buys. It also allows the shopper to place items on blank walls or on walls that are already covered in art.
Art.com built the AR feature in house, as well as integrated Google’s ARCore software, which includes motion tracking that enables a consumer’s phone to understand and track its position relative to the world around her.
Art.com has more features in the works for next year, but it declined to reveal more.
“We’re excited about the new Art.com and believe we can make a real difference in people’s lives by helping everyone tell their unique stories with the art on their walls,” Barbieri says.
Walmart, No. 3 in the 2019 Digital Commerce 360 Top 1000, acquired the assets of Art.com in December 2018. Those assets included the retailer’s catalog, intellectual property, trade name and U.S. operations. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. The art and wall decor retailer features more than 2.1 million images and art pieces, as well as on-demand customization options and services.
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