What Makes a Great Ecommerce Website?

An ecommerce website needs to do more than display products. It should also guide visitors toward purchasing with as little friction as possible.

Whether you’re selling one-off items or subscriptions, the fundamentals are the same:

Clear, intuitive navigation

Clear and easy-to-use navigation is critical for guiding customers to what they need. Visitors with a clear path to purchase are more likely to stay on your site and convert into paying customers.

The opposite is also true: 25% of ecommerce users abandon purchases due to complex navigation or website structure.

Fast loading times

A slow website can have an immediate and severe impact on your sales; every second counts when it comes to keeping a customer on your page.

For every 1-second delay in mobile page load time, conversions can fall by up to 20% and conversion rates are 3x higher for e-commerce sites that load in just 1 second compared to those that take 5 seconds.

You can test your page speed and identify issues using Google Pagespeed Insights.

Mobile-first design

Today, more than 70% of online shopping happens on mobile devices, and a responsive and fast mobile experience is no longer a luxury; it’s a necessity. You can test how responsive yours is using Google Search Console’s Core Web Vitals.

Compelling product pages

Detailed, engaging product pages are what convince a customer to make a purchase, especially when they can’t physically interact with the item.

One study found that the presence of high-resolution, zoomable images and 360-degree views on a product page can lead to 40% higher conversion rates than pages with basic imagery.

Streamlined checkout

A complex or lengthy checkout process accounts for around 28% of all abandoned carts, significantly impacting sales.

A streamlined checkout experience involves:

• Keeping the process as short and simple as possible.
• Limiting form fields to what’s essential.
• Offering popular payment options like credit card, PayPal, and digital wallets.
• Making guest checkout available.
• Displaying a clear progress indicator so customers know how close they are to completion.

Trust signals

Building trust is essential for an online business. Around two-thirds of consumers say that trust signals like reviews, seals, and testimonials can give customers the confidence they need to complete a purchase.

These elements are universal, but subscription-based businesses have extra considerations to factor in, and that’s where your website’s design and functionality need to go further.

Extra considerations for subscription ecommerce

Running a subscription business means your online store has to do more than sell; it has to manage an ongoing relationship with each customer.

This means your website needs features and design choices that go beyond what most standard ecommerce sites require. These include:

Flexible subscription options

Customers may want to choose their delivery frequency, pause or skip shipments, or switch products without canceling entirely. Your site should make these actions quick and intuitive. Doing this reduces churn by up to 50%.

Account management tools

Subscribers need easy access to their billing details, order history, and plan changes. A clunky or confusing account area can lead to unnecessary churn.

Transparent pricing and commitment terms

Unlike one-off purchases, subscriptions require an ongoing financial commitment. Being transparent about pricing, renewal dates, and cancellation policies builds trust.

In one study, 84% of customers said that ease of cancellation was one of the deciding factors that led them to buy a subscription in the first place.

Recurring payment processing

Your checkout must securely store payment details and handle automated billing without errors or interruptions.

Retention-focused UX

From personalized product recommendations to surprise-and-delight perks, your site should help improve customer engagement over time. In fact, customized content can lead to an 82% increase in brand loyalty.

Scalable backend

As your subscriber base grows, your online store needs to handle more users, more transactions, and more customer data without slowing down.

These requirements mean subscription ecommerce sites are often more complex to build and maintain.

That’s where AI website builders can make a big difference. They take care of the technical setup and coding, so you can focus on refining your offer and keeping customers happy.

How AI Ecommerce Website Builders Simplify the Process

As briefly mentioned earlier, there are three main routes most people take when building a subscription ecommerce site:

Coding it yourself: This offers full control, but it’s slow and requires technical knowledge. Every new feature or design tweak means diving back into the code, testing for errors, and making sure nothing else breaks.

Using a drag-and-drop builder: Faster than coding, but often limited. You’re constrained by pre-set customizable templates and layouts, which can make it hard to create something truly unique.

Hiring an agency: You get professional results, but it’s the most expensive option. Projects can take weeks or months, with a lot of back-and-forth over drafts. Even small changes after launch may mean another invoice and another wait.

An AI ecommerce website builder is when an AI platform automates all aspects of building an entire online store for you. This includes:

• Design
• Coding
• Writing content
• Integrating functions
• Testing and debugging
• Launch

An AI site builder is trained on best practice techniques for all the above.

This means all you need to do is give it a brief, resources (images, for example), and specific requirements (like you would for an agency or freelancer). It will then build your site for you.

You can then tell it what changes you would like to make, using simple, plain-English instructions (known as prompts).

This means that an AI website builder can deliver the speed of drag-and-drop, the flexibility and control of custom coding, and the polish of an agency, all at once.

It still requires some oversight, but the difference is likely to be transformational for many companies, who will be able to get a fully functional site up and running much faster, leaving them to focus their time and resources on other business priorities.

To understand how they work in greater detail, let’s take a look at our own website builder and what it offers subscription ecommerce business owners.

Subbly’s AI website builder is agentic

Most AI-powered tools are based on large language models (LLMs).

These can look at user requests, assess their meaning, and then return a response. But they can’t take on complex multi-task projects.

That’s why we’ve created our own AI website builder that uses something known as “agentic AI”. This is where an LLM is armed with a series of tools that enable it to take action on your behalf.

They can handle multi-stage tasks such as:

• In cybersecurity, agents can perform real-time threat detection, respond to alerts, and perform automated threat hunts.

• Streamlining recruitment by automatically screening resumes and scheduling interviews.

• Optimizing supply chain management by analyzing data from various sources to forecast demand and manage inventory.

And of course, build websites!

Our web builder agent can:

• Understand your brief, including style, tone, layout, and features.
• Plans the project, organises tasks, and determines the code and assets it will need.
• Writes and edits the code itself by creating original HTML, CSS, and JavaScript (no templates or limitations).
• Tests, troubleshoots, and fixes issues without you needing to touch a thing.

It also iterates on your feedback. In other words, you can ask for changes by describing them in plain English, as you would to a developer. However, unlike a developer, the AI can then update the site instantly.

This agentic approach makes the AI website builder act less like a static tool and more like a fast, skilled web developer who works around the clock, never needs a break, and can deliver a fully custom subscription ecommerce website in less than an hour.

Step-by-Step: Building a Subscription Ecommerce Website With AI

Here’s what the process looks like when building a subscription ecommerce site using an agentic AI store builder like Subbly’s.

1. Set up your account and connect essentials

Before the AI can start building, you’ll need to have some basics in place:

• A Subbly account.
• Add your products to the platform.
• A connected Stripe account for payment processing.

This setup allows the AI website builder to pull in accurate product information, pricing, and payment details into the site it creates. Of course, you can always manually integrate them later, but it’s likely this will slow the process down.

2. Give your AI website builder a creative brief

As with any project brief, the more specific you are, the better the results you will get.

A typical brief might cover:

• Overall look and feel
• Brand tone
• Target audience
• Inspiration
• Website structure

For example, a brief prompt could read:

“Give my online store a modern and minimal look and feel. Our target audience are foodies who love gourmet coffee. Make the tone warm, inviting and informal.

“Use this website for inspiration: https://www.pureroasters.com/

Please create the following pages: homepage, about us, build your subscription, pricing and contact us.”

For more specific design requirements we have created a visual prompt builder.

This is a simple, point-and-click interface that lets you choose your site’s style, colour palette, layout, and typography before the AI starts coding.

You can add common sections like hero banners, pricing plans, and FAQs without typing a single line of text.

The builder then converts your selections into a structured prompt for the AI to execute, helping you launch visually consistent pages in fewer steps.

You can learn more about this feature in our recent update webinar.

3. Consider subscription features

Remember to stipulate key subscription ecommerce features in your brief, such as:

• Delivery frequency selectors on product pages.
• Account login areas where customers can pause, skip, or change their subscription.
• Transparent pricing tables.
• Upsell or cross-sell sections to increase average order value.

The AI can add or adjust these based on your requests, for example: “Add a toggle so customers can choose between monthly and quarterly billing.”

Recently, the Subbly team has introduced metafields, customizable data fields that let you collect customer preferences at checkout or within their account.

The AI then uses these to automatically build subscription forms in future.

This gives subscription businesses more control over personalization and the ability to create richer customer experiences without manual coding.

In our recent update webinar, our CEO Stefan used a protein supplements website as an example. He showed how the AI could set up fields to collect and remember data on dietary needs, flavor choices, or fitness goals.

4. Upload your assets

Adding logos, product images, videos, and brand visuals at the briefing stage speeds up the design process and helps make your first draft look more complete.

You can also provide AI-generated product descriptions or brand taglines for the AI to incorporate.

5. AI creates a plan and starts coding

Once briefed, the AI agent:

• Analyzes your instructions and any reference sites you’ve provided.
• Plans the site structure by deciding how sections will be laid out and what features to include.
• Starts generating HTML, CSS, and JavaScript code for your site.
• Connects your products and payment links from Subbly’s backend.

You can watch the coding happening in real time. You’ll also be able to see overall progress via a project checklist in Subbly’s interface, so you know what stage it’s at, even if you can’t read the code.

6. First draft review

Within about 10 minutes, you’ll have a functioning website draft. You’ll probably be impressed with how close to your original vision your draft is.

But at the same time, there’s likely to be things you want to change. To do this, you have two options:

1. Make quick manual tweaks with the point-and-click editor: This feature is helpful for small adjustments, such as changing the font size or color.

2. Use AI prompts: This is better for more time-consuming or complex changes. For example, ensuring your specialty products can only be ordered via your top-tier subscriptions or changing the font across the entire site.

7. Fix errors fast

AI can still introduce bugs just like humans can. So when you come to run your code, there’s a chance an error message will come up.

We’ve made this super-easy to fix. When it happens, a button is shown saying “Fix with AI”. Click this, and the AI automatically fixes it within seconds.

That’s way quicker than traditional coding, which would involve a developer manually debugging and fixing the issue.

8. Connect your domain and launch

Once you’re happy with the design, it’s time to launch your online storefront. This is as simple as it is with any standard website builder.

• Go to your settings and click “Deploy”.
• The builder will give you DNS records to copy into your web hosting provider’s settings.
• Once connected, your site goes live on your custom domain.
• If you don’t have a hosting service or domain name, then the site can be accessed via a free domain URL.

9. Iterate and improve

An AI agentic builder can make updates on demand.  Want to refresh your hero section for a seasonal promotion? Need to tweak subscription options? Just give the AI new instructions or use the manual editor.

You can make updates yourself any time, with no coding knowledge. This is ideal for the fast-paced world of subscriptions. For example, you can launch promotions in minutes, avoiding high agency fees or the stress of managing developers.

You can also add products, change offers, or adapt your design as your subscriber base grows, making the AI website generator key to your site’s scalability.

By combining your brand vision with AI’s ability to code and design instantly, you get a custom-built subscription ecommerce site that’s flexible, fast, and future-proof.