e-commerce websites have become ubiquitous over the last decade, with billions of dollars being spent on ecommerce websites each year. What are some of the reasons that you should consider creating an ecommerce website? Here are ten great reasons you should start using an e-commerce website today!
1. Customer Engagement
One of the best things about being able to build a professional looking online store is that it allows for direct interaction with your customers. Being able to interact directly with your customers and respond quickly to their feedback, questions, or issues is essential to your business. Not only will it make your customers feel valued, but they’ll be more likely to purchase from you again if they have a great experience!
2. Sales and Marketing
No matter how great your product or service is, if nobody knows about it, they can’t buy it. It’s no wonder that marketing and sales are often referred to as the lifeblood of a business. But let’s be honest—they’re not exactly fun. That doesn’t mean they don’t require thought and effort though! From websites to email campaigns to social media strategy, there are endless ways for small businesses to market themselves online.
3. Ease of Use
If your site is easy to use, people will return again and again. A user-friendly layout can result in a greater chance of making purchases. Even if customers have access to a brick-and-mortar store, they will still turn to online shopping because of its ease. The easier it is for your customer to make a purchase, the more likely they are to spend money with you.
4. Fulfilment & Distribution
No matter what your product is, it can’t be sold unless there’s a way to get it into your customer’s hands. You have two main options for fulfilling orders: work with a third-party fulfilment Centre, or ship them yourself. One is not necessarily better than another – it just depends on your business needs and how quickly you want to scale.
5. Getting Started & Initial Costs
The first thing you’ll need is a domain name, hosting and a shopping cart. This typically doesn’t run more than $100 – $300 depending on what type of software or platform that you decide to use for your site.
6. Scalability
An online store is scalable. It’s not a specific product or brand—but rather a platform that you can leverage to sell thousands of different products and brands to millions of people. That means your investment (or total costs) are spread out over more than one product. And if a certain product isn’t selling as well as expected, it doesn’t mean everything on your site will tank; there are dozens, hundreds, or thousands of other products out there doing just fine.
7. Security
An online store is more secure than a traditional brick-and-mortar business in terms of protecting customer information. While there are some things that can be done to boost security, it’s likely that any measures taken will actually decrease customer experience (by encouraging users to type their information over and over again, for example). It’s easier to set up a secure payment system when all of your customers are located in one place; setting up multiple payment systems can complicate things for both you and your customers.
8. SEO and On-Page Optimization
Search engine optimization (SEO) is a good example of on-page optimization. This essentially refers to everything that can be done within your site to rank higher in search engines. Your keywords, meta tags, title and description are all examples of SEO. On-page optimization is more than just finding keywords though – it’s about creating content that ranks highly across all metrics that matter to Google: relevance, usefulness and authority.
9. Web Analytics
It’s not enough to have a web presence. You need to know where your customers are coming from, what they want and how they’re interacting with your site. Analytics can give you all of that information, and it will help direct your growth strategy in a meaningful way. It takes just a few minutes to install Google Analytics on your site—and then about 10-15 minutes each month to get acquainted with how people are visiting and engaging with your online store.
10. User Satisfaction
Your customers are your lifeblood—they give your business life. If they’re not happy, then you’re not likely to succeed. As such, it’s important to always be paying attention to what makes them tick, and when it comes to ecommerce businesses, user satisfaction is key. Here are 10 ways that satisfaction will help your bottom line.
We offer modern, user-friendly e-commerce solutions so why not contact us for a no obligation quote for an e-commerce website today.
