What an E-Commerce Business Needs in Order to Ensure Its Success

An e-commerce business is a business that functions completely online and doesn’t have a permanent physical storefront like a traditional brick-and-mortar business. E-commerce businesses are becoming more and more popular these days since the COVID-19 pandemic forced many people to stay home and shop online instead. Because this isn’t your traditional type of business, there are a few things that e-commerce business owners should be aware of. Here’s what e-commerce businesses need to ensure their success.

A Mobile-Friendly Website

Not only are more people shopping online these days, but they’re also doing more shopping from their smartphones and tablets versus their laptops and desktop computers. Because of this, you’ll want to make sure that your website is mobile-friendly and isn’t just presented in the standard desktop view. The desktop view can be annoying to navigate through on a mobile device, making it more likely for potential customers to click off of your website. So make sure your website is mobile-friendly, or you can choose to release an app version that can be used on mobile devices in place of or in addition to this.

An Easy-to-Navigate Website

In addition to being mobile-friendly, your website should be easy to navigate in both mobile and desktop forms. Choose a simple design that doesn’t overwhelm your visitors (this includes limiting or even eliminating ads), and make sure that your menu bar is kept simple and organized. You should also have a search bar so that visitors can search keywords to be able to find what they’re looking for more quickly. A clean, simple website is more likely to keep visitors browsing longer, whereas an overcrowded one may encourage them to click off.

Written Product Descriptions and Video Tutorials

As an e-commerce business, your customers won’t be able to see your product until they actually purchase it and it’s shipped to them. Because of this, you’ll need to make sure that your product descriptions are as detailed as possible. Have several pictures available from different angles, and include video demonstrations on how to use the product if necessary.

Accept Multiple Forms of Payment

Although Visa and MasterCard are the largest payment-processing corporations worldwide, not everyone owns one or the other. Not even American Express and Discover cards are owned by everyone, so you should try to be as inclusive as possible when determining what type of payments you’ll accept. Start with these four since they are the most popular in the world, but also offer alternatives like PayPal and Apple Pay.

Utilize SEO and Other Digital Marketing Strategies

Traditional marketing methods aren’t going to cut it when it comes to an e-commerce business. Digital marketing is going to be your best option, and so are certain types of digital marketing strategies. SEO (search engine optimization) is number one when it comes to getting more traffic to your website. This strategy involves using keywords on your website and company blog to get it to rank higher on search engines like Google.

Social media marketing is also really going to help get the word out about your business. Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest are the top three platforms that are best for e-commerce businesses.

Make Sure Your Business is Insured

As with traditional businesses, you’re going to need insurance coverage for your e-commerce business. The biggest type of insurance coverage you’re going to need in this industry is product liability insurance because you’re selling products to customers. This type of insurance will protect you financially from claims of your product causing bodily injury to your customers. Depending on how exactly your e-commerce business is set up, you may also need some additional types of insurance.

Protect Your Business from Possible Cyber Attacks

Cyber attacks began to rise as more and more people were shopping online, and with good reason. Our advanced digital world doesn’t require information to be stored on hard drives anymore, but directly online, or “in the cloud”. Because of this, it’s easier for hackers to obtain the personal information of others— unless you’re protected by a managed security services provider. Your customers are trusting your company with their personal information, so you’ll want to make sure that it’s extremely hard for cyber criminals to hack into your system.

An informative, yet easy-to-navigate website is key to your success as the owner of an e-commerce business. It should also be inclusive of different payment methods, as not everyone owns one of the major credit card company’s cards. Digital marketing is going to be the most effective form of marketing for you, and above all, make sure to have the proper cybersecurity to prevent cyber attacks.