Times of crisis call for times of creative thinking and critical business decisions, especially for start-ups or entrepreneurs. Consumers are spoilt for choice when it comes to products and services online and in-store. Business success and customer conversion rates are closely linked to your offering. If you are not online, you may be falling behind the competitor curve. Additionally, since the pandemic, consumer spending is tightening, and they are not as quick to part with their hard-earned cash as before.
Find a Way to Sell Your Products or Services Online
Many business owners mistakenly believe that if they are not in the retail industry, they do not have a need for an online store. This is where creative thinking and a strategic business approach can help build a better business. If you are an accountant, you can build accounting packages that potential clients can purchase from you online. A tutor can construct tutoring packages online for parents and students to purchase with either onsite lessons or virtual lessons. You only have to focus on how to position your service as a product you can place into an online store.
Where to Start?
You can get straight into an ecommerce website builder and create your online store. You do not need to be a professional developer to get started on your site and make a success of it. The steps are usually quite easy with platforms like Wix who lay it out step by step. Setting up an account with new logins will be your first step and then you can browse the themes available. Choose a theme that resonates with your brand, your vision and mission, as this will go a long way to ensuring brand awareness online. Wix’s ecommerce templates are easily customizable, so that you could create a unique online store that resonates with your style and brand.
Once you have chosen the theme, you can begin customizing your online store! Adding products, services, pricing, descriptions and more is relatively easy. Site builders usually guide or prompt you through the entire process. The next step is usually to connect to a payment provider and also to set up shipping. Once this process is done, you are almost set to go and to start trading online!
Before you can make your website live, you will need to choose a domain. The domain name will become the name of your online website address. Think about your brand equity here and choose a name that suits your business well. Simple domain names usually fare better so think this one through properly before going live. Once you have completed the domain steps, you should be ready to publish your site and go live online!
Get Set for Better Search Engine Optimization
Now that you have an online store, you will want to ensure it is optimized for quality leads. The best way to ensure this is to come up with an SEO strategy for your site. Online success for your site and store can be achieved by employing various techniques and fixes that improve your chances of competing online with your rivals. Grab your piece of the ecommerce pie with SEO. Depending on the platform you have chosen to create an online store, your ability to optimize it shouldn’t be difficult. Research which SEO aspects the platform has available for you to tweak.
Hopefully you won’t need to be an avid web developer to employ the SEO techniques on your site. Ecommerce website builder platforms that have SEO built into them are the best for small businesses or start-ups. If there is some coding work involved, see if you can outsource someone to either do it for you or to teach you how to do it yourself. At times, you may need to include plugins or widgets to optimize your site properly.
Benefits of an Online Store
There are numerous benefits to operating an online store. You provide global flexible access to your products and services 24/7/365. You are able to save costs on business premises rentals, human capital costs, and various other utilities you may otherwise need to budget for. An online business is also easy to manage from anywhere in the world, as long as you have internet connectivity.
Focus on Additional Marketing Activities
Set your brand or business up for ultimate success by packaging and marketing your offering digitally. Take advantage of social media platforms to spread the word and expose your business online. Social media platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram are great money makers when your content is shared by the communities which exist in these spaces. If possible, integrate a blog or newsletter system into your website so that you can market new promotions, launches or relevant communication to existing clients.
By getting your business online, you are setting yourself up for a sustainable business model which can yield dividends year after year. You are also insulating yourself against future dire financial straits during times of crisis if you are able to fulfil your products or services to your target market online. Don’t delay and get your online store active today!