Start your online selling journey with e-commerce website. Your e-commerce website is face of your brand for your customers. Building an e-commerce website is not a technical task you just need to focus on some essential aspects like integrating shopping cart software and configuring reliable payment gateways.
E-commerce website is where your customers browse your product catalog, buy your products, and pay you online. User friendly e-commerce website enhances your brand visibility and engagement rate. Creating such website involves several key steps including organizing your product catalog and ensuring the checkout process is supported by efficient shopping cart software.
In this article we guide you on how to build successful e-commerce website.
7 Easy Steps To Build Successful E-Commerce Website
Follow these easy steps to build successful e-commerce website for your business.
STEP 1
Establish Your Brand Strategy
When you start online store, the first thing to do is to develop brand strategy. The logo and your brand colors must be consistent on all your social media platforms and website. Also remember choosing the domain name for your e-commerce website should be easy to remember for your customers. Do not use too lengthy domain name for your website. Prefer using the .com extension if possible because it is most popular extension and easy to rank higher on search results.
- Focus on the business model that influences your target customer audience.
- Create powerful visual logo for your brand building.
STEP 2
Choose E-Commerce Platform
Next you have to choose e-commerce platform to host your website. There are three most common website builders that you can consider when building your website.
- Shopify
- Wix
- BigCommerce
Shopify
The most popular SaaS is Shopify which is easy to use and has lots of add on tools and features that allow you to dropship and omnichannel sell through your website and social media.
- No coding skills are required to build your e-commerce website in Shopify. You can easily customize your store using the drag and drop functionality.
- Shopify provides secure e-commerce website hosting and reliable performance.
Wix
Another website builder is Wix for your website building platform. With its easy drag and drop feature you can customize your website design features and templates. Sell your products on various platforms like Google, eBay, Etsy, Amazon, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, all managed from one dashboard.
- Configure secure payment gateways and shipping options.
- Ensure your store looks great and functions well on both desktop and mobile devices.
BigCommerce
BigCommerce is robust e-commerce website builder designed to help businesses create and manage online stores.
- Also has powerful tools such as SEO tools and international selling.
- With drag and drop features you can easily manage your online store without any coding skills.
STEP 3
Choose and Customize Your Template
Now it’s time to design your e-commerce website. Choosing template and theme based on your ecommerce platform. There are free or paid themes both are available for you to build e-commerce online store. According to your preferences personalize your design, layout, and navigation of the theme. While choosing theme for your website keep this following point in mind:
- Theme should be responsiveness
- After sales support service should be available
- Future expansion and customization features available
If you selected the right theme for your website now, you can customize and personalize your e-commerce store according to your preferences.
STEP 4
Create E-commerce Website Pages
There are some must have pages to create for your e-commerce website. E-commerce website is not only based on the home page, cart, and checkout page. There are also some other essential pages which enhance the user experience. Here are the list of must have pages to create for your e-commerce website:
- Home Page
- Cart Page
- Checkout Page
- About us
- Cancellation Policy
- Refund Policy
- Shipping Policy
- Privacy Policy
- Terms & Conditions
- Order Tracking
- Contact Us
You need to add links to these pages in your website navigation so that your customers can find and reach the important pages effortlessly.
STEP 5
Optimize and Finalize Your Products
Gather all the product details and plan to organize them before adding products to your website. You need to ensure the following checklist before adding product catalog to your e-commerce online store.
Products Should be Category Wise
Whether it’s offline or online store, every store needs sections to add products category wise. For example if you started developing website for clothing store you need to add products category wise for women and men.
Use SEO Titles for Products
Focus on adding the right keyword in your product title and description for better visibility of your product in search engines.
Use High Quality Images
Add high quality images to give better and right experience to your customer. Image adding by you should match the product when you deliver the product to your customer.
Product Description
Add clear, concise, and right product information in the product description section to give clarity to your customers. Mention all the features and benefits of the product by giving reason to the customer why should they buy your product from your online store.
Competitive Product Price
For successful online business your price of products should be competitive. Do market research, analyze the price of the product, and clear out why your prices are stacked up against your competitors.
Product Variants
Add all the different colors, sizes, and styles of your products to your page with current quantities. This helps shoppers find what they need quickly and easily.
STEP 6
Setup Payments and Checkout
For accepting orders from your customers the next step is to setup payments and checkout for your e-commerce website. There are many payment processors to choose like PayPal, Stripe, and Authorize.net. Pick the one that suits your business best.
Decide if you want to let customers pay by credit card, debit card, or bank transfer.
Most e-commerce sites now offer mobile payments like Google Pay, PayPal, and Apple Pay Cash. You can also offer cash on delivery (COD) for physical products.
Also calculate the shipping cost for your online store. You can charge fix flat rate for everyone who pays the same shipping fee, or variable rate where the fee depends on the customer’s location and the weight of their order.
STEP 7
Preview and Publish Your Online Store
After completing the setup of your online store, at last make sure all functionalities working properly. Test the following checklist before launching your online store.
- All product pages are visible.
- The shopping cart and checkout process work well.
- Shipping and delivery methods are easy to use.
- Payment methods are functional.
- The contact page and forms work.
- The website works on all devices.
- All links work.
- Email notifications are set for events like orders placed and shipped.
- The site is secure with an SSL certificate.
- The website is optimized for SEO.
- Website speed and performance are optimized.
Follow these 7 easy steps to develop your e-commerce website. For building successful online business you need careful planning and ongoing optimization. Keep monitoring your analytics, testing new features, and adapting to changing market trends. Your e-commerce website should evolve with your business growth and customer needs. The key to long-term success lies in maintaining balance between user experience, security, and marketing effectiveness.
Frequantly Asked Questions (FAQ’s)
Q1. Which is the best e-commerce platform for beginners?
Ans. For beginners Shopify is often considered the best e-commerce platform. It’s user-friendly, has lot of features and offers great support. You can easily set up your store and start selling without needing technical skills
Q2. What security measures are essential for an e-commerce website?
Ans. Here are essential security measures for an e-commerce website:
- SSL Certificate: Ensures secure data transfer.
- Strong Passwords: Use complex passwords.
- Regular Updates: Keep your site and plugins updated.
- Firewall: Protects against attacks.
- Secure Payment Gateways: Use trusted payment processors.
- Data Encryption: Encrypt sensitive data.
- Backup Data: Regularly back up your site.
- Monitor Activity: Watch for suspicious activity
Q3. Which one is better Wix or Shopify for developing e-commerce website?
Ans. if you are looking for powerful e-commerce platform go with Shopify. If you want something simple and easy to use Wix is good choice.
Q4. How can I improve my e-commerce website’s search rankings?
Ans. To improve your e-commerce website’s search rankings:
- Use Keywords: Add relevant keywords to titles and descriptions.
- Quality Content: Write informative blog posts and product descriptions.
- Optimize Images: Use high quality images with descriptive names.
- Improve Speed: Ensure your site loads quickly.
- Build Backlinks: Get reputable sites to link to yours.
- Mobile-Friendly: Make sure your site works well on mobile devices.
- Internal Links: Link to other pages on your site.
- Update Content: Keep your site fresh with new content.
