When selling products online, one old school option is to hire a web developer, spend a few months planning and coding your ecommerce site. Even doing that, the developer will still have to spend much time uploading all the product content. A better version of this is to also create a CMS (i.e. content management system backend with the site. But then, why not simply launch your online store on a readily used website builder such as Shopify, Wix, Bigcommerce, SquareSpace, Weebly, etc?
If your choice is to launch your online shop on a Shopify website, refer to this Shopify setup checklist guide. Secondly, implement some of the key points from the following tips to your ecommerce site.
Increase your website’s search usability including the effective navigation of the main menu and the search capability.
Use high quality photos. Make sure each product has a few good looking photos.
Make sure for each product you have written a good product title, a sub-heading, a short product description, and a long description. For products that involve sizes such as shirts, include all the necessary attributes. Your customers would need this information before deciding to make a purchase.
When possible, display a personalized homepage to users/customers, especially those visitors who have logged in on your site. You may display some product promotion messages to some specific customers according to their past purchase preferences.
Integrate social media account logins onto your site such as Facebook, Twitter, or Google accounts. This allow users to login to your site without having to register again.
Create specific landing pages for a few key products. This allows you to display a key product differently from your website’s normal layout, user interface and site structure. This enables you to show the call-to-action buttons and other supporting elements in your own ways that would suit a specific key product better than the rest of all other products you are selling on your site.
Include a section on your product pages for user generated content. An example is to enable the display of user’s product reviews on your individual product pages.
Optimize your site’s shopping cart and checkout flow. If you don’t need your users to fill in her purchase information with forms that span across multiple pages, then keep it all simple by providing only a two-page or even a single-page checkout form. The shorter the checkout process, the lower the cart abandonment rate it gets.
Make use of all types of methods to get people to visit your website. It may be through using social media marketing, search engine optimization (SEO), email marketing, forum posting, and more.
