Shocking Facts
Pizza Hut was one of the first major brands to experiment with online commerce, starting in 1994.
80% of the online population has used the internet to make a purchase, and 50% of the online population has purchased online more than once.
79% of online shoppers desire a tracking option with their delivery.
Open cart is just as the name suggests, an open source eCommerce solution which is a free alternative to other paid eCommerce platforms that you can use to get started. Open cart is a drag and drop solution that is easy to use and has a lot of cool features to get your business going.
Features include support for unlimited products and categories, support for templates, support for multi languages and currencies, support for user product reviews and ratings, integrated payment gateways, integrated tax and shipping weight calculation, among many others.
Don’t try to sell everything
Most successful eCommerce websites start by focusing on selling just a limited range of products for one specific category. Once they create an audience and make money from it, they were able to invest a little into stocking something else to sell.
If it worked and sold well, they would invest more, and add more products, and that’s how modern juggernauts like Amazon.com were born, so don’t assume that stocking a lot of products from day one will bring success. Focus on selling what you know best, first.
Map a business plan
One thing you will need to absolutely do before launching your eCommerce business is to think about a solid business plan for it. It will not be enough to just create a WordPress site full of product pages while you sit back and wait for it to work on autopilot.
You need to define a plan where every basic aspect of your core business is clear to you. You will need to define your budget and expenses, expected profits, target audience, marketing process and plan ahead for stuff that you’d like to implement in the future, like affiliate programs.
Every eCommerce website owner should know that getting and retaining visitors is not magic, and marketing efforts can go as far as leading prospects to an eCommerce site, but what can be done once visitors are inside the site?
Common sense should tell you right away that having a great template, interface design, good looking product pages and a streamlined user experience is a no brainer for keeping visitors interested.
After getting your domain name and hosting service, next comes designing the page. It used to be that you needed to hire a web designer to handle that, or maybe you could get your hands on web development software and work on the design yourself.
For eCommerce websites, there’s a more intricate phase of the design that requires creating databases, implementing checkout processes and managing security aspects.
