Having an eCommerce presence is practically essential for any modern retail business. It’s easier than ever to build an eCommerce site, giving your business a dedicated online presence for customers to use.
The eCommerce landscape has grown significantly over the last few years, with more businesses taking up the technology to connect with existing customers and find new ones. Here’s how your business can create an effective eCommerce presence and take your offering online with a dedicated web design Warrington service
Plan out your requirements
Scoping out what you want your eCommerce store to do for your business is the starting point. By understanding your goals, you can then begin to consider the design and user experience.
A significant part of this will be dependant upon choosing the right eCommerce platform that suits the nature of your business. Working with an ecommerce agency with specialist knowledge of the platforms available, such as Shopify or Magento, can help you to understand the right choice for your business.
Once you’ve selected a platform, whether that’s open-source or hosted eCommerce option, you can start designing it visually and from an user experience (UX) perspective so it has everything it needs to fulfil the complete customer journey.
Make your site trustworthy
Trust is incredibly valuable online. It can be a large factor in a consumer choosing between two competing retailers, as many will opt to choose the retailer with the better reputation.
Using review widgets from known review sites, such as Trustpilot of Feefo, can help to establish your reputation. Testimonials from satisfied customers will also help to reassure potential customers that choosing your business will be a positive experience.
Signpost your delivery and return information
Making vital sales information readily available on your site can help consumers to feel more comfortable using your site. This is because they can easily find out crucial delivery information around how their purchase will arrive and what to do if there’s a problem.
Optimise your onsite SEO
Part of creating a valuable online presence is competing for relevant keywords which will attract new customers to your business.
Both open-source and hosted platforms will typically have features which allow you to optimise the SEO of your ecommerce site, but others may restrict what you can do. Undertake research into relevant SEO terms, optimise the necessary pages, and track the position of your site for specific keywords and phrases.
From there, you can plan an SEO strategy to improve your rankings in areas where you fall short.
Keep contact details visible
Providing clear contact information on your ecommerce website will help customers to trust your business. This gives consumers a direct way to get in touch about any enquires they may have. Having a variety of ways for customers to get in contact (phone, emails, contact form, live chat, etc.) can help reassure them.
By considering each of these areas when setting up or reviewing your ecommerce site, you can create a better experience for those who engage with your site and help to increase your conversation rate.