Having an ecommerce site is the first step to making money online and it can be a very exciting endeavor. However, most new online business owners tend to either mess up a few things, or their website isn’t up to par with their competition. Knowing what customers look at, and how to improve the website, can dramatically improve conversion and profits.
Design
Just like a store design, the ecommerce site has to have a good design that works with the products. Having a professional web designer make the website can be beneficial, especially if the site is in a competitive niche. The website should have a design that is streamlined, easy to look at and makes the customer want to buy the product. Simple designs tend to work best for ecommerce, because they do not detract from the products.
Shopping Cart Software
Every ecommerce website has shopping cart software. This is the program that enables users to put products in their digital cart and it is also the program that processes credit card payments. While all shopping carts do the same thing, some of them aren’t very good. Having a shopping cart that is easy to work with, and one that moves quickly is very important. If the shopping cart does not move quickly enough, or if there are bugs that cause functionality issues, then people may leave the website without buying anything.
About Us Page
Some ecommerce owners forget to add this page, thinking that it isn’t important. However, the About Us page is often the most visited page on the entire site. People are interested in the company. They want to know who they are buying from, and what business philosophies the owner lives by. This doesn’t have to be incredibly detailed, but including a few paragraphs about the business should be enough to make customers feel confident about buying from the site.
Proper Hosting
When the ecommerce website is initially made, inexpensive hosting is generally enough to keep the website up and running. However, as the website gets more visits, this type of hosting may not be enough. If the owner does not upgrade hosting at the proper time, then the website may go down when there are too many visitors, which dramatically decreases profits.
Secure Socket Layer
More commonly known as SSL, this is a protection method that is able to encrypt credit and debit card numbers when they are processed through the shopping cart. Having SSL protection is imperative, as some people will not buy from a website unless it has SSL security.
Does your e-commerce site need some help or do you feel that customers respond favorably to it?
