Starting an ecommerce store can be hard and there’s often a lot to learn. however just because you’re new to the world of ecommerce doesn’t mean you should be making silly mistakes.
Despite being one of the easiest ways to generate business, ecommerce can also be one the easiest things to get wrong and without a good plan and a little help along the way, you could be losing out. Luckily we’ve got 8 of the biggest ecommerce mistakes business make when selling online and how you can avoid them, so you don’t have to learn the hard way.
Difficult to navigate
Nobody wants to spend hours figuring out how to use an overly complicated website. Your customers want an ecommerce website which they can easily navigate, these days people want a quick and easy shopping experience, expecting to find their product and checkout within a couple of minutes. If your customers can’t work out your website, then they’ll definitely be tempted to head straight into the arms of your competition.
‘If you build it they will come’
You might think that the creation of a shiny new website full of exciting new features will automatically pull customers in, however that’s where you would be wrong. Building a beautiful site won’t make customers come, you’re marketing strategy will be the real way to pull in customers. Your website needs to work in tandem with your marketing strategy in order to encourage customers to your website.
Low quality images
When showing off your products be sure to use high quality images. You want to show off the great items your ecommerce website has to offer, using low quality, blurry photos not only gives off the impression that your business is also low quality but also can’t give your customers a full view of what they are seeing, which could send them to a website which will.
Complicated checkout process
Your customers want to choose their items and pay, it’s that simple. If you can’t offer this, then your ecommerce site isn’t working. Having an overly complicated checkout process or a checkout process which takes too long can be hugely off-putting for customers. In a world where you can now buy an item with one click there’s no need for a confusing checkout process.
Insecure website
According to research, one of the main reasons for a high bounce rate is because of concerns over website security. It’s important for all website are secure, however even more so for ecommerce websites, where personal details are likely to be entered. If customers are worried about entering details such as card details and contact details into your website then they definitely won’t be happy buying from your website.
Not focusing on products
When visitors arrive on your website they want to find the product they need, an image, the price and any a brief description of the product. You should keep it simple and keep the focus on your products, don’t add lot’s of extra irrelevant information which can detract from the actual product, this can not only confuse customers but also create an impact on SEO.
Not mobile friendly
Whilst this should be common knowledge by now, your ecommerce website needs to be responsive. With the increase in people shopping on mobile and tablet devices you need to make sure these people can also access your website. Failure to provide a responsive website could cause a huge impact on your business and could result in a lot of missed potential.
Insisting on creating accounts
Selling your products is your priory, not forcing your customers to make accounts in order to buy. There’s nothing more annoying that being asked to create an account before you can carry on with a transaction. Whilst it’s always a good idea to ask customers if they would like to create an account, you should never force your customers to, otherwise don’t be surprised if they want to go your competitors website instead.
Building your business can be hard and you should always take time to double check the small details outlined here, to make sure everything is still working for your website. Keeping track of your ecommerce goals can help you make sure that you’re on the path to more traffic, more sales and business success.
