A Quick Guide on How to Start an Ecommerce Business

The appetite for online shopping and home delivery isn’t going away anytime soon. Globally, eCommerce sales will reach over $5.5 trillion this year.

Isn’t it time you turned your entrepreneur dreams into an eCommerce website and joined the gold rush?

To help you begin planning your new startup, we’ve put together this short guide for you. Here’s a step-by-step look at how to start an eCommerce business from scratch.

Decide What to Sell

You’ll need a product (or products) and a niche. Many specialist stores perform well online, so don’t be afraid to pick one product to sell. That will make website management, marketing, and branding more manageable.

Alternatively, go for a range of products but try and keep to a small niche to distinguish yourself from the giants of the internet world like Amazon and eBay.

Positioning and Branding

There is no limit to how you can position your brand so that you have something to grab your target customer’s attention. Ultimately, what you choose depends on what type of shop you wish to run.

Would you prefer to launch a high-end luxury brand, or are you more interested in offering a discount product?

Perhaps you have a desire to become a small and intimate family-run business. Or maybe you have a passion for the environment and want to launch a revolutionary eco-friendly product range.

Whatever you decide, be bold and be distinct. Don’t try to be everything to everyone.

Find a Trusted Supplier

Now it’s time to find the best supplier for your eCommerce company.

Your reputation is everything, so you’ll need to do your research to find the perfect product. Order samples from a range of shortlisted suppliers so you can test the quality.

Get friends and family to help with this! Think about other factors affecting your business operations, such as whether your supplier has a reliable number of products in stock.

Also, consider whether they are shipping from abroad, as you might need to allow several weeks for a shipment from some overseas wholesalers.

Check the packaging quality and whether you need the product or packaging customized with your brand logo.

Also, thousands of packages are either stolen, lost in NYC alone and it is only getting worse as more people prefer to shop online. The procedure to handle or claim stolen packages can be lengthy and cumbersome with no instant resolution. To avoid this hassle Stowfly offers amazon missing package where customers can make use of an alternative address for receiving and storing your packages and thereby protecting packages from theft.

Set up a Website

Fortunately, there are many eCommerce platforms on the market, which means you can set up a website even if you have no coding or technical background. The top three are Shopify, Big Commerce, and Woo Commerce.

Shopify is probably the easiest if you aren’t technical.

You’ll need to allow plenty of time for your content creation and to list your products. And remember to set up and test your payments integration plus a post purchase experience.

Run Some Paid Ads

Now it’s time to launch your store! Ensure you have a social media presence on all major platforms. To help win those first few customers, invest in some paid PPC advertising on either Google ads, Google shopping, or Facebook ads.

Are You Ready to Start an eCommerce Business?

Use these tips to start an eCommerce business that flourishes in this exciting market. There might be lots of competition, but there’s still plenty of room for an ambitious and innovative entrepreneur!

Before you go, take five minutes to check out the articles in our technology section for some tips on apps and plugins to add to your new online company.