Here are some fatal e-commerce mistakes you don’t want to make when running an online store.
With the e-commerce world growing every day, there are many mistakes that you could be making.
These mistakes may be costing you:
- new customers
- repeat customers
- and ultimately sales
If you have an e-commerce website or you are looking to start one up, here are some fatal mistakes you want to avoid at all costs.
The platform
It is easy when you are getting started with your online business to try to do it as cheap as possible. While it is essential to not go over the top when you are getting started, you also need to ensure that you can quickly scale your business in the future.
Choosing the right platform that allows you do to this is vital to the longevity and ongoing costs of your business. The wrong platform may cost you business, uptime of your website, security issues and more.
Your audience
Do you know that people want what you are planning to sell? What research have you done?
How will you be marketing your store’s products to the people who want to buy them?
- Social Media
- Paid Ads
- SEO
- and more…
Unfortunately, you can’t just build a website for your business and hope that people can find it all on their own.
Postage costs
The number one thing that online buyers want to know is – What are the shipping/delivery charges!
You must have the details of your delivery options obvious.
Free delivery is essential – you should offer a minimum spend to get free delivery. E.G. Spend just $99 and get free delivery.
If you cannot offer free delivery, your policy and pricing should be easy to find and easy to calculate!
Never leave the shipping calculation until after people have entered all their details. This forces people to abandon their cart or never fill the order. People don’t want to hand over all their details only to be shocked by fees.
Guest checkout
Providing the option for a guest checkout gives your shopper a speedy checkout option.
Enforcing the creation of an account and making everyone enter every detail can prevent sales and leave you with abandoned carts. Sometimes people want to make a quick purchase without going through all the effort.
Have the option for a guest check out where minimum details are required for the customer to make their purchase.
Customer service and policies
Although I have written it last, customer service includes many different things and needs to be evident throughout your online store.
You should:
- be responsive to messages
- easily contactable
- able to follow up with customers
- show a phone, email and address for contact
Policies – A lack of terms and conditions plus your return policy will cost you sales. The return policy is going to be read and it needs to be easy to find, easy to read and easy to action for purchasers.
Be smart and make it easy for people to know your policy, and make your policy easy if people need to return their purchase.
On a positive note – Ask your customers for product reviews. This will help your new clients understand how great your business and the products are. The more reviews you have, the more likely you will convert sales today and into the future.
I hope you find these fatal e-commerce mistakes easy to avoid and grow your online business.
Do you need help marketing your online store?
Contact Kelly @ My Sassy Business
