| With the continued squeeze on the High Street | | | | this means a site that has good usability and |
| and the online ecommerce spend continuing to | | | | accessibility. Make sure the entire |
| grow, you cannot afford to be without a good | | | | experience is a positive one even before they |
| ecommerce web site if you are in retail. | | | | arrive at your site or before they know it |
| | | | exists. This starts with good site |
| The question is where do you start with the | | | | optimisation, so that when a visitor clicks |
| bewildering range of ecommerce shopping carts | | | | on a link from a search engine the page they |
| and ecommerce solutions available? Whether | | | | land on specifically meets their needs. It is |
| you are looking for corporate website design | | | | compliant with all accessibility guidelines |
| and ecommerce, business to business ecommerce | | | | and is user friendly, meaning it is easy to |
| build and development, or more modest | | | | use, downloads quickly, has punchy well |
| affordable e-commerce web site solutions, you | | | | written copy and guides visitors easily |
| still need to apply the ecommerce golden | | | | through the ecommerce process. |
| rules. A good web development company will | | | | |
| be able to help with these questions and | | | | Retain your customers |
| more. But first what do you need to know in | | | | |
| order to set up a good ecommerce site? | | | | It may be a cliché but it's true, it's a |
| | | | lot easier to make money from existing |
| The rules of successful ecommerce solutions | | | | customers than to get new ones. So you need |
| | | | to do all you can to not only retain your |
| 1. Ensure visitors can find you | | | | customers, but to get them to recruit new |
| | | | ones for you. A good ecommerce solution is |
| 2. Convert your visitors - give them what | | | | an ideal way of increasing customer retention |
| they want | | | | as you have a lot of information about them |
| | | | that you can use to your advantage. You have |
| 3. retain your customers - make them into | | | | their purchase history, their level of spend, |
| repeat visitors | | | | the types of items they like. You need to use |
| | | | this information to arrange your site in such |
| 4. integrate your ecommerce into your | | | | a way as to encourage repeat visits and |
| business | | | | increase the level of spend on any given |
| | | | visit. You also need to use the information |
| 5. finally, find a good ecommerce consultant | | | | in database marketing campaigns, so you can |
| to put it all into practice | | | | automatically segment your customers and |
| | | | target them with offerings appropriate to |
| Ensure visitors can find you | | | | their purchase history. A good ecommerce |
| | | | consultant and consultancy . can help with |
| It all revolves around marketing both online | | | | this. |
| and offline. Market yourself ruthlessly. Put | | | | |
| your URL on all your stationery and promote | | | | Integrate your website into your business |
| it at every opportunity when you have client | | | | |
| contact. In addition, you need to make sure | | | | It doesn't matter whether, you just sell |
| your website is fully optimised for search | | | | online or whether the ecommerce aspect is |
| engines and you undertake a search engine | | | | just a part of your overall business, good |
| promotion strategy. Search engine | | | | processes lie at the heart of any business |
| optimisationinvolves researching the key | | | | including ecommerce. An ecommerce site gives |
| phrases that your customers use to find your | | | | you the opportunity of integrating a lot of |
| services and including them appropriately | | | | your systems to make you more efficient and |
| throughout your site. It also means ensuring | | | | spend less time on the administrative aspects |
| you do not use technology that impedes search | | | | of running the business. For example, |
| engines when they are indexing your site. | | | | payments should be automated and then passed |
| Once your site has been listed, you will do | | | | directly into your accounts system. Your |
| well for some phrases and poorly for more | | | | stock control system should be tied into any |
| competitive ones. In order to improve your | | | | warehousing system and ideally into your |
| search listings you need to get links to your | | | | tills (if you have them) via an integrated |
| pages under the key phrases you wish to be | | | | EPOS system. You also need to be able to |
| found under. Again, you need to get a good | | | | analyse your business effectively. You need |
| consultant to organise the creation of link | | | | good reporting applications top be able to |
| building strategy . | | | | query your website, to determine how people |
| | | | find you, and how they use your site. You |
| Convert your visitors | | | | also need to be able to determine what sells, |
| | | | what makes money, what causes problems, your |
| Once you have attracted visitors to your | | | | most profitable customers etc. A good |
| site, the next challenge is to get them to | | | | ecommerce consultancy will not just create |
| transact with you. The two principle rules | | | | you a site and wave goodbye. They will first |
| here are; attract the visitors most likely to | | | | spend time looking at your business model and |
| want your offerings, so less targeted traffic | | | | advising how the ecommerce aspect can support |
| is better than a lot of generic traffic; and | | | | and grow your existing business. |
| make it easy for them to engage with you, | | | | |