For your business to be successful you need to be up to date with the latest trends, and e-commerce is one of the biggest business trends of this 2018. By 2021 the retail e-commerce worldwide sales are expected to reach $4.479 trillion. The potential growth in e-commerce business is huge, more than 80% of the web population have done online shopping. These numbers prove that there is no doubt that eCommerce is the future of business.
Online shopping has increased the comfort level among customers and profit levels for the business owners. There must be strong reasons as to why people are closing their brick and mortar stores and moving to open online stores. So here the reasons you need to explore:-
Reason 1:- Starting business is easy and affordable
The overhead expenses are lesser when compared to starting a traditional business. You can easily start a business at affordable startup cost and get going using right technology. There are so many eCommerce tools readily available in the market to make your work easier. Also, automation has reduced the scope of human error and increased efficiency.
The first step is setting up a well-modeled website for your business. There are ready to go platforms available like Shopify that help you build a hassle-free online store. There are so many tools present to manage social media, design your website, accept payments, etc. In the whole, it provides you a ready-made website.
Other e-commerce solutions are also there, that takes care of almost everything, from inventory management to accounting to customer management, one such tool is EMERGE app. It has a complete suite of features that manages all the essential tasks and is suitable for all kinds of business.
For individual tasks like managing social media, SEO tools, efficient marketing, communications tools, there are many technology solutions present. All these tools are available at affordable plans to suit your needs.
Reason 2:- Increase your reach, sell globally
While setting up an offline store, location plays a prime factor. Many a time the location acts as a limitation, you are not able to reach out to the potential customers. This constraint is removed when you set up an online store. eCommerce makes your business flexible, you can sell online and offline in any part of the country. It adds wings to your business in a very short span of time that helps you spread your reach globally.
Reason 3:- 24/7 Visibility
Opening an online store means your store is always available to the customer. Your physical presence is not required, you can earn money even when you are asleep. This visibility makes a huge difference when it comes to increasing sales. The customers can surf through your website and make purchases at any instant of time. The whole day orders can be received and processed.
Tip: If you are selling both online and offline, you should use a order & inventory management softwares like EMERGE App.
Reason 4:- Affordable Marketing
Having a good marketing plan is very crucial for your business. In 2018 you don’t need posters, ads or fliers to preach about your business various social media platforms, Facebook and Google ads have replaced them.
It’s not just enough that you open social media accounts, your active presence is required so that you continuously engage with customers. People will not follow your page if there is no engaging activity going on, so from time to time hold lucky draw contests or competitions. Ask them to post pictures with your products, or tag their friends, and randomly select winners.
You can also get in touch with social media influencers, provide them free services and in turn ask them to promote your brand or company. This way without much efforts you will be able to reach out to their follower base as well.
Content marketing is also a good way to sell more. Write interesting articles on topics you have expertise. Ask them to subscribe to your blog. Later on send them promotional emails, discount vouchers, new launches and draw potential buyers to your website.
You can also retarget customers who have abandoned their shopping cart by email marketing. Shortly after they have abandoned the cart
send them deals that they cannot ignore.
Reason 5:- Customer support
Customers nowadays are ready to pay more for better experiences, for that having an efficient customer support team is a necessity. The customer service should be available 24/7 on the website to assist customers at all times to solve their queries and problems.
Customers reach out on social media websites also with their problems. Get back to them as soon as possible. Don’t avoid their queries. Many post feedbacks, reply back to them also. Say thank you for positive feedbacks and tactfully handle negative feedbacks. Apologize to unhappy customers, this will make them feel that your company actually cares about their customers and help you regain their faith.
Reason 6:- Mobile commerce
Also known as M-Commerce, has gained popularity with the rise in the usage of mobile phones. You need to create a mobile application for your e-commerce website. This is a good way to attract customers and increase traffic to your website through mobile phones.
Reason 7:- Remove the hassle of delivery and logistics
You can consider starting a drop shipping business if you are new to the e-commerce business. In drop shipping business, you don’t have to store the products you want to sell. All you have to do is connect with a supplier. Whenever you receive an order you forward it to the supplier and the supplier ships the product directly to the buyer. This way you will remove the complications of renting storage or warehouse, managing inventory, returning policies, etc.
Wrapping it up: There are countless benefits
The advantages of online store will only increase as it is a growing technology and it will just get better and better with time. It provides flexibility to your customers that they can shop whenever they want from any part of the world. And at the same time, it provides you also the flexibility of being independent of the location, accepting various payment methods, work hours, how you want to work etc.
Buyers have a lot of options these days, they are not just looking for products, and they are looking for better experiences and services. With the help of an e-commerce website, you can directly communicate with your customers, improve using their feedback. There are a variety of marketing channels which you can utilize to connect with your customers for free. All this helps you build a trustworthy relationship and make them your loyal customers.
You can start your business around the things you are passionate about. It gives you a creative liberty, you can experiment and try out new things. This is a perfect platform if you want to enjoy doing business.
