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10 Things That You Should Essentially Consider Before Launching an Ecommerce Website in 2023
E-CommerceWith around 2 billion global digital buyers, most people prefer to develop an e-commerce website. It is considered an outstanding business idea. However, an online store that stands out involves more than good SEO and a pretty design.
A good place to start involves creating a memorable and catchy store name. Another important thing is to craft a solid marketing strategy that will help you to drive sales.
If you are unsure about the key factors to consider while launching an online site, you are in the right place! We shall be informing you about all the factors you need to know before hiring an ecommerce website design Melbourne company. So, let’s get started:
Top Factors to Take Into Consideration in Ecommerce Website Development
1. Website Security and Safety
While browsing the web, every internet user would prefer staying away from a bug as it may put the safety of their computer at risk. Similarly, as an e-commerce business owner, your main focus is to emphasise the security and safety of your website. It’s because your site stores large volumes of data about your products.
It also includes the details of the users who have registered to purchase on your website. So, safety is one of the most important e-commerce website development requirements. Any sort of data breach puts your site at a greater risk. There may even be chances for your leads’ contact information to be stolen, or you may risk permanently losing important data.
An unsecured site even hampers your reputation on Google and other search engine platforms. Google has started to flag sites that do not contain an HTTPS protocol and SSL certificate. Users would not be able to visit websites without these two components.
So, when you launch your website, you must get an SSL certificate and HTTPS protocol. If your certificate has expired, renew it as soon as possible; otherwise, you might lose potential orders.
2. Appropriate Optimisation Practices
Google flags all those websites which possess slow loading speeds. According to Think with Google research, if a website page takes up to 5 seconds to load, the probability of visitors bouncing rises by 90 per cent.
Due to this reason, it is important to focus on optimising your website by choosing Ecommerce Web Design services. It will help you ensure your site is in good condition.
SEO typically aims to improve your overall sales volume by making it rank higher in search engines. It involves adopting different techniques and strategies like adding keywords to your website content and meta information to pages, including descriptions, titles and images.
Although customers can easily find your business through an image search, it is only useful if you incorporate ‘alt’ descriptions to your visual content.
Another important thing most business owners miss is hiring an SEO specialist at the early stages of e-commerce development. It is a significant step as it decides the success of your store.
An experienced SEO specialist could assist you with organising internal linking and page structure, crafting a content strategy, enhancing loading speed, building a mobile-friendly design, etc.
3. Payment Options
While developing an e-commerce website, adding all possible payment alternatives is impossible. Instead, you should add a few popular payment methods to ensure your customers do not divert from your website.
As per the 2019 Payment Methods Report, a lengthy checkout procedure (26 per cent) and unexpected shipping costs (55 per cent) are the major reasons buyers abandon their shopping carts. However, 6% of the people would bail on you due to insufficient payment options.
According to Hostgator, some of the most recognised method options include 2Checkout, Masterpass, Visa, Square, Stripe, American Express, Google Pay, Amazon Pay, Apple Pay and PayPal.
Based on the type of items you sell, you can even focus on some other options involving cryptocurrency. You can hire a trusted ecommerce website design Melbourne company to receive expert assistance.
4. Website Search and Filtering Feature
Presently, you are most likely to find a search bar even on websites that do not sell anything. So, if you have an e-commerce website, it is absolutely mandatory to offer advanced search functionality.
For instance, an advanced feature could be a visual search where the users can easily upload photos of an item they like. After they do so, the search engine will work to discover a similar product that matches their requirements.
Browsing categories is only important if users lack a clear idea about what they are searching for and need inspiration. In other cases, a simple search is sufficient to find them the specific product they need and that too in a few clicks.
5. Registration and Related Concerns
Registering on an e-commerce website has certain benefits, such as saving the shopping history or delivery address. However, some users prefer a one-click-buy feature or a guest checkout form.
You will likely find that some people want to avoid registering on another website to make a one-time order. In this regard, you can consider adding a guest checkout feature to your website. You can remind shoppers of your website address in many other ways. It includes adding it on the order packaging or at the message end with the shipment number.
Note that a registration form is not the only option left in front of you. You can also ask your users to sign in using social media or a minimal form with their phone number, name and email.
In both cases, you can auto-generate an account and email the login details to them. You can approach a professional Ecommerce Website Design Australia agency if you need any related assistance.
6. CMS Integration
A CMS or content management system stores and manages all your marketing documentation and written and visual content in one place. You get the option to add new information or edit any existing ones. Once your website is published, the changes will be automatically reflected.
A CMS allows your employees to react quickly to tickets from customers. You can employ a ready-made solution like Magento, OpenCart or PrestaShop. All of these options are open-source. So you can easily integrate them into your website code.
7. Shipping Rates
As mentioned in the above section, unexpected shipping rates could cause 55% of customers to abandon shopping carts. The reasons behind this could be that many may be unaware of the rates, have expected a lower sum, etc.
Although online shopping offers a lot of convenience, offering a free delivery option is not always possible. So, you should add detailed info about shipping rates and options in the menu with a link on each product page.
8. Mobile Functionality
It is evident from Criteo’s 2018 Global Commerce review that more than 50 percent of online transactions are done through a mobile device. Although most individuals are more likely to purchase from a mobile application, your conversion rate is still expected to increase if your site’s interface easily adapts to the mobile web.
For instance, Walmart Canada experienced a 20% increase in site conversions after a more responsive design was released. They also reported a stunning 98 per cent rise in mobile orders.
With the increasing number of individuals employing mobile devices, e-commerce website owners must invest in responsive design. It includes adaptive typography, image size, mobile-specific features, and hidden menus. Finally, you need to ensure that your mobile site is optimised down to the product descriptions. In this regard, you can take the help of a professional web design company Sydney.
9. Appealing Shopping Cart Design
You may have a simple shopping cart that involves as few steps as possible, but you could adopt several approaches to improve its functionality. For instance, you can have 3 types of users, i.e. unregistered, registered and those who prefer to remain a guest.
When a user considers tapping on the shopping cart, the first step is typically asking them to register, log in or purchase as a guest. Once the users log in or register, they will be automatically redirected to their full baskets, as repeatedly searching for the same items can be discouraging.
On the contrary, you could do a one-step checkout where all the steps will be in a single dynamic window that automatically updates whenever any user considers inputting data.
You can even incorporate upselling and cross-selling into your shopping cart by adding a section with products that might interest the users. It is something that you should consider early into your WordPress development journey as you may need to decide how to distinguish the most relevant products to a specific buyer.
10. A Website Design Complementing the Products You Are Selling
The colour scheme of your website should perfectly complement the product you are involved in selling. For example, if you are designing an e-commerce gaming website, use a font or background self-explanatory of the wide variety of items people can discover here.
On the other hand, e-commerce websites that are related to food will perform effectively with a purple, yellow and green range. It’s because all of these colours are known to stimulate appetite. Make sure to use a lot of white space, so your website design and food items do not contradict each other.
Final Thoughts
So, those mentioned above are a few important things for you to consider when developing an e-commerce website. If you decide to come up with a high-functioning web store, then it is important to opt for the assistance of a reputed ecommerce website design Melbourne agency.
