E-commerce consists of buying and selling products electronically utilizing the internet or a arrangement. Nearly any product can be bought electronically from one of the millions of websites with more being adding to the list each day. Like in the physical world, there are both e-commerce specialty stores that contain many different types of items as well we specialty stores that cater to a specific niche.
There are excellent and terrible e-commerce practices. The following is a list of twenty tips to make for a more successful e-commerce business. The tips include:
- Offer a strong guarantee
- Make the font on a product copy readable; at least 12 point and nothing too fancy
- Ensure the title tag on each page is unique and is relevant to the content on the page
- Avoid dynamic URL’s
- Use or make a product rating feed and a house for user-generated comments
- Avoid having the customer fill in both the credit card billing and shipping address
- Have a newsletter sign up area
- Offer a list of recommended products that additional users have bought
- If selling software, allow immediate access to the full version once bought
- With paid advertising, send the customer to the product page, not the home page
- Always be certain to answer to any email inquiries within a 48 hour time frame.
- Allow your clients the opportunity to view shipping charges without having to register
- If shipping internationally, alphabetize the public drop down menu
- Acknowledge multiple payment types
- Make the website simple to buy from with a no registration option, 800 number and live chat
- Add a photograph of the owners office and upload this to the contact page with the company fax
- Keep initial product pages light with links to further product details
- Build the website for customers and users, not exclusively for search engines
- Keep the customer informed in this area order status before they question
- Find the most web un-savvy person to test the site
- Make the site so it’s simple to enter credit card numbers
- Install an brilliant stats system to footstep where the customer stopped during the purchasing process
These are brilliant guidelines to follow for newcomers and novices alike. In general, excellent practices putting the customer initially will always result in a successful site. Making a more user-friendly site and making the buying process as hassle free as possible will go a long way to generating customer loyalty.