3 Factors to Consider Before Starting an E-commerce Site From Scratch Share: Manektech Date Published 25 October 2021 Categories Blog Reading Time 5-Minute Read For entrepreneurs and businesses alike, in 2021 and the years to come, eCommerce web development is the key to a successful business. The benefits of an eCommerce website have multiple facets, including marketing and branding. Along with ever-rising internet technologies and usage of smart devices, the current COVID era has paced the growth of online businesses and consumers as it gives the safety of one’s home. The concept is similar to having an online store that allows online sales and transactions without borders. Finding the right eCommerce web development company and knowing the process is the key to creating your online store. How to Build an eCommerce Website? eCommerce website development is complex but not necessarily complicated. Some factors need to be considered for setting up your online store, including requirement analysis, understanding framework, user experience, SEO, check-out process, and more. Consider the following factors when developing a website for selling products online: Your Business Model Choosing the suitable business models for your product depends on the nature of the products or services, the target audience, the investments, and the ROI involved. Examples include Amazon based on business to business (B2B) and Slack based on the business to consumer (B2C) model. Your Target Market Identifying your target market and the sustainability of the online store before getting into the development phase is a crucial step. First, brainstorm the scope and nature of the target market. Right eCommerce Platform With evolving technology, we have quite a few options for eCommerce platforms that will lay the foundation of your website — like Magento, Shopify, or WooCommerce. But, which platform best suits our eCommerce growth? Finding the Right eCommerce Website Development Platform Guided by your business model and target market, below are the eight key features to look for in an eCommerce platform for your website development and business growth. Responsive design: Viewing should be smooth in different screen sizes, whether desktop or mobile. The eCommerce platform should offer a consistent format and experience. Product/Inventory management: One of the essential parts of the business workflow is adding, editing, and keeping track of inventory and pricing. It should be easy to do with an eCommerce platform. Content management system (CMS): Mostly for all content categories like blogs or news on the websites, a CMS is used for updating and editing dynamic content. Keeping your website updated with new content to support your product becomes increasingly important through the integration of a CMS. Payment Process: Your platform should be compatible with different payment processes such as credit cards or electronic payments like Apple Pay, PayPal, etc. Safe and secure check-outs are possible with platforms that support HTTPS/SSL. Integrations: Seamless integration of your existing website or social media platforms along with options to choose from can be a happy perk. Does it work with other plugins or APIs? Look beforehand. SEO-friendly: For customers to quickly find the product and services you are selling, it should rank high in browser search results, especially if you’re a new eCommerce store. An SEO-friendly eCommerce platform is the best way to achieve this. Analytics: To monitor your eCommerce website’s performance, critical metrics like sales, amount, order number and more should be available in easy-to-understand ways. Tech support: eCommerce websites are not just HTML or CSS, so any downtime will severely impact the business. So, a solid customer support team is needed. The Best eCommerce Platforms: Magento and Shopify Now, we know the criteria of choosing our eCommerce platform, so let’s analyze the best eCommerce platforms, including Magento and Shopify, to make the right choice. Magento Magento offers two different platforms— Open Source (free) and Commerce (Paid). Popular brands like Nike and P&G used Magento to develop their eCommerce website. You should approach a Magento development company that provides end-to-end eCommerce development services based on its pros and cons below: Benefits: Robust and feature-rich platform SEO Friendly Mobile-Friendly and responsive design High Scalability Flexible in choosing where you want to host the software Disadvantages: Expensive: the community version is free, but the enterprise version costs a lot. Requires highly skilled developers Virtually no product support Requires dedicated servers as it needs ample space and memory to perform well Shopify Shopify is a software as a service (SaaS) tool— in other words, you subscribe to the software monthly, and you don’t own it. Available in five different versions, it caters to different needs from small-scale to large enterprises. A Shopify development company and developer are needed to assist in designing templates and integrating other features; check out its pros and cons below: Benefits: Ideal for larger stores Multi-platform selling, including Facebook, Instagram, and more A Lot of Payment Processors World-class Site Performance and Tech Support Variety of Themes/Designs Disadvantages: Hard to customize the design No Email hosting Fewer built-in features than other platforms High transaction fees With ever-growing technologies, eCommerce will continue to grow and expand. Moreover, in the pandemic era, having an online address is as essential as being physically present for your business to thrive. Finally, it’s time to find an eCommerce web development company to launch your website. ManekTech can help you provide the best eCommerce solutions you need for your next big project. Let’s connect today!