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The
Internet is great at leveling the field for businesses. Where else
can you put up a site and immediately compete with huge companies on an
international basis?
What
It Is
eCommerce,
or web commerce, basically means selling of
merchandise or services over the Internet with electronic transactions
and also through a secure network. eCommerce is not merely buying and
selling or providing services but it is also a method of advertising
and marketing through an electronic system as well. eCommerce also means
facilitating the progress of commercial transactions
electronically.
Right
now eCommerce is a well-established technology in all major
countries. In most cases internet marketing requires you to have your
own eCommerce store for maximum return. Requirements of an eCommerce
Store Building an online store is not an easy job. Software is required
that can manage customers as well as their needs. eCommerce software
should be able to handle inventory, shipping and handling costs, taxes,
dispatching and payment processing of client's orders.
You may
encounter many options when setting out to build an eCommerce store.
Before choosing any of them it is important to have a clear view of
your requirements. Technical requirements might include coupons,
tracking systems, customer login options or any number of other things.
Other requirements include what type of impression you want to provide
to your valuable clients.
Study the Sales and Marketing Cycle to
Determine Your Needs
Before you opt for any of solutions for building e
commerce store, study the basic model of e commerce that represents the
entire sales and marketing cycle. The first building block of this
cycle is audience in which you define what type of customers you will
target. Second are commodities, in which you characterize the types of
products you will put on the market. Third is customer support where
you will answer the questions and offer solutions to clients' or
potential clients' problems. Next are advertising, marketing and
endorsement where a business promotes the products or services. Then
there is transaction processing, the most important technical phase of
the cycle, which will handle orders, taxes, payment processing and
order delivery.
Transactions may be automatic or manual. In manual
processing you have to enter credit card information manually through
an offline terminal. In the case of automatic processing a client's
order form will be setup with a program that processes and charges the
credit card for you. After that there are post-deal services regarding
how you provide solutions and services after the sale. Last but not
least is brand name with which you will create a distinctive business
image to correspond with customers. Nobody is going to pay attention to
your online store unless something catches their eye.
Research Your
Options
Once you have defined your needs, you can then begin
researching your options. There are two basic paths you may follow when
building an eCommerce store - either buy ready made software or build
a custom system with components and parts according to your
requirements and budgets.
Flexibility
Some business firms offer gifts
and well placed impulse products for better marketing approaches. This
requires an e-com solution to be flexible enough to allow various
give-aways, coupons and promotions. Also, if your product comes in a
variety of models or styles, with different options and different
prices then you must communicate these factors and portray them
distinctively in your online store. A true businessperson will
certainly follow the patterns of his or her usual clients as well as
those who directly visit the site. Web statistic tracking tools can be
a great help to this end.
Ease of Use
Some e commerce stores are very
easy to use and require only a few minutes to learn while others are
more complex with so many features that they can be overwhelming. Being
able to see a demonstration of software before buying it is a great
help to determining ease of use.
Scalability
Being able to grow with
your company is very important. If you choose a very simple solution
now, then require a more robust solution down the road, you will lose
time converting your store. If the URL structure of your store is not
consistent, you can also lose search engine rankings by changing e
commerce solutions.
Therefore, it is important to choose an e commerce
solution that can grow with you. For example, some stores owners may
not want coupons in the beginning but then down the road decide it is a
good idea. Some stores may also have limits on number of products,
inventory control and tracking that down the road will be very
important. Security Of utmost importance to online stores is
transaction security. The priority for any business firm should be
secure transactions.
Thanks to SSL (secure
socket layer), data can be protected by online store owners. SSL is an
encryption technology that encrypts a message and the receiver decrypts
it by using RSA security. To enable SSL on your web server you need a
digital ID (a form of identification that will recognize you). Many web
hosts provide SSL installation for anywhere from a few bucks to a few
hundred bucks per year. Overall, you want flexibility, ease of use,
security and scalability in your store. Research your options before
you make a final choice, and whenever possible, get a free trial of
your solution before you buy.
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Handy Guides: eCommerce
Gal Recommends...
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Here
are
products and guides I personally recommend for building your online
business. There isn't a guide or tool recommended on my site that I
haven't personally used and found to be helpful. My philosophy
is to bring quality, affordability and value to as
many
people as possible.
Check out my latest product recommendations.
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