5 Key success factors for E-Commerce Business

Ask yourself! Why do you buy a product from a specific website? What are the factors which motivate you to choose that site and not others?

The answers are what you’re looking for your own e-store. They are the key factors which help your e-store to stands higher in crowd and sell more.

One more thing, online selling is not much different from your brick and mortar store. The concepts are almost same.

1. Branding

Are you a Brand-Crazy person? Do you like Prada or Gucci? Do you like Starbucks?

I mean who don’t like them as long as they are not Gandhi or any Saint.

A brand is a belief. This is the most powerful thing. This is reason why you decide to pay higher price.

So think one more time, how do you brand your business? What are the current efforts for branding? Is this really helpful? Is it costing too much? Can you measure ROI (return-on-investment)? Is it scalable?

If you’re getting more ‘No’ than ‘yes’, then it’s time to tune your Brand-Building process.

Now, it’s question time. How can you build a strong brand if you’re totally new?

The answer itself is good enough to fill hundreds of papers. So I’m going to make it short.

These are the effective ways to build a stronger brand using Internet.

1. Unique Design:  Good enough to hold them! If you’re able to amaze them, you can sell even more.
2. Utilize Social Networks: Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are very helpful here. They got some very innovative products to promote a brand. Spend some time to discover the ‘best practices’.
3. Run multiple Display Advertising Campaigns: Bore people with your ads.
4. Participate in conversation and Q&A sites
5. Showcase your Testimonials, Reviews and feedbacks across the site and networks

2. USP

USP stands for Unique Selling Proposition.  How do you differentiate your business from others? What are the product differentiators?

A buyer usually spends a good time on research. He searches for
• Price
• Quality
• Deals
• Reviews etc
So think again! How do you differentiate your products? Is it price, quality, customer support, any guaranty (Money Back, warranty etc.) or payment flexibilities?

When you find your USPs, showcase them everywhere. It’ll help buyers to make decisions.

For example, I’m willing to pay higher for fast shipping. I can spend few extra bucks on different shop if it offers EMIs (Easy Monthly Installations).

3. Store Experience

A good store experience is must for Ecommerce success. If your cart or design sucks, nothing is going to help.

Make your store as much as user-friendly you can. Get a good design, speed-up the store, smooth the Cart and get higher conversion rate. A good Ecommerce platform or software is a necessity.

Offer number of features but don’t confuse them with lot of options. Simplicity is also necessary.

An example: Yepme.com: Store Review.

4. Customer Retention

A business is never going to be a success without the army of Loyal Customers. Customer retention is helpful to get more sales and to build your brand. A loyal customer not only buys from you but he also spreads the good words in his network.

Also you’ve to apply less effort to sell something to them again. They’ve already used the product and they won’t be in question zone.

Simple advice, always be connected with your existing customers. Let them feel special.

Ask for regular advice (design or feature) using newsletters, blogs or surveys. Thus they’ll be connected and feel like a part of the business and not only a proposition/asset.

5. Multi-Channel Marketing

There are opportunities lying everywhere in Internet. Some businesses are making millions from Facebook. Some businesses are killing their competition with Search Engine Marketing.

The mantra is to spread your reach everywhere. It’s not that hard with Internet.

Let me ask you something. How do you promote your business? What are the current quality traffic sources?
If you can only list 2 or 3 traffic sources, be ready for sudden loss.

If you’re totally depended on search engines, a negative change in ranking algorithm can affect your whole business. If you rely on Ads for traffic, their policy change can bring you to a danger situation.

An ideal marketing strategy should focus on no. of marketing channels. You can use Email Marketing, SEM, Affiliate Marketing, Referral Marketing, Social Media and offline campaigns to diversify your reach.

Thus you’re not dependent on a single source and they’ll also bring you regular amount of buyers. All it needs good and specified targeting and regular data-driven optimization.

Now, it’s time for your participation. What are the success factors behind your business? How to do you sell more? Please share!

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