OLBlog: Ecommerce

9:40 PM

What is E-Commerce And Why Does my Business Need It?

Transacting or facilitating business on the Internet is called e-commerce. E-commerce is short for "electronic commerce."

Modern examples of e-commerce revolve around buying and selling online.
But the e-commerce universe contains other types of activities as well. Any form of a business transaction conducted electronically is e-commerce.

What is e-commerce marketing?

E-commerce marketing is the process of driving sales by raising awareness about an online store's brand and product offerings. Digital marketing for e-commerce applies traditional marketing principles to a multichannel, data-driven environment.

E-commerce marketing can be divided into two general actions: driving website traffic and optimizing the user experience for conversion. Both are critical components to growing an online business — failure in one is all but sure to undermine any success in the other. Seasoned marketers can thrive in a digital landscape, starting with a solid foundation of common terms.

Popular e-commerce business example:

Amazon: Amazon was founded by Jeff Bezos. According to Alexa, Amazon has currently ranked the 9th most popular website worldwide, and 4th in the United States.

eBay: eBay was founded by Pierre Omidyar. On Alexa, the e-commerce site is ranked 33 globally, and 9th in the US.

AliExpress: AliExpress was founded by Jack Ma. It’s currently ranked 40th in the world and 9th in Russia according to Alexa.

Flipkart: Flipkart was founded by Binny Bansal and Sachin Bansal. Alexa has it ranked 147 globally and 9th in India.

Also read: How To Start Online Business From Home

E-commerce investment

Investing in e-commerce is important for all businesses, because consumers use all channels at their disposal when researching, selecting and buying a product. In-store browsers can become online shoppers and vice versa. This was seen in the Wipro data. Even when consumers reported browsing both online and in a store, one in three (34% in the US and 33% in the UK) chose to go back online to make their purchase.

Also read: How to Use Facebook Ads for Ecommerce Marketers

Does my business need e-commerce?

Setting up an online store can be difficult, especially if you are not an expert web designer. If you don't have an advanced knowledge of online sales, you may be daunted by the prospect of moving a significant portion of your operation online. You may be worried that your online endeavor may fall well short of your expectations and put the success of your business in serious jeopardy. The truth of it is that if you choose not to take the plunge, a hundred companies are waiting right behind you that will. There is no doubt that e-commerce is here to stay.

When implemented correctly, e-commerce:

Connects you to a customer base you otherwise never would have access to
Lower your costs and raise your margins on sales
Create an automated flow of repeat business and perpetual ordering cycles
Save you lots of money in loss prevention costs
Increase your brand recognition and make your business a leader in your industry
If any of this sounds good to you, and it should, you should take the time to look into building an e-commerce platform for your business. It may not be as hard as you think it is, and it could have an enormous positive impact on your business for years to come.

Whether you're a bootstrapper or an investor with a bit of extra money to start a new enterprise, e-commerce is a great field to get into, especially today. Even as a beginner in e-commerce, the tools and resources are all laid out for you. All you need is a strong work ethic and a desire to succeed.

Benefits of E-commerce

The primary benefits of e-commerce revolve around the fact that it eliminates limitations of time and geographical distance. In the process, e-commerce usually streamlines operations and lowers costs.

Specialized Forms of E-commerce

On some platforms, e-commerce has shown the promise of explosive growth. Two such examples are:

M-commerce

M-commerce is short for "mobile commerce." The rapid penetration of mobile devices with Internet access has opened new avenues of e-commerce for retailers.

F-commerce

F-commerce is short for "Facebook commerce." The immense popularity of Facebook provides a captive audience to transact business.

Despite this discussion, at the consumer level, online retail has become synonymous with e-commerce.

Also read: Easy Ways To Make a First Sale on Ecommerce Website

Conclusion

Most entrepreneurs have other business ideas they would one day love to explore. Once you've built up a successful ecommerce business, selling it may provide you with the capital you need to move onto greener pastures.

10:40 PM

Unemployed? Try Building Your Ecommerce Empire

I know, how difficult it is to find & get a job and manage it for a successful career. Many of you can't land your dream job just after graduation. Many of your friends may be working in a good place, and you are frustrated. Do you know, you can make more money than your friends are earning through their day jobs? Start an e-commerce business even if you have a 9-5 duty. Be the one to build your own future.

Don't get stressed if you are unemployed. Start an e-commerce business and make your career successful. Learn to create online store from scratch.

Becoming a Sidepreneur or Blogger

Many people are managing a side business while they still do a full-time job. Operating a blog or an e-commerce business is easier than ever with WordPress, Shopify, Squarespace, Etsy and similar service. Also, you can start and manage a blog instead of an online shop. If you look around, you will see a lot of successful bloggers who are literally unemployed but earning more than an employed person.

Related: How to create an Online Store with Etsy
20 Keys To Creating An Online Store And Get Sales

Is it Ok to be unemployed?

I'm sure, many people never know the bright side of being unemployed. There is nothing bad being unemployed as long as you can handle your personal issues. However, for social improvement, you should earn money for you and your family. Yes, you can make money by doing anything you want, and you can do it as long as it's legal in law. As an unemployed person, you have unlimited time, freedom of works, longer holidays and many more things. Learning new skills is another great advantage of being unemployed.

Build Your Career, Start Now

I can't see anything to worry about if you are unemployed. I can see a bright future and millions of dollars in your bank account. There are tons of opportunities for unemployed peoples. Stop thinking, and start building. Today, I'm here, bringing you a great news that anyone can start and grow an e-commerce business to make money on the side.

The figures indicate that the volume of people in unemployment continues being high and in the absence of good job opportunities this group is deciding to undertake as an alternative.

People of all kinds have chosen to step forward and stop waiting for a job to fall before their eyes to shape businesses with those who seek a livelihood.

Today it is being seen that a lot of entrepreneurs bet on a particular group: online business.

1. Selling on the internet as self-employment

This search is something that thousands of initiatives are raised every day.
Creating a business from scratch without the complications and investment requirements that a real trade requires are good points to keep in mind. Although shaping an online store is not just a matter of minutes, it is a demanding process that is available to everyone.

2. Tools that help

To form an online store, different tools are a good starting point. Entrepreneurs who choose to do so have to pick a system that is easy to use and provides them with all the support they need.

You can create a free online store with many web builders that simplify the process and provide confidence. Reduce difficulty levels to a minimum!

Also read: 5 Success Keys For Your eCommerce Business
5 Tips to Make an Effective Market Study for Your Online Store

3. More options to sell

Once the store is created, and the business is in operation, a wide range of possibilities opens up to the entrepreneur. For example, the opportunity to bring the products of this trade to more sales platforms.

Selling on Facebook or Amazon as an addition to the sales made in the online store is an idea that more and more people are betting on.

Nor should it be overlooked the importance of taking care of the presence of the warehouse in Google, since it will be the primary source of new customers that will reach it. And much less you can abandon social networks, which play a fundamental role at the time of attracting new potential clients.

In any case, it is easy to understand, given the results, that creating web shops has become solidly one of the most common options to get out of self-employment.

Helpful resource:
Your 10 Point Checklist to Starting an Ecommerce Business - Read Now.
Free Guide: How to Build a Profitable Ecommerce Business - Read on HubSpot
6 Key Ingredients To Build A Profitable Internet Business - Read on OLB
How To Start Online Business From Home - Read on OLB

12:30 AM

5 Success Keys For Your eCommerce Business

3:20 PM

How to Use Facebook Ads for Ecommerce Marketers

Facebook advertising is vital to generate traffic for e-commerce companies. However, that's not enough to convince your visitors. To make the most of your advertising expenses, make sure the offer is attractive, competitively priced inside your store. And do it smartly, track your competitor's prices and research their market value.

Like advertisers, we know that when we use passive platforms like Facebook where the user is not actively looking for the product, costs can skyrocket, and conversions may be imperceptible. For this reason, we must focus on strategies based on the intention of purchase of the user and with ads type "shopping."

How to use Facebook ads for Ecommerce?
We bring you the four advertising strategies that any e-commerce should use on Facebook:

Product Remarketing

Remarketing is an essential strategy that has been used extensively on other channels. But now you also have the opportunity to carry it out on this social network.

With the product feed of your website, Facebook allows you to create dynamic remarketing campaigns for the exact products that each user saw.

One of the significant advantages of using this platform is that you eliminate the problem of user tracking between devices. Facebook captures the potential customer and reimports it on the mobile or computer interchangeably. Google can only do this with a small percentage of its users.
Also read:

Facebook knows your customers almost better than you

Facebook's lack of purchase intention is offset by its ability to collect data from any website. Its users not only leave data in their profile and the application, but they are shouting to Facebook their tastes every time they click on a button "I like" the web.

When you make campaigns in Google, you need to define the demographics and interests of your potential buyers, whereas Facebook already knows how your visitors are and what your frequent customers are. Just let the Facebook algorithm do its work.

5 images are worth much more than 1

For some time Facebook has included a carousel of images in publications with links. If it is good to show a picture of your products, imagine 5! Also, you do not even have to use the ones that load by default on your page, but you can choose them and upload them yourself.

Make your campaigns Responsive

80% of Facebook traffic is mobile, and 78% of purchases made on the social network are manufactured from a mobile. This means that your campaigns must be prepared for these devices.

Your e-commerce has to be totally adapted so that the user does not find any barriers during their purchase.
Can you make a purchase on your site with less than 10 clicks?

Now that you have the keys, so don't miss the opportunity to sell on Facebook.
Your customers also spend every day on Facebook. Make them see you!
Also read:

Create Your Facebook Advertising Plan

There are some fundamental decisions in every advertising plan that you need to do before taking any action. Here are some questions that you should be able to answer before beginning:

What are your goals?
To whom?
Age?
Sex?
Location?
What is the need for your product to satisfy?
How will you achieve your goals?
How much do you want to invest in advertising?
Are you going to offer a deal?

Monitor Results

Some of them may seem obvious, but by writing and answering them carefully, you will find yourself much more aware of your actual news with the advertising campaign. Let's look at each of them:

Set goals for

In addition to selling only products, you need to create your goals. You need to create your goals. You could only want to sell your Facebook page if you want to get more subscribers. In other words, here you have to decide your goals for the advertising campaign. There are a lot of strategies, and the most direct ones are not always the best. I will explain at least the most right approach.

I want to get more followers:

Having a good number of Facebook fans can be very profitable in the long run if they are the right people. Maybe your sales increase a lot at specific times of the years, like summer or Christmas. If this is your case, you can create a campaign to get more followers so they can show their best offers when the time comes. This makes sense if you are planning to launch an exciting product or offer to create a word of mouth advertising campaign. This is the best option if people usually buy your product on impulse.
Also read:

I want to get the prospects over:

In this case, you are interested in individuals who are likely to buy something from you. It is less general than the previous one, and in most cases economically more efficient. This is the best option if the product meets a need.

I want to sell more: I know, I know, everyone does. But do you need to increase your sales now? Is not it better to focus on getting more prospects? See your budget and what you need now and what is required in the future. This strategy is usually the best in intense moments of Christmas sales, Valentine's Day, Mother's Day, and so on.

How will you achieve your goals?

If you are just looking for fans, then you can conduct a contest and try to increase subscriptions that way. Another option, if appropriate for your business, is to publish viral content, funny page to keep doing.

On the other hand, if you are looking for prospects, you have to focus on the needs of the user. Explain to them how much they have an unmet need, how their product satisfies the need and how to get their product. The easy way is the basis of writing.

If you want to increase sales, then let's face it, the best option is to promote a deal. Words like "free" or "discount" are the best way to improve short-term sales.

7:32 AM

5 Tips to Make an Effective Market Study for Your Online Store

Without understanding your target audience, the needs of the industry, what the competitors are doing or the market conditions, it will be difficult to create a profitable business.

Online stores are not exempt from this claim. The eCommerce and the digital world are constantly changing, so it is essential to conduct market research to better meet the audience and predict changes.

This is the way you can ensure that your business stays with interested and committed customers. By understanding your industry and your environment, you will be able to create competitive strategies to boost sales, because you will know what customers think and feel about your product or service.

However, market research in e- commerce is a bit complicated for many entrepreneurs. It can be difficult to track an industry in general, find reliable sources and accurate data, especially when it comes to business ideas or innovative products.

Fortunately, it is not impossible, it just takes practice and knowing how and where to look. In this post, we will share some useful tips to do a market research that will help you find valuable information on the Internet for your e -commerce store.

1. Identify influential people in your industry

To know your market niche, you can start through the identification of influencers, i.e., reporters, bloggers, twitterers or artists that are relevant to your industry. These are the people you should follow and strive to maintain a relationship at every opportunity you have.

But it's not about going to any character with many followers, you need to be able to detect influencers that listen to your ideal customers. Through them you can identify conversations, the content they share and things that worry you about your industry.

But how do you identify influencers that can provide you with valuable information? To do this, you must first define:

Who is your target audience?
Where they are present on the internet.
What people are following.

Once you have this information, Google can help you find influencers. Use specific keywords on a topic and the results can show you blogs or profiles that are commenting on it. Analyze your content, features and find patterns that may be useful for your business.

Also, once your business is established, make contact with them to get them to promote your business is a good way to win customers and credibility. You can read more about influence marketing in this post.

2. Search for news about your sector

Undoubtedly an excellent source of research are news sites, many reliable sites show interesting data, such as research publications or surveys; And expert conclusions that can be of great help.

You just need to identify trusted sites that focus on your audience, including e- commerce sites (to keep up with the news).

Some places where you can find statistics or interesting research are:

You can use tools like Feedly to collect interesting posts or use Google alerts to receive notifications when you publish interesting information about the topics or news you want to know.

3. Follow your competitors

This advice is more as a learning resource, it is not about developing and monitoring your competition to copy their strategies. It's about staying abreast of how they approach strategies and attract your audience (especially if your business is new).

Following your competition to know what customers think, how they catch your eye and what channels they commonly use makes it easier to focus your efforts in the right direction.

While there is no way to get accurate sales data from competitors, it is possible to know how popular your products are on e-commerce sites like Amazon.

Remember to monitor the competition to get data to keep you informed of what they are doing, not as a step-by-step guide you should follow. Every business must be original and find a value proposition that they provide to their customers.

4. Ask your audience

No one better to know relevant information than your potential clients. Although this seems obvious, some entrepreneurs overlook the process of getting opinions from real clients for fear that the results will not be what they expected. However, if you want to provide useful solutions for your customers, you need to listen to them.

There are different ways to ask questions to your audience, Quora is one of them. You can take advantage of Quora by asking questions to experts in your area, many of them take the time to respond with valuable content, or to customers.

Search for online forums or communities where your clients interact, so you can get their opinions on specific topics or ask specific questions. Also, you can have a look at reviews or reviews of products similar or equal to yours. Sites that allow users to add comments is an excellent way to get information on how people perceive the product, common issues, or what they like about a particular product.

5. Consider testing your website

Since you are going to invest a good amount of time and resources in your research, it is best that you make sure to gather the necessary information to direct your business to success.

However, it is easy to lose some detail in the process. Do not forget that important part of your business is your website, so the usability and user experience tests should not be left behind. When you are analyzing competitor sites, trends and customer comments, also pay attention to details that relate to the website.

Even if you have the opportunity to test your site with potential customers, you must, you will get valuable information to help you create a friendly site.

Start your research

Carrying out a market study is not easy, it is spatial when you are new, and you do not have a big budget that allows you to hire an agency that does the work for you. However, with a little creativity and determination, you can find the information you want.

We hope these tips will help you get started with your market research. Do not forget that this is a process you can not do without if you want your online business to succeed.

What are you doing to conduct an adequate market research? We would love to read your recommendations in the comments.

5:54 AM

Easy Ways To Make a First Sale on Ecommerce Website

So, you have decided to step your foot into the eCommerce business. When it comes down to any business, the first sale plays a vital role in triggering the furtherance of sales and to get the momentum going. Also, it helps in strategic branding and marketing while enabling you to iron the kinks out in terms of your operations. However, this is a natural fact that your first sale is also the hardest one. Let us see & discuss the effective ‘mantras’ on how to make first sale on your ecommerce website.

Create A Pre-Launch List & Email Them

Generate a buzz while you create an email list that tells the story of your launching of business. If you have already got your pre-launch lists built, then shoot it right away before you apply any other tactics. You have already got their email shared by them, so they are perhaps your easiest potential leads when starting an eCommerce business.

Direct Selling to Friends & Family

The easiest and perhaps the basic way of making your first sale is to seek a legitimate help from your friends and family. You need not guilt-trip anyone for not purchasing your product, but you need to generate a subtle need by listing out the benefits of buying from your online store. You can connect with those who genuinely are interested in your product and you may want to try out MPOS. Your friend/family can also benefit by saving their shipment costs as you can handle the product directly to them.

Giveaways, Contests & Sweepstakes

Okay, so it is a hands-down fact that giveaways are likable and help in grabbing quick attention towards any new product. If and when done correctly, these contests have the potential to garner quite a buzz and traffic to your website which can enhance your brand’s publicity by word of mouth marketing. There are plenty of apps which help you to generate contests and giveaways which you can share on your social media

Social Selling: Facebook, Whatsapp & Instagram

Your Facebook friends list or your Whatsapp contacts list is a gold mine, so dig deeper and plan how to resourcefully extract the best of the available opportunity. Most likely all your friends and family are on social media so share your product with them. Dip your toes into the world of social media where you can choose from multiple platforms like Facebook, Whatsapp and Instagram to generate leads. You are likely to find your potential first 10 sales on these platforms. You can also integrate your ecommerce website with your social media by using third party apps.

Selling On Online Marketplaces

The best part about selling on other marketplaces like Shopclues, etc. is the fact that they are well established brands and have their logistics chalked out intricately in advance so that new sellers like you can benefit from the strong brand presence and make your first sale. Do you want more? Then try and integrate your online store with these marketplaces by using ecommerce enablement platform which enable you with features for selling your stuff on marketplaces while rolling your ecommerce website into more sales.

Advertise on Facebook

Facebook has a native advertising platform by which you are enhancing the visibility of your newly established business. You can choose your desired target market, track and analyze your growth and pay according to the number of visits you get on your page. Collaborate this with your online store and you can generate more traffic to your ecommerce website.

Earn Credibility through Google Adwords

Google Adwords has been the most far-fetched and popular advertising platforms and networks available on the internet. Its reach is seamless and its search based or intent based advertising helps you in generation of targeted traffic to your ecommerce website. There are quite a lot of online guides through which you can acquire the basics of Google Adwords.

Create and Manage a Blog

Blog posts bring organic traffic to your website which, when effectively marketed can generate sales and bring revenue to your ecommerce business. Use this tool effectively and wisely by creating a rich, informative yet subtly selling content on your blog to create credibility for your brand and build a targeted audience.

Your first sale is more likely to be your important one. This will draw an ignition to your selling engine while helping in gaining a sustainable momentum for the business. The best advice is to try out the method that suits your business and its niche in the best way. Do not be hesitant in spending some money like in giving out discounts or offers if it is fetching you well and more in the future. When your business is fine tuned to your desire, it will automatically reach its break even very soon.

9:22 PM

50 SEO & Online Marketing Techniques for ecommerce Websites

11:50 AM

From Where eCommerce Traffic Will Come in 2016

The world of eCommerce has evolved dramatically over the last 8 years because of the way small businesses are being able to effectively market to their target audience online in the same way as their big brand competitors have been.

A small business no longer needs to rely on SEO and offline marketing channels to sell their products/services thanks to social media.
As you may know by now, I love sharing reports and this is no different. Yotpo released an eCommerce benchmark report where data was pulled from 65 million orders and 2 billion transactions across 120,000 eCommerce stores.

The data compiled covers everything from traffic quality and quantity, mobile vs. non-mobile traffic, value of customer loyalty and impact of reviews.

Traffic Quality and Quantity
It is no secret that, as I said above, small businesses are taking advantage of social channels however, direct, search and referral traffic still beat social traffic in percentage with 40%, 34% and 10% respectively.
eCommerce

This however does not deny the fact that social traffic is quality traffic. Instagram is the leading traffic source for an average time on site (beating email, direct and referral traffic)
. eCommerce

Mobile vs. Non-Mobile
Non-mobile traffic still trumps mobile traffic however, the gap between the two is closing year on year. Mobile accounts for 38% of traffic which is still close to half of non-mobile traffic however, it is still critical for businesses to optimise their website responsively as that 38% of potential sales, may be the make or break of an online business.

eCommerce

How Much is Customer Loyalty Worth?
As we know, customer retention is extremely important as returning customers are more likely to spend with you more than once, because trust has been built. Data shows that customer retention does pay off. Repeating shoppers spent over £250 million during 2014 out of a total £950 million. This accounts for 33% of overall spend from a returning customer.

15% of all customers are repeat shoppers which doesn’t sound like much, but they do account for one-third of the total spend, this study reports. The study also showed that returning customers spend 2.92x more than a one-time buyer.

The Power of Reviews and Ratings
It won’t be surprising to hear that reviews and good ratings help conversion rates. Businesses who use social media to share their communities reviews on their products/services do get a better conversion rate. LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook conversion rates are much higher than the average industry standard of 2% when reviews are shared. Twitter is the leader at a 6% conversion rate.
eCommerce

From this data it is easy to say that mobile and social media have, and will continue to change eCommerce. Reviews on your products/services are extremely important and do impact a buyer’s purchasing decision.
Whilst this study is based on just 120,000 online businesses, if it’s working for them… It will work for you too.