Ecommerce

For everyone who prefers to shop from eCommerce platforms around the globe, Amazon is the first eCommerce marketplace that clicks their minds. Amazon had its feeble birth in the garage of Mr Jeff Bezos, and later it rose to its dominance by claiming a jewel in the eCommerce market in the last decade.

The only other company to attain a trillion dollars market share with the gigantic Apple Inc, Amazon is what it is today, following a sustained and smooth path of innovation, dedication, reimagining the eCommerce domain, and solid professional principles from its founder, CEO, and the world’s richest man to date, Jeff Bezos. For marketers, eCommerce start-ups, and e-retailers, Amazon is the perfect case study if they want to learn how to do things.

eCommerce Omnichannel Marketing - Amazon’s Success Story

To set itself as the top suggestion when it comes to buying any product online, Amazon Marketing sets the trend and culture within itself by utilizing every channel possible that keeps prospects as well as customers engaged, active, and keen on frequent purchases, i.e, Omnichannel Marketing. Amazon has remarkably adapted eCommerce omnichannel marketing for its mission to operate at a much higher frequency than its competitors. It is aggressive, customer-centric, and evolutionary.

Amazon is using only SEO for gaining popularity is an absurd statement. Amazon capitalizes on user-generated reviews to easily boost its product pages to the number one position. However, this was an idea they invented way back in the early 90s. There are a bunch of cultures and trends they set, which have now become SOPs for eCommerce marketing experts.Their primary reason to attract overwhelming fame is easy to access to products integrated with a service network that pays micro-grade attention to detail. Amazon’s CEO Jeff Bezos had the vision to make Amazon the most customer-friendly eCommerce platform in the world and has been able to accomplish this up to a remarkable extent and gave the bleeding edge to his competitors.

Renown eCommerce Practices Introduced or Improved by Amazon

Today, most eCommerce platforms adapt design and UX approaches that this eCommerce king has either pioneered or mastered. Below are the top 4 omnichannel marketing strategies that Amazon has utilized to become what it is today. Let’s discuss each of them in detail.

User experience

Amazon believes in the customer-first approach. It has triggered a massive transition in the entire eCommerce marketing domain, pushing entrepreneurs and marketers not to put themselves first and consider putting their customers on priority. They introduced the use of UX processes and design elements to make the online purchases of products or services an interactive and enjoyable experience. They dedicated a notable amount of time and investment into acknowledging customer pain points, prospects’ journey, and understanding what turns a visitor into a customer.

One of their most renowned patented technologies (ended in 2017) is ‘Amazon One-Click.’ It makes the overall process of online shopping smoother and more efficient. Once your account is set up with payment and shipment details, the next time is to just click on the ‘Buy Now’ button. It jumps the cart and directly finishes the payment, and ships your deliverables. This feature has been well embraced by customers who want to refrain from visiting different pages and carts and complete their purchase journey faster. The same methodology is incorporated by the Amazon Echo device, where you can make online purchases by giving voice commands to its speech recognition engine, Alexa.

Exceptional customer service

Amazon went through an exceptional roadmap to ensure that its customers were taken care of. Their supply chain and inventory management possess state-of-the-art technology and methodologies, most of which are industry-based. ‘Amazon Prime’ is an excellent example of their customer-first approach. The Customer-first approach is the key reason behind Amazon’s remarkable growth over the decade. Using Amazon Prime, users get to enjoy multiple perks for a yearly subscription, including same-day delivery, special discounted offers, major add-on utilities such as Prime Video, and much more.

Amazon is unbeatable on the pricing edge. Mostly, Amazon offers the most aggressive pricing models that limit its competitors. The most reasonable pricing structure is due to their highly optimized supply and logistics chain, decreasing unnecessary expenditure and cutting down the overall purchase cost. Using robots to increase efficiency in their inventories has drawn criticism from different segments who believe that it puts people out of work. Amidst this negative feedback, Amazon raised its minimum wage for warehouse workers to $15 per hour, which is considered one of the highest wage scales in the world. It stresses the fact that Amazon knows how to move with the flow and does what is needed to incorporate sustainability mixed with innovation and a futuristic approach.

Innovative advertising strategies

The most recent ad strategy they have implemented involves artificial intelligence and machine learning to gain insights into user preferences and send them samples of products they potentially like and the products they purchased. This perfect combo of advanced AI and user preference tracking ultimately allowed Amazon to serve its customers. Their giveaway campaign is also a top marketing strategy adopted by many eCommerce businesses now. Thousands of products are promoted using this practice by allowing you to win the product for free once you click on the giveaway button. If you fail to win, you have the option to buy that product at the least possible price, most of the time much lower than available anywhere. It's a win-win situation for both the customer as well as the company.

They are also trendsetters in enabling customer interactions via omnichannel marketing. Push notifications, email, SMS messaging, and digital omnichannel advertisement strategies have been used for a long time to enhance customer engagement and unlock cross and upselling opportunities. Their “Frequently bought together” and “people also purchased” options and sponsored product placement at strategic positions on the web store and mobile application are some of the most popular initiatives adapted by every eCommerce retailer in the market nowadays.

Diversification in eCommerce marketing is essential

Other than primary eCommerce operations, Amazon has diversified massively over the course of the decade. Echo, one of the most successful virtual assistant-based products, is a severe shocked by its well-known failure in the form of the Amazon Fire smartphone. It failed so badly that it had to stop production within a year of launch. This bold step company to try different ideas itself shows that they don’t refrain from experimenting and accepting failure as a part of the roadmap to utmost success. They have a notable presence in other businesses such as:

• OTP Amazon Prime Video
• Purchase of the Washington Post
• Purchase of video game streaming site Twitch
• Setting up brick and mortar retail stores
• Launch of the Amazon book stores, etc

Their thrust to change, evolve, and upgrade has made Amazon such an unbeatable eCommerce entity.

Conclusion

From being one of the first eCommerce platforms to one of the largest, Amazon has been able to mark success because of the time and effort invested in offering top-notch and premium customer services. They use data along with high-end Omni-personalization to turn their prospects into satisfied and loyal customers. By critically focusing on crucial data points and maximizing their interactions, offering programs that entrust loyalty, and improving their logistics and supply chain, they maintain to remain the dominant eCommerce platform in the tech-driven globe.

With the newly emerging B2B eCommerce market trends, a global B2B eCommerce market share is estimated to reach USD 25.65 Trillion, Expanding at a CAGR of 18.7% from 2022 to 2028. Despite having a sluggish trend of adapting eCommerce in the pre-COVID era eCommerce, B2B brands are now significantly shifting towards digital means to boost revenue streams through eCommerce channels. That is something accelerated after the COVID19 pandemic and another inspiration coming from the remarkable success of Amazon Business and the evolving B2B customer demographic.

B2B Ecommerce Statistics

Let's look at the numbers that reveal the significance of today's top B2B eCommerce trends. Almost half of B2B businesses prefer blogging as their prime marketing approach, while the rest look to sending emails and uploading engaging content on social and digital media platforms, including Instagram, Facebook, and Youtube. Digital approaches in content marketing have replaced conventional print advertisements and flyers, and B2B customers are exploring different brands across the said digital channels. Almost 30% of content demand is pushed by audiences in IT, followed by CEOs, HR departments, marketing, and the education sector. B2B customers expect a multitude of digital efforts from brands, like:

• 45% want personalized content in the form of blog posts or articles

• 44% are looking for interactive and user-friendly ROI calculators

• 38% seek support for augmented reality.

According to research, over 50% of B2B decision-makers claim that video was the most useful content to engage and convert prospects into customers, followed closely by comprehensive case studies. Once the sales funnel was almost linear, but now 90% of B2B customers enter and exit the funnel to reenter the at different layers. Around 80% of B2B purchase decisions are driven by customers’ direct or indirect CX, and only 20% are driven by the price structures or the discount offers.

Evolving B2B eCommerce Trends

In 2021, almost 50% of B2B customers were millennials, nearly 2x the number of millennials in the early 2010s.With the changing demographics of B2B customers, businesses are also witnessing significant changes in their revenue cycles. If Gen X customers prefer to have a brick and mortar store experience for their purchase journey, millennials prefer to have a more comfortable and personalised experience through streamlined, digital platforms. It leaves businesses to embrace the digital means of B2B customers’ preferences that are driven by:

1. Changing Audience

Before the COVID19 pandemic, the B2B customer segment was mainly baby boomers, and members of Generation X. Baby boomers used to follow a conventional practice of getting information from hard copies of documents, sales records, and product trials. On the contrary, Gen X intended to acquire information from trade shows, conferences, and social media marketing channels. Today, around 3/4th of millennials are involved in the B2B process. These newcomers have confused most merchants by revealing a sudden shift in preferences and buying habits. Still, they possess some distinguishing attributes that showcase how and why their mind functions while making a purchase. Millennials are brought up under the shadow of digital technology, and as many as over 30% of them admit to using the latest gadgets like tablets, laptops, smartphones, etc. More millennials hold at least a graduate degree compared to their preceding generation.

While this trend is interesting, it has cast a notable impact on how they are making their career choices. The student debt crisis in the US and other developed or developing countries is also a primary reason why millennials are protective of spending their money and seeking transparency from brands. Another notable reason is the growing trend of adopting a minimalist lifestyle among millennials that refrain them from buying too often. These factors translate into how this group of B2B customers perceives marketing campaigns.

2. Impact of Digital Marketing

Before 2014, conventional marketing practices included television advertisements and trade shows. Experts started accepting that these mainstream marketing practices are going to dilute soon, and digital marketing in terms of ebooks, email marketing, blogs, and social media, will occupy the main ground. According to the survey, in today’s time, B2B customers perform around 12 online searches before finalizing their purchase decision from a particular vendor. It made marketers shift their approach. Now, over 50% of B2B marketing budgets are directed toward digital marketing, ensuring a highly personalized CX by integrating recommendation engines and AI algorithms to help consumers enjoy their purchase journey.

More businesses are adopting AI to gain a competitive edge over their rivals by introducing chatbots, single-click purchase options, and recommendation engines. By the end of 2022, it's expected that over 25% of enterprise-grade organizations will launch augmented reality, and the rest of them will start experimenting.

3. Payment Gateways

Around 25% of B2B retailers with eCommerce platforms accept orders via fax.  That chunk is much less compared to the most preferred payment methods:

• eCommerce site: 80%.

• Email: 77%

With the sudden upsurge in mobile apps and eCommerce platforms like Amazon, B2B retailers quickly transition from isolated eCommerce platforms to full-scale omnichannel digital practices.Credit cards still share a notable share in eCommerce payment methods at 94%.In 2018, most B2B retailers, over 75%, were selling their products and services for at least 2-5 years or more.

Top B2B Ecommerce Trends for 2022

We've compiled the top B2B ecommerce trends for businesses to adapt to embrace digital transformation.

1. Aim on producing B2C-like experiences for their niche
2. Acceleration of eCommerce platforms
3. Businesses prefer B2B mobile commerce.
4. Increasing expectations of personalized B2B CX
5. Introducing a DTC medium
6. Integrating different platforms for omnichannel marketing
7. Demand for hassle-free B2B order fulfilment process
8. Refrain from jumping on the bandwagon

• Aim on producing B2C-like experiences for their niche

An increasing number of B2B customers prefer to purchase products digitally. In fact, B2B customers perform comprehensive research on a brand and its products before they even think about consulting a sales representative. According to the research, B2B customers go through around 12 online searches before finalizing their eCommerce vendor to buy a particular product. Additionally, 74% of B2B customers claim to explore at least half of their procurements online.

Also Read: 7 Benefits of Using Chatbots for B2B Lead Generation

So it requires your eCommerce site to provide a B2C experience. Considering business procurement individuals are the same people who visit online platforms for their personal purchases, offering them a B2C-like shopping experience can play a vital role in improving your engagement. And it remains vital to improving an overall user experience and user interface (UX/UI) that makes it interactive and user-friendly for the visitors to quickly find what they want to purchase, as most B2B customers already know exactly what they are looking for.

• Acceleration of eCommerce platforms

In 2018, eCommerce platforms like Amazon, eBay, and Alibaba claimed their dominance in the B2C eCommerce industry by holding more than 50% of online sales. Similarly, B2B ecommerce sales via eCommerce sites are growing significantly. Only 6% of B2B buyers are not using eCommerce platforms, and 75% of B2B procurement drives are expected to happen via eCommerce marketplaces within the next five years.

According to statistics by Gartner, the enterprise eCommerce platform is a new business model that will open a wider portal, offer new opportunities, and allow businesses to generate new revenue streams by targeting a vast majority of buyers. eCommerce marketplaces are more efficient in saving time and cost, as they serve as a one-stop solution for B2B customers. One of the primary benefits of B2B eCommerce platforms is their ability to attract and convert new audiences. It will boost revenue streams and offer an opportunity to attain a global reach and test new product niches.

• Businesses prefer B2B mobile commerce.

Following are some recent statistics about B2B eCommerce trends from Google and BCG that showcase the cruciality of a hassle-free mobile UX for the B2B segment.

• 50% of B2B queries today are performed via smartphones. Experts claim this number to grow significantly in upcoming years.

• The mobile-friendly interface of eCommerce platforms is responsible for around 40% of sales in leading B2B enterprises.

What should we interpret from this data? Apart from making your B2B business available online, it must be mobile-friendly as more B2B customers prefer to explore and purchase their products via smartphones. Let’s discuss this in detail. Overall, these emerging challenges contain B2B businesses from launching eCommerce platforms to initiate with, due to:

• Fear of lack of expertise in introducing and experimenting with a new channel or platform.

• The inability to break the threshold is based on fear of the unknown concerning a new channel or platform.

• Lack of revenue streams due to sluggish adaptability and reforms

It is difficult to embrace change. Adapting mobile-friendly platforms is undoubtedly the most important B2B eCommerce trend. Introducing such UX will allow B2B customers to log in and see their particular product and checkout instantly using a preferred payment gateway, all in minutes with comfort and without opening their laptops or desktop PCs. This is how you enjoy the perks of having B2B mobile commerce. Over 20% of B2B businesses reported having and using an interactive mobile application to facilitate their customer base as a mobile application allows faster-recurring orders based on the business account. The app can also board your sales team for instant sales that are currently waiting in your funnel for the final steps.

• Increasing expectations of personalized B2B CX

According to recent research, around 50% of B2B customers prefer improved personalization as a primary utility while searching for products or services on eCommerce platforms and turned out to be loyal customers. Consumers prefer to spend 50% more if they find their purchase drive is personalized. The CX management market is expected to be twice the existing one, attaining $14.9 billion by this decade. B2B customers expect the same engaging experience that B2C customers experience, and businesses must admit it. For completely personalized B2B customer experiences, businesses must leverage customer data, recommendation engines, artificial intelligence, and machine learning algorithms. For most B2B businesses, the experience of their IT teams is enough to embrace an emerging B2B eCommerce trend of better customer experience.

• Introducing a DTC medium

According to research, its member organizations of DSA UK had experienced around 50% growth in revenue, on average, through the direct channel until now. It makes DTC’s rivals one of the primary challenges many B2B businesses are experiencing. However, a DTC channel introduces a variety of opportunities, such as engaging new customers ready to buy from the business directly, introducing:

• New Revenue Streams

As brick-and-mortar stores face operational restrictions due to COVID19 containment measures, consumers prefer eCommerce stores to make purchases they used to purchase by physically visiting the stores. Brands are in an impactful position to help fulfil these consumer demands while making up lost sales due to COVID19 restrictions.

• Customers’ Data

Integrating first-hand data from customer behaviour with a transactional record from retail stores leads to a better understanding of your customer’s preferences and buying habits. You can make strategic business reforms in product placement packaging and price structures using this insightful data.

• Build Customer Loyalty

Introducing DTC gives you complete control over the sales funnel, from the moment a prospect visits your website and converts into a customer by finalizing a purchase up to delivery and beyond. More engaging customer experiences are easier to personalize for different segments offered to the visitors from the collected data.

• Integrating different platforms for omnichannel platforms

While the B2B ecommerce trends are evolving continuously with a growing number of B2B customers, businesses have a relatively small domain to choose their digital approaches from.B2B requirements are difficult to fulfil, and not every platform ensures 100% efficiency.B2B businesses can deploy comprehensive and expensive eCommerce platforms that demand expensive customizations and a whole team to handle different aspects of the site. Others will hire an outsourcing vendor to get the job done. Some B2B businesses choose third-party apps to work in parallel with their eCommerce platforms to process order fulfilment, inventory transparency, or payment gateways.

However, for the practical implementation of this omnichannel framework. An integration provider is needed to integrate multiple systems to efficiently produce fruitful outcomes for your business. Integration providers are intended to provide pre-built APIs or several connections to sync data and streamline critical functions between eCommerce platforms and back-end frameworks like an ERP, POS, or 3PL to boost operational capacity and curb resource-consuming hurdles. Around 60% of B2B businesses claim that eCommerce integration like omnichannel marketing and sales channels are another primary digital need. They perceive eCommerce integration as integrating backend frameworks for managing different aspects of the business, including warehouse, supply chain, and orders fulfilment with their eCommerce platform.

• Demand for hassle-free B2B order fulfilment process

As more and more B2B businesses overcome the digital barrier, the need for a fast and effective order fulfilment process has become a vital need for any business. Before Amazon changed the digital makeup of the eCommerce domain, millennials were still looking for this feature, and 75% of them are already involved in the B2B purchase drives today. Customer expectations are evolving rapidly, and this is another way B2B businesses can attract and engage potential customers. Businesses can automate their order fulfilment process by using order management programs. These types of software programs assist B2B businesses to manage and track orders across different stages of the sales funnel, ensure transparency, and eliminate inventory-related issues. Businesses can also opt for third-party extensions or tools to get the job done most budget-friendly manner. This is a great option if your business is growing rapidly, your current sales are escalating, or you waste too much time and effort on inventory management that you can utilize elsewhere.

• Refrain from jumping on the bandwagon

Do not jump irrationally on any bandwagon to follow masses and trends, as not every trend is worth following. If some B2B eCommerce trends provide significant advantages, others can be too expensive and irrational to adapt. Filtering the value-added B2B eCommerce trends will often come down to knowing your target market, your limits, and competitors in each domain. There are multiple practices you adapt to examine industry trends and make the right choice for your business.

Tips to Follow the eCommerce B2B Market Trends

• Identifying the evolution of the industry, backed by numbers and statistics

Every industry undergoes transition sooner or later, and staying up to date with all the latest trends by regularly consulting authentic reports and statistics from the relevant sources can prepare you for the launch. The data and stats in these reports often originate from comprehensive research you can rely on instead of just following the masses. Apart from this, when you keep yourself updated with what's happening in your niche, you'll get a rich idea of each trend, whether it’s worth following.

• Evaluate customers' behaviors

Use customer data to determine if a trend is fruitful for your businesses. Most trends might work for your competitors, but only you can know your customers better than anyone else. Refrain from relying on a single data-gathering source so that you can see customer needs and priorities from different perspectives. Use this data and stats to evaluate the overall trends in your niche. Would adopting a particular trend support your customers’ interest or contradict it?

• Ask for feedback

Please don't refrain from asking your existing customers what they need. Getting feedback and valuing constructive criticism from your customers can give you insight into the trends that best serve their expectations. You can also develop more targeted strategies for the future. You never know if your customer will suggest an idea you would never think about.

• Keep an eye on the competitors

Closely look at your competitors. Did they jump on a particular B2B eCommerce trend? If yes, how effective it would be for them? Of course, you don't have to adapt to everything your competition is up to (as we discussed earlier), but being familiar with their footsteps is another way to measure the cost and impact of any particular trend.

Conclusion

It is certain to say that global eCommerce sales are expected to break all the records by the end of 2022 with a 300% increase in market share compared to 2015.Payment gateways and website UX remain the two primary factors for converting your prospects into loyal customers. Your reputation in the market remains vital in brand awareness and the consideration phase.

FAQs about B2B eCommerce Trends

Are B2B eCommerce platforms using VR or AR?

‍Some B2B eCommerce platforms offer VR and AR utilities. The most common way B2Bs use this technology is to provide customers with the experience to see their products in a virtual environment. VR and AR can also provide B2B customers with the highly personalized UX they are looking for.

‍Is B2B eCommerce using video content?

‍Yes, many B2Bs use video content to establish and improve brand image. According to a survey, over 50% of B2B marketers stated that the video is the most impactful form of content, followed closely by case studies or white papers. For B2B customers in a tech niche, videos are considered the preferable content type.

‍Can B2B businesses integrate an omnichannel marketing approach?

‍Yes, B2B businesses can enjoy the perks of having an omnichannel marketing approach. In fact, B2B buyers expect a smooth and hassle-free purchase drive on any medium they are using, whether it's a mobile application or an eCommerce site.

Are you running a business and finding it difficult to manage your orders? An order management system is an answer to the problem. Some companies use an independent order management system while some integrate it with their already existing ERP systems. Sales, orders, inventory, and fulfillment are monitored by an order management system. This also helps the necessary people, systems, and alliances to make their way to the consumers who bought the goods. A successful OMS offers one unified location for all distribution channels to handle orders.

You can handle customer details and transactions through a single order management system, view your accounting data, configure your retail point-of-sale system, and upgrade your warehouse inventory — all from one platform. You can also use the data generated with the right tools to use business intelligence strategies to enhance your business processes — like controlling your supply chain. It was probably relatively simple handling orders in the early days of your company.

You can probably also recall the first one, from details about the consumer to the product you sold, and even how you handled it. With every new sale, however, you tend to find it harder to manage your orders and will lose the magic to be on top of every order manually. It is critical at this point to find the perfect order management system designed specifically, otherwise, you’ll scare away customers, harm your credibility, or set up an order management system that doesn’t support the process of your company.

In this article, we will discuss order management solutions, tips that you should follow to choose the right order management program, and the benefits of enhancing your order management.

What is an Order Management System (OMS)?

An Order Management System is a tool that allows you to keep track of your order process from the customer’s first interactions with your company to the delivery, thus improving the order management efficiency. In between owning a physical store, social media sales, and managing e-commerce, you need your order management system to help you track:

• Customers
• Multi-channel selling
• Multi-location inventory management
• Purchase order and receiving management
• Customer service
• Order processing
• Make-to-order or make-to-stock business model.

Benefits of Integrating an Order Management System

Let’s have a quick look at the benefits of integrating an Order Management System for your business;

Automation

You may be the master of spreadsheets, but sadly you will not be able to outperform automation of the manufacturing process. Good order management will affect manual labor efficiency, reducing the likelihood of human errors, and freeing up resources so that you can concentrate on growing your company and improving customer service.

24/7 Accessibility

If you wake up unexpectedly in a nervous sweat and want to check your orders quickly for peace of mind, without a cloud-based order management app, it would be a sleepless night for you. By setting up an order management system, you can manage orders, you can check your orders anytime from anywhere. Aside from calming any worrying thoughts about your out-of-whack order management, this immediate, 24/7 access allows for enhanced data monitoring, better customer satisfaction, and more effective order processing.

Growth

Your order management system automates the delivery of your order. Most specifically, all of the distribution platforms are taken into a single forum. This smooth automated process allows you to leave it to run in the background, allowing you to free up time to collect and analyze data. Invaluable free time to collect this information helps you to prepare smartly to expand your company further and recognize any problems that can occur during your manufacturing process.

Management of Inventory

Solutions for order management will significantly enhance your inventory management by providing you with real-time information about current stock rates, products delivered, returned, traded, or in production. This helps suppliers from making inventory over-selling or not producing enough. However, for retailers most order management software was developed in mind, or drop shippers hoping to gain more control over their company. Be sure to find something that can help you out with your inventory management of raw materials when looking into an order management tool.

Business Centralization

Using an order management system, as mentioned earlier, enables manufacturers not only to manage their sales channels in one place but also to manage their entire business from one dashboard. An order management tool can break down complicated details to simplify your orders into one location, protecting you from order mistakes, customer frustration with delays, or loss of low inventory revenue and incorrect invoicing. Yet once again you want to centralize your sales as a distributor, but still consider a tool that can help you handle your production planning and scheduling too.

Real-Time Information Feed

Ultimately, and commented on again in the earlier sections, providing real-time knowledge about the success of your company with an order management system is a critical component to the growth of your company. Even if you use small business order management software, having live inventory and sales updates will help you react to any issues with your automated order management immediately, rather than allowing problems to develop and leave the customer unhappy.

How to choose the right Order Management System?

It is essential to choose the right OMS for your business and you must do your research for the final selection because the wrong system can hurt your business; so, consider the following points while making the decision.

System Integrations

Does the OMS fit easily into your platform, or do you have to create a whole new structure around it? Most leading software systems for order management are designed to be integrated with the major eCommerce platforms. Our list of the best OMSs below will provide examples that can be conveniently installed directly at your eCommerce store or manufacturing management systems.

Consider Your Suppliers

Will this system make it harder for you to get your suppliers to buy and process orders? That should not be the case, at all. The right OMS will simplify complicated concerns about the supply chain and make communication with suppliers simple.

Fulfillment Process Integrations

Not only does your OMS need to integrate with your site, but it also needs to work with those who are packaging and shipping your orders (assuming you are using a partner for fulfillment). A program that has already been tested within the industry will have the framework in place to combine delivery and adequate resources, making fulfillment management easier.

Scalability

When you undergo rapid growth, would your order management system be able to scale with you? Most systems have their drawbacks, and learning what those are is well worth the time. Make sure the system will comply with the growth goals and beyond.

Ability to Generate Reports

Order management systems are not only designed to check the order process, but they are also perfect for monitoring demonstrated results. Revenue, distribution, and demographic reporting are top features and the program should also help you stay within regulatory requirements with ease.

Customer Handling

Can they manage your sales — even multi-channel orders — regardless of where your customer is and what currency they use in the world? eCommerce opens the door to the whole planet, so differences in language, currency, and taxation can cause headaches. When your order management system is equipped with a single interface to automate much of this, it gives you more time to concentrate on the expansion of your company, rather than dealing with order management issues.

Order Management System for eCommerce Business

Although some businesses prefer to use their eCommerce platform as their order management system, it is not commonly advised — especially if you are already taking in revenue in millions. But, if you are a small business (and plan to remain that way), all orders are put on your website, and your website is closely connected to your delivery and inventory (allowing customers to check their order history), this could be a reasonable choice for the current state of your business.Using your order management e-commerce platform may not be the best choice if you have multiple outlets, expecting growth in the long-term, you get orders from multiple warehouses or different locations, i.e websites, point-of-sale, etc. The separation of the distribution channels from the background management processes helps you to separate and concentrate on each specific role.

Few Order Management Systems (OMSs) To Consider

I’ve compiled a list of a few order management systems for you to consider based on the reviews and user experience. Note that the following are not recommended by shopdev or any person associated with the company except for the Omni Channel Engine built by shopdev.

Microsoft Dynamics 365

Microsoft Dynamics 365 provides integrated solutions that enable companies to automate field service, drive sales, and track leads, and improve operations using cloud-based mobile business apps that are ready for the enterprise.

OE (Omni-Channel Engine)

A cloud-based omnichannel commerce platform with multichannel inventory management and distributed order management. A single interface to manage your products, orders, and customers seamless integration with POS, ERPs, eCommerce, Shipping, and Accounting platforms. The Omni Channel Engine adds in the capabilities of Order Management, Inventory Management, and Logistics & Supply Chain management.

ShippingEasy

ShippingEasy is a cloud-based system for shipping and inventory management, suitable for small to medium-sized e-commerce companies. Main features include order control, product customization, multi-seller channel integration.

Odoo

All in one software solution, Odoo is a customizable open-source and fully integrated suite of business applications including sales, CRM, project management, manufacturing, inventory, accounting, and other business needs.

Shippo

Shippo is a cloud-based shipping management solution that supports order management and label printing for eCommerce businesses of all sizes. Its main features include mapping customer experience, cost comparison, monitoring of shipments, and more.

Zoho Inventory

Zoho Inventory is a cloud-based inventory management system designed for businesses of small to medium scale. This provides modules for inventory management including monitoring and analysis, inventory handled by the manufacturer, and traceability by the lot.

Conclusion

As eCommerce continues to expand and break down barriers globally, it’s even more important to employ the right system to manage purchase orders. As you’re searching for the right one for your business, make sure you first Identify your business processes, goals, and objectives, then assess the benefits, costs, and features that align with your business, and at the end do proper research of OMSs to find the one that works best for your business needs. Order management is an inherently complex process.Selecting the right order management system is not only vital to business longevity and quality, it’s an often-overlooked area where you can get some easy wins. You can always opt for custom software development to get an order management system developed that is completely customized for your business but that has its perks and downsides, which I’ll try to cover in another article. A dedicated OMS presents a complete view throughout the lifecycle of all orders across all channels, giving business owners the extra time to focus on what they should be focusing on; the growth. Businesses will save money by increasing business processes faster without compromising on quality while increasing customer satisfaction and retention.Fee free to get in touch if you have any queries or need assistance with order management systems.

With the rapidly-evolving era of technology, businesses are experiencing a rapid transition in their digital makeup and IT infrastructure as organizations around the globe – specifically those linked with eCommerce – must acknowledge, embrace and effectively deploy modern digital technology across their entire infrastructure to improve functional efficiency, productivity, and customer experience.

This is where top-notch eCommerce business Consulting Services join the stage to be instrumental in more ways than you can think of. All renowned organizations and enterprises are based on a proven system that is constant, consistent, efficient, and productive without any deadlocks and irrelevant distractions or hurdles! This applies to any successful, viable, and effective small to mid-sized business – be it on a local or global scale.

How to Evaluate the Need eCommerce Business Consulting Services

The question is, how can you effectively utilize the E-commerce Consulting Services for proven outcomes, customer satisfaction, goal-oriented business operations, and initiatives that take your business to the new summits.

This blog post will cover all the relevant aspects and reasons to hire eCommerce consultancy services. Let's discuss this in detail.

‍When does your business need an e-commerce consultant?

• During the phase of creating and launching an eCommerce store.
• For your poorly performing eCommerce store that needs an overhaul and evaluation
• To boost productivity and ROI

In simple words, you need consultancy at every scale or phase so that your eCommerce business becomes viable and provides value at all times.

‍What are the main problems that consultancies detect?

‍Lack of transparency, poorly structured framework, lacks in optimization, services & products that do not address the contemporary market needs, supply-demand gaps, lack of differentiation or specialization.

‍To simplify the concept, let's break down the whole scenario into 1 simple question: What can a consultant do for your eCommerce business.

‍eCommerce consultants tend to add a solid, sustainable, and differential value to your business and make it capable enough to show rapid improvements and growth. To achieve this goal, consultancy experts try to:

• Gain a competitive edge over rivals.
• Defend against competitors.
• Attract the convertible and long-term customer base
• Evaluate a price policy that is profitable as well as aggressive
• Maintain profitability levels that have been initially projected.
• Monitor and handle the growth of ongoing projects
• Cut unnecessary costs and burdens
• Evaluate and study market and niche to gain opportunities for expansion.

How does a consulting company work?

1. Collects information to conduct an audit
2. Evaluate the different areas and departments of business
3. Investigates the targeted market in order to offer them what they actually want
4. Introduce the 4 key areas related to the customer-facing sales process that are:
5. Discovery
6. Consideration
7. Conversion
8. Loyalty.
9. Study competitors, their patterns and strategies deeply
10. Suggest proposals from an impartial perspective
11. Suggest ideas and innovative methodologies or alternatives
12. Identify hidden opportunities and potential
13. Outline key stakeholders in the business and solid suppliers
14. Suggest strategies and solutions
15. Provides guidance and assist in the process of the application and implementation of the action plans and strategies

How does a consulting company accomplish this?

What tools do they use?

What actions do they take?

‍Here we have some examples.

• Usability and in-depth analysis of the digital architecture.
• Analysis of the product catalog and campaigns
• Evaluation of metrics and implementation of the sales target control.
• Analysis of the traffic and the patterns, interest, attention time, and preferences of the website visitors
• Search engine optimization
• Generating lead funnels
• Optimization of the payment gateways, shipping and refund policies, etc.
• Reviewing the legal and tax framework of all digital activities and the services or products
• Crosscheck and evaluate price structures and compare them with that of competitors
• Suggesting online and offline marketing strategies

Benefits of Choosing eCommerce Business Consulting Services

1 – Lowering Business Costs

The revenue your business makes is needed to be increased. On the other hand, your business's budget needs to be downsized. This dual impact causes your Return on Investment (RoI) to boom and helps your eCommerce to thrive at a rapid pace.

Undoubtedly, an eCommerce Consultancy is a great way to cut operating costs and keep your business running. The reason is operating costs contribute to the fact that small business owners always worry about. As compared to a regular or full-time employee, an eCommerce Consultant charges cast less burden on your budget. Suppose you compare the cost of outsourcing an eCommerce Consultant against a full-time employee. In that case, you'll be amazed to see the expenditure gap, as well as other benefits like You, will not have to give paid leaves or any other retirement benefit to your eCommerce Consultant. You can also free yourself from acquiring an in-house HR department to deal with employee-related liabilities and management. You just have to pay at the time you hire an E-commerce Consultant, and no work means no money.

2 – Higher Productivity

As a small or mid-sized business owner or entrepreneur, you are expected to keep yourself engaged in carrying out challenging and core business tasks rather than non-essential and mundane tasks, such as making bookings for travel, managing meeting schedules, etc.

Outsourcing a dedicated resource to handle these tasks is highly recommended as a good eCommerce Consultant can draw a line between core and non-essential(but urgent) and energy and time-consuming tasks. By outsourcing a dedicated role for administrative and non-core business processes, small businesses free up their time and commitments to maximize productive tasks like decision-making, strategy building, etc.Successful SMB owners fully acknowledge the perks of having an eCommerce Consultant, and it allows them to spend their time only on growth-centric and productive activities.

3 – Turn Weaknesses into Strengths

All businesses used to face a set of challenges pushed by a particular area of weakness (both digital and structural)In this situation, virtual assistants can help you fill the void in the skill domain of any SMB. eCommerce Consultants are no longer remain remote workers. Instead, they are skilled experts and can perform various duties with utmost efficiency.

For instance, if you want any resource that can well manage your social media or someone who can carry out product research for Amazon, Shopify, or eBay, you can easily rely upon a virtual assistant for the said purposes.

4 - Growing Your Business

What's an obvious priority and long-term goal for any business – online or offline, small or big? All businesses want to grow, flourish, bolster, and scale to new summits like never before. A company that doesn't scale is like a plant that stops growing and only consumes resources.

It is easy to scale up by collaborating with virtual assistants that manage your business's concerned aspects well. And if you outsource an eCommerce consultant from a different demographic background, you can enjoy the perks of having a flexible schedule and 24/7 functionality. As consultants are skilled professionals, you don't have to invest time in spoon-feeding and training them for each and everything. They will start working as soon as they join you, and it allows you to scale up easily without dealing with any irrelevant hurdles and roadblocks.

5 - Pay as You Go

eCommerce business consulting frees your company from managing any Legal contracts or Human Resources compliances like you do when hiring an in-house employee.

For instance, you cannot instantly cut ties with an in-house employee when he fails to meet KPIs with significant margins. However, on the contrary, you can end the agreement with your eCommerce Consultants whenever you want without any legal limitations. Simply, you can hire a consultant on a pay-as-you-go basis, allowing yourself to have more flexibility and authority.

End Words

An expert, professional, and experienced eCommerce Consultant under your authority is practically a secret sauce that any eCommerce or online business owner requires to boost RoI & productivity and experience instant growth and sustainability. So regardless of the size of your business, you can never overlook the importance of getting an extra set of hands to take the burden off you! Get in touch with us to discuss the future opportunities and expansion plan of your e-commerce business.

What keeps eCommerce enthusiasts active at night? Someone invests years developing a business with a renowned eCommerce platform and ends up outgrowing its native capabilities. Since the maximum scalability has been achieved is it possible to switch to something more flexible while refraining from starting everything from scratch?

You’ve probably heard the discussions around headless eCommerce and the enormous benefits it offers that significantly boost site speed and improve UX on a priority basis.

But what about headless Shopify?

How are brands turning their existing Shopify stores headless?

Is it somehow possible?

You can’t manage to lose the powerful eCommerce functions that Shopify is famous for such as payment gateways, inventory management, PCI compliance, etc. But in parallel, you may want to deploy a technology that dramatically boosts the speed of your site, or maybe you have advanced content management requirements, a lengthy product catalog, or maybe just want to surpass the limitations of your theme and ensure a unique site experience.

It’s perfectly possible to merge headless commerce with an existing Shopify platform and there are different ways to make your shift drive more smooth and directed. This article will describe the reasons and approaches of going headless with Shopify, how can you achieve this, and the benefits you will experience as an outcome.

What is headless Shopify?

If you gear up to go headless with Shopify, you incorporate all the remarkable backend eCommerce functions Shopify provides, you’re just using a separate frontend or “head” to drive the customer-facing view of your web store.

Shopify is one the top one-stop-shops that sustain all your eCommerce requirements, with plug and play options like:

• Easy to install apps from the app store
• Mobile-friendly checkout supporting alternate payment gateways, like Apple Pay
• Great security and compliance protocols
• Advanced order management and inventory

But as you scale up your store and business, you start to feel some features or design functionalities a little inflexible. The one-size-fits-all strategy can work up to a certain limit, but when growing up to a certain limit you may find you need something more than the Shopify Storefront alone can provide. Often, brands opt for Shopify headless as a medium to ensure:

• A faster site load with quick page-to-page load time
• More control over how your products are visually appear
• More flexible content management
• A highly-customizable URL

If you’re going to expand your store, a storefront tailored to the varying needs of your brand starts becoming a necessity. The good news is there’s no need for an across-the-platform overhaul or creating a new eCommerce store from the scratch. Shopify was developed with freedom in mind and is able to sustain a frontend that better serves your business requirements with minimal hassle as you scale up. That’s where their storefront API comes into play. Is Shopify a headless CMS? It would be more appropriate to say that Shopify offers a CMS with a headless option. The primary advantage of Shopify, and what’s made it such a powerful platform for online business is its built-in tools and services. Shopify’s integrated CMS, the Theme Layer, and Editor, which you may already be known, supports the rest of its eCommerce functions. But these functions are developed in such a way that they can also function independently from one another if necessary.

So if you need a slightly more flexible environment than your organized content in your CMS (Shopify only allows four predefined content types) you can utilize a more diverse third-party CMS like Contentful or Prismic to outline your data in a way that matters to you, and, with headless, link it to Shopify via an API. Shopify and other providers have introduced an effective toolset that makes the process a lot easier than you ever imagine. Shopify CMSThird-party CMSExperience Platform Theme layer and simple editor allow you to make changes to content in Shopify. Four predefined content types: pages, blogs, products, and collections. More adaptable CMSs like Contentful and Prismic allow you to define content exactly how you want it.

A frontend solution that combines an Experience Manager and CMS to create an intuitive visual environment, where changes, updates, and experimentation can be done quickly and easily If you’re a small eCommerce business, Shopify’s CMS might well be enough to sustain your needs, but if you’re scaling, or have a mobile-first business structure primarily focused on speed, presentation, and the customer experience — the relative simplicity of Shopify headless commerce and an effective CMS option might well make following a PWA build valuable. You might opt for this option with an experience platform or a frontend-as-a-service provider who’s got a CMS built-in compatible with Shopify.

Benefits and Disadvantages of Headless Approach

As more and more customers start to see online shopping as a new norm the pandemic pushed up but certainly didn’t initiate, the need for performance at scale and across channels becomes ever more crucial. Going headless with your Shopify store using a PWA (progressive web app) can give you faster page load speeds even on mobile. This boost in speed allows you to future-proof your business. But there are certain factors you’ll need to consider for getting on the bandwagon of adopting a headless approach.

Benefits of Headless eCommerce

Rich control over the customer experience

Using a headless approach, you are allowed to have more customization and personalization than you’d get with plug-and-play Shopify. While the variety of themes that Shopify features are appealing enough, and up to a certain scale somehow customizable, they start to show lacks in performance in an attempt to provide an effective and responsive customer experience when you significantly scale up your operations. Opting for a headless approach allows you to keep your branding stand out from the masses. You can surpass the limitations of Shopify’s integrated features and themes, and make a significant difference by your digital presence in terms of visuals and CX.

If you want to launch your business internationally or want to produce multiple brands or product categories, the headless approach enables you to take your content management up to the next level. If you are up for breaking your comfort zone in working with standard Shopify, you must redesign workflows and manage content from a broad perspective. You’ll also gain more freedom in site management without expertise, and without compromising on customization.

Increased speed

It’s been well proven that more speed comes amidst more sales, especially on mobile, so anything you can do to automate your codebase will help you gain leads. Being able to add apps via Shopify at the click of a button is very appealing, but at a certain point, all that excess code starts slowing down your site. The headless approach allows you to independently and freely use a faster frontend delivery approach. Using a headless PWA architecture allows your browser to load quickly a statically generated site that doesn't cast any burden on a database by sending multiple requests.

Customizable URLs for better SEO

The structure of your URLs plays a vital role in assisting customers in finding their way to your site. To let Google know your product page is worthy to show in response to a customers’ search. So it is highly recommended to make your product page URLs scalable enough to entertain highly detailed product descriptions. Shopify is primarily very inflexible when it comes to modifying your URLs. There are only four predefined URL types to opt from, so you can’t add all the detail you require to make Google your key partner. Developing your web pages within a headless architecture gives you immense control over your URL structure, sparing you time and effort to maximize your SEO returns.

Reduced time to market

With a custom frontend linked with your Shopify store, your marketing team will be able to handle and create campaigns effectively and rapidly while playing around with site layout and product placement without disturbing any backend processes. You’ll also get enormous control over your look and vibe to match your brand exactly without any compromises.

Disadvantages of Headless eCommerce

Can mean loss of support for apps/services

When you abandon Shopify’s built-in themes, some of your apps and services are going to stop working. If you opt for a frontend-as-a-service provider, then they’ll have extensions and services you can pick and choose to have remained intact and working for you. But if your business is building your Shopify store’s frontend from an outsourcing firm or vendor, you’ll have to write some custom code so that Shopify’s APIs can support your third-party applications and services.

Can introduce complexity

Introducing another layer to your eCommerce stack means increasing the complexity of the operation. If you decide to opt for a dedicated frontend, you’re going to have to manage (at least) two platforms to keep your site keep going. The app-related compatibility issues pushed by headless Shopify also apply to a multitude of frontend integrations. Considering the extra complexity, if you’re immature in the eCommerce domain and running a small business then Shopify may well be already providing you enough flexibility. If you tend to scale up your store and operations then you’ll either need an in-house development team familiar with React, or you’ll have to go for outsourcing from a frontend-as-a-service provider and/or outsourcing firm.

Implementation partner considerations

Having someone who can deal with the technical aspects of going headless, sparing you and your eCommerce team enough time and effort to concentrate on sales and marketing. But you need to allow this under your conscious supervision. Have a close look at your partner’s history of past services and clients. If they have experience of serving the brands like yours, that’s a strong determinator of their experience and skills-base required to turn your eCommerce presence into your success.

The Three Paths to Headless Shopify

If you’ve decided that your Shopify storefront needs a new and improved frontend, there are three main ways to do it, and pros and cons for each. Which route you choose will depend on your specific business needs:

Do it yourself - DIY

Pros

Complete control: Creating your own headless structure using Shopify Plus means that you’ll have full ownership and control of all your eCommerce functionalities, potentially allowing you more freedom and flexibility. It means you don’t have to adjust to someone else’s system and can take the necessary steps regarding development and coding.

Cons

Requires rich knowledge: going headless from scratch requires high development and coding. For instance, Shopify themes use Liquid as a template language but you can’t use Liquid in a headless approach, so if you want to build a custom storefront accessible via the Shopify Storefront API, you’ll require a team that’s used to dealing with frameworks like React.js and Ember. Or, if you want to build a static platform, they’ll need to be well-informed about frameworks like Next.js or Gatsby.

Build with an agency

Pros

Expertise: You’ll have an outsourcing vendor who’s well-informed in turning sites headless. If you choose your outsourcing firm wisely, you’ll be working with someone who has a rich experience of building headless platforms that are compatible with Shopify’s backend and will be well aware of all the potential hurdles and how to dodge them! Further, choosing an agency can allow you to make your store headless by teaming up with a frontend-as-a-service provider for the software to complete your headless transition drive.

‍Extra help: An agency will be able to provide you with suggestions and recommendations at the design phase and have the knowledge to turn your brilliant concept into a reality.

‍Experience: They’ll be able to make recommendations about the features, layout, and navigation that work best with a Shopify backend, and so help you optimize your web store.

Cons

Ongoing management: In the end, you have to manage your headless store on your own. Once the initial design and development are done, it’s up to you and your technical team to keep the whole operation going.

Use a Frontend-as-a-Service Provider

Pros

Bundled Software: If you want to absolutely free yourself from research, design, build, test, and deploy a complex platform and custom APIs, a frontend provider can take all your stress and load. What you get in the end is a complete package with everything you need to keep your storefront managed, still completely customizable and sustainable to your needs, and that too without any need to do all the heavy lifting yourself.

‍Lightens the load: Instead of your teams having to negotiate with multiple players at different phases of the development cycle, they’ll be able to manage all the eCommerce and marketing concerns while freeing themselves from a great number of technical headaches.

‍Expanded skills-base: Many frontend providers are linked with partner agencies that are specialist website builders, so not only will you get an expert opinion, and assistance for the sleek functioning of your store, you’ll have an attractive new site in your account.

Cons

Loss of control: You’ll lose active control over some core and internal aspects of your site’s functionality. You won’t be able to simply make a few coding changes whenever you want to. In fact, you’ll need to discuss some detailed, technical, and behind-the-scenes activities with your frontend provider.

Make and Crosscheck a List (before going Headless)

Now you have decided whether to go headless or not. Before going headless with Shopify, it is highly recommended to:

• Acknowledge that all the apps you’re depending on have APIs and can interact with Shopify Storefront API. Outline the apps and services you absolutely need to make it over to the headless site and consider how you’d like the experiences for each service to appear and perform with respect to their UX.
• If you’re taking a Do It Yourself - DIY approach to go headless, you’ll need a rich how-know of GraphQL, the language Storefront API uses.
• Benchmark your web store. Perform some tests and find out what your initial score is and what might be pulling it back. This way you can identify the benefits of your new headless commerce platform quantitively and measure its success ratio once launched.

The eCommerce business industry has expanded faster than ever in the recent COVID-19 crisis. Due to lockdown measures, online shopping was once a convenience, and luxury has become necessary. Check out the following statistics;

A lot of people want to explore this area and show overwhelming interest in starting an eCommerce store. If your objective is to start earning a bit, the goal should be a scalable & profitable strategy having a long-term impact. If you want to start an e-commerce business that offers a notable returns over minimal investment, this blog post will guide you along the way.

How to Start an Ecommerce Business out of Scratch

There's nothing more appealing than starting a business from scratch and watching it sustain. You build it up once, and no one can snatch it from you. eCommerce is a skyrocketing business. But we can see too many eCommerce startups fail to get proper traction.

Looking for eCommerce Consultancy? Talk to an eCommerce Expert

Building an eCommerce platform requires more than just choosing a brand name, writing product listings, and selling products online. It's a proper recipe, and with wrong ingredients and choices, even the best business ideas can crash. Now let's discuss in detail and discover the roadmap to start an eCommerce business from scratch.

Step 1: Choose From Different Ecommerce Business Models

Starting your research is the first vital step. Keep in mind that growing any eCommerce business is an investment in time, money, and energy. So treat it accordingly, and no need to hustle.There isn't an absolute business plan that works for everyone. As we hear today, the types of businesses, like Service-based businesses, software products, and numerous physical products, are just the tip of the iceberg.Before deciding what to sell on your eCommerce platform, you need to learn how to differentiate between the different business models available as it impacts your business structure.If you want to start getting a profit without investing heavily, dropshipping or print on demand is the best choice ever.If you are gearing up to set up your warehouse full of stuff, you're investing too much upfront and working with a wholesaling or warehousing (retail) model.

Want to launch your brand? Must look deeper into what white labeling and manufacturing may offer you.And then, there is the subscription option, where you can custom build a category of products or a single product to be delivered regularly to your customers.The eCommerce business model that suits newcomers is a single product category that you supplement with affiliate marketing. You can focus your content marketing and branding efforts on a single product and utilize the rest of your energy and time on driving sales by capitalizing on the traffic.

Step 2: Perform eCommerce Niche Research

It's disappointing to see that people have eCommerce platforms filled with hundreds of products, dozens of categories, and no real focus.Unless you have an overwhelming investment, you can't be the next Amazon. You have to niche down your product choices to boost your return on investment (RoI).

Choosing your niche is the most crucial step in starting your eCommerce business. Start this practice by identifying successful businesses already working in this domain.Must ensure that the domain is highly competitive because an absence of potential rivals usually reveals no market.Refrain from pushing yourself in an overly crowded niche, and dodge anything dominated by major brands. If you're facing problems with this, dig down deeper and find what you want to do – the more relative you are, the less competition you are likely to experience.

Niche-ing down also gives you the perks of having numerous partnership options. Related to what you do, but not identical, you can collaborate with other businesses in those niches, turning your rivals into partners and expanding your customer base.Don't forget to choose a product category with at least 1000 plausible keywords and focus on a niche that shows positive social media platforms.

Step 3: Validate Market Niche and Product Choice

Now that you've chosen a niche and business model, you might be eager to start acquiring products to sell. Don't hustle. Before you think about product ideas, ponder over your targeted audience. You can't expect people to buy your product if you don't know who you're selling to. Similarly, self-consciousness is equally essential. Ask yourself these questions.

• Who are you?
• What does the store represent?
• Who are your ideal customers?
• What are the demographics of your customers?

You need to maintain a consistent brand image that can promise you a long-lasting profit. Luckily, Facebook allows us to find our target audience online. Specifically, determining how many customers, you can engage. You can dig deeper to get very dedicated numbers and detailed demographics. You'd be surprised to know that most entrepreneurs have no idea how many people are in their target audience. Once you've chosen the brand outlook you want to showcase and the customer you will engage, it's the right time to think about product ideas. Don't put everything at risk. You can use affiliate marketing to validate your idea. On getting a reasonable response, you can consider making your brand of that product.Before investing in a certain product, perform a SWAT analysis carefully. Even if you opt for a dropshipping business model, you must test it carefully and get a feel for that certain item yourself so you can foresee any possible issues and prepare a customer service response to address frequent questions.The segment related to the validation of the idea is about determining its viability. Again, SWAT analysis comes into action here. Can you find the right suppliers that sync with your price model? What happens if your supplier leaves the table in between? Is there any backup plan?

Step 4: Register Your eCommerce Business & Brand Name

If you want to make a grand launch in the eCommerce market, you need a brand that showcases your identity. Acknowledging your persona makes it easier to set up an eCommerce brand. You might refrain from choosing multiple and contrasting colors and images if you sell products to corporate customers interested in living a minimalist life.But before you set up your eCommerce store and get into the trouble of building a brand, you should follow a recommended roadmap. Let's discuss it step-by-step.

• Choose a brand/business name and get your company registered, as some legal protections and tax benefits are involved.
• The domain of your eCommerce site and the legal name of your business doesn't need to be the same, but keeping identical is a good practice.
• You'll need to have an Employer Identification Number (EIN) to open a business bank account, even if you don't plan or have any employees. Your EIN serves as your business's social security number that identifies your business and helps you handle necessary paperwork or legal activities.
• Operating an online business does not give you a green channel to walk away from acquiring specific business licenses and permits. Determine and sort it out according to the rules and regulations of your country, state, or region.
• You'll have many rivals ready to give you competition on every aspect from aggressive pricing to quality and service, so it must be your priority to explore the best quality products at the best prices. Keep exploring until you find the right vendor.
• Ensure that your logo doesn't resemble any other company specifically in your niche.
• Must rethink and reconsider the colors of your brand, the images you'll use, and the font type you'll choose. If you've got a little more budget, don't hesitate to hire a marketing firm to create a design for your company. If not, you can create your own on different online logo makers.

Step 5: Evaluate and Finalize Your eCommerce Business Plan

For now, you have got a tremendously rich idea about the overall appearance of your business. You have your business model, a target market, a product niche, and your very own brand name.It's high time now to put your business plan on paper and finalize your plan by considering your startup budget, loan requirements (if any), and monthly expenditure. The financial question is the essential aspect of any business.

Determine your break-even point, both in unit sales and duration (in months). Any real-time business practice is fundamentally an investment of resources and capitalization over these resources. You are in deep trouble if you fail to determine your profit margin.The business planning phase must include the details of your staff (if any), product sourcing, logistics layout, and marketing budget. Ensure that you acknowledge all the financial resources available at the time.

Step 6: Create Your eCommerce Store

Once you're officially an eCommerce business owner, you must register your relevant domain name. You have to choose the appropriate design for your eCommerce store.There are numerous eCommerce shopping cart platforms. Choosing the right eCommerce platform is not easy. You need to consciously evaluate the essential factors like loading speed, features, compatibility with various payment gateways, your business structure, SEO features being offered, and more. Some of the essential eCommerce platforms available include:

1. Magento
2. WooCommerce
3. Shopify
4. OpenCart
5. BigCommerce

You can explore more about these platforms and the drop-shipping options in our similar blog post: How to Launch Your Dropshipping Store.Once you opt for your eCommerce platform, You can select many themes offered by the aforementioned platforms.If you don't want to indulge in credit and debit payments issues, you can sell products online on an existing marketplace like Amazon. Keep in mind, setting up your eCommerce store requires more than just adding your products and content. It would be best to prepare your email marketing and automation setup.

For a smooth order fulfillment process, consider using dedicated shipping software to automate shipping label creation, tracking, and delivery notifications. This ensures a seamless experience for your customers and helps streamline your operations as your business grows.

Step 7: Driving Traffic to Your eCommerce Store

Want to skyrocket your reach and engagement? SEO is the key to unlocking this potential. You need to keep keywords and search terms in mind on each page of your eCommerce site, in your URLs, and your marketing campaigns. You also need to consider driving traffic to your site.The best eCommerce sites are eye candy because of heavy investment in digital marketing.

If you don't have enough budget, you can still avail the perks of utilizing the true potential and proper use of SEO, not as instantaneous as digital marketing. Still, it has significant potential in the long run. Subscribe to digital marketing newsletters, join community pages, follow relevant threads and listen to digital marketing podcasts to stay updated about updates, trends, and recent breakthroughs in the digital marketing industry.

Your eCommerce platform isn't the only thing you need to attract traffic to but the products you choose also need space in your marketing budget.You are here to sell products, not just drive traffic. You have to think outside the box and find hidden dimensions to expand your approach to selling products.

Despite the way you choose to sell, the first step is to set up an email list. Place an option for free sign-up on your eCommerce site, run a social media campaign to attract subscribers, or arrange a giveaway session where the entry 'fee' is your customer's email address. Providing consumers with discount coupons and content via email helps keep your brand active in their minds, upsurge in sales, and promise credibility. Keep your emails interesting – ask for your customers' input often, including reviews. Evaluate your site operations and insights by looking at how and where traffic flows.

Are your product pages relevant to your persona? Are you losing potential customers? If you're driving traffic to your store but experiencing empty carts and low sales output, improve everything you think needs improvement in your sales channel by carefully optimizing each page and evaluating your product listings. Use Google Analytics to keep track of vital operations and insights. Some tools can help you observe and optimize every segment of the sales process.

Don't hesitate to use these tools and methodologies.Look for a partner and collaborate to boost your brand presence by using affiliate marketing options.You can also offer influencers and Instagrammers a gift sample of your product in exchange for reviews and marketing. It can bring you overwhelming traffic and boost sales.

End Words

Learning how to start an eCommerce business isn't that much easy as you think — but by carefully taking one step at a time in the right direction, as we've discussed, you can make the process more organized, take control of things and mitigate possible risks.

Additionally, there are numerous perks of starting an e-commerce business, including the much lower investment, small start, and feasibility to utilize 24 hours a day, seven days a week while offering services to all around the world if you're willing to ship that far.

It's also much easier and budget-friendly to expand operations if needed. Refrain from getting things done in a hustle. Choose a business model and your market niche carefully. It is more important than the development and operation phase.

Everything will start aligning automatically if you take the initial two steps seriously. There is, however, a specific roadmap to follow and investments to make if you want your eCommerce business to provide you with appealing ROI.

You should deal with your eCommerce site like any other business, follow the regulations and laws related to tax and registration, don't forget to obtain necessary permits as per your country or state's policy. Don't hesitate to invest in customer retention and communication. Last but not the least, don't forget about building a mobile-friendly platform as more than 60 percent of the purchases are being made through mobile devices, according to recent statistics.

Internet of Things - IoT is taking over the world like never before. That includes everything from the smart speakers in our rooms, AI-based gadgets, and interactive kiosks at the food courts. For a business to gain customers’ attention in such an environment is undoubtedly a challenging task and an opportunity.

The primary question businesses need to ask themselves are:

• How can we effectively distribute our content in front of the right audience, at the right time, and on a suitable device, amidst the multitude of diverse variables in action?
• Apart from that, what is the most effective way to scale the content marketing and advertising strategy to reach more devices and touchpoints?

This is where the role of headless content management comes into play. A headless CMS is based on a modular architecture that decouples content creation, management, and publishing from how it’s displayed. It allows marketing and editorial teams to publish new content and developers teams to make new tech updates without depending on the other for help or worrying about blocking any process.

Application programming interface (API) technology allows content modules to be quickly optimized and distributed on various channels like websites, mobile applications, intelligent gadgets, digital billboards, kiosks, chatbot knowledge bases, and every other modern consumer channel.

Headless CMS is part of the MACH methodology. MACH methodology is based on four fundamental principles:

• Flexible Microservices to deliver state-of-the-art functionality
• APIs for infinite flexibility,
• Cloud for affordability and scalability
• The Headless approach so that it can function without hurdles on any platform.

Businesses and enterprises can use the fundamental theme of any front-end utility (API) they want to present the content. They can enjoy the freedom of delivering content beyond websites and apps to any medium, from digital kiosks to smartwatches and VR headsets.

Top 20 Headless CMS to use in 2022

1. Butter CMS

Butter CMS is a Chicago-based, API-first CMS that was introduced in 2014. Salient Features of Butter CMS include:

• Custom page types
• Relational content modeling
• Webhooks
• CDN support
• Multi-site support
• Testing emulator
• Customizable Admin interface

Butter CMS provides an ecosystem for independent blogging that you can integrate into any framework.For marketers, Butter CMS provides a What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG) interface to support the development of SEO landing pages, customer case studies, news pages, etc.

‍Variants:

• Free trial version
• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

2. Contentstack

San Francisco-based Contentstack was introduced in 2007, is a headless CMS that provides RESTful APIs. Its rich Features include:

• Content previews
• Collaboration
• Asset management
• Workflow management
• Versioning.

Turnkey integrations for utilities such as Marketo, Salesforce, and Eloqua, also come available.

‍Variants:

• Free trial version
• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

3. Contentful

Introduced in 2013 by a German-based company, Contentful offers an API-based headless CMS. Contentful’s RESTful API allows developers complete control over content, digital assets, and translations. The platform leverages caching techniques and external CDN integrations to allow the distribution of API payloads in the sub-100ms range.It can showcase JSON snippets, a rich-text editor, and its content modeling features allow marketers to outline and separate individual fields and content modules such as text, images, and calendars.

‍Variants:

• Free trial version
• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

4. dotCMS

DotCMS is an open-source headless CMS introduced by a Florida-based tech company in 2003. DotCMS is not a new name in the world of content management. Their Java CMS ensures multilingual and multi-tenant capabilities parallel with a WYSIWYG interface and drag-and-drop tools that allow non-technical individuals like marketers to effectively interact with content modeling platforms, develop workflows, and modify their page layout.  DotCMS can be hosted either on-premise or in the cloud. The platform provides features like:

• Analytics dashboard
• Customization tools
• Custom endpoint building
• Support for 3rd party tools like AWS, Docker, Salesforce, etc.

Variants:

• Free trial version
• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

5. Mura

California-based Mura is an open-source decoupled CMS that comes with plenty of features for marketers and IT experts to capitalize on. It is recommended to explore a highly customizable WYSIWYG editing interface, custom navigation creator, multi-device content previews, and an integrated analytics dashboard for marketers. Developers enjoy the perks of APIs, Docker support, CSS framework utility, and support for renowned JavaScript frameworks such as Vue.js, React.js., & Ember.js.

‍Variants:

• Free Version Available

6. Cockpit CMS

It is a free, open-source, and self-hosted headless CMS introduced by Germany. Cockpit declares itself a “content provider,” not a website developer, as it is a backend utility that holds and distributes content across multiple channels. The lack of editing utilities to alter the presentation of your content is what makes it a dedicated headless CMS.The platform depends on APIs and JSON to deliver and showcase the content.

‍Variants: Free and Open Source

7. Core DNA

The Boston-based company introduced Core DNA as a headless CMS platform that comprises around 80 different applications that assist digital experience management, eCommerce, and intranets.

With a rich multi-tenant and decoupled structure, the SaaS platform offers features such as:

• Personalization
• Multi-site management
• Localization
• Integrations
• Framework agnosticism
• Comprehensive inventory management.

The platform also offers a WYSIWYG editing interface to support rich text and media management.

‍Variants:

• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

8. Craft CMS

In 2013, Craft CMS was a Bend OR-based “content-first” headless CMS that allows users to manipulate experiences throughout their content.

Craft CMS provides features like:

• Custom fields
• Drag-and-drop layout management
• Multi-site management
• Localization
• Asset management
• Live content previews
• Built-in image editor.

Each user maintains their own customizable and highly visual dashboards.

‍Variants:

• Free Version
• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

9. Zesty.io

Zesty.io is a San Diego-based headless CMS that provides utilities for both marketers and developers.

For marketers, Zesty.io offers features like:

• Template and page building
• Workflow management
• Automated SEO
• Advanced SEO tools
• Tools to launch microsites and landing pages

For developers, Zesty.io provides:

• content-aware templating
• Custom endpoint building
• Built-in staging environments
• Customizable content models to support headless JSON APIs.

Variants:

• Enterprise plans Available

10. Directus

New York-based Directus is an open-source headless CMS and API tool. Using Vue.js., Directus effectively handles custom-schema SQL databases. The theme behind Directus is that developers can develop custom databases per specific project needs without having any prerequisite skill of working with a framework or any other IT skill. Once the database is prepared, Directus’ API or SDKs can be integrated. The outcome is a customizable and interactive interface that allows business users to manage database content for their websites and applications.

‍Variants:

• Free trial version
• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

11. DatoCMS

DatoCMS is an Italian headless content as a service (CaaS) utility that supports multiple languages. By doing so, DatoCMS enables brands to:

• Organize digital assets in separate folders
• Locate media files quickly using AI-based tagging and search utilities
• Publish content wherever required

Variants:

• Free Version Available

12. GraphCMS

It is a Germany-based API-first CMS that was introduced in 2017. The platform is based on GraphQL, a data query language that, according to some experts, is the successor to REST. GraphCMS enables developers to create a hosted GraphQL backend for their application that provides the liberty of defining relations, structures, and authorizations for the app data. It also comes with several utilities to create and effectively  handle the content, including:

• Text editors
• Asset management
• Workflows
• User roles
• Multilingual support.

Variants:

• Free trial version
• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

13. Cosmic JS

Cosmic JS is a cloud-hosted headless CMS platform that provides both RESTful and GraphQL APIs. The platform provides features like:

• Content modeling
• Localization
• Webhooks
• Media management
• WYSIWYG  editing interface
• Support for third-party utilities like GitHub and Typeform.

The CMS supports integration with Slack, AWS, Stripe, HubSpot, and Algolia.

‍Variants:

• Free Community version
• Premium Plan

14. Kontent.ai (Kentico)

Kentico Cloud, marketed as Kontent.ai, is a Czech Republic-based SaaS headless CMS that enables developers to integrate existing technologies and develop sites using the languages, methodologies, utilities, and frameworks. It also offers several SDKs, secured access to API, and SLA-promised uptime. As far as content creation is concerned, Kentico Cloud provides a WYSIWYG interface and enables editors to collaborate, manage workflow, design content layout, customize different aspects of the process, and localization.

‍Variants:

• Free trial version
• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

15. Prismic.io

US-based Prismic is a SaaS headless CMS that offers:

• Visual editor
• Custom type builds
• Multi-language support
• Full revision history.
• Native integrations with top eCommerce platforms like Shopify and Magento

Prismic also provides scheduling options and project management utilities to ensure collaboration and intelligent workflow management. It provides developers rich development kit for their desired programming language or framework.

‍Variants:

• Free version
• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

16. Bold (Quintype)

Founded in 2014, an Indian platform, Quintype is an API-based headless CMS intended to serve digital media organizations and news media outlets. Quintype’s interactive editing interface allows:

• Collaborative content generation
• Rich features to manage workflow effectively
• Automated publishing
• Support for both multilingual and multi-format content.

Quintype’s CMS engine also provides features like:

• Engagement tracking
• Dashboard for Real-time analytics
• Automated daily reports
• Author performance indicators

Quintype’s “auto-scaling infrastructure” provides support for Facebook blogs, Googe AMP, content syndication as well as push notifications.

‍Variants:

• Free version
• Enterprise plan

17. Sanity

Introduced in 2015, Sanity is a Norway-based, state-of-the-art open-source headless CMS Oslo. Built on JavaScript and React.js, Sanity provides an interactive WYSIWYG editing interface that enables users to embed editable data in existing content. It also offers a Sweet Query API that allows processing multiple queries on a single request.Sanity richly provides:

• Real-time collaboration
• Live to preview
• Content versioning.

Variants:

• Free version
• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

18. Scrivito

Scrivito was introduced by Germany, a headless CMS that supports AWS, JavaScript, and ReactJS. Its rich features include:

• WYSIWYG drag-and-drop editing interface
• User permissions
• Collaboration
• Client-side rendering
• CDN support
• Dynamic Image Resizing

Variants:

• Free trial version
• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

19. Sitecore

US-based Sitecore is regarded as a WCM industry leader by Gartner. The enterprise variant of this platform provides:

• Sitecore Experience Platform
• Content Hub
• Experience Manager
• Experience Commerce
• In-context editing and designing
• Cross-channel preview
• Enterprise-class search
• Asset management
• Content targeting

Variants:

• Demo available on request

20. DNN Evoq Content

Evoq Content is the open-source headless CMS that provides various features favorable for both marketing and IT operations. Marketers can leverage upon features like:

• WYSIWYG editing interface
• Inline image editing
• Content layout module
• Liquid Content (To allow content flow to any medium or device, in a traditional headless manner)

For developers, it provides utilities like

• Module creator
• Built-in JavaScript libraries
• Dot NET API

Variants:

• Free trial version
• Premium Plan
• Enterprise plan

How can you choose the right headless CMS?

There is a multitude of options that makes it challenging to navigate through the ocean of features. We think it’s best to focus on a CMS that allows you to thrive and is highly adaptable and scalable as per your requirements. Below is the list of questions you need to ponder over to evaluate your choice effectively.

• Is it possible to develop the kinds of content structures you need to?
• Is it necessary to look after content hosting and maintenance all by yourself?
• Will your content be stored securely and privately?
• Would real-time editing and collaboration improve your workflows?
• Will your comprehensive text content be locked to HTML?
• Can you scale your content operations without spending extra money?
• What is the procedure for managing files and images?

Headless API Types

To better evaluate the value of a headless CMS, it’s mandatory to know more about APIs. API stands for Application Programming Interface. In the given context, it means you get content in a way that is simpler to integrate with existing or new software utilities. Typically, you do this by sending the headless CMS a network request to an API end node. This network request is much more the same thing you do while visiting a webpage, but instead of a web page, you get a list of the backend of the content.

While using this information to develop software using a programming approach with APIs, most Developers prefer them because it provides them complete control of how to develop their application. Some CMSes also allow you to change content using APIs. API is a broad area that goes beyond the domain of CMSes and the World Wide Web. Therefore, exploring the two frequently-used APIs is recommended when we talk about content management, namely REST and GraphQL.

What is REST API?

APIs can be more or less scalable when it comes to developing applications on top of them. In mainstream practice, Headless CMSes have offered REST APIs. They outline the content behind multiple URLs such as posts, authors, or images. Developers have to deal with multiple requests with the IDs of the variety of content types together. REST APIs can be effective for simple data structures, but this approach can be time-consuming if your content models are more complex. It requires more effort to change or mold these APIs for different purposes.

What is GraphQL?

Facebook introduced GraphQL as an alternative to the less flexible REST approach. It allows you to query the API with the fields and relationships you require for each event. This is exactly how you interact with the databases. It also makes it simple to introduce new fields and content types as your system grows horizontally. The reason to choose more flexible and scalable APIs is to eliminate the hurdles to reuse content across different channels.

End Words

Going headless or transitioning from an old-school content management methodology to an advanced one will likely be an overwhelming task. Still, it’ll save both your time and money if you opt for the right headless CMS platform per your feasibility and priorities.

The eCommerce industry is skyrocketing like never before, especially due to the COVID19 crisis. In addition, due to containment measures, online shopping that was once used to be a convenience and luxury has become necessary. Stats reveal a notable upsurge in global eCommerce sales.

Many people want to explore the domain of eCommerce and show a keen interest in launching their very own eCommerce store. However, if your objective is to start earning instantaneously, the goal should be a scalable & engaging eCommerce Store. Suppose you want to add true value to the contemporary online market to earn you a notable return over minimal investment. In that case, this blog post will take you to the journey of a 10-step guide to launch your eCommerce store using Shopify.– from picking a brand name to acknowledging shipping alternatives. Let’s discuss every step included.

1. Getting Started

There are many eCommerce platforms to opt from, but Shopify provides a very user-friendly interface, offers a free 14-day trial, and is efficient enough to handle your growth. Start by making an account on Shopify by entering your email address, password, and unique brand/store name.

You’ll then be provided with another page that needs you to enter personal and business information. It’s a good practice if you do it without skipping this option later. Don’t forget to:

• Setting up Google Analytics – it’s your much-needed tool to reduce cart abandonment.
• Adding your credit card details – you don’t want all your effort and progress to disappear once your 14-trial days are finished.

2. Personalize Your eCommerce Store

Here comes the most interesting part, that is, building your eCommerce store.

Buying your domain (optional)

Your domain name is your website address. Shopify automatically assigns you a .myshopify.com domain for free, but if you’re curious about brand image and growth, you are recommended to purchase a personalized domain name. Go to your Shopify admin and click Online Store >Domains >Buy a new domain and start searching your domain name from available options. Ideally, it must be easy to cram, quick to type, and possess your store/brand name.

Selecting a theme

Your theme is one of the most important entities that showcase your website’s presentation, appearance, feel, and ease of use for your customers, and it cast a notable impact on engagements and conversions. Go to the Shopify Theme Store to search for free or paid themes. All these themes are highly customizable and don’t require any coding or programming skills. Must ponder over sample web layouts and reviews. Make sure that your theme is optimized for smartphones.

Customizing your theme

Once you’ve selected a theme, you can begin customizing and adjusting as per your requirements. Go to the Shopify admin, click Themes>Customize and start customizing by adding colors, fonts, social media links, pictures, and visual options such as categories, lists, menus, and products per page.

Here, you’re gearing up to create an attractive visual flow and streamlined customer experience. Enrich your website with plenty of light color space, high-quality images, and an organized layout that drives visitors to your buy button.

Adding content

Once you’re done with your website’s overall appearance, look and feel, you need to add relevant content. Start by enriching:

• A home page;
• A contact us page;
• An about page (Don’t forget to add shipping and returns policies); and
• Category pages.

Refrain from using complex vocabulary. Instead, maintain clarity by using crystal clear and engaging words that improve your customers’ experience, and refrain from using lengthy paragraphs. Keep it as much simple as you can. Last but not least, add SEO-friendly content.

Adding extensions

You can boost your eCommerce website with utility applications and integrations but don’t get too carried away. Poorly designed apps can drive down your website’s performance and reduce engagements.

3. Add Products

What’s an eCommerce platform without any products? But wait a minute, you need to choose between where you’re getting your products from.

Dropshipping or not?

You have two viable options: opt for sourcing and owning products yourself or a dropshipping model. As a starter, dropshipping saves you a lot of effort and helps you avoid numerous risks as you market and sell the products of a third-party supplier, while the third-party supply stores and ships the products directly to the customer. In addition, dropshipping frees you from the burden of manufacturing and inventory management. The perks of dropshipping can be attractive for entrepreneurs, but one must not oversee the possibility of encountering poor delivery standards, limited inventory visibility, and less RoI. Another alternative is to source products by yourself and use an outsourced shipper to store and deliver.

Adding a product

To add a product, go to the Shopify admin and click Products >Add products and fill the product briefing including:

• A clear, concise, and relevant title;
• A complete, informative, and SEO-optimized product description;
• Clear, high-quality, and professionally outlooking images; and
• Any other relevant information such as price and variants etc.

Organizing your products

Imagine an eCommerce website with a poor layout and messy appearance, and you will hardly tend to stay on such a website, forget about searching and buying anything. Organizing your products into categories (for example, womenswear and menswear) is a lifeline of your business as it allows your customers to navigate your website easily. Create product categories and filters on the search page.

4. Select a Payment Gateway

Now, you want to make sure that you can accept payment for your products. First, choose a feasible payment gateway using the Payments section on the Shopify admin page. The key points to consider while choosing a payment gateway include:

• Transaction fees – taken on top of Shopify’s transaction fees;
• Payment options – the more payment methods you provide, the stronger customer base you can build; and
• On-site checkout – keeping payment methods on-site allows your customer to have a smooth purchase journey.

5. Line up your taxes

Depending upon your location, you may need to charge your customers for sales tax. Go to Settings >Taxes, where you can select tax regions and add options such as all-inclusive rates, shipping taxes, and taxes on digital items.

6. Create Shipping Policy

The next step is to ponder over your shipping rules and to dedicate shipping options. For example, is it rational to offer free 2-day shipping, as Walmart’s fast shipping program does?

Fast shipping costs you more than standard shipping, but it is worth the spending as it can skyrocket your customer’s satisfaction trajectory. Statistically, sellers experienced a 900% increase in sales by offering fast shipping on their products. Therefore, another directed strategy is offering fast shipping on your trending and best-selling items to increase their traction. Once you acknowledge which strategy you should opt for, decide how to fulfill your Shopify orders, fast delivery is an important concern for 99% of US consumers, so it is recommended to opt for the option to promise on-time delivery to your customers.

You met with the two choices here:

• Self-fulfillment - It means fulfilling orders from your home or warehouse and handling everything from labels to packaging and shipping on your own. This practice ensures you full control and deep analysis of your business operations.
• Outsourced fulfillment - It means partnering with an outsourced vendor that handles storage, packaging, shipping, and tracking of your products. Shopify-powered fulfillment vendors are a trusted option for eCommerce stores eager to benefit from professional staff expertise and suitable delivery rates.

Once you’re done choosing your method, you need to set your delivery fee.

Free shipping

Every customer prefers to form a platform that provides free shipping. You can later cover the costs of free shipping in the form of a sales boost.

Flat rate

Flat rates are driven by parameters like product destination, weight, or value. Flat shipping rates are favorable while selling items of similar sizes and weights. However, when items vary, the cost burden would be on the shoulders of either a customer or the seller.

Real-time shipping rates

Shopify integrates with specific shipping carriers to provide real-time shipping rates. Unfortunately, this option is only available on the most premium Shopify plan, and it doesn’t allow you to offer attractive rates. Once you’ve made your mind regarding how to ship and how much to charge, go to Settings >Shipping and add shipping origin, destinations, weights, sizes, and rates.  

Source: Shopify

7. Test

Before going live, it’s very important to test your eCommerce site, specifically:

• Accessing your store;
• Exploring the products on your site;
• Buying a product (Apart from Shopify’s bogus gateway, it is recommended to use the real payment gateway to ensure it works)
• Testing on multiple devices.

Is the process hurdle-free and quick? Do you find what you want easily? Are there any errors? Are you drawn to the checkout without any trouble? Are the shipping options and policies clear? Does your inventory update itself? Ultimately, would you prefer to buy from you? If your answer is NO, change anything that you think is causing trouble.

8. Market

Once you go live, you will realize it’s making any change at all without any customers. So prioritize a pre-launch marketing plan and utilize social media, podcasts, google ads, Facebook ads, youtube ads, discounts offers, and blog posts to boost engagement and gain customer retention.

9. Go live

It’s time to sound the launch drum and get ready to cut the ribbon as you launch yourself to go live. If you’re still using a 14-day trial version, you’ll need to choose a plan and then go to Online Store>Preferences, uncheck the Enable password page option, and click Save.

10. Expand

Congratulations – your eCommerce platform is now live, but you’re not done yet. Once you’re live for business, you need to start working on your next objective, that is, expansion.

Multi-channel selling

Seventy-five percent of online shoppers utilize a multitude of sales channels for locking a single purchase. Customers go through reviews, compare competitors, and most of the time prefer buying from a brand they trust. Integrating online marketplaces with your eCommerce store is the best way to engage these customers, and it’s easy to use multi-channel fulfillment vendors, cross-channel inventory utilities, and multi-channel listing tools.

Outsourcing fulfillment

If you opt for self-fulfillment at step six, you will find yourself bound as you try to expand. However, outsourcing your fulfillment in part or fully lessens your burden by handling strict delivery deadlines, especially during peak seasons. It also has additional advantages while selling on multiple sales channels, as it allows you to win your place in the fast shipping programs.

Getting reviews

Reviews influence more than 90 percent of consumers. So reviews about transparent tracking, excellent customer service, and timely deliveries surely create a difference by giving you a competitive edge over your potential rivals.

End Words

There are many advantages of having your eCommerce store, and with Shopify being so simple and easy to manage, you can easily turn your e-commerce startup dream into reality. Thinking of launching your e-commerce store, get in touch with us for consultation.

Statistically, around 90% of the products that are launched annually - Fail. People who run their small online businesses try to launch product after product; this is pretty much becoming a new normal. When you introduce something to the consumer market, it becomes a game of dart and arrow, and you tend to throw as many arrows as you can to see how many of them hit the bull eye. The victory is in your hands if you know how to map a successful product launch strategy that possesses the development, launch, and promotion phase.

How to Launch a Product in 2023

This blog post discusses the effective approach and product launch roadmap that every eCommerce store should adapt to increase the probability of success:

1. Meeting consumer’s needs

An effective product launch strategy should always consider consumers’ needs and demands as a priority and satisfy them in the most suitable way possible. A fruitful way is to evaluate the contemporary market and answer the questions: Why would someone buy your product? Determine how your product could fill any void and add value to someone’s life. These are all reasons that push consumers to buy any things. Acknowledging customers’ perspectives of buying your product is how you can initiate your promotion strategy more effectively.

2. Know your target audience and your competitors

To make rational decisions related to your brand or product, you need to grasp the insights of the contemporary market and trends, that is;

• Who are your potential customers?
• Who are your current competitors?

There are several ways to do so, such as:

• Google your product or product category and outline the direct and indirect competitors that show up.
• Connect with the people within the domain of your target market and ask them which product or brand they are most likely to buy from and why?
• Observe the relevant social media accounts or pages your potential consumers follow and are responsive to.
• Gain customers’ perspective by shopping online or offline to feel what it would feel like on customers’ behalf to browse and purchase products.

As you go about your research, make a note of:

1. Who your potential and most likely customers are—the ones you can engage easily.
2. Who your top rivals are— specifically the brands that are performing well and famous in the market.

It’s crucial to deal with this aspect before heading forward, as it will remove the curtains of doubt, making it obvious for you where you should keep your focus and gain a competitive edge over your rivals.

3. Making a prototype and Beta Testing

To refrain from making false investments in a wrong product or item, outsource beta testers to run a test mechanism so they can provide feedback on how to improve and what to change, if necessary. It will allow you to dodge undesirable customer reviews that may, in turn, damage your image in the market, causing your patrons and investors to perform damage control to justify their linkage with your brand or business.

Also Read: How to Launch a Successful eCommerce Business in 2022

4. Readjustment and Changes

Once you step into the testing phase and start getting feedback from testers, friends, family, colleagues, or anyone who can help eliminate the risks, it’s crucial to make necessary adjustments accordingly. It’s difficult to make changes after completing a product, but it can create a notable difference in its quality. Everyone has a different perspective; some of your patrons may outline a feature that you’ve never considered adding or point out something irrelevant that you can eliminate. Ultimately, your product would become an ideal entity that your consumers not just need but want.

5. Strong marketing campaign

A successful product launch strategy is directly linked with your marketing strategy. Try to build anticipation among your target consumers by running promotional campaigns before the product launch. This awareness approach will be more effective and drive more RoI s on a new product.A few effective ways to start a promotion campaign for your upcoming product involves:

1. Build a dedicated page about the new products on your website
2. Initiate an email campaign that encourages signups to learn more about the new product.
3. Reach out to influencers that can promote your product through their content and tease the product
4. As per your budget feasibility, try to advertise at as many appropriate channels or platforms as possible where you can receive enough traffic to trigger public interest.

Don’t underestimate the power of SEO. If you want to cut your budget short, use effective SEO methodologies and keywords.

Related: How to Start Dropshipping Store [Complete Guide]

6. Build a firm supply chain

Business owners need to manage the inventory record of their products and ensure they have enough supplies to meet demand (This headache can be dodged by white labeling, which will be discussed in the following piece of writing). The most effective way to do this is to set up a manageable supply chain framework. Maintain rich communication with your vendors and ask about the limit of their generation capacity and how many units they can assemble or provide in a specific time frame. Then, discuss the scenario of scale production in case your product launch yields more demand oversupply.

7. Network and share your product

Once you’ve set a launch date, stick to it. It will reduce your efforts to continuously update your digital marketing mediums, customers, vendors, anyone involved in any changes or updates being made.When it’s time, promote the new product and trigger your email campaigns and social media channels, and encourage your friends and colleagues to spread the word as well. Your work is not over yet; ensure that you get the market’s attention on every marketing platform. And if necessary, repost and share reminder notices at regular intervals after the official launch.

8. Reach out to the press - post-launch

Once you’ve launched your product, and as soon as positive responses and feedback start to come, reach out to the PR firms and collaborate with influencers and ask them to share your story. People tend to buy from where they feel their emotions attached, so take your audience on a journey from inception, to development, to eCommerce. The public shows a keen interest in reading and listening to the content related to the origin of successful products, especially if they suddenly appear out of nowhere. Don’t hesitate to do so if you have an inspiring and catchy product story to reveal. Feel free to post your story on social media channels, including Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, or Instagram.

9. Consider public feedback - post-launch

Google and other relevant sites made for customer feedback are modern-day consumer reports. Notwithstanding how effectively you engaged the audience during your product launch, the public’s opinion of your brand can be ruthless if your business fails to deliver what it promised.If you receive negative feedback, hold patience, respond with a positive greeting, and provide a short-term way to solve the consumer’s immediate concerns and a long-term solution to ensure future customers won’t encounter the same issues. Responding to the reviews and feedback whenever possible reveals that you are dedicated to your product and care for what your customers think.

‍10. Go with White labeling - Manufacturing and Selling or Just Selling?

‍Manufacturing an entirely new product is often risky and costly. Here comes white labeling into play as a perfect solution to help an eCommerce business grow with a budget-friendly approach. The manufacturer provides the eCommerce business to acquire readily available goods to sell under its branding. The only task left for the eCommerce business is to run marketing campaigns and sell the products at a suitable markup rate; thus, both the eCommerce facility and vendor make money.Like a corporate practice, the manufacturer deals with the design and development of the product. At the same time, the eCommerce platform owner has to handle the marketing and sales of the product.Here are some of the primary reasons why you should opt for selling white label products.

• Reduces manufacturing costs

One of the topmost reasons businesses consider selling white label products is the notable reduction in manufacturing costs, which provides space to invest more revenue back into selling more products.

• Lean operations

By operating as a white label eCommerce platform, your business will run lean, as you aren’t bound with heavy manufacturing costs and HR-related issues (as discussed below).During the COVID-19 pandemic, many businesses crashed because of high manufacturing costs.

• Improved customer experience

Statistically, the businesses that prioritize customer experience generate around 5 to 6 times more revenue than businesses with average customer experience. One of the most effective ways a lean team can improve their customer experience is by offering white label products. As your resources are limited, collaborating with a manufacturer will expand your resources, and you can focus on core business goals such as improved customer experience and improved marketing strategy as well.

• Instant access to knowledgeable staff

Private label or Direct sale companies that manufacture their goods and services have to deal with new employees’ hiring and training process for every new product assembly. Rather than recreating and running the whole lengthy process, white label partners allow you to benefit from the knowledge and experience of dedicated staff who already have a firm grip over the product’s inside and out.

• Pivot quickly with consumer trends

Private label companies also have to tackle market pivot issues.Imagine you’re a fitness retailer, and you decide to create a line of trainer shoes with a currently trending design. With the traditional manufacturing approach, it may no longer remain popular among the masses when your product is finalized. In this scenario, you would be in a deadlock kind of situation due to the burden of high manufacturing costs, unsold inventory, zero demand, and nothing to offer your contemporary customer base.On the contrary, if you have a white label partner, you can choose to sell one of their existing and currently trending products to your consumers with suitable markup.

• Ideal for rapid growth

As an immature business, you may not have enough capacity to manufacture multiple products at a given time but partnering with a white label manufacturer enables you to have sudden access to their entire supply line. Therefore, you can expand to a new market of consumers offer multiple products to your consumer base.Let’s say you are a private label company that only sells cricket bats. However, some of your potential customers may want to purchase a cricket bat and cricket ball together. It’s human nature; rather than buying a cricket bat from your store and a cricket ball from a different store, the customers will likely choose to purchase both items from another store, offering both products.By partnering with a white label manufacturer, you can enjoy instant access to the cricket ball and the cricket bats. Therefore, you would engage a broader consumer segment, those who want to buy only one of either item or both.

• Test product lines risk-free

If you’re a budding company that ultimately plans to exercise private labeling or direct selling, white labeling is still a greater good as a first small step towards your destination. The process involving a white-label approach takes a few short weeks before you start selling. In contrast, private label selling may take several months to start selling as it bounds you to find a facility space, hire employees, create designs, purchase raw materials, and start manufacturing products on your own. On the contrary, you could start selling white label products to get some cash in the bank and then shift towards private label as the company grows further. In a nutshell, White labeling is the best option to start selling instantaneously while reducing your company’s costs and plausible risks. Creating a white label partnership medium is very simple, and you’ll be instantly enjoying a variety of product options at the tip of your finger.

Conclusion

Keep in mind; you will never have 100% control over how people perceive your brand. You can cut your extra expenditures to boost RoI, engage more customers in the effective way possible, make a great first impression and sustain your reputation. Still, you can’t control the individual opinions that exist in everyone’s mind.All you can do is remain honest, push your limits to the extreme and try to resonate with your core consumer base. With the right knowledge of how to handle things and rational decision-making, you can unleash the true potential of your business.