E-commerce is a tremendously profitable industry. Having a website to sell products online could be an excellent money making business. A website will save you from the hassle of keeping an inventory, paying rent for a physical store, or warehouse. However, simply starting an e-commerce website isn’t going to bring in sales. Many people think starting an online store is a slam dunk and that products sell and money comes all by itself. The main aim of an e-commerce store is to acquire many customers and maximize conversion rates. However, there are so many things that can go wrong, ending in customers going crazy. Let’s take a look at some of the mistakes that e-commerce websites can make, which might impact their sales and amplify bounce rates. 1. Lack of Customer Service Consumers will continue to shop online. Even though they don’t speak face-to-face with a sales rep, customer service is still important. It should be easy for consumers to get their questions answered, speak to a person (if they want) or raise a grievance. You also need to be prepared to accept returns, support a variety of payments, including refunds if necessary. 2. Providing Low-quality/wrong Product Photographs Bounce rates increase on your e-commerce website due to misguided users after they see wrong or bad product photographs. if it is supposed to be a ‘blue bottle’ then the image should be that of a blue bottle, not a white or red one. The size of the product is important. Images taken from different angles can provide the audience an idea about the colours, design or material of the product. 3. ‘No Results’ Upon Searching Don’t show customers a ‘No results’ page that might annoy them and turn them away for good. Suggesting alternatives to their search might help. For instance, if a customer searches for ‘white socks with prints’’ and you don’t have such a product in the inventory, suggest other items on the same lines. For example, suggesting a ‘multi printed socks’ could serve the purpose. It might seem tedious but in the end, will help in converting your leads into sales. Worth it right? 4. Including Out of Stock Items Imagine this. When you diligently search for an item on an e-commerce website, but instead find the words ‘Out of Stock’. What do you do? Leave that site and move on to another. Now this could happen to you. If any of your products are out of stock, DO NOT display them on the results or on category pages. Another option is to add a tag on the product image, clearly stating that the product is not available. 5. Lack of Shipping Options Customers like to have variety and this is true for shipping options as well. It is recommended to offer customers a number of shipping options so that you can justify that the customer has made a good choice by purchasing from your site. This is indirectly beneficial to you as well, since different shipping providers offer different rates, and functions. 6. Poor inventory management You might ask why inventory management is an important aspect in maintaining an e-commerce site. Well, of course it is. Otherwise how are you going to sell customers the products they want? Whether you are keeping inventory in a warehouse or opting for drop-shipping, you will still have to maintain a thorough count of your inventory and stock levels. If you are operating on a large scale, you can invest in an inventory management system it will allow you to have greater inventory control, know when to replenish stock and maintain orders. An inventory management system will give you access to real-time data, so that every piece of inventory , every movement of goods is accounted for. 7. Desktop-only design or unresponsive website should be upgraded Today people are shopping, making payments and transactions through the mobile and tablet at a rapid rate. We no longer live in a world of desktop computers. So it is essential that the e-commerce website must be responsive one. It should be one that can be optimized on different devices, desktop, mobile, tablet, and laptop. In not doing that you can lose existing and potential customers who use other devices or are shifting from their old ones. In conclusion Starting an e-commerce website might seem like a cakewalk, but it’s really not that easy. Each and every aspect about your website has to be carefully planned and implemented. Even the slightest change in design, navigation, optimization might have a significant impact on your website’s performance in terms of traffic, conversion of leads and ultimately sales. So next time you are thinking of starting your own e-commerce site, make sure to avoid these mistakes.
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