Have you ever dreamed of starting your own e-commerce business? Or, perhaps you wanted to be a business manager of a profitable and well-known organisation and brand?
Well, if your answer is yes, then we have the perfect guide for you to start the best e-commerce business.
What is the Best Time to Start an E-Commerce Business?
There has never been a better time to start your own online business. Don’t believe it? The worldwide retail sales reached nearly $5 trillion in 2021 alone.
The facts and figures show that now is the time to start. Most importantly, to be successful at your own e-commerce business, you need to be vigilant, creative, and productive.
E-Commerce Business Ideas
Let’s talk about some of the best e-commerce business ideas currently trending.
According to Cloudways, there are 3 main types of business ideas:
- Niche ideas: It is important to know your niche, and how to make them a profitable investment.
For starters, you can search for ideas in both the fashion and jewellery product market.
There are also opportunities in vaping hardware, flavours, liquids, electric scooters, skateboards, hoverboards, selfie drones and so on. You can go even further by selling super niche products, such as gluten-free products. - Local ideas: This includes smart home products and accessories, AR/VR headsets, dashcams, video doorbells, and more.
- E-Commerce product ideas: Besides thinking of any creative product lines, you can look around you to see what is reaping profit online.
Among them are: online grocery and foods, smartwatches, face masks, kitchen and dining mats, personal safety equipment, and many others.
The Perfect Opportunity to Sell
Creating a booming and in-demand product line is the most challenging part of establishing a new e-commerce business.
It’s not just about selling a new product idea or selling trending products, perhaps the answer lies somewhere else.
For instance, you can always look around the online market and just observe. See what the customers are willing to pay for and what they are usually unhappy with. We have some ideas for you:
·Customer pain points:
These are ideas derived from existing products or aspects of products that bring everyday frustrations and small annoyances.. Learn from your own experience as a customer, too!
· Enthusiastic hobbyists:
Everyone has hobbies they are willing to spend money on, just for gratification or to add to their vintage collections.
You can evaluate the potential opportunity of such products by determining which products are being sought after by hobbyists lately.
Bonus: you enjoy customer loyalty and a high level of engagement from all your enthusiastic customers!
Building an Online Catalogue
To build a resilient e-commerce business, you need to keep a lot of factors in mind, like local delivery. If you can deliver locally or across states, or even internationally in the future.
Always keep in mind that it is vital to form a connection with nearby customers to drive sales.
A good customer experience is a sure way of generating sales and revenue. Also, it builds a solid marketing foundation too.
How to Build an Online Catalogue?
E-commerce business is all about understanding the ways to utilise the internet. Next, it is about learning how to generate profit, and lastly about how to reach a larger customer base than ever before.
Though, you should keep some points to keep in mind while building your online catalogue:
- Follow the basics:
Make sure that all the recognisable aspects of your e-commerce business are featured properly (like your logo or brand colours). It will make it easy for people to browse and buy products that are in-store and ready to be shipped.
Don’t forget to offer exclusive discounts and gifts to your customers to get into their good books early on.
In this way, you can gain more and more loyal customers and enhance your sales.
- Be as concise and transparent as possible:
Make sure to have an attractive homepage for the customer to easily browse from. mention your shipping FAQs, return and exchange policy, and make them as clear and concise as you can. - It is IMPORTANT to make them understand how will it be beneficial to them in the long run.
- Captivate them! : What draws your customers in will be your captivating product descriptions and photography. Don’t leave anything up to chance!
Creating a hype around your e-commerce company brand and all its products, which is the best marketing strategy! Bring those customers in!
- Choosing domains:
If you are choosing a business or brand name, or if you have to choose a corresponding appropriate and available domain name to go along with it. Both are quite daunting challenges.
It will be wise to structure your website in a way that makes it SEO-optimised and user-friendly. Keep it in mind!
Writing a Business Plan: Where to Start?
It is time to bring all your creative and ambitious ideas and thoughts together to write your business plan. What are your goals, your priorities? Fret not, we’ve got you covered.
First and foremost, your plan should reflect your company’s uniqueness and potential. You need to show your investors, employees, and customers the core brand values of your e-commerce business.
Digital marketing relies heavily on two things: driving targeted traffic to your website, and converting it to sales. You can rely on social media channels, paid ads, and analytics for insights.
What is your Business Planning Strategy?
The CEO of eCommerce gives this advice to all aspiring e-commerce entrepreneurs:
“Do not worry about selling a specific product to start an e-commerce business. You only need to validate your business plan and monetisation strategy.“
According to him, the best eCommerce niches have the following factors:
- Market & sales growth
- Growth on Google Trends
- Strong Amazon sales
- Bloggers and influencers
- A clear niche type
- An identifiable niche audience on Facebook
Shopify is a commerce platform that allows anyone to set up an online store and its products. They have a list of trending business ideas and model insights, marketing tips, and supplier info.
Currently, they suggest selling many popular items, like art supplies, makeup and cosmetics, camping equipment, kitchen supplies, t-shirts, men’s, women’s, and kids’ etc.
E-Commerce Business is a Marathon, not a Sprint!
The first year of any business is neither a promise for your success nor your failure.
It is for:
- reiterating your strategies to find what hits the bullseye,
- reinvesting your sales right back into your business, and
- experimenting with marketing and advertising.
Knowing your target audience is paramount – get the right products in front of the right customers at the right time. The products you create or decide to sell should be in demand and give the customers what they want.
It need not be the next big thing, it just needs to be something lacking in the line of available products.
For more information, sign up for our EWOR platform.
