HomeBusiness Advice Guide Internet and E-commerce Online Stores

Online Stores - 5 Small business Mistakes to Avoid

Mistakes in any new business are common - learning from them are what's important. We will highlight five potential mistakes that can swiftly lead to the demise your online store.

1. Bad Advertising. Ecommerce customers don't find you by accident. Too many e-tailers expect this. Getting new ecommerce customers without advertising is highly unlikely. Even though there are millions of ecommerce websites battling for a limited amount of ecommerce customers, if you don't advertise your chances of success is greatly reduced. Fortunately to be effective doesn't mean you need to spend a lot of money. One cost effective way to market your product is with a Targeted e-newsletter. Keyword targeted ads are also a low cost solution to reach consumers who are already familiar with your product.

2. Bad Ecommerce Website design. Ecommerce customers will look elsewhere if your online store appears to lack focus and meaning. It's important to present a professional image as your online store links you to your ecommerce customer. By taking every aspect of your small business seriously you can pass that confidence on to your ecommerce customers. Templates are a simple way to start the web building process but fully understand what your product is, or service does so you can best market it. What you put in is what you get out. So deliver the best content to your ecommerce customers to reflect your willingness to appeal to them.

3. Under estimating Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Properly utilizing major search engines have a large impact on how people find you. Conservative estimates state that 70% of all online purchases start with a web search. Appearing in the first couple of search results is vital to grabbing any share of that ecommerce market. Content is also an important factor here, it needs to clearly convey what your product offers, and it must contain keywords that will maximize the effectiveness of your ecommerce website.

4. Bad Ecommerce Customer Service. Attracting new ecommerce customers is extremely difficult if you don't maintain a positive relationship with your current ones. The internet is a powerful tool for delivering information .positive and negative. An unhappy ecommerce customer can have a sizable effect on the future of your online store. Emphasizing your company's contact information on your online store can relieve a lot of stress for the ecommerce customer. Letting your ecommerce customers know that you are there for them, and having an appropriate response system in place is vital. One way to effectively manage your ecommerce customers is through Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software. Conventional CRM software has been pivotal in keeping and improving on ecommerce customer management for many years. New "Online" or "On Demand" CRM software is making this even easier and more cost effective for the small business then previous methods. Salesboom.com is an industry leader in applying small business software to the small business market. With affordable CRM software your company can always be on top of your ecommerce customer relations.

5. Lack of Ecommerce Website updates. Once you have built your online store, you need to carefully maintain your site by applying regular updates. You don't need to re-invent yourself every 6 months, but a good show of interest in your company by applying product, contact, and support updates every now and then is very important.

By avoiding these 5 problems that tend to plague online stores, you can help to assure yourself of success. Building an ecommerce website and gaining new ecommerce customers is an exciting time for any new online business. But it doesn't end there. It's important to evaluate the competition regularly and consistently provide good online ecommerce customer relations.

Try our free CRM software 30 day tria