So you want to sell online? You want to be as successful as Paul Hurdsfield with your online business? Well then you need to know a few things before you get started.
Here are 3 top tips from Paul Hurdsfield to make sure you get started in the best possible way.
Your E-commerce System
I would say that this is the number one factor when it comes to making your website appealing to your consumers. You will have spent hours making sure that the site is designed perfectly but all of that will go down the drain if your e-commerce system isn’t good. Think about it, when it comes time to check out, if you feel that it’s difficult to complete or appears to be insecure, a lot of customers will close your website and find a store with a better e-commerce system. So what do you need to do? Well, budget is a big part of which system you choose. Then you need to consider if you want to take credit/debit cards, if you don’t then the best thing to do is use something like Paypal which will take your payments.
Signup To A Marketplace
If this is your first go at selling online and you’re not the most tech savy person in the world, your best bet is to put your store on a reputable online marketplace. The big players are Amazon, Etsy and Ebay – they will take a lot of stress out of the whole process, you’ll gain access to a huge number of consumers instantly and you don’t have to start from scratch. Everything is done for you; website design, software, managing your inventory, payment processing and shopping cart. Of course this doesn’t come for free, but paying a fee is not the end of the world because it might add up to less than if you set it all up by yourself.
Be Secure
So your site is setup beautifully, you’ve got the systems all worked out, the customers are visiting your site in droves but for some reason they keep bailing when they reach the payment page. What could this be? Well you might have ignored one major thing – an SSL certificate. This is when you have a padlock next to the URL – consumers nowadays know all about this and if they don’t see that padlock they’ll be gone very quickly indeed. So make sure you get your SSL certificate because if gives you more credibility and protects your consumers.