Build an E-Commerce Website in 8 Easy Steps - Part 2

 

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Fortunately, there is a structured process in building an e-commerce website. Here are the rest of our eight easy steps.

4. Choose an e-commerce platform

There is a multitude of e-commerce platforms on the Internet nowadays, such as Square Online, Weebly, Big Cartel, Constant Contact, BigCommerce, Wix, Shopify, Squarespace, WooCommerce, and more. Some comes with a free plan while some comes with a free trial but for a limited period. Choose one that best suits your budget and requirement. Also, you need to make sure that the platform you chose is optimized for mobile phone usability to take advantage of the accelerated growth of smartphone usage worldwide. The online e-commerce platform can easily help you build your website in a couple of simple steps.

5. Set-up your e-commerce store

Your e-commerce website is your online store, and it needs an appropriate theme to represent your brand. You have to set it up properly so as to ensure that your potential customers will have a good browsing experience in terms of fast loading speed, navigability, user-friendly, etc. Your website should contain accurate details on your products or services, quality images, good descriptions and prices as well as options for customers to leave reviews and star ratings. All this should be included in your product page for the viewing of prospective customers so that they buy based on an informed decision and not to mislead them into buying in any way. You must make your website and its web pages eye-catching as it's your brands' representation to your online customers.

Besides, you need to include pages on your website with respect to About Us, Contact Us, Return Policy, Privacy Policy, Terms of Service, Shipping Information and Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs). These are very important in order to build trust with your customers where they will feel confident to part their money in exchange for your products.

6. Set-up payment gateway

For your online store, you must have a few payment options in place for your customers. Most e-commerce store builder platforms already have functions to allow you to easily set up the payment gateway. The customer should have options to make payments via PayPal, credit card, debit card, online wallets, Internet banking, etc.

7. Secure your website by installing an SSL certificate

For all websites that transfer data online, especially relating to payment, you must ensure that the network connection is protected by a Secured Security Layer (SSL). The SSL certificate keeps your website secure from website hackers and will help to build trust among your customers.

8. Choose your shipping partner

When you start selling products on your e-commerce website, you need to ship the products to your customers using shipping companies. You must choose those reliable ones that have good track records in fulfilling shipments within agreed durations and at the lowest available shipping cost, so that you can give your customers the best deal as well as maximize your profit.

Check out an e-commerce website that is built using Shopify e-commerce platform at https://avanti-e.store.

Article Source: https://EzineArticles.com/expert/ChiKoong_Chong/1348083