Getting customers to trust your e-business

Trust forever the fact that when it comes to building a business; nothing works like trust. Trust is the foundation of a great business. It is just what drives your business, no matter how much you may have invested into it and no matter how organised and smart you are. Why should an ecommerce business earn it, and how does it earn it?
The importance of trust
No celebrity can drive a brand as effectively as a satisfied customer. This is the ultimate testimonial for a product, and is what may be considered the gospel truth about it. It is this word-of-mouth that is the ultimate seller of the product. No tool is as effective as a good referral. There are obvious reasons for which we would want to buy a user-recommended product rather than one endorsed artificially by a celebrity who is doing it for no reason other than for being paid to do so. The referral from an actual user is like the wisdom that flows from the horse’s mouth. It is something like: “Hey, I have been there and tried it and know it works. Why don’t you try too?”
Special for ecommerce!
While a good word of mouth recommendation is a great thing for any business; it is the final stamp of the quality of your business, when you can earn it doing an ecommerce business. If a customer who does not see you and has not interacted with you can recommend you, it means you know your onions! If you have already earned the rare honour of being recommended by your online visitors, keep up the work. If you have not and want to, remember that there is only one mantra: Quality!
All about quality service
Ecommerce is all about service. Service is more important than the product you sell on your site, no matter how good the products you sell are. It is only this quality that endears you to your faceless customer. Offer them the best you have, and in every sense, and there is no reason for them not to recommend you to their acquaintances.
Give them the opportunity to rate you
This is an important element of your ecommerce website. It should have a section on which you can let them air their views. And this should be a genuine one, upon which you should have no influence. This sounds risky for those who are not confident about their business; but not for those who are. By giving your customers the opportunity to tell what they feel about your product or service and depriving yourself the option of editing or excising it; you are showing that you have the ability to dare! And nothing drives your ecommerce business better than this.

Personalisation in ecommerce

Personalisation in ecommerce has been a highly debated and discussed area. Its genesis can be traced very nearly to the start of ecommerce itself. With the growth of this industry, personalisation grew, too. Today, personalisation is talked about as one of the most important components of ecommerce email marketing success.
Know your customer!
Well, knowing your customer is as important for your business as knowledge of the subject is for the teacher. But remember that this is all the more important in e-commerce, because unlike in the brick and mortar kind of business in which you can see the customer face to face and enquire as to her specific needs; here, you have the faceless customer who drops in and goes out. Getting the customer to stay on the site and purchase is the real challenge in ecommerce.
When a customer enters a website, what is it that is most likely to hold her attention? Of course, the product. But which product does she stay on the website for? This is the key to answering why personalisation is so important. When a woman in her 20’s visits your website and the first display is of an after shave lotion, does that make sense? Similarly, if your ecommerce website offers a glut of products that thevisitor has no interest for; you can be certain that you have lost a potential customer. But then, how do you know that the customer is a 20’s female? This is where personalisation comes into the picture.
Ways of personalisation
The high level of growth in the ecommerce industry can be traced to several factors, one of the most important of which is personalisation. Personalisation has now grown into much more than a customised “Dear Ms Sara”.Of course, personalising the email to the exact customer is an important aspect, but there is more to personalisation than just addressing the customer by name.
Segmentation
The most important purpose of personalisation is served when the customer who is looking for X product is led to X product and not to Y or Z products. This can be arrived at by properly classifying your visitor into a group based on the demographic data she has provided at the time of registering on your website. Market research professionals can help get a proper slot of the visitor. Once the visitor gets to see products that more or less match her needs, you can rest assured that she is not going to leave your site in a hurry.

Getting the basics of email marketing right

It is surprising that although email marketing is inseparable from ecommerce and is its driving force; there are ecommerce businesses that commit fundamental blunders in their email marketing. It always pays toget the basics right, whether it is someone who has been there for a while and knows the ropes or is a new entrant.
Follow your customers!
The old adage, “the way to a man’s heart is through the stomach” can be paraphrased to “the way to the customer’s mind is through the website”. The business has to make a habit of consistently tracking the customer no end. When the website fails in this; it goes out of the customer’s mind. When this happens, it is the end of the relationship with that customer. How does an ecommerce website remain in the customer’s mind, when she visits hundreds of similar sites? This happens only when the ecommerce business is in constant touch with visitors and customers.
Simple mails do the trick
Wouldn’t we greet a person who pays us a visit? This is just what is needed when a visitor comes to your ecommerce website. Just a simple and sincere “hello…thank you for passing by” after she leaves the website is a great welcome message.This is the first step to making the visitor feel at home with your website. Here, the business doesn’t need to go overboard. It can be to the point, rather than trying to promote itself at the first instance.
Following up
When a customer fails to complete a sale, it is a case of cart abandonment. Finding out the reason is not the easiest of things to do, because it can happen for a variety of reasons. To get to the root of the problem, just mail the visitor and politely ask what she expected and did not get from the site. One way of trying to get the customer back into the website is by offering an incentive for buying what she wanted to but did not. Of course, the ecommerce business can use its discretion and offer a discount with some conditions. This will act as a bait to get the abandoner back.
Stay in touch
Remember that any ecommerce business can think of being successful only when it is in the minds of its customers. This can happen when the business shows its customers that it is interested in them. There are some shoppers who register for updates and don’t turn up for some time. When you notice such a gap, you can write to them asking them why there have been no visits from them. When they still show no interest, you can assume that they are just casual visitors and can remove them from your mailing list. When a visitor is bombarded with unsolicited communication, you can be sure they are trashing your mails. So, be selective in sending out mails.

Words to avoid at promotions

A promotion is a sure-fire way of attracting customers to your ecommerce website. Promotions are usually occasional and don’t happen on a daily basis. The aim is to push a few products at a particular time of the year when customers are more likely to buy. While this is the primary aim; a promotion is also a way of making customers come back for more from time to time. Given that these are the twin intentions of a promotion, some care needs to be taken in the choice of words. Some words can have a magnetic effect on customers, while others would turn them off. Research has shown that a few words or expressions tend to be viewed unfavourably by the customer.
Pompous words!
Always remember that an ecommerce website is meant for selling products, and is not a place for showing off the depth of its vocabulary. For a creative person who may have spent a good deal of her career honing her writing skills, it is always difficult to suppress the urge to write creatively. But note the major difference –writing creatively is different from writing pompously. An ecommerce website is usually global and hence caters to customers who are from all parts of the world, many of whom are not native English speakers. Writing high-sounding, grandiloquent terms could deterthem from buying from the website. Keeping it simple and straight is the way to go.
Roundabout expressions
Selling a product does not need too muchmore detail than is necessary to make the visitor understand what the product is about. About the only information any visitor to an ecommerce website expects is what the product is about, and how it could help her.Anything more than that is not likely to make the customer any closer to the purchase. It is well known that web viewers’ attention span is much limited compared to that of readers of print. So, the faster you come to the point, the better.
A few must-avoid terms
A promotion is meant to attract as much as possible. There are some words that are known to be catchier than others. Try to model your promotions on these words and try to avoid some that are known to act as repellent factors. Some of the words any promotion must avoid to avoid being turned away are:
“No obligation”: This gives the impression that there is some hidden bait.
“Sign in”: This could scare a customer away because she might think that signing is a way of pulling her to the purchase.
“Deal”: When you use this word, this is likely to give the customer the impression that there is something deceptive about the whole sale.
“Buy today”: This, along with the related expression, “buy now”, can be quite a put-off. These expressions are almost like demanding the customer to buy.

Ways of getting seen on Amazon

For an ecommerce business, selling on eBay and Amazon is the shortcut for reaching out to nearly 300 million potential buyers, at least a tenth of whom are from the UK. When your ecommerce business can help you get across to such a huge marketplace from where you are seated; it is an opportunity that cannot be missed. But how does one make sure that the product you are going to place there among hundreds of others gets noticed? Keeping a few thumb rules in mind could go some way in helping your product crawl its way in these sites.
Categorise rightly
Categorising your product is a key to selling on these sites, especially Amazon. It is important to know where to place your product. This is what categorising is all about. Getting your product listed on these categories is often the first step in helping visitors to see your product. Getting this wrong can make the product confusing and out of place. No visitor is likely to make sense of a grouping that categorises cell phones with shoes. Categorising cell phones with say batteries and shoes with socks is simple common sense. This is the heart of the matter; there are several sub categories that refine the search further.
Usethe right terms for the products
Obviously, it goes without saying that the more apt the description of the product; the easier it is for visitors to get an idea of what they are looking for. With some experience, a business can get down the specific terms that online visitors use for products. It is important for the business to include words that don’t really confuse the visitor. The words and brand should be clear and the description of the product should be apt and to the point. Basically, the thumb rule is to understand that the buyer usually researches on these sites and does not just browse. Offer words and phrases that make this easy. Any description that is too lengthy or any word that is too high sounding is almost certain to take the visitor away from the product.
Make display attractive
This is another fundamental of any marketing, more so when you want to market on these sites to which there are hundreds of visitors at any point of time. It is a good idea to induce the visitor to see the product for herself. Having a photo or video of the product will complement the text. eBay has the gallery photo option. This is a way to open the auction bid on eBay attractively.

Easy ways of selling successfully on eBay and Amazon

Selling on eBay is not rocket science. It may at first sound intimidating to be able to stand out among hungry competitors, but a business should be more focused on the seemingly unlimited opportunity these websites offer. Like all other activities that one does over the long run, selling on eBaycan take a little time, since it has its own set of dynamics and subtleties, which one has to get a hold of. A person or business selling on eBay could implement a few simple and easy to implement steps that can serve as a basis for successful selling on these sites.
Know who your buyers are!
Knowing your market is as fundamental to selling on eBay as it is for a doctor to diagnose an ailment. This is the foundation on which the whole business is built. When you know which products you have, knowing who needs it should be intertwined with it. The product should be inseparable from the buyer, or else there is no point in having a product. When you are planning to sell several products, it is going to take some time for you to get a precise feel of who your buyers for these multiple products are. Although this can take time initially, once you get used to the brass tacks, it is easier for you to pitch your product.
Try to sell unique items
Once you have done considerable research on your market and have some idea of what sells and what does not, you can consider introducing unique items on your product list. If you have noticed that a buyer of furniture could be making consistent purchases. Keeping such a buyer, you could think if introducing an elegant wall painting to your collection. A small step like this is helpful in two important ways. First, it offers the buyer an option to buy a unique product that really supplements her tastes and preferences. Secondly, when the customer gets the impression that you respect her preferences, it is sure to bring about loyalty. A loyal customer is the best asset for any business.
Think of the long run
Selling on eBay and Amazon need not be only a fad. You could think of it as a serious option. But for that to happen, you have to be focused on being there in the long run. This calls for some planning and mix and match of the products from time to time. You would also be required to understand the market pulse, which will help you outdo your competitor. Like in all other businesses, when selling on eBay and Amazon, you will come across situations that are peculiar to this business. Persistence and intuitiveness is key.

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Ways of increasing sale value

Getting a visitor to buy on your ecommerce site is one aspect of marketing. Making this happen, although at times formidable, is only half the work done. Getting the customer to buy a higher value on each sale is the more important part for the business. If with all your efforts, a visitor ends up buying s soap when you would have liked her to purchase a jewellery item can be disappointing. Are there ways by which the value of a sale can be made to increase?
Entice the customer!
Making a customer buy more than she is prepared for qualifies as success in ecommerce marketing. The most effective way of doing this is by luring her into buying more than she intended to. The way to do this is to offer some incentives that will push her into making that extra purchase perceiving some value from it. If a customer were offered something like a discount on extra purchases but not on single items, it would make her think strongly about placing an order for that extra pack. If a 100-ounce moisturising lotion were to cost say £ 7 and the offer would be three packs for £ 16, the customer would be forced to seriously think of going in for the bundle, thinking of a saving of £ 5 on a product which is going to be used daily and whose requirement she would have anyway for a lot more time to come.
Associate products wisely
Another way of increasing the value of a purchase is to offer different but related products as incentive. This is what is popularly called cross selling. Here, the point to bear in mind is that products have to be associated judiciously. It is good to associate related or supplementary products rather than offer something that is in no way related to what is being purchased. It makes sense to cross sell a pair of socks with apparel, but to someone looking for a flower bouquet, socks would mean nothing. Even if a pair of socks is offered at a very attractive price, it would hardly catch the buyer’s attention, because her mind is focused on a totally different kind of product. This is where a little common sense can go a long way in increasing the value of the sale.
Other incentives
If it is not possible to associate products or cross sell in some circumstances, it will be a good idea for an ecommerce business to offer other kinds of incentives. One of the most popular options relates to delivery. Let us say a set of toiletries costs £ 20. If the cost of delivering it is £ 3; it could make the customer think twice. On the other hand,by offering free shipping for a purchase of three sets of the same item, you would offer the customer a strong reason to choose the three’s pack.
As you go about with your ecommerce business, you will learn that ingenuity is the name of the game. The more you experiment, the likelier you are of better results!

Spring a surprise on your customers!

Good marketing is all about coming up with intuitive ideas at the right time. These should be ideas that work, and should be driven by common sense. Many a time, a really simple idea can take the business places. One of these is the art of springing a surprise on your customers. This is a very smart and neat way of retaining and increasing customer loyalty. In ecommerce, it is all the more relevant because the customer is liable to leave the site at any time and hop to another with utmost ease and without notice, at a far greater ease than a customer to a physical store can.
The art of springing a good surprise
By the expression, “springing a surprise”, what is meant is not offering a 50 per cent discount during Christmas and New Year. This is something every business does, and carries no element of surprise. On the other hand, a surprise on a customer is when there is no particular occasion for it. If you have noticed that a middle aged male has been frequenting your ecommerce business for items like say perfumes, a real pleasant surprise on him would be to send him a free pack of a well-known brand of after shave lotion. The out-of-the-blue element is the real icing on the cake. This is one of the nicest pleasant shocks you can administer on your established customer.
Benefits of springing surprises
A well-sprung surprise is one of the best gestures with which you can rest assured that the customer is going to be really delighted. Figure yourself in the customer’s shoes. How would you feel if you bought a pair of jeans and T-shirts at a store, and a few days later, you receive a parcel containing a pair of shoes? Wouldn’t you feel like hugging the shopkeeper? Here lies the biggest benefit of springing a surprise –you have earned a customer for life, almost.
Who to surprise?
One question that an ecommerce business needs to consider is this: If it chooses to surprise, who does it surprise? It is advisable to try this out on some long-time customers. It is for two reasons. One, this is a customer whose tastes and preferences you are pretty familiar with. Two, this is a way of rejuvenating an existing relationship. Springing a surprise on a fairly new customer is not likely to bring in too many results not only because you don’t know for how long she is going to stay a customer; you are also likely to gift the wrong item to a new customer! Moreover, doing this on a customer who has just started shopping on your website is likely to make her expect more in the future.

Measuring customer satisfaction in ecommerce business

One of the toughest questions that ecommerce businesses face concerns what is at the heart of a business –customer satisfaction. At first glance, anyone doing ecommerce business or having an interest for this subject may wonder if the idea of customer satisfaction exists at all in ecommerce. The reason for this doubt is well founded –when the customer is not at all seen, how does one get to know the level of satisfaction she enjoyed while shopping?
Keep in touch with the customer!
Drawing the visitor to the website and getting her to complete the purchase is one aspect of ecommerce. Once the visitor buys a product and becomes a customer, it starts a whole new dynamics of the relationship. It is from here that the ecommerce business should start thinking of customer satisfaction. The customer may not have shopped by being physically present at the store, but no purchase is complete without some information about the customer. Using the contact information, the business can start understanding the level of satisfaction she derived from the sale.
Start at the beginning
The easiest way to start measuring customer satisfaction is by asking how the customer felt about the shopping experience.A simple, courteous “Thank you for shopping from our site” could be a good beginning. It could be customised to include the shopper’s name, making it more personal and likeable. A few days later, the actual work of measuring satisfaction could begin.
Customer satisfaction surveys
One of the most effective ways of understanding customers’ perceptions towards the ecommerce shopping experience is to invite them to take a survey. Notice the word “invite” here: Unfortunately, no matter how important it is for the ecommerce business to have the customer take up a post-purchase survey; the customer is not obliged to do it. She can only be requested to take one up. The mail inviting her to take up the survey could say as much, while adding that a few minutes spent on completing the survey could enhance her shopping experience greatly.
Continuous exercise
Keeping in touch with the customer after she has purchased the product from your ecommerce website has to be done on a regular, continuous basis. And importantly, it has to also be done with repeat customers. When an ecommerce keeps getting responses from its customers on a regular basis and analyses their feedback dispassionately and seriously, it can be certain that it has a good measure of what customers feel about the way it does business. It helps the business to take important decisions. For instance, a new introduction of a product, such a quintessential feature of engaging the customer; can be decided based on what the customer may feel about it. In ecommerce, it may not be possible to quantify customer satisfaction, but taking steps like the ones mentioned above can lead to qualitative analysis –a better barometer for the business.

Making customers out of visitors

What a fantasy it is for any businessman to have all visitors becoming customers! If the art of converting visitors into customers were simple, business would have been fun. But real life business is no fantasy. Undoubtedly, one of the biggest challenges of any business is converting visitors into customers. How does an ecommerce business make this happen? Although it is not always easy or possible to ensure that everyone who visits your site becomes a buyer; a few methods can be tried.
Get your basics right!
The cornerstone of a good business is inknowing your customer. This is the base on which the business builds its ability to convert a visitor into a customer. The ecommerce business should know who its customers are, what age group it is trying to target, what that age group’s interests are and so on. This is the first step to finessing the art of making customers out of visitors. The greater the business’ clarity about what it is selling; the higher the chances that it could get visitors to buy. If an ecommerce website is targeting the college going market, it should have a sense of what its customers look for. This will help it sell products that its niche market segment could find difficult to refuse buying. Designing the site according the target market’s tastes and preferences, placing products or services at the right location, making usability easy and other related aspects are supplementary to a clear understanding of who an ecommerce business’ customers are and what they want.
Think, think, think!
Any business that has its ears to the ground will know what its customers want. It would clearly know what is selling on its site and what is not. It can study trends for a while and then start making changes into the site accordingly. It a particular product is moving, it can introduce its variants. It a product is not moving, it can perhaps think of giving offers on them. This way, an ecommerce business can juggle its strengths and weaknesses and be sure it makes its visitors buy what they are looking for. Analytics are a good guide to tell what kind of product is selling where; but a good gut feel is a better guide.
Be inventive inequipping visitors with knowledge of products!
Pushing a visitor into a sale is not always possible with just a one or two-line description of a product. Remember –an ecommerce website does not have a salesman prodding and convincing a visitor about the need for a product. So, the product description should take the place of the smart salesman. It should have just the information that will make buyers take well-grounded decisions on the purchase. Make the product description appear like it is specific to that person, even if it is a generic product. Try to give the customer information that makes her understand what is in it for her.

Assess your own ecommerce business quantitatively

Understanding where you stand is one of the most important elements of an ecommerce business. An important way of gauging customer satisfaction is in understanding what they feel about how they felt shopping in your site. This is qualitative and subjective; a more tangible way of measuring this is by using a few parameters. These may not be the most definitive guide to assessing your ecommerce business; but it helps to get some idea of where your ecommerce business is headed.
Number of visitors
This is one of the simplest and easiest methods to know how well you fare in the industry. It is simple common sense that if you are receiving a high number of visitors, your popularity is high, and vice versa. Getting the number of visitors who visit your site is a parameter no doubt, but the ecommerce business needs to use this as just a beginning point. An ecommerce website can have thousands of visitors, but few customers. The business needs to analyse why visitors are not becoming customers. This will give it a good idea of how to fine tune its business.
Cart abandonment
This is another important metric to assess the position of your ecommerce business. This is one of the most common problems ecommerce businesses face. Analysing why there is cart abandonment can go a long way in understanding how well your business is doing. There may be a good number of visitors, but when many of them do not go on to complete the deal, then the underlying reasons for it have to be analysed and corrective steps taken. One way of doing this is in mailing these customers back to find out what is it that prevented them going ahead with the purchase.
Number of registered users
Another important parameter of how your ecommerce business is doing is the number of registered users to the website. Registered users are akin to subscribers in that they are keenly interested in the website. Sending out details of offers to registered users is one of the common ways by which an ecommerce business can expect to grow. The trick is to make a neat profile of these customers and keep sending them information about offers and other related aspects of the business. An ecommerce business would ideally like to expand on this list of registered users from time to time. The greater the number of registered users who come to the site consistently and shop on it, the bigger it is a measure of the site’s popularity.

Making shopping baskets effective

The online shopping bag
In the online shopping space, the shopping basketor the shopping cart may be likened to the shopping bag of physical shopping. In ecommerce, it is the virtual bag you carry to the online store. Just as you pick up your shopped items and put them into the bag and have them billed at the counter; the shopping basket is the place in which you place all your selected items. Although modelled on the shopping bag, the shopping basket comes with a few extra features. Unlike the shopping bag which is more a utility item, the shopping basket should also be equipped with a few aspects of its own.
The extra little
If your shopping bag or trolley is the source into which you put your selected items, the shopping basket is the same, except that it has a system of real time billing. In physical shopping, you don’t get to value the bill with every item you shop for, while this happens in the online shopping basket. This is obviously because it runs on software designed for this.
Combination of effectiveness and aesthetics
The shopping basket is one of the most important elements of an ecommerce website.The shopping basket, being what it is, requires a fine combination of utility and looks to enhance the shopping experience. Since the shopping basket is a source of near total information about the product, online shopping websites would need to be made both attractive and effective.
Scope for many features
A good shopping basket could facilitate a number of thoughtful features. One of the primary features of a shopping basket should be to give the shopper the option of making changes into their shopping list. This is one of the main ways by which the basket looks friendly. This feature is where you could decide what to go for and what to discard. The basket should also have all important details of the product, in a way that makes the online shopping easier. When the total value of the purchase is made known with the purchase of each item, it is that much easier for the online shopper to decide on whether to go ahead with the items or not. It can also have details such as the unit price, the tax as applicable, and the shipping rates and so on.
Other utilities
Another important feature it could have is that of available stocks, which will be another important component of decision making by the shopper. The shopping basket should be made accessible from any page of the website, so that viewers are not left searching for it. Also, there should be space for virtual window shopping, as would be done in real shopping. These are a few of the simple, yet effective ways in which the shopping basket can make for a good experience.

How important is customer service in ecommerce?

Customer service in online selling –an oxymoron?
Some people are sure to frown at this title, because it seems kind of contradiction in terms. Some others are likely to dismiss it, asking if there is such a thing as customer service in ecommerce. Where is the scope forcustomer service in ecommerce? How on earth is customer service imaginable in a business in which the customer is faceless and whom the business never gets to see?
Customer service is indispensable for ecommerce
Anyone asking these questions betrays perhaps the highest ignorance about ecommerce. It is often thought, terribly wrongly, that the ecommerce software does all the work that salesmen are supposed to. There could perhaps be no greater misconception about ecommerce. In fact, if there is one space in which customer service is as critical an aspect of business as say marketing, it is the online space. The logic for this is simple –it is only because of ecommerce that you see the invisible customer who is all the more difficult to please and retain!
Customer service starts much before the sale happens
So, how does an ecommerce business carry out customer service? What are the aspects of business that require customer service? In an offline business, if customer service starts when a product is sold, in the ecommerce industry, it starts much earlier. It starts with tracking a potential customer and answering questions about the product, all of which happen much before the product. Here is how –customer service starts with phone calls to the customer who has shown an interest for a product. The next stages, namely emailing and ensuring that the product is to the exact specifications of the customer request also require customer service. The exact way in which the shipping was requested for has to be fulfilled, which also is another important aspect of customer service.
Post sale customer service
Customer service does not end in ecommerce with selling the product. After this is done, the customer has to be serviced. After the product is shipped, the sales team has to make sure the product consignment was fine and that it reached the right person in the address provided. This is normally never the case with offline selling, because these businesses need not worry where the buyer takes the product! When there are returns, customer service is required. This is how customer service is an extremely crucial aspect of ecommerce.

Understanding channel conflict and dealing with it

For an ecommerce business, channel conflict is often a major problem. Defined by businessdictionary.com as a “situation when a producer or supplier bypasses the normal channel of distribution and sells directly to the end user”, channel conflict can be a potential cause for clash between channel partners, because the distributors get the feeling that they are being overlooked, leading to a loss of business.
The dynamics of channel conflict
Channel conflict is an unhealthy practice in ecommerce, and leads to a unique situation by which a business associate can become both a partner and a competitor. A prime reason for channel conflict is that both the partners’ business is carried out over the Net, which means that businesses could be partners; but could hardly have seen each other. They could be operating in different continents and could still be related to each other by business. Also referred to as disintermediation, channel conflict is a tempting proposition because partners can make direct contact with the seller and make a greater margin, as the channel costs are cut down.
History of channel conflict
Channel conflict began with the emergence of ecommerce. With the advent of this medium, distributors, who were the channel between the seller and buyer, started losing their importance, since their need was no longer as important as earlier. A costumer, instead of going to a shop which the distributor ran, could order online and get it delivered. This caused disquiet with the distributors, who tried to assert themselves by trying to show that they still had importance. Some distributors hit back by transforming themselves into distribution and logistical channels, which are very important for an ecommerce business. Some others devised a strategy of taking on supplemental roles such as order management.
The customer is the arbitrator
The customer is the one who finally decides how these conflicting interests converge. If she decides that it is best to have the product delivered through a distributor, then it is best for both to accept the need for each other. If the customer decides otherwise and thinks that no intermediary is needed, then the two partners need to devise ways by which they can contribute towards a harmonious business relationship, in which both get a share of what they agreed on. In essence, they need to collaborate and complement each other rather than be engaged in conflict, which will cause ruin to everyone –the partners and worse, the customer.

Strategising at the time of setting up an ecommerce business

The decision to migrate from a brick and mortar store to an online ecommerce store is a momentous one for a business. The same goes for a business that is about to start an ecommerce site altogether afresh. When taking a decision of this magnitude, it always pays to do some homework, because a business plan that goes awry is bad for the morale and the financial health of the company.
Am I prepared for it?
This should perhaps be the foremost question a business should ask itself before it embarks upon the idea of starting an ecommerce business or migrating to one. This of course, is a question a person starting any business has to ask herself, but is all the more pertinent to ask in ecommerce, because the entire dynamics of switching from a brick and mortar to an ecommerce business is different. It is a kind of acculturation, because very little, or nothing at all, of all that you did so religiously in the previous business is of relevance anymore. So, it pays to make the groundwork for the eventual transition.
Introspect, consult
The best way to go ahead and do this is to think of your strengths and weaknesses in relation to aptitude, talent, resources and the market dynamics. It is a good idea to consult someone you know who has entered the business. You could also talk to a person who has some idea about the business, even if she has not actually tried her hand at it. Or, if you can afford it, it is a great idea to get the opinion of experts, who will tell you thread bare what the business is all about and what it takes. It you think you have it in you to take it up, take the plunge.
How far is it going to take me?
Ecommerce as an industry is certainly here to stay. It is not likely to go out of the reckoning any time soon. Having said this, when someone wants to get into the business, it is a great idea to look at how far you can get in this line of business. The way to look at it is to see what kind of business you plan to do on the Net. Some of the questions you could ask yourself could be: For how much time are people going to buy my product/s? Can I handle the competition? What share of the market pie can I hope to get, and what does it take for it? An important aspect that is peculiar to this business is that it is completely technology-driven. This means that it is almost always in a state of flux. Can I hold my own in changing times?
Now, take the call!
Once you have a clear strategy that straddles all these areas and many more that you could find on the way to starting an ecommerce business or changing your existing one to that, you will be well placed to take a decision. A well-judged decision is at the core of any success, and so it is for your ecommerce, as well.

What kinds of ecommerce business should have daily deals?

One of the most effective ways by which an ecommerce business can make a good turnover is by offering deals. Which customer would not like a good offer? If a customer can buy three trousers at the price of two, it would have the ecommerce website up and busy, with the cash registers ringing all the time. The prospect of a good offer is as tempting for an online shopper as it is for a shopper in a physical store. Yet, no matter how beneficial it may be for an ecommerce business to rope in customers with offers; there is no universal rule about them. While most products are perfect for offers, only some are suited for daily deals. There is a big difference between those that can be offered on a daily basis and those whose frequency needs to be on the lower side.
Those that click…
An ecommerce website is sure to attract a lot of hits if it offers daily deals on products like consumer items. No individual or family can subsist without a purchase of soaps, toothpastes, hand washes and groceries. Of these, one can rest assured that the items that could sell like hot cakes if offered as daily deals are toiletries. Customers are almost certain to find offers like one mouthwash free for three toothpastes enticing.
And those that don’t…
There are several products that people use frequently, although not on a day-to-day basis. One of the first such examples that come to mind is merchandising items. We all have a fancy for shopping bags, caps, shoes and apparels. But we would rarely look for offers day in and day out. An ecommerce business will not expect to do too well at putting up such goods on a daily deals basis.
Blending for better business
A mix and match policy makes sense for ecommerce businesses that sell both items that are offered on daily deals and those that are offered less frequently. In the course of offering daily deal items, an ecommerce business can selectively also push in other items unobtrusively. It can offer a dangling carrot of a merchandising item; say a T-shirt or goggles, for X amount of groceries bought. This way, it not only stimulates the sale of day-to-day items; it also keeps the customer’s interest high with occasional offers on products she does not need daily. This way, not only does the business grow by pushing less frequently bought items; it can retain customers, because they will like to visit for specific offers from time to time.