How to Launch an eCommerce Site in Just 14 Days
When you launch an eCommerce site, you immediately add a revenue stream to your business. You create ways for customers to buy from you without visiting your physical storefront.
Yet, many brick-and-mortar businesses put off launching an online store.
Maybe it’s because they think they don’t need one, their customers don’t want one, or that launching an eCommerce website is too complicated, expensive, or difficult. But, the truth is: almost every business can benefit from and quickly launch an eCommerce website.
When you have an eCommerce site:
Your business is open 24-hours-a-day, seven-days-a-week which allows you to sell all day, every day.
You can continue to make sales in the event of a major marketing pivot or business disruption that shuts your physical doors.
You can sell to customers across the country (or the world), instead of just to nearby shoppers.
You can sell gift certificates even if you don’t sell products to drive additional revenue for your service-based business.
These benefits outweigh the perceived difficulties of launching an eCommerce website. Whether you’re a new business or an existing one, it’s never too complicated, expensive, or difficult to launch an eCommerce site.
Here’s how you can start selling products online in just 14 days.
Days 1-4: Collect Your Assets
Getting organized early is key to quickly launching an eCommerce website. Get all of the assets together that you will need. This includes:
Brand assets such as logos, color palettes, and font schemes.
Brand guidelines that outline audience segments, voice, tone, and branded terms.
High-quality product images shot from multiple angles.
Product descriptions that introduce all product features as benefits. A little bit of keyword research will help identify how your audience is searching for your products.
Don’t rush through this process. Take your time and make sure you know your brand and audience segments well and are approaching your site copy to clearly fill your target audience’s needs and pain points.
Day 5: Select an eCommerce Platform
Even if you already have a website, you will need to add a platform that turns your site into an eCommerce store. To create an eCommerce store, you need product pages, a shopping cart, and payment processing.
Shopify and Squarespace are two popular eCommerce platforms that we love. Browse their templates, and choose your favorite. (Find out why Shopify is our favorite.)
Day 6-10: Add Products
In days one through four, you collected and created product images and descriptions so this step should be easy.
Go into your eCommerce system and add all product information, photos, and pricing to create sales pages for your offerings. Remember to keep your target audience in mind, and position all pages to show how your offerings help customers resolve pain points and challenges.
Day 11: Setup Technical Details
Once your products are added, ensure that overall eCommerce settings are in place.
Set up your merchant account so you can receive payments.
Review your shipping and fulfillment expectations and build a relationship with your shipping vendor. Ensure that the time and cost are realistic for you and your customers.
Check to make sure analytics and customer acquisition tracking are in place.
Other technical details may include a proper privacy policy and service agreement pages.
Day 12: Program Automated Emails
Automated emails triggered by user action are pivotal for your eCommerce store. They share sales information with customers and also help you increase sales and improve customer experience.
Set up:
Thank you emails with receipts and shipping estimations for customer records.
Abandoned cart emails that go to shoppers who put an item in their cart but didn’t complete their purchase.
Cross-sell emails that feature products or services that are related to a customer’s recent purchase.
Emails with coupons and other incentives for purchasing if a customer hasn’t returned to your shop in a few weeks.
Survey emails can also be helpful for listening to customer feedback.
Day 12-13: Conduct Quality Assurance
The last thing you want to happen is for an engaged customer to visit your site and not be able to make a purchase because the shop doesn’t work. So, conduct a deep quality-assurance assessment.
Go through your eCommerce site on your own and act like a customer. Also, ask colleagues and family members to use it and give feedback.
Read all of the content (even the fine details).
Click on everything to see how customers can get lost.
Test purchases in the demo site to ensure that everything processes properly.
Day 14: Soft Launch Your Site
As you build your site, you’ll discover many awesome features or website content that you want to include on your site. It’s important to delineate between “must-haves” and “like-to-haves” prior to your launch. Don’t get hung up on the like-to-haves. Get what you need to quickly launch, and know that you can come back to add the like-to-haves.
Once you have the must-haves, share it with your audience.
Start with a soft launch, and use your current distribution channels to call and email your current customers. By starting with a soft launch, you can identify potential problems and user experience issues before driving too much traffic to the site through amplification efforts.
Day 14+: Iterate, Evolve, Grow, and Promote
Take what you learn in the soft launch and use it to iterate, evolve, and grow. Every site is in constant evolution. Yours should be too. Learn from the analytics and your customers buying behaviors, and listen to what customers are saying. Take what you learn to make site changes and adjust. This is also the time when you can return to your list of nice-to-haves and continue to build out the site to your full vision.
And, continue to spread the word. Once you know that your site is effectively selling to customers and offering a positive customer experience, promote it to a larger audience. Run Google Ads and paid social media posts to drive both past and new customers to your new eCommerce store.
Launch Your eCommerce Site in Just 14 Days
Don’t sell your business short by thinking that you don’t need an eCommerce website or that it’s not worth the effort.
An eCommerce website creates an additional revenue stream that can support your business and help it grow and reach new customers. Follow these steps to launch an eCommerce site in just 14 days. And, if you need help with the process, let us know.
SpotOn Digital offers full website development services that can help you, whether you are adding an online store to an existing site or starting from scratch. Contact SpotOn today to see how we can help you quickly launch an eCommerce site and start selling online right away.