Crucial considerations for enterprise eCommerce platform decision
Within the last five years, the rise of eCommerce platforms has been phenomenal such that every second we are bombarded by different products. Nevertheless, it will be wrong to assume that everything about online shopping lies in business-to-customer (B2C) platforms alone. Recent studies from Forrester Research show that the United States business-to-business eCommerce industry will reach over $1.3 trillion over the next five years. In other words, this figure will double the B2C market size. Therefore, to acquire a B2B buyer, you need to provide a seamless and customized shopping experience that comes with automation. To up your game and win in this ever-competitive industry, you need to provide a self-service option for B2B buyers. To do that, you need to consider the enterprise eCommerce platform you would use. What is a B2B eCommerce Platform? Business to business eCommerce is an online platform where the parties involved are businesses. What facilitates the transaction is the eCommerce platform, which is a software-based solution. The software is responsible for presenting and providing relevant information to increase sales. What to consider for enterprise eCommerce Platform? Cost The first thing to consider is the cost of acquiring the platform because a hosted solution will cost more. It comes with the software fees, development costs, maintenance cost of hosting the platform, and the IT team costs. Furthermore, Paas or SaaS platform often requires monthly fees for support, hosting, maintenance, and security. You need to consider these as they will help you determine the overall cost of operating the software. Security Security of the eCommerce platform must be top-notch. Today, the rise of online theft and hacking is on the rise, and you need a platform that offers security for your business. Here, you have to consider if it is your responsibility or a third-party team to maintain the security of your platform. Most cloud-based platforms offer client security since the data is on their servers. It means they are responsible for managing your security. Maintenance What maintenance features does the eCommerce platform offer? Here, you have to consider if it performs routine check out on the platform or you have to schedule maintenance on the system manually Features, add-ons, integrations Integration is an important thing to consider when choosing an eCommerce platform. It should effectively integrate the platform with other systems to enable it to work both online and offline. If you have a well-integrated platform, it will allow you to deliver a better customer experience. When analyzing different platforms, you need to check if the platform can work with POS or ERP systems. Most eCommerce platforms have a trial period that you should take the most advantage of. Moreover, don’t miss out on maximizing efficiency for your stores. Try our automation apps for free: BigCommerce Automation, Shopify Automation. Customization Customization allows you to customers various aspects of the platform. You can enable you to customer business units, product lists, and individual customers or buyers. Analysis shows that over 75% of business-to-business brands increase sales when they provide a customizable customer experience. Most times, eCommerce stores fail because of their rigidity and decision to depend on a particular template. However, there is no one size fits all solution to meeting the needs of customers for any business. Therefore, when choosing an eCommerce platform, ensure it allows customizable experienced instead of using an already-made template. Further reading: Comparing top B2B eCommerce platforms.
Types Of Automation Apps For eCommerce Store
Automation apps allow you to manage your campaign and marketing process through several channels without using any manual execution. For example, marketers can send customers automated messages via social media, email marketing, messenger marketing, and SMS in just one click. Automation is an absolute solution for the hectic task of fulfilling customer needs. However, it’s not easy automation every process at the same time. Therefore, businesses often start small with certain aspects of their work. There are several automation apps to boost productivity, optimize daily operations, and drive higher sales. This section will explore some of the few automation apps you can integrate into your eCommerce stores. Chat marketing automation One mistake store owners often make is to kick start their automation process without understanding what they need to automate. Therefore, before you invest in any platform, you need to identify what your business is struggling with. With automation, you can easily qualify and nurture leads. However, the potential might come from anywhere. How do you take advantage of different sources of traffic? You can utilize chat marketing automation, which helps speed up the sales cycle and reduce friction. It also helps strengthen the post-purchase relationships with your customers. Email marketing automation Email marketing is a crucial aspect of your marketing strategy. There are scads of tools available at your disposal to set up your email marketing automation. At the basic level, it means sending emails to your customers, regardless of transactional, promotional, or conversational campaigns. Email marketing automation tools can tag your customers based on predetermined criteria and trigger email campaigns without human intervention. Then you can channel your resource and time to other essential things. You might also want to customize your email templates to boost conversion rates and improve your brand engagement. CRM automation Another essential automation app to integrate your eCommerce store is related to customer relationship management. The CRM automation leverages your customer services by actively engaging in customer retention. Additionally, it allows you to track customer interaction across multiple channels. In other words, a good CRM automation system helps strengthen relationships with your customers and improve sales effectiveness. Facebook advertising automation Facebook offers different types of ads with several goals. Brands often run multiple Facebook campaigns at the same time to identify which type of ads work better. Though effective, this takes up a lot of time every day. Therefore, one optimal solution is to integrate your Facebook account with an automation app. This helps boost your sales strategy while saving you a lot of time and effort. Additionally, you can combine it with CRM software to generate one-by-one conversations with potential leads. Workflow automation Automating your business workflows helps in streamlining your processes to stay productive without requiring any human support. Workflow automation allows store owners to improve customer experience, boost efficiency, and gain insight through different marketing channels. Workflow automation apps can be regarded as a combination of all the abovementioned platforms. It creates a centralized management system where you can automate your store without switching between different apps. If you’re looking for an effective workflow automation solution, we’re running on a free forever plan for Atom8 Automation. Try it out today and have your work done under just one click.
Best Shopify Apps To Increase Sales
Shopify makes it easier for business owners to set up their stores and sell things online. Additionally, it offers over a hundred apps that foster business growth. This huge number is confusing for any store owner, let alone newcomers. To help you get everything set up appropriately, we have researched the best Shopify apps to increase sales. Using Shopify plugins helps extend the functionality of your store. The best thing is that these small Shopify add-ons can be installed quickly in your online store. Using these apps allows you to promote your products, store, handle inventory, reward customers, and shipping to increase sales. Oberlo Oberlo is one of the best Shopify apps that provide a streamlined supply chain from the wholesaler to end customers. On the one hand, the app is connected with a marketplace where you can search for direct suppliers for your store. On the other hand, it allows you to receive an order and fulfill it through dropshipping customers. OptinMonster OptinMonster is the best Shopify app to convert visitors into customers, which then increases your sales volume. The app helps you create stunning visual features to be attached to your website. This will reduce cart abandonment, increase email newsletter signups, and drive sales and revenue. You can also adjust any element in real-time so as to optimize the conversion rate. TrustPulse TrustPulse is one of the best Shopify apps when it comes to social proof. People are more likely to shop in a store with high reliability and transparency. Therefore, stimulating trust from previous customers is very important to attract new ones. Using TrustPulse can increase your conversion rate by 20%. The key feature of the TrustPulse Shopify app is real-time tracking for demo registrations, purchases, and email lists. Furthermore, you can always match your brand with actionable analytics to boost your conversion. Drip Drip is a simple but powerful marketing tool that can integrate perfectly with your eCommerce store. The app allows for automating email campaigns and dividing your subscribers into different segments. It also enables you to quickly gather feedback from customers and set up abandoned cart email campaigns. Additionally, the dashboard with detailed analytics helps you identify the performance of each campaign. Atom8 Atom8 is one of the best workflow automation apps on Shopify. The app allows you to convert repetitive tasks into workflows that execute whenever needed. Some of the app features are: Auto-publish products Auto-categorize orders according to value, locations, etc Auto-segment customer based on demographics, spending, the total number of order, etc Auto-tag customers on CRM, email marketing, and delivery platforms Auto-generate reports & lists on Google Sheet Auto-notify of low-stock items, abandoned cart, or high-value orders Auto-detect and halt high-risk orders With Atom8, you can streamline your store activities and have a centralized control system. By effectively running your store with the best Shopify apps, you’ll have more time to invest in sales strategy to drive higher revenue. We’re running on Free Forever Plan. Check out the app today and enjoy the work done.
How To Build Your BigCommerce Website
Setting up your eCommerce website is an integral part of your business. You don’t want to ignore this process. Otherwise, it will affect your customer experience, growth, and sales. While creating your website from scratch requires lots of effort, you can consider using premade eCommerce platforms such as BigCommerce. Most of these platforms come with unique features and add-ons that allow you to integrate them into your store. Notwithstanding the option you choose, the website doesn’t just complete itself. This blog will guide you through the seven steps to set up your site. Create a detailed plan You must always have a concrete plan before you start with your eCommerce website. Any mistake during this period will negatively affect your performance. In other words, a rigorous plan would save you precious time, effort, and resources. One important part of your plan is the resources, which include both human and technical resources. You must know who will be in charge of each stage of your website, who runs the daily affair, and what other things will be needed. Once you create a detailed plan, you can start transforming your plan into reality. Choose a platform Before jumping to a decision, make sure you check out all available options. Every platform has its strengths and drawback and might serve some demands better than others. If you have a strong IT department and want to have full control to build your website, Magento and alike would be a good choice. But if you want to get things done quickly, consider website providers such as Shopify and BigCommerce. These platforms offer unique features and functionalities that can ease your shipping and fulfillment process. Choose and setup domain name It would help if you chose a domain name that suits your brand. The domain name is what distinguishes your store from others. For instance, shoe stores often include the word “shoes” in their name. Clearly, it’s better to use www.bestshoes.com instead of www.buyanything.com. You need to give your store identity, such that once a visitor sees the domain name, they understand the kind of business you are into. Adding products, categories, content After selecting a theme, you need to add content, categories, and products to your new BigCommerce website. When writing product descriptions, don’t forget to optimize the content according to SEO guidelines. This makes it stress-free for customers to find your products when they do a search online. You should also give as detailed a description of your products as possible, including the product name, price, color, size, weight, and dimension. Furthermore, you might want to upload a high-resolution video and photos for customers to get a feel of what they want to buy. Test and launch Before onboarding your website, you need to preview and test all important functions to ascertain everything is working perfectly. It will turn off your customers when they access your page only to discover a particular section of your site isn’t working. In your testing, make sure to check the compatibility and workability on both mobile and desktop devices. Some points to keep in mind is: Are the product photos and descriptions appearing as they should? Is the website responsive? Is the checkout page is working seamlessly? Are the shipping and payment integration working perfectly? Once all of these works well, you can launch your website immediately.
Memorial Day Promotion Ideas 2021
Memorial Day is the day to honour fallen soldiers and an unofficial mark of summers. Small eCommerce businesses see it as an opportunity to attract new customers and increase sale. These businesses take advantage of Memorial Day by running promotion campaigns to earn more revenues. Here are some of the ideas to run as promotions on Memorial Day. Join a BBQ or Outdoor Events People often have a day off and are looking for a place to chill out. Thus there cannot be a better day to host an outdoor event to attract visitors. A party on the beach or a barbecue event, or a picnic in a park would do. Create email templates tailored as an invitation for Memorial Day promotion events. List all the fun activities like raffles or giveaways in your email templates to arouse your customers’ interest. You can also free samples or one-day discounts to people who attend your party. Highlight summer-related items Memorial Day is the best time to launch summer-related merchandise. Send emails to customers to remind them you are the go-to eCommerce store for Memorial Day goods. In fact, you can run Memorial Day-themed promotions with a focus on the summer season on your website. You can also offer them discounts or start a sale. You can craft email campaigns to highlight special summer discounts or to announce new launches on Memorial Day. Create a one-day deal for veterans Craft a new email template with a Memorial Day background, to send out to Veterans with promotional offers for them. One popular theme for this day is patriotism with red, blue and white colours. Offer special Memorial Day promotion discounts, giveaways or freebies to honour veterans on purchasing from your eCommerce store. Another approach would be offering an exclusive one-day deal for veterans, active military members, and their families will make them feel appreciated and show you care for the community. Happy Hour Happy hours are those special hours of the day when a customer gets a particular discount or offer on making a purchase. So, have happy hours on Memorial Day to offer an extra discount on every purchase. Use it as a topic for email marketing campaigns Email marketing campaigns never hurt your business and are a great way to engage with your customers. Send out emails to your audience with a promotional offer or an event or contests or giveaways. Memorial Day is a perfect occasion to also collect emails of visitors on your website by asking them to register in return for discounts etc. So, design memorable, engaging and personalised emails with Memorial Day promotion offers and send them to your customers to re-engage with them and offer them an incentive to make purchases from you. Conclusion Memorial Day is one of the big shopping weekends of the year. Small e-commerce businesses offer extra holiday day discounts on this day to attract new customers.
