If you want to get the best out of your eCommerce website, you must consider many factors before its development. These factors will determine the success of the project and how well the website will represent your brand and drive user engagement.
Remember, the purpose of your eCommerce website is to expand your reach and increase your customer base. You also want to provide a platform where those customers can locate, choose and pay for your company products. If you don’t achieve these goals after launching the website, the whole project becomes a waste of time and funds.
So, let’s explore some of those things you must focus on when developing your website.
Factors to Consider in eCommerce Website development
- Suitability of the Website Design
The website design you choose can make or mar your business. If your design doesn’t represent what you’re selling, it will not attract the attention of your target niche. Moreover, every company has its branding style. It might be the color, image, logo, texts, or arrangements.
So, when developing a ecommerce marketplace for your company, make sure that the design matches your brand image. Also, ensure that the website is suitable for the products you’re offering to visitors. Don’t choose a design that tells a different story from what your products are saying otherwise you have to redesign the project. Moreover, don’t forget the shopping cart. The layout must be easy to understand and navigate for a good user experience.
If you’re confused about which design to use, do a little research to that effect. You can check a lot of design agencies ‘ work, such as a portfolio of e-commerce website by Keen To Design, to get inspiration for color concepts and the latest design trends.
- User’s Security and Privacy on the Website
When we talk about eCommerce websites, it means a marketplace where sellers and buyers exchange goods and services for money. This means that sensitive data are also shared between the vendors and buyers on the site. For instance, a buyer will often disclose their credit card or debit card details on the website to pay for the goods or services. The vendor will also store the data of these customers and important details of his products on the site.
So, all the parties have something to lose if there’s a data breach. This is why security is of utmost interest at the beginning of the development phase. For example, the eCommerce website owner has to protect his buyers’ data from hackers who can steal and sell them to competitors. In addition, he has to ensure that people who buy from the website are not exposed to viruses or phishing links that will compromise their privacy. So, from the onset, decide on the security measures to put in place to protect user’s data on your site. Failure to do that will attract penalties from Google and even a loss of customers for your company.
It is equally important to communicate your site’s security measures and data sharing practices with your users. Your website should have up-to-date policy pages such as a privacy policy and cookie policy page. Similarly, data privacy laws like the GDPR, CCPA and LGPD require websites to implement cookie consent. In order to avoid compliance risks and earn your customer’s trust, you should implement a cookie consent banner, keep a record of user consent and generate policy pages for your website.
- Search Engine Optimization Approach
If your eCommerce website is not visible, it will be hard to attract more customers. There are lots of things that help to optimize a website for the Google search engine. Some of them include industry-related keywords, fast page loading speed, security, the responsiveness of the design on different devices, etc. Also, optimization involves link building, using a mobile-friendly web design, strategizing content, etc.
In fact, from time to time, Google updates these requirements, and it will be great to check them out during the development stage. A web development company atlanta can help you make sure that the pages load faster and that the keywords, descriptions, images, titles all meet the requirements of the search engines.
So, we recommend that you hire an SEO expert from the start to manage all the activities that will push your site to the frontline. He/she will help to ensure that everything is working correctly.
- Secure and Fast Payment gateway
Every eCommerce website is for buying and selling. Site visitors must pay for something on the site through a third-party payment gateway. The security and efficiency of the service you choose will boost user experience and drive more patronage.
So, make sure you use the best in the industry and make your customers happy. Also, research properly to find a secure service that won’t compromise your customers.
Some popular ones right now include PayPal, Amazon Pay, American Express, Stripe, 2Checkout, Braintree, Authorize.Net, WePay, etc. Also, with the popularity of the cryptocurrency industry, you can still consider some of the gateways available that support it.
- Registration or Guest Checkout
Here is another factor that you need to consider from the beginning. Will you want your customers to register before buying or buy and pay without registration? Each of these options has advantages and disadvantages.
For instance, the registration approach might give you customer data to work with, but it will discourage them from buying your products. Many people who are time conscious want to purchase and go their way without opening an account. So, decide earlier on which approach works best for your business.
Conclusion
If you want to get the best results from your eCommerce website, consider the factors we shared above. Getting them right is crucial to the success of your online business.