How to Start a Successful E-Commerce Business?

**Manpreet** · 30-09-2014, 10:38 AM

If you’ve got questions about starting an e-commerce business, consider the following tips and recommendations:
1. Decide what you want to do and define your niche
2. Have a plan
3. Market research on your product's merchantability, demand, supply and competitors.
4. Design a site with a personality
5. You need a user friendly and no hassle ecommerce shopping cart
6. You need a payment gateway and merchant account.
7. Start marketing and advertising your ecommerce site

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**JoMatt** · 01-10-2014, 10:54 AM

Use secure payment gateways
Allow social media site integration
Offer some deals or discounts

**Manpreet** · 06-10-2014, 05:52 AM

Thank you JoMatt for adding these points.

**Andula** · 21-11-2015, 06:09 AM

Name: start-ecommerce-store1.jpg
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I have written answer at quora on how to start eCommerce business step by step guide. I think this answer will give you better idea to start online store successfully.

**superkool2011** · 25-07-2016, 04:51 AM

5. I just have a suggestion on the shopping cart. Choosing a shopping cart which have user friendly and no hassle requires you to be really careful. Magento, Prestashop, Wordpress WooCommerce and Shopify are the biggest one in this field. However, in this five big shopping carts, Magento is concerned to be the most common one with many attractive features which promise to enhance your sales and manage your store perfectly. If you concern to use Magento but has chosen another shopping cart, do not worry about that. Magento migration service can help you to solve all. More details, see here: http://litextension.com/shopping-cart-migration.html

**pablohunt2812** · 10-12-2016, 08:05 AM

There are many entrepreneurs whose greatest desire is to build a business that allows them to live a lifestyle of their choosing, and have it run more or less on autopilot. Ecommerce tends to be fairly complementary to those desires.

However, if you want to turn your ecommerce store into a massive business, the only thing getting in the way is you. The potential is always there, and you have to make a decision to start putting in the time and effort it requires to scale up.

Here are five top secrets to running a successful ecommerce business.

1. Treat your ecommerce business as if it were a thriving offline business.
How do you treat your ecommerce business? Do you see it as a hobby? Something fun to do in your spare time?

It might be easy to see it that way, especially if it isn't earning you millions of dollars yet. However, if you sincerely have the desire to grow it into a massive business, you need to act as if it is already.

Related: Selling Online: Art, Science or Just Hard Work? What's Your Experience?

”Your ecommerce store is a real business, and it should be treated with the same respect that the CEOs of Fortune 500 companies treat theirs," says Anton Kraly from DropShipLifestyle.

A lifestyle business is nice to have, but realize that you can create even greater wealth by focusing on the ongoing growth of your business. Don't wait around for your venture to feel like a big business. Think about the decisions you would make if it already was.

2. Find the right software for your business.
As a business owner, you need to have the depth of vision to see potential issues before they even come up. For many ecommerce business owners, software is something that needs to be addressed and evaluated on an ongoing basis, because it's really foundational to the entire operation.

Security concerns, scalability, usability, marketing tools and other factors have to be taken into account when you're looking for the right software to rely on.

"The real growth killer is when an online store owner is not running the right ecommerce software for their business," says Susan Delly of Zippy Cart. "Your ecommerce software should be scalable, secure, user-friendly and have a solid set of conversion and marketing tools."

The right tool depends largely on what needs you have. Make sure to identify your challenges and do your research to find the tool that matches your requirements.

3. Figure out where your customers are.
This is business 101. Know who your target audience is, and figure out where they like to hang out. Many business owners don't take this step seriously, and end up wasting a lot of their time and resources on marketing that doesn't convert.

"We started off promoting on social media and that got us nowhere fast. After about six months in business we were connected with someone at a deal site, ran our first deal and it was a success," says Jessica Geier of Raw Generation. "After that I spent an entire month searching out every deal site I could find and contacted all of them until we got on their calendars. That was the catalyst for our early success and I have no doubt that is the reason we are still in business."

Of course, this doesn't necessarily mean that you should go after deal sites as well. It really depends on what your business is centered on, what products you offer and who your target market is.

However, you do need to take this principle seriously. If you can figure out where your marketing dollars are going to produce the greatest return on investment, you'll have an easier time bringing in a steady stream of leads.

If you still need to determine who your target market is, take a read through 10 Questions to Ask Before Determining Your Target Market.

Related: 4 Signs Your Site Traffic Is Being Hijacked by a New Type of Malware

4. Allow your customers to be your brand ambassadors.
There's nothing quite like the glowing testimonial of a satisfied customer to add credibility to your business. By collecting and sharing testimonials and reviews on a regular basis, you can encourage more sales from your website visitors.

"The most powerful tip we could give in growing your ecommerce business is allowing your customers to be your brand ambassadors," says Michelle Michalak from Slyde Handboards. "Make it easy to compile and share testimonials and reviews from your customers."

You can talk yourself up as much as you want, but it's ultimately what people say about your business that's going to have the biggest impact on buying decisions. Your customers are the greatest assets you have, so learn to leverage them.

5. Remove friction from the checkout process.
If you want to sell more product, you have to ensure that your visitors aren't getting frustrated, abandoning their carts and leaving your site to find another store where they can purchase a competitor product.

Friction is one of the biggest challenges for most etailers, especially as we move into the mobile age. You have to find a way to make checkout so simple and easy that anyone could do it.

"My biggest tip to grow an ecommerce business is practically common sense, but I rarely see websites taking it as seriously as they should: remove friction from the checkout process," says Nick Euba

**luffy268** · 17-12-2016, 02:34 AM

Originally Posted by Manpreet

If you’ve got questions about starting an e-commerce business, consider the following tips and recommendations:
1. Decide what you want to do and define your niche
2. Have a plan
3. Market research on your product's merchantability, demand, supply and competitors.
4. Design a site with a personality
5. You need a user friendly and no hassle ecommerce shopping cart
6. You need a payment gateway and merchant account.
7. Start marketing and advertising your ecommerce site

Thanks for sharing. I think this is 7 basic elements for succeeding in E-commerce business