Selling online is more accessible than you think
It’s quite staggering that in times like these, we have turned to technology to keep us connected with the world, ironic after so many bodies telling us for months we are in technology saturation. The Zoom call has replaced the board room for meetings, the smartphone is the new choice for cinematography and e-commerce is keeping us supplied with all the necessaries… and in some cases unnecessaries.
For many businesses the prospect of commerce on-line is a non-starter but for those who are already in the space or have been quick to move and adapt, they are actually cashing in on this opportunity. It’s simple rules of supply and demand and if you can offer it on-line, people are buying it in their droves.
What this has gone on to do is actually create quite a furore on-line, with competition between retailers hotting up and some staggering deals to be had if you’ve the time to seek them out… which admittedly a lot of us do have at the moment.
What’s even more interesting is this has made e-commerce more accessible to businesses than ever before. A decade ago you would have paid a small fortune to sell your wares on-line but in these times you’ve so many options to go at.
One of the simplest solutions to get you off the mark is Shopify. This is a superb solution if e-commerce is your one and only focus, with the ability to have basic site up within a couple of days. If you need something a little more complex and have a few grand in the pot to spend, a Shopify partner such as ourselves can help you create a Shopify site that is more creative and with a few more whistles and bells than the out of the box solution. The platform has its pros and cons, you’ll never actually own the site outright, but it’s a superb starting point.
Beyond that are more customised e-commerce platforms, that can do so much more for you, such as WordPress, Craft and Magento (a real beast in the industry). Sophisticated customer tracking and interaction help generate and increase sales, social media integration that creates social shops, multi-lingual solutions that sell across the globe and heavy weight sites that host not tens but thousands of products. These are all at your fingertips if you’ve slightly deeper pockets.
However what must be remembered is that you can’t just bang up a site and expect miracles. It’s all well and good having a site that sells but if the brand equity isn’t there and you’ve not ‘sold’ you product well to the customer, you’ll get swallowed up and lost in the ether.
What’s the point of this ramble? It’s that e-commerce is now accessible to all and offers you an opportunity. There will be thousands of over-night entrepreneurs out there who have wanted and strived to take control and sell that golden nugget, bright idea for a product that’s been smouldering at the back of their mind for years. It’s worked for countless other people, blimey ‘The Dragons Den’ series relies upon it. Now might well be the opportunity to take that chance, to seize the day and make the cottage industry dream a reality. Go on, make a plan, create a brand, sell your miracle widget.
Start small but dream big… “this time next year Rodney, you could be a millionaire”.