Tag: Building Online Stores

The average rate of checkout abandonment is 69.82% across all industries. Another way to look at it is that for every 100 customers, around 68 of them will abandon their online shopping cart – ouch!

Unfortunately, ecommerce checkout abandonment is pretty common. In fact, each year, brands lose $18 billion in revenue – roughly $4 trillion in sales is expected to be abandoned in 2024 alone.

By just creating a better checkout design, the average large e-commerce website can gain a 35.26% increase in conversion rate. The EU and US have a combined e-commerce sales of $738 billion, if we add the 35.26% conversion rate increase that equals $260 billion worth of lost orders that can be saved by changing the checkout flow & design.

After spending countless hours creating your business, building a website, and marketing it, the last thing you want is to fall at the last online hurdle. It’s super important to know what causes people to hit the digital road and resolve it. This will help to boost your profits in the long run.Read on and we’ll show you exactly how to do this.

What Is the Average Cart Abandonment Rate by Device?

Research shows that about 85.56% of cart abandonment happens when customers use their mobile phones. This could be due to a less mobile-friendly user experience or because people are more likely to put a smaller screen down than with a desktop.

Mobile had the highest cart abandonment rate, while tablets had 80.74% and desktops 69.75%.So, the smaller the screen the more likely shoppers will quit at the checkout! That’s why it’s important to make sure your website is mobile friendly and just as easy to navigate on other devices.

The reasons for cart abandonment involve three main areas of the customer journey; hidden information, time taken to checkout, and poor website design.

There will be a small few who are just browsing for the sake of it, but a large majority of your visitors will turn tail as a result of one of the three factors mentioned above. Below, we’ll take you through each reason, and what it is that causes someone to bounce off your site:

#1. Long forms result in 17% of abandoned shopping carts 

Your customer is ready to purchase, they’re short on time, and they need what you have quickly. However, they get to the checkout and find that they need to fill in long or complicated forms. Cue a quick exit!

The frustration this causes accounts for17% of abandoned shopping carts. When you also factor in having to create an account just to buy a few products, that increases the abandonment rate by an extra 24%.

#2. Websites with hidden costs account for 48% of unfinished orders

There were 16% who stated the reason for cart abandonment was that they couldn’t see the total order of costs upfront.

It may seem logical to add extra costs like VAT or shipping at the end of the buying process. After all, you don’t want people to be put off by a hefty price tag in the beginning. However, in an effort to entice buyers, you could end up making your customers feel like they’ve been tricked.

They thought they were signing up for one price, only to find that the extra costs keep tallying up. Unsurprisingly, they then jump ship for better prices.

#3. 18% of customers abandon carts due to security concerns

Around 18% of people abandon a shopping cart because they don’t trust a website with their credit card details.

This can be because of the overall design of the website, requesting too much information, the perceived quality of products, or first-time website shoppers.

#4. Shipping issues cause 22% of customers to abandon carts

Whether it’s the length of shipping, if it can be delivered at all, or other limitations on delivery, shipping is a big reason why people quit at the checkout with a 22% cart abandonment rate. If buyers make a last-minute purchase and need it to arrive by a certain time, they’ll turn their nose up at a three-week wait.

There was also 12% that noted that the “returns policy wasn’t satisfactory.” Either it wasn’t shown, or they didn’t offer returns on items, which can put buyers off.

Similarly, if your business doesn’t deliver to a customer’s area then you’ll likely see them seek a store that does.

#5. 30% of shoppers will abandon carts if they have to re-enter payment or shipping information

Like the previous points, customers might give up on their shop if the checkout experience makes them jump through extra hoops. Make sure your checkout page is fully optimized and as streamlined as possible. It’s best to keep things simple and brief.

#6. Website performance accounts for a 13% cart abandonment rate

If websites have many performance issues like crashes, errors, slow servers, poor coding, traffic spikes, or just plain bad optimization, customers might seek a better user experience elsewhere. Although minor performance issues can bounce back quickly, it’s still worth keeping an eye on.

#7. Payment issues account for a 13% cart abandonment rate

Issues like slow loading on payment pages or lack of credit card options can also stop a shopper in their tracks.

It can be frustrating if a customer is ready to purchase and is sat furiously clicking the “Buy” button, but cannot complete their order because of issues like these.

So now you know what the main causes are for cart abandonment, but how can you prevent your customers from turning tail and leaving behind unfinished orders?

Spoiler: if you’re thinking “the more pop-ups and ‘Buy Now’s! I put everywhere, the more likely it is that customers will give in and commit to a purchase’, we can confidently say that’s not the best strategy to reduce your checkout abandonment rate.

The best approach is to create an effortless user experience, fostering trust and ease for buyers.

Think about your own experiences with checkout. Does it annoy you when you need to give every detail about your life before you can purchase? Do those hidden fees that triple the price aggravate you? Well, good news – once you’ve identified these key pain points, you’re halfway to finding solutions for them!

If you need a helping hand, though, take a look at some of our recommended cart abandonment remedies below:

#1. Don’t Hide Anything

The Etsy homepage delivers on showing you faster delivery options

From extra fees to returns policies, don’t hide them from the customer. This will only lead to that feeling of deception we mentioned above.

The online retailer Etsy provides little “fast shipping” icons on their prices to highlight which items offer a faster delivery than others. Being upfront is the best way to earn trust and get people to purchase.

#2. Create Short & Easy Checkout Forms

The simpler the form the easier it will be for your customers to make the purchase

Keep the steps really simple. Only ask for the details you absolutely need to complete the purchase.

In this example, Dunelm has created a two-step process for customers: address details, payment details, and then it’s complete! Notice, they’ve also attached their “Terms and Conditions”, “Privacy Policy”, and a tick box to opt-out of promotional content. These are all vital for fostering customer trust.

#3. Check Your Payment Options

How many ways have you got for your customers to pay?  Do you accept the big names like VISA, Mastercard, American Express, PayPal, and Apple Pay?

The more options you have, the easier it is for a buyer to commit and enter their payment details to complete their purchase.

Regularly checking that your website’s payment gateways are working properly will also help you retain customers in the long run.

#4. Continuously Improve Your Website

Owning a business means constantly making it better over time. Whether that’s the design, functionality, or user experience, the more you optimize and update your website, the better it will rank on Google – and the less likely customers will be to dabble in checkout abandonment.

Using an ecommerce website builder can help you easily update your website over time. This is because they’re so easy to use, meaning that you can make changes quickly, and preview them before you set them live.

This also makes it easier to spot problems, although we’d recommend carrying out regular performance tests to catch any issues as early as possible.

#5. Retarget Cart Abandoners

It’s inevitable – you won’t be able to stop cart abandonment completely, and so you’re likely to wave goodbye to a portion of your customers. But all is not lost!

To regain checkout abandoners you can advertise through targeted emails, social media, and other websites with the products they were looking to buy.

But is it worth the trouble? The answer is a firm yes! Research suggests that retargeting customers canincrease sales by around 20%.

Ads focused on retargeting customers can encourage around 26% of shoppers to return to their carts.

Fostering that connection and reminding buyers of what they were about to purchase is a great way to reduce checkout abandonment. A simple automated email that says something like “Hi Tom, we see you were about to buy this!” alongside links back to their cart is a great way to offer them a second chance to buy.

Get creative with how you grasp a cart abandoner’s attention

Retargeting mail campaigns have an open rate of almost 40%, and a click-through rate of 23%.  Even better, a massive 21% of customers then go on to complete their purchases.Well worth the time and effort to create!

Reducing cart abandonment is as simple as being upfront and helping create an effortless experience for your customers.

The exciting thing about it is that if you can regain even 15% of those lost customers, you’ll see a healthy boost in your profits. For example, if you’re earning $30,000 per month, then you could earn an additional $54,000 per year – which is a pretty sweet deal!

To help reduce cart abandonment, make sure to:

1. Show the buyer costs, fees, shipping times, and returns policies upfront
2. Create quick and easy checkout forms
3. Provide lots of payment options
4. Keep updating and checking your website functionality
5. Retarget cart abandoners

Let us know in the comments what stops you from hitting the buy button, or what your business is doing to slow down the checkout abandonment rates!

Before you can start selling online, you need to set your business goals. Having a plan in place will prevent you from making impulse or rash decisions that could end up impacting your business.

Think about your long-term vision and aims when it comes to selling:

• What are you trying to achieve with your business? It’s important to determine your site’s purpose and goals, whether you’re looking to sell a certain number of products each month, focus on building an engaged customer base, or generate brand awareness
• Do you have a niche? If you’re looking to sell to a particular crowd (e.g. pet supplies to pet owners) then you should recognize where your business sits within your niche to help your website stand out
• Who are you selling to? Figure out your target audience and understand the buying habits of your customers to help shape your business, products, and marketing strategy
• What are your competitors doing in the market? Identify product or service gaps through market research and learn from your competitors – look at what works and what’s missing (this applies to their inventory, website, and marketing)

I recommend having all of these questions answered before you get started, but it’s important to be open to adapting as your business grows and evolves. You know your business and products better than anyone else, and you’ll come to understand your customers more once you get a few sales under your belt.

Developing clear business goals at the beginning will allow you to embed your mission throughout your website, like Nike. Source: Website Builder Expert

Of course, you need something to sell, so the next step is to build your inventory. What you sell can come in many shapes and forms, such as physical products, digital items, online courses, or services. Whether or not you’ve got products in mind, you must understand the demand and what already exists in the market.

You want your product to provide a solution or benefit a customer’s life in some way – and it’s a bonus if you can offer a superior or more affordable product than your competitors too!

If you’re struggling for ideas, you can find trending products to sell by using platforms like Google Trends or user-powered forums like Reddit.

I used Google Trends to check product interest over the last year. Source: Website Builder Expert

Product Pricing

Once you’ve sorted out your products, you can set your business margin. Take note of your production costs if you’re creating the products yourself or purchasing them elsewhere – outsourcing work and delivery fees all add up! You’ll subtract this production cost from the price you’re charging customers, and that’s your margin.

Whensetting your product prices, consider your margin and check competitor pricing for similar products. A high-profit margin means the production costs are much lower than what you’re selling your products for. However, you don’t want to scare away customers with extreme prices! Find a middle ground that works for both your business and customer base.

Product Descriptions

Another important element to consider is product descriptions. These are critical for search engines to help scan product pages and show relevant results to shoppers. They also help customers understand how the product can benefit them and why they should buy it.

I used Shopify Magic to generate product descriptions for my store. Source: Website Builder Expert

While you can sell across marketplaces or through social media platforms, I recommend using a website builder to sell online. Your website can be open 24 hours a day, seven days a week – building an online store gives you greater flexibility and more opportunities to sell products to customers.

Squarespace gave me the option to add a lot of different product types. Source: Website Builder Expert

The perk of selling online with a website builder is that the platform will come with important sales features and support, such as abandoned cart recovery, mobile optimization, marketing tools, and security. You can also personalize your site to suit your brand, rather than having a generic storefront created for you when using marketplaces like Etsy or Amazon.

From our recent round of testing, our top-rated ecommerce website builders for 2024 are:

Shopify is the best ecommerce website builder overall, offering unparalleled sales features, such as customizable checkouts, and the ability to scale with your business. When testing Shopify myself, I found it a little difficult to design my website with its section-style editor, but it was straightforward to add products and manage the inventory backend.

I found Shopify’s section-style editor less intuitive to use than the drag-and-drop editors of Wix or Squarespace. Source: Website Builder Expert

If you’re looking for something more user-friendly, Squarespace is the easiest builder I’ve used. Its drag-and-drop editor and intuitive interface are great for building an online store. Plus, Squarespace is ideal if you’re looking to sell services and take bookings thanks to its Acuity Scheduling tool.

You can compare these titans of ecommerce in our table below, and click through to their review pages if you want a closer look at each builder:

Swipe right to see more

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Shopify	Wix	Squarespace	GoDaddy
Overall rating 4.8	Overall rating 4.8	Overall rating 4.7	Overall rating 4.2
Starting Price $29	Starting Price $29 $26.10 with code “TAKE10”	Starting Price $23 $20.70 with code “WBE10”	Starting Price $20.99
Free plan or free trial 3-day free trial, then 1 month for $1	Free plan or free trial Free plan	Free plan or free trial 14-day free trial	Free plan or free trial Free plan
Number of templates 200+	Number of templates 900+	Number of templates 150+	Number of templates 100+
See our Shopify review	See our Wix review	See our Squarespace review	See our GoDaddy Review

If you’re still not sure which website builder is right for you, take our quick quiz to get a personalized recommendation based on your business needs:

Setting Up Your Store: A Quick Guide

No matter which website builder you choose, you can start creating your online store by adding your products and building your website pages, such as a contact page. Make sure the customer journey is smooth from start to finish – this means optimizing your content and personalizing the experience to suit your customers’ needs.

While the exact way you set up your online store will vary depending on the website builder you use, the basic steps below will remain the same:

#1. Choose a domain name

• We’ve thoroughly covered choosing a domain name, but some key things to remember are that it should be short, niche, and keep your target audience in mind.

#2. Pick a suitable template

• There are certain criteria that should be prioritized for all ecommerce stores, such as maintaining user friendly navigation and an efficient checkout to encourage sales. But beyond that, you should look for templates that include additional website pages that would compliment your brand. For example, you may want a template with a strong blog layout if your customers would appreciate a personal touch or product updates. Or, if you’re selling something visual like artwork, you’ll need to find a template that has creative visual elements.

#3. Add your products

• You’ll need to add your inventory to your store so that you can start selling. For each item, upload clear product photos, an accurate product description, pricing, and any other information that would be helpful to your buyer, like weight, materials, and care. It’s also important to think about how your customers will locate the items on your site, so create logical categories to organize your products.

#4. Customize your design

• The stylistic tweaks you make should keep in mind your brand’s identity, tone of voice, and customers. For example, if you’re selling pet toys, you might choose a bright color palette that accentuates the playful nature of your products, whereas a more traditional ecommerce business, like an electrical goods store, would use white space and clear fonts.

Check out our guide to building an online store for an in-depth guide of what’s involved.

Can You Sell Online for Free?

Are you looking to limit your expenses? Selling online can result in many outgoing costs – creating or buying products, website and software fees, domain names, it all adds up. The good news is that you cansell online for free. Free ecommerce platforms like Square Online include ecommerce functionality with its free plan. However, the free plan imposes some limitations, such as ads on your website, and you can’t add a custom domain name, which isn’t ideal for a business.

Other builders, like Shopify or Squarespace, offer a free trial to try things out but you’ll need to pay for a premium plan to start selling.

It’s good to get your products seen by as many people as possible. That means selling across multiple channels in addition to your website, such as online marketplaces like Etsy or eBay, and social media platforms like Facebook or Instagram.

Certain sales platforms favor different types of content, so you’ll need to research the platforms you’re selling on and adapt your content to fit. For instance, when growing your business on social media, visual platforms like Instagram and TikTok are suitable for both pictures and short, attention grabbing videos, whereas Etsy and Pinterest are designed for high quality images.

Similarly, algorithms change between marketplaces. Optimizing your listings for Amazon will involve Amazon SEO, which differs from the set of practices for selling on Facebook Marketplace. Familiarize yourself with the algorithms of the platforms you want to sell on to give your products the best chance of ranking well.

If you’ve already subscribed to a website builder, you won’t need to lose much time setting up additional accounts and listing products across platforms. Most builders, including Shopify, integrate seamlessly with other sales channels, allowing you to sync your inventory no matter where you’re selling.

Here are some tips to sell successfully on multiple platforms:

• Stay consistent with your brand voice: while you should adapt your content style to fit each platform, your brand identity should always maintain consistency. This will make your brand memorable, recognisable, and trustworthy to potential customers who come across your online content.
• Choose sales channels that are relevant for your audience: it’s no use putting your time and effort into nurturing a sales platform that your target audience won’t be using. Think of the age and personality of the customers you’re trying to attract; an embroidery business popular with elderly customers would be better suited to Etsy than TikTok Shop because of the age demographics for that app.
• Research your competitors: keeping tabs on sites with a similar target audience to you will help you to understand which platforms and styles of content your audience will be most receptive to.
• Focus on quality over quantity: to build a strong social presence, your posts need to be frequent and high quality. You won’t have the time to achieve this if you spread yourself too thin. If you’re just starting out or you have a small and busy team, it’s a good idea to focus your time on one or two sales platforms, and increase them as things become more manageable.
• Utilize influencer marketing: influencers can help promote your products on social media channels by introducing them to their audience. Influencers can drive your sales dramatically when picked carefully, which is why it’s important to create a focused influencer marketing strategy.

While having a website or online store is essential in today’s world, I don’t recommend relying solely on one single channel. It’s always a good idea to meet your audience where they are – whether that’s Amazon or TikTok, you want to make it as easy as possible for a large number of people to engage with your business. Building a good presence across multiple channels is a great way to strengthen your brand, build recognition, and even boost sales, without relying purely on SEO for traffic. Integrating socials and marketplaces with your website can really help your marketing efforts, as long as you pick channels that your target audience are using.

Lucy Carney
Deputy Editor

To sell online, your website must be set up to accept payments so customers can shop with your business easily. Most website builders accept all major debit and credit cards and providers like Apple Pay or PayPal. Alternatively, you can use a built-in payment processor, such as Shopify Payments or Wix Payments, to authorize transactions.

If you activate your website builder’s payment gateway (if available), you’ll usually benefit from reduced or non-existent transaction fees. This is another useful way to save on costs when selling online.

I appreciated Wix’s guidance for selling online, offering support when setting up new payment methods. Source: Website Builder Expert

Sure, you have products to sell online, but how will customers receive their orders? Part of selling is thinking about the whole journey, from product creation to the customer’s experience of opening the product for the first time.

You’ll need to consider couriers, labeling, packaging, and regulations. For domestic packages, shipping products is a little easier and cheaper. Some website builders, like Wix, let you tweak your shipping options in each region – for example, you could offer customers free shipping or a rate by weight. Shopify also provides these features while committing to sustainability by offering carbon-neutral shipping through its Planet app.

If you’re selling internationally, there are a few additional steps and costs to cover when going through customs.

Offering a free shipping option, like House Plant Shop does, will encourage sales and provide choice. Source: Website Builder Expert

It’s time to attract customers and promote your products – you can’t make sales if people don’t know your products exist! As we’ve already discussed, you should have a clear idea of what your target audience looks like and how they behave when shopping, so keep this in mind when marketing your business.

Wix gave me a personalized SEO checklist to help improve my online store. Source: Website Builder Expert

I recommend the following methods to help spread the word:

• Social media– customers are already browsing, shopping, and engaging with content on social media, so it’s a good idea to create posts, share product links, and set up ads on these channels
• Search engine optimization (SEO) – you should fully optimize your site for SEO purposes, but remember to keep your content aligned with what you’re selling to attract the right customers (e.g. don’t use random keywords!)
• Email marketing – a good ecommerce email marketing strategy will help you deliver key messages to customers about sales, products, and store updates, or remind them about your brand with retargeting campaigns
• Blogging – showcasing expertise in your niche and sharing product tutorials or updates can easily transform readers into customers, especially if you guide them to your store or product pages
• Set up deals & promotions – sharing special discounts or offers is a great way to revive interest in your store, improve customer relationships, and encourage sales
• Prep for the holidays – prepare your store and inventory for big holidays and shopping periods (such as Black Friday or Christmas) to catch eager-to-shop customers, through holiday marketing and seasonal deals

Converse promotes its newsletter by offering free shipping and birthday perks to those who sign up. Source: Website Builder Expert

The work isn’t over when a customer completes their purchase. Not only should you regularly audit your online store to make meaningful improvements (such as updating the navigation to be more user-friendly), but you should also check in with your customers to hear about their buying experience.

If you’re selling online, customer feedback is important – good and bad. Gathering positive reviews and comments will inspire other customers to shop with your business. This can easily be achieved by asking customers for reviews with a survey or a nudge through email after a purchase has been made.

On the flip side, receiving constructive or negative reviews can also be extremely beneficial for your business – even if they’re not always the most fun to read. Knowing what customers dislikeabout your products can help shape futurewebsite updates, resulting in happier customers long-term.

I added a testimonial element to my Squarespace website which made it easy to show off great product reviews. Source: Website Builder Expert

Our step-by-step guide has walked you through how to sell online, from determining your target audience and what products you want to sell, to setting up shipping methods and promoting your products to customers.

You can sell on a marketplace, like Amazon, or social media channels, but building an online store will give you full control over your storefront and products. Plus, ecommerce website builders make the process easy nowadays thanks to their beginner-friendly editors, powerful sales features, AI tools, and built-in marketing support.

So, what is an FBA business? An Amazon FBA business is the ultimate dropshipping model. 

FBA stands for Fulfillment by Amazon, so an Amazon FBA business is an online business that uses Amazon to store, sort, and dispatch your goods to your customers. It also provides the customer service that comes with the territory.

It’s fairly easy to sign up to Amazon FBA. Once you familiarize yourself with how to sell on Amazon, you’re ready to get started. Here are the steps:

1. Register and Pick Your Plan

You’ll need to register your business and provide all the legal, financial, and practical details necessary to run your online business. This includes your bank account info, a credit card, ID, tax info, and a business phone number.

Then you will need to pick which subscription plan works for you. (See below for the cost breakdown). You don’t have to feel anxiety to pick the wrong one – you can always switch back and forth.

Amazon FBA handles your orders, from picking products to packaging and shipping, for you.

2. Amazon Provides You with Your Seller Central Hub

This will help you keep track of everything – your sales, engagement, inventory, etc. Take your time and have a look around! There’s a lot of information there and you don’t want to miss out on anything that will make your life easier.

3. Check Out Your Competition, Both On and Off Amazon

This is a key step that some new online business owners skip at their peril. You need to see what competitor hubs look like, how much your competitors sell their comparable goods for, and which dispatch services and discounts they offer. That’s where market research comes in!

Online customers have no problem taking an extra two to three minutes to see if they could save money with someone else. We do it with our purchases all the time! So you have to make it worth their while. What can you offer that competitors aren’t? How can you improve the customer experience?

4. Get the Product Information

You’ll need information and details about the products for your listing including SKU numbers and descriptions. Amazon provides detailed information and if you aren’t sure about what to include Amazon has a video to help.

5. Create Your Product Listings

If you want to edge out your competition, don’t forget to first focus on what your customers will feelif they get your product. It’s the emotional side of things that persuades a customer to buy. Then include the logical and practical stuff.

Have a think about how your customer’s life would actually improve if they bought it (honesty is important!). Will they have more fun? Will they delight a friend? Will they have fewer headaches? Will their day-to-day life be more organized?

It’s all about improving their lives. You just have to know the language to do that.

6. Make a Million Jillion Dollars!

Our favorite step. Bear in mind, it might take some time.

In all seriousness though, it does take patience and dedication to build up a customer base, grow sales, and beat the competition. Keep monitoring, testing, iterating, and improving, and you’ll get there! It also helps to understand your Amazon conversion rate, how to calculate it, and the factors that influence it!

Amazon FBA offers an app to make the experience easier for you and your customers

As with any service, there are pros and cons to using Amazon FBA.

Pros

Increased Visibility: Your products are eligible for Prime two-day shipping (yay, customers love that!) and will have the Prime logo on the product detail page. Not only do you know your products will ship according to ecommerce shipping best practices, but the Prime logo can increase visibility and sales.

Increased Convenience: Amazon handles pretty much everything, so you’ve got more time to grow your business.

Amazon’s Logistics Network:Amazon’s huge network makes everything easy and efficient.

Improved Product Listing: Your products will have priority in search results because they are stored in Amazon’s fulfillment centers.

Cons

Limited Control Over Shipping and Handling: Amazon controls the speed and quality of the service.

Potential for Stockouts:Increased visibility means your product could get popular, fast. This means a risk of running out of stock, which can harm your reputation and lead to lost sales.

Dependence on Amazon: You can become dependent on the platform, which limits your flexibility and increases your risk if Amazon changes its policies or fees.

Yes, there are costs (see below) but it’s a model where you have to do very, very little heavy lifting – literally and metaphorically!

We like to give it to you straight, so we will say that Amazon FBA can be expensive. There are a lot of fees to consider.

Subscription Fee: $0.99 per item or $39.99 per month

This is the fee for operating as a business under the Amazon umbrella. If you choose the Individual plan, you’ll pay $0.99 for every item sold. If you choose the Professional plan, you’ll pay $39.99 per month.

Selling Fee

Like you see on eBay, fees depend on how much the items cost. There might be additional referral or closing fees, so check if your item categories include these.

Shipping Fee

This varies wildly, depending on the size and weight of your items as well as what type of shipping services and speeds you offer. The locations of where you are willing to dispatch your items too will also alter your shipping fees.

FBA Fees: $3.22 – $158

These are separate fees that Amazon puts on top for handling the end-to-end process for you. This will include the storage and customer service costs. Fulfillment fees depend on the size tier, dimensions, and weight of your products.

Storage Fees: $0.87 – $3.63 per cubic foot

You need to pay for the storage your inventory uses in Amazon’s fulfillment centers. This is charged as a monthly inventory storage fee – the cost depends on your product type, size-tier, and the time of year. For example, “dangerous goods” are more expensive to store, and all products become more expensive to store during peak times such as between October and December.

Amazon FBA is not the only choice you have as an online business owner – many sellers seek out Amazon alternatives. You’ve got dozens of options, but here are three of the most popular both on and off the Amazon platform:

Amazon FBM

FBM does increase your profits and reduce your overheads because you get to take advantage of Amazon’s enormous freight and shipping discounts. But you’re going to need to put in more work. With FBM, you as the seller stores your products and ships them directly to the customer.

You will be responsible for all aspects of fulfillment, including storage, shipping, and customer service. FBA is ideal for those who want to focus on product sourcing and marketing, while FBM is better for those who want to retain control over their fulfillment process and keep costs low.

FedEx Fulfillment

FedEx is a multinational courier delivery services company that provides shipping, logistics, and supply chain management solutions to businesses and individuals. The company offers a range of services, including wide coverage of ground and air delivery, international shipping, printing, and office services. It has also integrated with ecommerce website builders and offers inventory management.

At first glance, it can be more cost-efficient than Amazon FBA. But bear in mind you will need to store your goods and package them – that could drive up your costs again.

FedEx gives plenty of info on its benefits

ShipBob

Though both ShipBob and Amazon FBA are fulfillment models, there are some big differences. ShipBob integrates into a variety of ecommerce platforms. With ShipBob, the retailer retains ownership of their inventory, while with Amazon FBA, the retailer transfers ownership to Amazon.

ShipBob’s storage fees are cheaper than Amazon’s, especially during peak season. ShipBob partners with multiple carriers to offer shipping at competitive rates (so you’re not just stuck with one carrier option). ShipBob is more flexible on what type of products can be stored. It also provides dedicated customer service and account management.

Whichever platform you choose, it’s important to remember that with non-Amazon platforms there will be a steep learning curve when it comes to their systems and software.

Amazon FBA is an extremely convenient option for online business owners who want to sell products online but don’t have the space, resources, or expertise to handle storage and shipping.

Whether you are simply extremely busy, or your online business is a side-hustle, or you quite frankly hate admin, FBA is a great option.

But you have to be aware it is expensive, so the time that you save should be worth what you have to pay out in all the fees associated with using the service, including storage fees, fulfillment fees, and shipping fees.

You also have to be very comfortable selling products on the Amazon platform because you’re tied into its marketplace by signing up to FBA.

It’s nice to have so many options for your shipping and fulfillment. As long as you are aware of the benefits and costs associated with each, you’ll be able to choose which one is best for you. We started out by asking “What is an Amazon FBA business?” and by now you should know the answer, and have an idea of whether it’s the right path for your business.

Sometimes it can feel a little intimidating to make such a big decision, but remember, nothing is set in stone. If you find out that the fulfillment service you chose isn’t right for you, you can always change.

The biggest nightmare for any site owner is your website breaking down just as you get a surge in customers looking to buy.

It’s enough to make you wake up in the middle of the night in cold sweats. Downtime on a website is like putting up a sign on your front door inviting your customers to head over to the competition.

Preparing and testing your website for Black Friday and Cyber Monday therefore is essential.

The important thing is not to panic: crashing a website usually takes A LOT of traffic. Even so, it’s still worth giving your site a stress test before the big weekend. Think of it as giving your car an MOT before you compete in a Nascar rally event.

What can you do to make sure your store is fighting fit?

• Test the load capacity (the amount of activity your store can take before it packs it in) using tools such as LoadImpact.com. If your store is self-hosted, you may want to consider upgrading the service or your hosting plan to unlimited bandwidth.
• Test email marketing in advance – if you’re sending any automated emails over the period, test, test and test again that they are delivering properly and that the copy is clear. Sending the wrong email to the wrong customer could affect sales and really damage your brand in the long run by making you look amateur.
• Test your site across different browsers (Google, Firefox, Internet Explorer) and across different devices (mobile, tablet, desktop) to make sure it’s working smoothly on all of them. Your shoppers will use all manner of browsers on a number of devices, so it’s important to spread your net as wide as you can to avoid missing out on sales.
• Test your checkout process and make sure it can cope with a large volume of orders all at once. This is particularly important if you’re thinking of running flash deals or time-limited offers on the day.
• Ensure your website is mobile-friendly. A website that doesn’t load or function on a mobile device is the stuff Black Friday nightmares are made of.

Advice From Experts: Infinity Dish

Laura Fuentes

My number one tip for Cyber Monday is to make sure your site can handle the traffic pouring in.

Any tips for handling website traffic on BFCM?

Nothing frustrates a shopper more than slowed screens and glitches. Unless a shopper is intent on purchasing a particular item from your specific business, if glitches happen, they will move on and look for similar deals with your competitors. Use a service like Google to check your site speed and whether or not it is fully mobile compatible. Check these metrics out ahead of time so that you can upgrade your speeds and compatibility well before Cyber Monday is here.

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2023 saw a 4.5% rise in holiday retail sales across key dates, including Black Friday and Cyber Monday. And according to our recent report on Black Friday statistics, 76% of Shopify customers were looking for high quality goods in 2022 rather than fast fashion items.

As a result, competition is much higher, and customers becoming more selective, so it’s crucial you give your products every chance of standing out.

If you took part in Black Friday and Cyber Monday last year, the first step is to analyze your sales data to see what went well. Use the information to make alterations to existing product layouts and product descriptions.

Plan ahead by creating a product schedule that determines when a product goes on sale and its price. Rather than playing catch up, you can get ahead of the game and then make slight tweaks rather than making it up off the cuff. Website builders like Shopify have apps that can help you auto post products. We like BigCommerce’s Discount Manager (more on this later).

Your product descriptions should instill urgency. Remind people they only have a certain window to bag the bargains on offer by adding phrases like:

• Black Friday sale ends soon
• Limited time only
• Only one left
• In high demand
• Sold out soon

Add special mentions to Black Friday and Cyber Monday in the product descriptions to signpost their relevance to the shopper.

If you’re stocking products from any well-known brands, make sure the brand names appear in a prominent position – this doesn’t just improve your organic rankings (which equals more traffic and so more sales), it also adds credibility to your store and makes customers more likely to become repeat shoppers.

You might also think about running a keyword search on Google and using Google Trends to find some Black-Friday-related keywords for your products. Including these in your descriptions may give your site an SEO (search engine optimization) boost – by climbing Google’s rankings for relevant terms, you’ll get more traffic on the day and, hopefully, more sales.

The top search terms for Black Friday 2022 included Nintendo Switch Black Friday and Black Friday TV Deals, highlighting a need to alter your keyword targeting to be Black Friday-specific in the run up to, and during, the big weekend.

It’s also worth running a quick audit of your categories and product listings to make sure they’re up to date, to avoid overselling. There’s nothing worse than advertising a product you’re not able to deliver.

Plus, now might be a good time to review what you’re selling. The pandemic has changed consumer habits for the long-term, and purchases are starting to reflect this. People are spending more time at home, and products that fall into health and fitness, work at home, and eat at home have all seen an increase in sales. If you don’t want to completely rewrite your catalog, why not think about ways you can associate your current stock with these areas?

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Black Friday and Cyber Monday shoppers are bargain hunters.

Be prepared: you’re going to have to slash at least 20 per cent off your items to compete. You might want to consider offering a free gift with your products as a little sweetener; web builders like Shopify allow you to add gift cards to your store for free.

You can also get in the holiday spirit and advertise a percentage of sales going to a charity, making shoppers more likely to purchase from your store. Learn more about holiday marketing tactics in our full guide, including how to target emotions and offer holiday discounts for your customers!

Expert Advice: Rebate Key

Ian Sells

Ian has been using marketing to grow businesses. He sold an Amazon brand first and is now managing over 10 million in sales.

If you’re going to run Black Friday deals, you want to be strategic.

What is a common Black Friday & Cyber Monday mistake?

A huge mistake a lot of retailers make is to give discounts on everything. When you discount everything, you’ll end up unnecessarily losing profit.

What advice do you have on the lead up to Black Friday?

Try using a high runner strategy to draw more people into your store and optimize for margin. Amazon uses a high runner strategy itself. To build a high runner strategy, all you need to do is determine the most popular products in your store, then discount those products as a way to drive traffic to your shop. Once a consumer is in your shop, they’re less likely to navigate away, which means you have the opportunity for strategic cross and up-sells of complementary products.

When it comes to discounts, the more creative the better.

Plenty of retailers will be offering 20% off, but how many will be offering “50% off for first-time buyers” or “30% off if you buy more than 5 pairs of shoes”? Let your imagination off the leash!

How to Design a Product Page has everything you need on designing a product page for your ecommerce site.

Everything about your store’s design on Black Friday and Cyber Monday should be geared towards making a sale and turning browsers into buyers.

The first thing to check is that your website is fully optimized for mobile visitors. Mobile shopping made up 51% of all online shoppers throughout Black Friday week in 2022, up from 46% in 2021.

Because of this, double-checking that your website layout configures properly on different screen sizes without compromising UX should be high on your priority list.

Making sure all of your content is mobile-friendly not only plays a large part in boosting your sales, but works in tandem with Google’s Core Web Vitals rollout to determine the search engine ranking of your store.

As well as poor mobile optimization, a sure way of missing out on sales is overlooking key opportunities for cross-selling and upselling.  For example, if you’ve got a great discount on a pair of shoes, cross-sell that customer some cut-price socks by displaying them on the same product page. Or, if you’re wondering how to upsell, advertise a better version of the shoes. Doing this is easy if you build categories of products that naturally fit together (like socks and shoes).

A customer should arrive on your store’s homepage and be in no doubt where to go.

Consider building distinct Black Friday and Cyber Monday pages to clearly signpost where your customers need to go to get the deals. Ultimately, you want your customers to get to your discounted products in as few clicks as possible.

Just like your product descriptions, your whole site should convey a sense of urgency. Here are two DIY steps to create a sense of urgency in the same time it takes to eat your dinner:

• Display discounts clearly on the homepage – this may sound obvious but it’s easy to get so caught up in your product pages that you forget to sort out the shop window.
• Add a countdown banner – a timer that ticks down to Black Friday and Cyber Monday can really help build excitement. Tools like Powr (fully integrated with BigCommerce) can help you do this for free in a matter of minutes.

Here’s an example of a countdown banner we added through Shopify:

Adding a countdown banner like this Shopify example drives excitement for your store’s sale

You might think, “my checkout is working fine, if it isn’t broken, why try and fix it?”

That would be a mistake.

Black Friday and Cyber Monday shoppers are fickle – they’ve got thousands of stores to visit and a limited amount of time, and so won’t think twice about leaving you hanging at the checkout.

Taking some time to improve and optimize your checkout process could pay off on the day. In 2023, cart abandonment rate reached 70.72%, so there’s always room to improve your customers experience at checkout.

Can you add extra payment options such as PayPal or Bitcoin? The more strings to your ecommerce bow the better because you’re giving your customers more opportunities to give you their money.

With 36% of American’s now having at least 3 digital devices to their name, a single online transaction can span multiple devices before completion. Tying shopping carts with accounts means your customers don’t lose their orders if they switch device, and you don’t risk losing out on almost a third of your revenue.

It’s a win-win!

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Running campaigns on social media sites like Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, TikTok, and Instagram can be a great way to get eyeballs on your ecommerce site; but it’s not enough to just push ads out there, you have to push those adds to the right people.

Watch out for Black Friday and Cyber Monday hashtags you can piggyback on. Using the social media plug-ins available from ecommerce website builders will let you integrate your store with Facebook or Twitter.

In our experience testing ecommerce stores, Facebook is the most effective channel to drive traffic to your site and generate sales. This is reflected in the stats we found in our recent report on digital marketing ROI statistics: it sees the best ROI, with 40% of marketers citing it as their leading social channel.

To give your social media strategy and campaigns the best chance of success, choose a quality product image and add your logo and some text advertising your deals. Make sure you start circulating the ad at least a few days in advance to build excitement. Leave it to the last minute and customers may only see your ad once, which means they’re unlikely to click through, given how many retailers will be demanding their attention.

Advice From Experts: Dark Horse Schooling

Tracy Brinkmann

Start working on your social media presence now to gain traction for those all important big sale days!

How do you leverage social media in this holiday season?

When it comes to social media there is a recipe to this – you cannot just be throwing random content out there and expect people to react. I mean it is social media, after all, so you have to be social, so put up some R&R content (i.e. jokes, funny stuff, throwbacks). Then some enlightening content (i.e. tips, trivia, etc). From there, toss in something to strike up a Conversation (i.e. polls, surveys, ask advice etc), as well as some Invigorating and Inspirational content (i.e. quotes, client success stories).

What is the outcome?

Once you’ve done that, hit them with a Promo (eg. show customer reviews, give a discount, invite them to a webinar). Finally, show off your Endeavour (i.e. show behind the scenes, let them see behind the curtain). Your spending time being social before you hit them with a ‘Buy My Stuff’ message.

Want to learn more about social media?

3 Easy Ways to Set Up a Facebook Store is the guide you need to get your Facebook marketing campaign off the ground.

Learn How To Grow Your Business on Social Media in our helpful guide.

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For many of us, Black Friday and Cyber Monday can feel overwhelming. Email gives you the chance to cut through the noise and provide a really personal offering to your customers.

We asked 65 business owners, which channel was the most effective for marketing, and 24% said email marketing!

Make sure you start your email campaign at least a week in advance to whet your customers’ appetite for the sales you’re going to offer them on across the weekend.

A simple but effective email campaign would include:

• One weekly email from four weeks until Black Friday.
• An email both the night before Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
• An email on Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

You may even consider offering your long-standing customers a special VIP offer over email. For example, you could give them a sneak preview of your Black Friday and Cyber Monday discounts and offer them an early chance to buy them. This can be a great way to build up brand trust; because repeat customers are more valuable to you, it also makes commercial sense.

Email gives you the chance to provide a really personal offering to your customers. Research shows that personalization helped increase email open rate by 30% and click rate by 50% on average

Advice From Experts: USA Wholesale

Alexis Frankel

In the past, the best campaigns I’ve produced have been for Black Friday/Cyber Monday ($10,000+ in a single day from email campaigns).

Is email marketing valuable during the Black Friday season?

Leads are in the mindset to buy and will do so if they see what they like. Give them what they want! Use data from their previous purchases, abandoned cart items, and average order value to target specific promotions that they will be interested in. Make sure to tweak and test for the best results.

Even if you do all of the above, you’re not done.

Make sure you follow up after Black Friday and Cyber Monday to ask for feedback and invite them to revisit your store.

Adding an automated abandoned cart recovery email is a great way of stopping customers slipping through the net. If a customer gets all the way to the checkout but then fails to purchase, they’ll get a follow-up email allowing them to go straight back to their cart.

This is a useful tool for your customers and potentially profitable one for you!

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Black Friday and Cyber Monday online shoppers are ruthless. With so many retailers competing for their attention, they can afford to be.

If your store is even remotely slow to load, many shoppers will simply vote with their feet and close the tab. Big, colorful product pictures and homepage banner images make your site look good but they can also affect load time and hit your conversion rate (the percentage of visitors who go on to make a purchase) and your rankings in Google.

The simple way to solve this issue is to use an image optimizer. These are tools that compress your image into a smaller version, without affecting the dimensions or the quality. Shopify has its own tool to help store owners resize and optimize images, but we’ve used a tool called Kraken.io before, which also works well.

Other helpful pages:

• Image Optimization for Best Website Performance – Find out what steps you can take to optimize your images and boost your site’s performance.
• How to Take Product Photos – Give your products the best chance with our guide to great product photography.

Determining how much your shipping will cost is almost as important as determining how much the product itself costs.

High shipping costs can be off-putting to shoppers, especially those looking for big bargains. In fact, many Black Friday and Cyber Monday shoppers will expect free delivery.

It’s up to you to weigh up the cost of free shipping against the discount you’re offering. For example, many shoppers would rather have free shipping worth $6 than a discount of $10, bizarrely.

A survey conducted by Finances Online found that almost half (49%) of all Black Friday 2022 shoppers stated shipping rates as their primary influencer for making a purchase and that they could be swayed into making an order if they were offered free shipping.

Advice From Experts: M&I

Brian Deschesare

Use a loss leader product, and offer free shipping on expensive orders.

What are your thoughts on shipping costs during Black Friday?

A ‘loss leader’ is a product sold at a loss to bring in more customers. You might be wondering why you would ever sell a product at a loss, but the idea is simple. You want to make it cheap enough to get them shopping. That way, they’ll start taking a look at the rest of your products, and they’ll buy even more.

Is using a loss leader too risky?

Without first using a loss leader, your customers might not even start shopping with you. There needs to be that ‘initial push’ that gets them browsing your store. The next step is to introduce free shipping over a certain amount.

Now that they have one cheap item in their basket, they’re going to start browsing through the rest of your selection. This is when you advertise that you offer “free shipping on orders over $50”, for example. Your customers are now a lot more likely to find items that they like.

With Walmart and Amazon dominating Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales, you might feel like a small fish in a big pond.

The trick is to turn this to your advantage.

One way to do this is by providing personal and quality online customer service. If you haven’t already, write a detailed FAQs section specific to Black Friday and Cyber Monday, so any questions your customers might have can be dealt with as seamlessly as possible. Make sure you cover key areas such as:

• Your refunds and returns policy.
• How long your sale lasts for.
• Expected delivery time.

If you employ any staff to help you run your store, make sure you give them a brief pep talk on the importance of being polite and helpful. You could provide them with certain customer service phrases or advice on how to respond to negative reviews, to ensure all customer interactions end on a positive note.

Anything you can do to improve the on-site level of service can have a big effect. You might, for example, want to introduce BigCommerce store, offers a free 30-day trial, so time it right and you can add a really attractive customer service tool for free.

If you aren’t using conversational technology as part of your ecommerce strategy, Black Friday and Cyber Monday make for the perfect excuse to get started.

With over 130 million people visiting US online stores over Cyber Weekend 2022, digital shopping isn’t set to go anywhere anytime soon – voice technology and chat solutions are ideal for bridging the gap between online and in-person shopping experiences.

Conversational commerce covers everything from voice search (assistant) technology to chatbots and boxes. Each can be used to bolster customer service efforts, as well as acting as an extra channel for matching customers with new deals and upselling related products.

Given that almost 33.3% of the global population now shops online, conversational technology fills the person-sized hole left in your shopping experience. For example, fashion stores like H&M use chatbots to deliver custom recommendations to customers, whilst Alexa reports all of the best Black Friday deals when asked. There are plenty of ways for you to use and optimize for voice search!

So at the very least, we recommend installing a chatbot to your site to give customers a deeper level of service, even when they’re shopping digitally. Not only will it foster better relationships, but it’ll drive sales, too – with business leaders estimating that chatbots result in a 67% increase in sales.

Advice From Experts: The Converted Click

Dave Nilsson

Our voice search optimization strategy gave us an increase in website traffic of 23.7% and an increase in sales leads of 34.2%.

Why did you add conversational technology to your website?

As SEO specialists we have implemented voice search optimization on our website with great success. We implemented voice search optimization on our website to increase our sales leads.

How does this help your customers?

Our approach is to focus on creating detailed answers to common conversational questions from our customers. For each question, we create content that gives clear and concise answers. Our content framework starts with a headline asking a common question, provides a concise answer in the first paragraph, then elaborates with further details in the rest of the page.

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Touch wood, you’ll be receiving more orders than usual across Black Friday and Cyber Monday. A lot more orders, hopefully.

It’s crucial to make sure your shipping process can cope and you’re not going to fail to deliver orders if they’re coming through thick and fast, or that you won’t sell out too quickly and end up failing to meet demand. Contact your supplier and make sure they know what’s happening.

Test your order fulfillment process, whether you’re using a dropshipper, a manual system or a fulfillment app like ShipStation.

You also need to ensure you’ve set up a smooth and optimized returns process. Black Friday and Cyber Monday may result in a lot of sales, but they can result in a lot of returns too if customers aren’t happy with the items or regret their purchase made in a haze of discounts and deals.

Plan your returns process in advance, make it easy to find the relevant information on your website, and don’t keep customers waiting for a refund. Good returns management, and an easy returns process, can help to ensure they return to your online store in the future.

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When making sure your store is ready for the busiest shopping days of the year, it’s easy to forget how important it is to make sure all the changes we’ve suggested work as well on mobile as they do on desktop.

Mobile devices made up a staggering 76% of all Cyber Week traffic in 2022, with the upward trend predicted to continue in 2024.

Don’t forget to look at navigation on a mobile, mobile responsiveness and the buying process.

Advice From Experts: The Gray Dot Company

Tory Gray

I recommend testing your site’s mobile compatibility in anticipation of these big-spending days.

What are your mobile and desktop recommendations for BFCM?

It’s more important to target mobile searches than ever before. Mobile makes up a whopping 61 percent of Google’s organic search traffic. Mobile users are also more likely to convert than desktop users, so it’s crucial that you are mobile-ready in the lead up to Black Friday and Cyber Monday. I recommend testing your site’s mobile compatibility in anticipation of these big-spending days. You should test your site’s responsiveness, loading time, and image sizes to make sure they are mobile-ready. Not only can mobile compatibility make for better user experience, but it can also improve your ranking and visibility on Google.

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Many retailers get caught up in the competitiveness of Black Friday and Cyber Monday and risk damaging their brand with unethical practices. Here are a few rules of thumb to bear in mind:

• DON’T spam customers with relentless emails. Just because they’ve bought from you or signed up to your newsletter doesn’t give you right to abuse their inbox.
• DO always have an unsubscribe button on any emails.
• DON’T offer promotions or products in paid advertising that you aren’t offering on the site. Customers must get what they were promised when they click on a paid advert.
• DO offer genuine discounts. Don’t raise the price a week before and then drop it back down to its original price but advertise it as a discount. You’ll be caught out and shoppers will punish you in the long run.
• DON’T be rude to customers requesting refunds or making inquiries. Black Friday and Cyber Monday can be stressful, but you should always remain professional and courteous.
• DO make sure any pop-ups you add to your website are as unobtrusive and as relevant as possible. We’d suggest they only appear after a visitor has been on your page for 10 seconds. There is nothing more off-putting than arriving on a webpage only to be attacked by a pop-up immediately.

Not built your online store yet?

Don’t worry it’s not too late!

• How to Build an Online Store – get the tools you need to get ready for Black Friday online sales.
• Online Store Builders Comparison Chart – our comparison chart will help you find the perfect online store builder for you.
• Best Website Builders – discover the best website builders compared side by side.

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There are no hard-and-fast rules, Black Friday and Cyber Monday trends are always evolving and changing. With it we’re always updating our content to keep you in the best of loops!

We hope we’ve helped prepare you for Black Friday and Cyber Monday, the biggest shopping dates in the calendar. Standing out of the crowd can feel impossible if you’re a small online store with limited resource.

But if you ask yourself the right questions, and take the right steps, you can ride the Black Friday and Cyber Monday wave and get in on the action!

Hopefully this guide has shown you some easy DIY methods to get your ecommerce store ready for Black Friday and Cyber Monday, without needing to hire an expensive developer or a designer, and pointed you in the direction of some really helpful tools available from top ecommerce website builders.

If you haven’t even built your ecommerce store yet, it’s never too late to get up and running.

Check out the Best Ecommerce Website Builders and the Best Free Ecommerce Website Builders to find which builder is best for you and your store.

Explore the Best Ecommerce Software to help you sell online, which shows you how quickly and easily you can build an online store and start selling, without needing any technical knowledge whatsoever.

Let’s hear it for a successful Black Friday and Cyber Monday!

More Information

• How to Design a Customer-Winning Product Page for Your eCommerce Store: Part 1 – for the 8 pieces of content your ecommerce product page must have if you want to supercharge your online store.
• How To Sell Online | 4 Superb eCommerce Solutions To Help You Succeed – your one-stop guide to selling online successfully, covering everything from building a brand to technology that helps you sell.

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Some ecommerce shoppers have time to browse through pages of products leisurely, but most don’t. A streamlined search function takes the headache out of online shopping, giving customers a way to quickly and efficiently evaluate everything available.

Note that there’s a difference between offering a passable search function and offering a good search function. Not all search options are effective in an ecommerce space and may even deliver results that are frustrating for users. One study found that 70% of ecommerce sites are unable to return valuable results for searches with product-related synonyms. In contrast, 34% fail to offer worthwhile options when a model number or name is misspelled.

An ecommerce-specific search function should focus on delivering product results rather than text-based keyword matches. Take Camelbak, for example. The search function is located on the top right of the homepage — not buried in site navigation — and provides product and image links to make shopping simple.

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It’s easy to believe that the checkout process doesn’t matter — especially after a shopper has a cart full of great products — but this could not be further from the truth. A frustrating checkout can be the death knell for an entire sale.

One survey found that 9% of people will abandon a purchase if the checkout process is too long and confusing, while a whopping 22% will walk away if they have to create an account to make a purchase. If you want to ensure shoppers complete the purchase process, a clean, simple, and easy-to-use interface with a guest checkout option is essential.

Offering a guest checkout option doesn’t require any additional steps in the ecommerce site setup process. LARQ, the brand behind the world’s first self-cleaning water bottle, excels here: the checkout offers Amazon and Google pay options that can make purchasing with a click incredibly simple as well as a guest checkout feature.

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It would be nice if every shopper who visited your website followed through with their purchases, but unfortunately, that’s not reality. Instead, around 70% of carts are abandoned prior to checkout.

Cart abandonment can happen for many different reasons. Sometimes, customers realize they can get products for a lower cost elsewhere, or they know that their eyes are bigger than their budgets. And sometimes, customers simply switch to another task and forget to complete the transaction.

Cart abandonment emails are a great way to bring back buyers. Serving as a reminder as well as a way to offer discounts to entice a sale, cart abandonment emails are popular for a reason: they work. Around 60% of customers who receive emails come back to make a purchase.

Not all cart abandonment emails are as successful as others. Before sending, keep these ecommerce tips in mind.

Send your emails in a timely fashion

A successful cart abandonment email can’t be sent too soon, but it also can’t go out weeks after a cart is left behind. Finding the sweet spot is key to inciting sales. For large purchases, a few minutes isn’t enough time for shoppers to ponder, but waiting a week may be too late. Ecommerce best practices suggest an email within 24 hours and another three to four days later, giving customers the push necessary to click “purchase.”

Have a well-crafted subject line

The average person gets over 100 emails a day, and a lot of them go straight to the trash. The open rate for marketing emails is a paltry 17.8%, so if your subject line doesn’t stand out, conversion rates will likely be poor. Give your email a snappy subject line, and if you’re offering a discount or other promo, make sure this is clear from the get-go.

Show off your product

A customer who liked your products enough to put them in a cart saw something appealing. In your abandonment email, a reminder can be a great way to inspire a purchase. Show images of the abandoned items, add the product descriptions, and emphasize why investment is ultimately the right choice.

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Everyone has a debit or credit card, so it’s easy to think other payment options are redundant. However, statistics imply otherwise. Around 6% of carts are abandoned due to a lack of ideal payment options, and when every dollar counts, that 6% can add up. And, without magically adding more options overnight, those shoppers are ones you probably can’t get back with a strong cart abandonment email.

Multiple payment options can open the door to more sales. Many shoppers have their favorites, like Amazon Pay or Paypal, and aren’t overly interested in platforms that can’t support their preferences. While credit cards will always be a forerunner, buy now, pay later options are on the rise, particularly among young people with poor or nonexistent credit. The opportunity to make four smaller payments later versus one larger payment now is enticing indeed. One study found that 31% of people who chose BNPL wouldn’t have made a purchase at all had the option been unavailable.

Redirects

Payment options that redirect users to another site to complete payment information before returning to a merchant’s checkout screen are trendy. Paypal is arguably the best known. Using this model, customers simply click the Paypal logo and are redirected to Paypal’s site. After logging in, they can then choose a payment method if multiple are available and proceed with the purchase. Billing and shipping information associated with Paypal is then used to complete the purchase.

Redirects are helpful because they reduce the information a customer needs to enter, like credit card numbers and addresses, making the checkout process fast and painless.

Checkout on-site, payment off-site

Checkout on-site and payment off-site is a model in which the checkout process is completed on a merchant’s website, but a third party processes payment, which means that all confidential banking info isn’t stored on the company’s servers; all transactions are managed off-site. Not only is this convenient for users, but the extra security can give buyers peace of mind. Stripe is a well-known example of one such payment processor.

On-site payments

On-site payments are what most customers have come to identify with ecommerce purchases: the merchant themselves processes all payments. This puts more onus on the merchants without a third-party to alleviate pressure, but does open the door to more options.

When control is in a retailer’s hands, the flexibility to use multiple methods, including on-site payments in conjunction with off-site and redirects, can create a robust environment tailored to a great customer experience. Revelry, a premium bridesmaid dress retailer, is a great example of how multiple methods can come together; buyers have a chance to see what payment options are available as soon as items are added to a cart.

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An iPhone can take a lovely photo, but that doesn’t mean cell phone cameras are right for ecommerce. While good enough for daily use, the average phone can’t capture an image high-quality enough to impress.

Three-quarters of buyers use images to inform a purchase decision, so if your images aren’t professional and don’t convey quality, shoppers won’t bite. Skullcandy, the beloved headphones brand, does a great job of sending a message with pictures. Their image quality is excellent, and products are illustrated beautifully, giving customers the information they need to move forward.

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Images matter, but so do words. Without a way to physically touch or try products, ecommerce sites need to lean into every available resource to inform customers. Product descriptions can come off a little dry when they’re not well-crafted, but a great description touches on all key points and can play a significant role in inspiring buyer confidence. With 87% of customers making decisions based on product content, the more information you can provide, the better.

Think about the who, what, where, when, why and how

A good product description needs to answer a few different questions, including:

• What is the product, and what features make it unique or noteworthy?
• Who is the product for?
• Where can the product be best utilized?
• When should the product be used?
• How does the product work?
• Why is this product a necessity for shoppers to purchase?

A well-crafted description can be all the ammo necessary to convince a customer to hit the ‘Add to Cart’ button.

Determine the best format to describe your products

Not all product descriptions are made equal. Some products, like clothing, are better suited for flowery prose, while others, like electronics, require a no-nonsense summary of functions and features. Once you determine what you need to communicate, you can move forward with the best format in which to do so.

Solo Stove does a great job with the format by providing a punchy description at the top of the page and a longer blurb below, for customers who want to dig deeper.

Make your product description copy short and sweet

Customers are on your site to shop, not read novels. Product descriptions need to be short and to the point to avoid losing readers. If your description needs to be a little longer to emphasize the nature of a product, add the highlights in bullet points so that customers have access to the cliff notes.

Use storytelling to your advantage

Using a story to sell a product isn’t always essential, but narrative can be very effective in certain circumstances. Creative storytelling can help a customer best understand why they need a product and how it can fit in their lives better than cold hard facts. For example, describing shoes as leather doesn’t pack the same punch as telling a shopper that these stunning, velvety couture leather shoes will carry you effortlessly throughout the night, complementing your outfit at formal functions or executing a corporate meeting ensemble.

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A decade ago, mobile didn’t really matter. Today, the opposite is true. Almost 80% of people have made purchases on their mobile devices, and 75% of users prefer mobile sites. Focusing solely on desktop leaves your business vulnerable to the competition.

There are advantages from a search engine perspective as well. Since 2016, Google has prioritized responsive and mobile sites on devices like phones and tablets, so a lack of mobile optimization costs you in more ways than one.

Lingerie retailer Natori has an excellent mobile site, making it easy for customers to make purchases without resorting to desktop.

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Reviews can mean everything online. The new evolution of word of mouth marketing, 90% of customers read reviews before making a purchase. There are plenty of review sites out there, from Yelp! to TrustPilot, but featuring reviews on your website can make a big difference in the research process.

When positive reviews are available front and center, site visitors don’t have to go very far to get a feel for the quality of your products. You can use a number of different online survey tools to gather product reviews, then display them on different areas of your site. So where are the best places to add them?

Category pages

Reviews on category pages provide a great way to make a first impression. With the ability to instill trust in a customer before they view products, buyers feel much more secure in their purchasing decisions.

Product pages

It’s easy to showcase great products on your site, but it’s harder to make customers believe that they’re great. By allowing customers to leave reviews on specific products after purchase, potential buyers can get detailed and legitimate feedback as they shop.

Cutter and Buck, for example, lets customers leave post-purchase star reviews, giving shoppers a quick way to evaluate the perceived quality of products while shopping.

Shopping cart

The shopping cart may seem like the last place reviews would be relevant, but this isn’t the case. Featuring reviews on a checkout screen can reduce cart abandonment, convincing customers on the fence that making a purchase is the right decision.

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Maybe you have a warehouse full of inventory ready to fulfill client offers quickly and efficiently — but you don’t have to let your customers know this. Creating the illusion of scarcity can compel a customer to make a purchase by making them believe it’s now or never. When done properly, this technique can increase conversions by over 300%, boosting your business in a way few other strategies can rival.

Showcase your “sale ends” date

Having a sale? Make sure your customers know that your great deals won’t be around forever. Many sites use a countdown clock when advertising promo codes on sites, driving home the point that if they want a low price, they have to act now.

Low stock notices

Many companies use low stock notices to push products. Labeling a product with a note like “four left in stock” or “only a few left” creates a sense of urgency that is otherwise lacking. Low stock notices can be real or artificial, but regardless of the reasoning, implying a lack of stock can drive sales. Larq does this well with a subtle but effective “limited stock” message below specific products on their product pages.

Use numbers to show demand

Low stock notices can use vague phrasing or numbers. When you have low stock, however, numbers make the most sense. Customers are provided with a tangible way to assess how long they have to act, and seeing low numbers, like one or two, can be the tipping point between purchasing and walking away.

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Customers love to feel important, and nothing does that better than a personalized experience. Personalizing pages when customers log in can create a perceived relationship between customers and retailers that otherwise wouldn’t exist. In fact, 91% of customers are more willing to make a purchase when an ecommerce retailer provides some level of customization. This can range from a welcome message for customers logged into an account to targeted promotions based on past activity. Whatever the strategy, personalization can make a big difference.

Display recently viewed items

Displaying recently viewed items is another great way to provide a level of personalization, even when customers log in. A simple setup using nothing but cookies, customers can see their browsing history and easily return to products when needed.

Make personal product recommendations

Using either logins or cookies, making personal product recommendations can make a shopper feel special. This technique provides customers with a seemingly-curated collection of products to consider and, when done successfully, can connect shoppers to products they may want to purchase.

Check out how Jeep People immediately asks visitors to select their Jeep model when visiting the site so that it can customize the page specifically to them.

Create personalized homepages

A personalized homepage inspires a feeling of community. Using a customer’s name when they’re logged in, featuring recommended products on a home page, or reminding shoppers of prior orders without forcing them onto an account screen can all make buyers feel welcomed back.

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Sometimes, customers have questions. With no live store associates, like in a brick and mortar store, shoppers are forced to turn to whatever web-based resources are available. This often means a chat function of some sort. Unfortunately, many stores feature automated chats, which limit interactions and can leave customers frustrated. Live chat, on the other hand, can boost conversions as much as 45%.

Increase conversions

No one likes talking exclusively to robots, especially when canned answers lead to dead ends. When customers can speak to a real person who can resolve their issues or answer their questions, they’re much more likely to move forward with a purchase.

Live chat software

Live chat software can facilitate the discussion process, helping customers to make contact easily. Some are exclusively live chat while others start with a chatbot and pass users on to live agents when automation can no longer address queries.

Some of the most popular examples include:

• Drift
• Liveperson
• Livehelpnow
• Olark
• Talkative
• Zendesk

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No matter how awesome your products are, some of your customers will inevitably want to return them. Maybe what they purchased wasn’t what they were looking for, or they chose the wrong size. No matter the reason, around 10% of all products get returned, so every ecommerce store needs a solid return policy to best satisfy customers.

Don’t hide your return policy

Some businesses believe that hiding a return policy in the fine print can make customers forget that returns are an option. However, this isn’t a wise choice. Hiding a return policy can actually scare customers away as it implies they’re stuck with their purchase, even if they’re not happy with what they receive.

Remove jargon, keep it simple

A return policy doesn’t need to be fancy; it merely needs to state what customers can expect. Making it too complicated can easily scare prospective shoppers off, sending them fleeing to competitors who don’t obscure their policies.

True Linkswear has a great return policy that doesn’t mince words. Customers are told clearly and plainly what they can expect without fancy phrasing or confusing industry terms.

Outline what they can expect from you

When customers send back an item, what happens? Do they get a refund in full, or receive store credit in exchange? Are there any items that can’t be sent back? Are there limits on how soon items need to be returned? What happens if returned items are sent back without a receipt? All of these questions, and then some, need to be addressed in full if you want customers to trust you.

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Customers want to trust ecommerce businesses, but the impersonal nature of transactions can make it a little harder. With no way to talk to an employee face-to-face, try products, or browse store shelves, ecommerce forces anonymity in a way that can be intimidating. As such, brands need to establish trust and legitimacy in other ways.

Add trust badges

Trust badges are a small, simple token that can go a long way. These badges, like McAfee Secure trust mark, the Norton Secured trust mark, and Better Business Bureau Accredited Business mark, all lend authenticity to a brand.

Media mentions

Has your company been mentioned in the media? Put it on your site. Brands that have been featured by legitimate media can use this to their advantage, advertising that a known entity endorses products and services. Di Bruno Bros features mentions in the New York Times, Travel & Leisure, and Food & Wine at the bottom of their site with links to references, to boost customer trust.

Business phone number

Providing a lack of support information turns company perceptions from comfortable to cold. Some customers just want to hear a voice, and there’s no better way to do that than with a phone number. Without a number present, customers may find themselves wondering who you are and what makes you so resistant to consumer contact.

Physical address

Just as with a phone number, a physical address further communicates the idea that your business exists. While location doesn’t specifically matter for ecommerce, an address to the headquarters drives home the point that, yes, real people work for your business.

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Ecommerce trends may come and go, but the thirteen points we’ve covered in this post are now well-established as best practices across a broad range of ecommerce industries. Let’s recap that list again:

Top 13 Best Practices for Ecommerce Stores

1. Allow Users to Search for Products
2. Enable a Guest Check Out
3. Send Shopping Cart Abandonment Emails
4. Accept Multiple Payment Options
5. Take High-Quality Product Photos
6. Write Informative Product Descriptions
7. Optimize for Mobile
8. Feature Customer Reviews
9. Create Product Scarcity
10. Personalize the Experience
11. Offer Live Chat and Support
12. Have Thorough Return Policy
13. Make Your Website Trustworthy

There are plenty of ways to boost your ecommerce business sales, but most of them boil down to one thing: a great customer experience. No matter what you sell or how you sell it, catering to customers and increasing customer engagement should be your number one priority. From easy payment options to measures that instil trust, your customers should never experience anything other than your best. With a customer-centric focus, you can create a store that keeps customers coming back again and again.

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PayPal’s homepage. Source: Website Builder Expert

Let’s face it: when you’re running a small business website, time is precious, and the budget is limited. For that reason, so many entrepreneurs turn to PayPal for their online payment needs. It’s a widely-trusted platform that makes life easier on multiple fronts.

Convenience Is Key for Any Busy Business Owner

With PayPal, your customers can pay using a wide variety of methods—credit cards, debit cards, PayPal balance, PayPal Credit, or even a PayPal cash account. There’s no need for shoppers to juggle separate systems for different payment types. PayPal easily handles it all in one place.

Top-Notch Security

But convenience doesn’t mean compromising on security. Quite the opposite, as PayPal has robust, industrial-strength security measures to protect both buyers and sellers from fraud and hacking attempts. It includes:

• Advanced encryption
• Anti-fraud models
• Dedicated security specialists

So you and your customers can check out with true peace of mind.

Neutral

PayPal’s neutrality as a third-party processor is also a huge benefit. If any issues or disputes arise, you can trust they’ll be resolved fairly and objectively, not favoring one side over the other. There’s  no shady business—just an impartial referee to ensure everyone gets treated right.

All-Inclusive Transactions

Speaking of fairness, PayPal takes an all-inclusive approach to transactions. It handles every aspect, from invoicing to payment collection to dispute resolution, eliminating extra hassles. Small business owners have enough on their plate already. Letting PayPal sweat those logistical details lets you focus your energy where it really counts, like actually running your business.

The facts speak for themselves: PayPal is trusted by hundreds of millions of users across the globe, including some of the world’s biggest brands. But its platform is just as popular among solopreneurs and small businesses. Part of that appeal is the fact PayPal partners with all the major ecommerce builders like Wix, Shopify, and more to provide a seamless experience.

PayPal Fees

Let’s talk about what you can expect to pay when using PayPal for your online store. The good news is PayPal keeps its fee structure nice and straightforward. There are really just two main areas to focus on: monthly fees and transaction fees.

No Monthly Fees (for the Most Part)

PayPal doesn’t charge any monthly fees to maintain your account or accept payments online. Its pricing is purely transaction-based, which means you only pay fees when you actually make a sale.

If, however, you’re dipping your toes into some of PayPal’s other features, you may be required to pay monthly fees. For instance, Payflow Pro is a customizable payment gateway offered by PayPal that has a monthly fee associated with it. The service allows merchants to build custom checkouts and is charged at $30 per month for Payflow Pro, plus a $0.10 fee per transaction.

Transaction Fees

For online sales, PayPal charges a standard rate of 2.9% of the total payment amount, plus a fixed $0.30 fee per transaction. As an example, for a $50 sale, you would owe PayPal $1.75 (2.9% of $50 = $1.45 + $0.30 fixed fee).

It’s worth noting that the rate applies to domestic transactions. International transactions have different rates. Let’s say your account is US-based, but the funds received from a PayPal account come from a different country. In this scenario, the fees for an entirely online transaction would be 4.4% + a fixed fee based on the currency.

Start for Free

You don’t need to pay anything to get started with PayPal for your online store. Just create a free PayPal Business account, connect it to your website, and you’re ready to start selling immediately. PayPal won’t charge you any fees until you actually start receiving online orders and payments from customers.

PayPal’s pricing follows a simple model with no surprises. There are no monthly hurdles for receiving payments—just manageable transaction rates that align with standard industry costs for online payment processing. This allows you to easily integrate PayPal and test it out risk-free until your business starts successfully taking off.

Setting up PayPal to accept payments for your online store is refreshingly straightforward. We’ll walk through the process step-by-step so you can start generating revenue quickly and smoothly.

Just follow these simple steps:

1) Create an Online Store

Building an online store presence doesn’t have to be difficult. With an ecommerce website builder, you get access to stylish templates, simple editing tools, and built-in sales features. Just select the template you like, add your products and key information, and then publish when ready. Some builders, like Wix, even offer free plans to get started on a tight budget.

However, don’t rush this step. Think through your business priorities—are you looking for advanced inventory management or multichannel integration to sell across platforms? Make sure to choose a website builder that provides the right ecommerce capabilities for your needs.

2) Create a PayPal Business Account

You’ll need to sign up for a PayPal Business account if you don’t already have one. This is different from a normal PayPal account used for casual payments between friends and family. A Business account gives you added functionality to integrate PayPal into your website.

Getting started with a PayPal Business account. Source: Website Builder Expert

Head to PayPal and click “Sign Up“,  then follow the steps to complete your registration, including verifying your email, phone number, and business details. Make sure you accurately portray what your business sells for the smoothest account setup.

3) Connect PayPal to Your Online Store

With your PayPal Business account created, it’s time to integrate it into your ecommerce website. The exact steps will vary slightly depending on which website builder you use:

• Wix: Go to your Wix dashboard > Select “Payments” > Click “Connect PayPal” and follow the steps.
• Squarespace:Go to Settings > Payments > Click “Connect PayPal Account.”
• Shopify: From your Shopify admin, go to Settings > Payments > “Connect a payment provider” and follow the steps for PayPal.

Most builders will walk you through the integration process with clear prompts. Don’t hesitate to reference their help documentation if needed. This is a really important step to make sure your PayPal is properly connected so you can start accepting orders!

4) Set Up PayPal Payments

With PayPal successfully integrated, you can now configure your payment settings for the customer experience you want to provide. This may include:

• Deciding which PayPal payments to accept (one-time purchases, recurring payments, etc.)
• Setting up shipping rates and policies
• Adding sales tax rates, if required
• Adjusting currency options for international buyers

Just remember to take time to review all the available settings. The goal is to create a seamless, hassle-free checkout experience for your customers to encourage more sales and reduce cart abandonment.

5) Start Selling with PayPal

That’s it—you’re all set to begin accepting PayPal payments on your online store! As customers land on your website, they’ll see the trusted PayPal icon at checkout. That iconic logo is widely recognized and provides an extra confidence boost as well as a sense of security for buyers to complete their purchases.

What Else Should I Know About PayPal?

From here, you can take advantage of PayPal’s full slate of sales insights and reporting within your PayPal Business dashboard. Keep an eye on transaction details, sales trends, and any other metrics that can help optimize and grow your ecommerce business over time.

Don’t forget to regularly update your product listings and promotions, too. An online store requires consistent nurturing through fresh content and offerings tailored to your target audience. Now that you can easily accept PayPal payments, the sales growth opportunities are endless.

What makes millions of businesses use PayPal, and where can it improve? Let’s take a look at the pros and cons.

Trusted and Recognizable

For small businesses looking for conversions, PayPal offers instant brand recognition and trust. With over 400 million active users, customers feel secure completing purchases through this widely-adopted payment method. Increased buyer confidence helps reduce abandoned carts and boosts sales.

Easy Integration With Popular Website Builders

Worried that adding PayPal will be too technical? PayPal integrates easily with all the top ecommerce website builders like Wix, Squarespace, Shopify, and more. The integration process is straightforward, with clear steps that virtually any seller can follow—you don’t need coding skills.

PayPal integrates with a range of website builders. Source: Website Builder Expert

Simplifies Payment Processing

As a small business owner, you’re pulled in a million directions. PayPal simplifies payments by handling every aspect of the transaction, from invoicing to receiving money securely. You don’t need to juggle multiple systems or worry about fraud protection headaches. PayPal has it covered under one convenient roof.

Comprehensive Reporting

With PayPal’s advanced reporting tools at your fingertips, you can easily track sales metrics that matter most. See your total revenue, payments received, disputes, and more all within your simple PayPal dashboard. Having these insights lets you continually optimize your online store’s performance.

Transaction Fees Can Add Up

While PayPal’s merchant fees are reasonable (2.9% + $0.30 per transaction for online purchases), they can put a dent in your profits over time, especially for low-cost items. Businesses dealing primarily in higher-ticket sales may be able to absorb these fees more comfortably.

Limited Customization Options

PayPal’s checkout process is designed to be seamless but standardized across its platform. So, in essence, you’ve got less ability to customize the checkout experience with your own branding colors, logos, etc, unless you opt for the more expensive PayPal Pro (more on that shortly). But for many small businesses, the trade-off for convenience is worthwhile.

Potential Account Limitations

While rare, some users have reported instances of PayPal holding funds or limiting accounts during periods of unusual activity as a fraud prevention measure. Having constant access to your sales revenue is super important, so such account limitations could impact cash flow if they occur.

The pros of PayPal’s simplicity, security, and market leadership outweigh its relatively minor cons for most small online businesses. As long as you understand the potential transaction costs and limitations, PayPal provides a trusted, user-friendly way to start accepting digital payments with confidence.

PayPal might not be for everyone, but are there any viable alternatives out there? There’s no doubt that PayPal enjoys a significant amount of the online payments market share, but it’s certainly not the only option for sellers. Depending on your business needs and priorities, some alternatives may be worth considering:

Stripe

One of PayPal’s biggest competitors is Stripe. This payment processor is particularly popular among larger businesses and anyone prioritizing customization and advanced reporting features due to its robust suite of tools and customization options. Stripe’s pricing is very similar to PayPal at 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction.

Adding Stripe can sometimes prove trickier than PayPal’s more seamless website builder integrations. But if you have development resources, Stripe offers flexibility to customize the checkout experience with your own branding.

Square

If you run more of an omnichannel operation with both physical and online sales, Square could be a good PayPal alternative to explore. Its payment processing fees are also 2.9% + $0.30 for online sales and 2.6% + $0.10 for in-person payments.

Square integrates nicely with website builders like Squarespace and Square Online and provides that unified solution to accept any payment type from any location. The potential downside is having to juggle multiple Square product registrations.

Amazon Pay

For ecommerce businesses already selling on Amazon’s marketplace, it could make sense to use an Amazon Pay solution for your online store as well. Fees are competitive at 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction, with no monthly fees.

The advantage here is providing customers with another trusted, recognized checkout option. But you’ll need to be approved by Amazon for its Pay service, which has specific qualifications for sellers.

Merchant Account

If you’re a larger online business processing over $100k per year, you could save money long-term by going with a dedicated merchant account instead of an aggregator like PayPal. These typically have lower processing rates, around 2% + $0.25 per transaction.

Merchant accounts, however, are more complicated to set up and maintain. You’ll need to be approved and may face expensive termination fees if you want to cancel later. For smaller sellers, those hassles rarely make sense compared to PayPal’s ease of use.

So, summing it up, PayPal remains the simplest and most accessible option for most online businesses and sellers. But it’s wise to evaluate your unique needs as you grow and see if specialized alternatives could be an even better fit down the line.

PayPal has a fairly straightforward pricing model with a standard of 2.9% + $0.30 transaction fee, which we discussed earlier. Although, there are a few additional costs and fees to watch out for depending on how you use the services:

Currency Conversion Fees

If you sell products internationally and receive payments in multiple currencies, PayPal charges a currency conversion fee. This is currently set at 4.4% above the base exchange rate to convert and process those international transactions.

Chargeback Transactions

In the event of a payment dispute where the buyer files a claim or chargeback, PayPal charges a $20 fee per chargeback case. This helps cover operational costs to investigate and resolve the issue.

PayPal Working Capital Loans

If you opt to take out one of PayPal’s working capital loans for your business, you’ll face loan fees that vary based on your credit profile and loan amount. These can range anywhere from 10-30% of the total loan value.

Instant Transfer Fee

If you need to instantly withdraw funds from your PayPal account balance instead of waiting one business day for a free transfer, instant transfers incur a 1.5% fee, maxing out at $15 per transfer.

While these potential extra fees are relatively minor, it’s still wise to understand PayPal’s full pricing structure so you can properly account for those additional costs when pricing your own products and services. Transparency and planning are key for profitable online sales through any payment processor.

We don’t just skim the surface when it comes to reviews and recommendations. Our team looks at several important factors, including:

• Fees and pricing:We examine the headliner rates, as well as every potential fee, from currency conversions to account withdrawals. Any hidden costs are laid bare.
• Integration and setup:We look at how each payment solution works with multiple website builders and online stores.
• Sales features: What sales, inventory, and business management tools are included? We explore each solution’s full product ecosystem.
• Support quality:We look at the quality of support and how easy it is for you to get help.

When it comes to accepting payments online, PayPal won’t be perfect for every business – but our testing will show you exactly where its strengths lie.

With PayPal’s trusted security, seamless integrations, and user-friendly fee structure, there’s no reason not to explore it for your online business. While not perfect for every seller, PayPal provides a refreshingly straightforward way for most entrepreneurs to start accepting digital payments and grow their operations with confidence.

Once you’ve set up with PayPal, make sure your checkout page is optimized for the best chance of converting.

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Somewhat paradoxically, company hierarchies aren’t set in stone – they differ across businesses, countries, and industries, so are hard to quantify. For the purposes of this guide, however, we’ve separated out the ecommerce job roles that follow into three camps:

• Executive-Level Managers (C-Suite)
• B-Level Executives (Middle Managers)
• Employees (Creatives, Laborers, and other Non-Managerial Staff)

Executive-Level Managers (C-Suite)

Executive-level managers (also known as C-level managers) will form your business’s C-Suite.

These are your ecommerce company’s biggest players: its head honchos when it comes to operations, finances, marketing, people, technology, and strategy. C-Suite members are the most senior employees of a company, and are usually responsible for the success and growth of entire functions or departments.

Founder/Director

What’s in a name?

Well, this one’s fairly straightforward – the Founder is, of course, the person that created the company.

In many ecommerce businesses, the Founder is also the Director – the individual elected to manage an enterprise’s activities, and ensure that all its financial and legal requirements are met.

If you’ve founded a company, but don’t have the time – or the inclination – to direct it yourself, you’ll need to hire someone for the role of Director. Since this person will, essentially, be in the most powerful and influential position in your company, it’s important to pick someone who shares your vision and plans for your ecommerce business’s future.

Chief Marketing Officer (CMO)

Your CMO will sit at the top of your ecommerce business’s marketing tree: planning, developing, executing – and then optimizing – all your advertising and marketing initiatives. The CMO is in charge of ensuring that all marketing activities feed into key business strategies and long-term goals. A CMO might also commission market research in the form of focus groups or surveys, or monitor wider market trends to help the company stay ahead of the curve.

In the typical company hierarchy, they sit above the Head of Marketing, who reports directly into them.

Chief Technical Officer (CTO)

Just as a CMO’s realm is marketing, a CTO’s world is – you guessed it – technology.

As Workable’s CTO job description puts it, the chief responsibilities of this role are:

• Developing the company’s strategy for using technological resources
• Ensuring technologies are used efficiently, profitably, and securely
• Evaluating and implementing new systems and infrastructure

As a C-Suite position, the CTO’s role isn’t to get bogged down in the day-to-day drudgery, but to coordinate an ecommerce business’s utilization of technological principles, practices, and platforms from up high. It goes without saying, then, that it’s a crucially important cog in the machine of all expanding ecommerce companies!

Middle Management (B-Level Executives)

The ‘middle’ in ‘middle management’ refers to where these employees sit on the typical organizational tree – below the C-Suite and senior managers, but above the lower levels of operational staff. Essentially, they’re the meat in the corporate sandwich – so let’s unpack why this layer of ecommerce job roles is so important.

Digital Marketing Manager

Digital Marketing Managers are responsible for coordinating your ecommerce company’s marketing efforts across different online platforms. This could include:

• Search Engine Marketing: paying Google for ads to appear at the top of its results pages, when customers search for keywords relating to your brand or industry online.
• Native Advertising: creating marketing messages that match the function and form of the content they appear in, for example “Promoted Listings” or “Sponsored Content” on online articles, or recommended further reading that appears at the bottom of web content.
• Social Media Marketing: utilizing platforms such as Instagram, Pinterest, and Facebook to promote products or services, and make money off social media.

And, to entrepreneur Tal Sheref – co-founder of online brand Condo Wizard – this is one of the ecommerce job roles you’ll need to recruit to grow your business.

“A Digital Marketing Manager has the skills to increase traffic and conversions to your business, which they’ll do by launching marketing campaigns across multiple digital channels.

“In addition, a Digital Marketing Manager will collaborate with your Developer and Digital Operations Manager to include various parts of your company in each campaign, enabling you to offer discounts, promotions, loyalty schemes, and incentives to your customers. In short, they’ll make your business known!”

These types of marketers tend to specialize in paid content. Usually, the Digital Marketing Manager’s counterpart is the Content Marketing Manager, a role which tends to focus on the organic, SEO-oriented side of advertising.

Customer Services Manager

Your Customer Services Manager will be in charge of coordinating and leading your team of customer service executives: managing performance, developing and implementing customer service policies, and strategizing new ways to measure satisfaction and improve services. They’ll also be working with the team to handle customer enquiries and complaints directly.

One job site summarizes the Customer Services Manager so:

“Any customer service manager’s main priority is to take care of customers and to provide them with the best possible experience. Whether that’s a Customer Services Manager in SaaS (Software as a Service) who may be working with a specific customer repeatedly for an extended period of time, or a customer service rep who focuses on one-off inbound requests from consumers, the end goal is always to offer the maximum possible value, while demonstrating empathy and expertise.”

For more info about which other positions will make up your ecommerce business’s customer services team, jump down to the ‘Ecommerce Job Roles by Function/Department’ section below.

Internet Sales Manager

An Internet Sales Manager’s responsibilities, as defined online, include:

• Overseeing your sales team’s daily activities, to ensure it hits its objectives and monthly quotas
• Analyzing sales-related issues, and providing corrective actions
• Qualifying leads, and then contacting them with product or pre-sales info
• Building positive, productive relationships with customers
• Explaining the features and benefits of your product to potential buyers
• Negotiating prices and completing online sales
• Remaining up to date on product knowledge and any ongoing promotions
• Developing best practices to boost sales and profitability
• Evaluating the performance of sales agents/executives, and providing feedback accordingly
• Scheduling and running sales meetings to discuss issues and provide recent updates

With sales being, essentially, the bread and butter of any ecommerce business, the role of Internet Sales Manager is a vital one. Not only will this person be in charge of driving online sales and cultivating customer relationships, they’ll also be responsible for ensuring the success and happiness of your sales team.

Employees

Finally, there’s the employee-level staff at your business. These roles won’t require the individual to manage anyone, or take on much senior responsibility, but they’re still skilled. These people are your creatives, your laborers, your developers, and your analysts. Basically, they’re everything you need to scale your ecommerce business’s operations – fast!

SEO Content Writer

Whether you want to build your brand with engaging, informational content, or create more commercial articles to deliver fresh, sales-ready leads, you’ll need a wordsmith at hand.

SEO Content Writers are in charge of writing blog content, ebooks, whitepapers, and marketing copy. They may also assist your sales and customer service teams with ad hoc requests, and get involved with other forms of lead or customer generation, such as your PPC (pay-per-click), social, or native advertising campaigns.

Your writers will also be in charge of ensuring that your brand’s content is optimized for the keywords most relevant to your business and industry. They’ll assist your PR team with composing the copy for link building campaigns, and writing up press releases to deadline.

Web Developer

Web Developers are responsible for using technological platforms to help your business hit its targets, and for creating a stable, scalable infrastructure upon which to grow.

According to job site The Balance Careers, developers can expect to be held accountable for:

• Having expertise in HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP, and similarly relevant coding languages
• Creating and testing applications for websites
• Working with other teams – such as Brand and Design – to redesign elements of your ecommerce site’s platform
• Maintaining your website, and troubleshooting any issues that may arise

There’s more to it than that, of course, which is why you need to make sure you’re hiring web developers with a skill set that matches the needs of your business. Some developers, for instance, specialize in WordPress sites, while others are more design-oriented. Certain web developers will be more adept at getting the frontend of your site scrubbed up and sparkling, while others will be better at keeping your backend ticking along….

…so choose wisely!

Business Analyst

So, Business Analysts… analyze businesses? Well, yes – although it’s a little more complicated than that. We reckon that Mary K. Pratt and Sarah K. White of CIO sum up the particulars of the role nicely:

“Business analysts (BAs) are responsible for bridging the gap between IT and the business by using data analytics to assess processes, determine requirements, and deliver data-driven recommendations and reports to executives and stakeholders.

“BAs engage with business leaders and users to understand how data-driven changes to process, products, services, software and hardware can improve efficiencies and add value.

“They must articulate those ideas but also balance them against what’s technologically feasible and financially and functionally reasonable. Depending on the role, you might work with data sets to improve products, hardware, tools, software, services or process.”

Against this backdrop, Business Analysts operate at that crucial nexus where technology, finance, information, and operations meet. Needless to say, you’ll struggle to optimize, evaluate, grow, and – ultimately – analyzeyour business without them!

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Of course, you won’t need allthe above roles when you’re just starting out. After all, what’s the use of a company hierarchy or structure – if it’s just you and a couple of friends filling orders from your basement?

Soon, however, you’ll want to start thinking about which roles you want to hire for – and, later, how to split these up by the function or goal they perform. Below, we’ve categorized the most crucial ecommerce job roles in 2021 by their department, to give you a good idea as to where to start.

So read on – we’restarting at the top!

Leadership

“Where there is no vision, the people perish.” 

• Proverbs 29:18

The importance of good leadership is, quite literally, biblical– so establishing the makeup and structure of your C-Suite is a crucial first step in laying the foundations for a successful ecommerce business. Here are the main roles:

• Founder
• Director
• CEO (Chief Executive Officer)
• CTO (Chief Technical Officer)
• CMO (Chief Marketing Officer)
• CFO (Chief Financial Officer)
• COO (Chief Operating Officer)
• CHRO (Chief Human Resources Officer)
• Departmental Heads

Tech

Technology (Tech) teams are becoming increasingly vital to modern ecommerce companies. They fulfill a wide range of functions to ultimately ensure that your ecommerce site looks good, stays live, and offers an excellent user experience (UX).

In an ecommerce setting, for instance, the Tech team might work on improving your site’s checkout experience: removing distractions, reducing the likelihood of shopping cart abandonment, and making it as quick and simple as possible for your customers to pay online. A Tech team might also ensure that any integration between your site and a third party – a payments platform, for instance – is seamless and straightforward.

Tech teams are also instrumental when it comes to maintaining your site – fixing bugs, creating or improving existing functionalities, and optimizing the look, feel, and efficacy of both your site’s front end (what the customer sees) and the back end (the section that you deal with and edit).

The exact nature and titles of jobs in tech differ between companies, and there’s often overlap between the kind of skill sets required and responsibilities expected. A few of the most common roles here are:

• Engineering Manager
• Product Manager
• Design Manager
• Frontend Developer
• Backend Developer
• Full Stack Developer
• Software Engineer
• UX (User Experience) Designer
• UI (User Interface) Designer
• UX Writer
• UX Researcher

Logistics

With all the complicated tech, new-fangled acronyms, and fancy job titles (Growth Hacker, anyone?) it can be easy for scaling ecommerce businesses to forget the fundamentals. That’s why the people working in your warehouse are so vital to the success of your operation as it grows – after all, what’s the use of taking more orders, if there’s no one on the ground actually fillingthem?

This is where order fulfillment comes in. While your den may have served as a makeshift storage space and warehouse when you were just starting out, pretty soon you’ll want something more… substantial.

Of course, a warehouse (also known as a fulfillment center) is no good without the right people. Here are some of the ecommerce job roles you’ll need to think about recruiting for your logistics team:

• Fulfillment/Warehouse Manager/Team Leader/Partner
• Logistics/Distribution Manager
• Fulfillment/Warehouse Supervisor/Specialist
• Fulfillment/Warehouse Officer/Operative/Executive
• Shipping and Receiving Associate
• Forklift Driver
• Material Handler
• Machine Operator
• Stocker/Packer
• Laborer

Customer Service

“Do what you do so well that they will want to see it again and bring their friends.” 

• Walt Disney

The importance of a customer service team can’t be overstated. They’ll be the first point of contact for anyone looking to engage with your ecommerce business, whether the customer is:

• Requesting information about an upcoming product or service you offer
• Seeking clarification around the delivery time or window for their order
• Asking for a refund, or wishing to complain about a product or aspect of the service

Basically, your customer service department solves problems! In their day to day, they’ll deal with a lot – so you’ll want to hire empathetic souls with politeness, personability, and a penchant for patience. Here are couple of examples as to what their titles might be:

• Customer Services Manager
• Customer Services Officer/Assistant/Executive

Sales & Business Development

Unsurprisingly, selling is going to be vital to the success of your ecommerce business – so you’ll need to hire people that are good at doing it!

If marketers are responsible for generating leads, salespeople are the ones jumping on those leads – and, ultimately, converting them into customers. Sales teams will pitch your products and services to prospective clients, give demos, negotiate contracts, and – once they’ve got new business on board – be responsible for maintaining those relationships over time.

Similarly to tech, sales roles fall under a wide umbrella of monikers and meanings. Whether you call it business development or account management, you’ll want these particular employees to be confident conversationalists, have an excellent understanding of people, and – perhaps most importantly – have large, flashing dollar signs in their eyes! Here are some of the roles you’ll want to consider hiring for:

• Business Development Manager
• Sales Manager
• Internet Sales Manager
• Inside Sales Executive
• Sales Executive
• Business Development Executive
• Account Manager
• Sales Consultant
• Sales Associate

Marketing & Public Relations (PR)

“Make it simple, but significant.”

• Don Draper

Common conceptions of marketing teams tend to coalesce around cabals of enigmatic, ‘Don Draper’-esque advertisers, putting together whip-smart ads to stun the masses. While there’s a certain charm to the idea, the reality is a little different.

That’s because, in a modern ecommerce company, ‘marketing’ runs the gamut from paid ads on Google or social media platforms, all the way to SEO-optimized articles and marketing emails. Often, marketing teams will be subdivided further, with ‘organic’ marketing (this is anything that’s ‘free’ to generate, and includes blogs and web articles), distinct from ‘paid’ advertising (which costs you money to get eyes on your material).

Some common roles in the marketing sphere include:

• Digital Marketing Manager
• Content Marketing Manager
• Email Marketing (CRM) Manager
• SEO Content Writer
• Paid Social Manager
• Emerging Paid Media Manager
• Social Media Manager
• Performance Marketing Manager

You’ll also require a PR team to work closely with your marketers. Again, you’re probably falling back on the mental image of the PR archetype; a room full of spin doctors scheming to to dilute a scandal, or divert catastrophe. But again, that doesn’t quitehit the mark.

In reality, your PR team’s main goal will be to monitor mentions of your brand and company in the news, and ensure that the overriding sentiment toward your business in editorial coverage is broadly positive. Depending on your industry, that could involve hosting events, reaching out to relevant publications to secure backlinks, or offering up quotes from your in-house experts to popular media outlets.

Whereas marketing advertises your ecommerce company to the world, PR promotesit. So what kind of ecommerce job roles will make up your PR team?

• Public Relations Officer
• Brand Ambassador
• Event Manager
• Public Affairs Manager
• Media Relations Manager

Accounting/Finance

“In this world, nothing is certain except death and taxes.”

• Benjamin Franklin

With Ben’s words in mind, if you want to guarantee a long life for your ecommerce business, you’ll want to make sure that your taxes are in good order.

That’s where accountants come in. They’ll balance books, pay invoices, reconcile your expenses and earnings, and make sure the reporting on your profits and losses is accurate and up to date.

An Accounting team will also hold you accountableto your ecommerce business’s budget, conduct regular audits, and engage in risk analyses and financial forecasting, to give you a good idea of what you can expect from the future.

Some of the roles you’ll look to hire in this department are:

• Accounting Manager
• Business Analyst
• Financial/General Accountant
• CPA (Certified Public Accountant)

Human Resources (HR)

No matter how tech-oriented all ecommerce businesses have to be these days (after all, you make money through the internet!), it’s still people that will drive your company forward.

A Human Resources team, then, is composed of the people that will help make your people successful. HR departments hire, fire, train, and onboard your staff, and are typically also responsible for organizing benefits and perks. Most HR departments contain L and D (Learning and Development) sub-functions, too, which coordinate external training courses and educational programs to upskill your staff.

HR also usually comprises payroll (ensuring that your employees are paid correctly, and on time), as well as facilities (managing and maintaining any physical office space, and provisions for it).

As it grows, the average ecommerce business will require some combination (or variation) of the following HR roles:

• Payroll Manager
• Facilities Manager
• HR Manager
• HR Assistant
• HR Analyst
• Recruiter
• Talent Manager

Information Technology (IT) Support

Though they’re not to be confused with the Tech team above, the people in your IT support team willbe of the ‘techy’ type. Your IT team will be responsible for maintaining the technological setup and systems your ecommerce business uses every day.

That includes repairing laptops, managing your business’s data and networks, coordinating user access to your systems and platforms, and keeping your telecommunications infrastructure running smoothly.

Some of the ecommerce job roles to hire for in this department include:

• IT Analyst
• IT Support Officer/Technician
• IT Coordinator
• Network Architect/Engineer
• Computer Systems Manager
• Computer Systems Analyst
• Telecommunications Specialist

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Above, we’ve outlined some of the most vital roles, teams, and functions that all ecommerce businesses will need to fill.

But of course, which of these ecommerce job roles your company prioritizes will depend on your staffing needs, HR investment, and the resources at your disposal – not to mention your business’s size and budget.

That’s why below, we’ve broken down eight of the 21st century’s most influential ecommerce job roles by which business size they’ll have the most impact on.

And who’s better placed to explain the importance of these positions than the CEOs, founders, and directors of successful ecommerce companies themselves?

Read on to find out where to start – and who to start with!

Key Ecommerce Job Roles for Small Businesses

Content Writer

“Your writer (also known as a ‘Word Magician’!) will assist in the creation of your initial website and product messaging, as well as in putting together SEO-friendly content. They’ll also potentially write the copy for email marketing campaigns, scripts, and other product assets.

“Your writer will help you communicate your ecommerce business’s vision to the rest of the world, as well as assisting your sales and marketing teams in creating compelling copy that communicates your product’s benefits.”

• Paul Stein | CEO, Trusted House Painter

“Having a website is integral to ecommerce. Thus, there is always a skilled and competent web developer behind every ecommerce business!

“Basically, the web developer and their team are in charge of ‘taking care’ of the website, both in the front end and back end. The web developer is the one who’ll build your ecommerce site’s architecture, optimize its ecosystem, and ensure the smooth daily performance of your online platform.”

• Antti Alatalo | Founder, SmartWatches4u

“Pretty much the person who determines the user friendliness and functionality of your website. Every growing ecommerce business simply must have a team of web developers working for them!”

• Ben Wallington | CEO, Designerwear

“Ecommerce relies heavily on logistics. You can have all the SEO or digital marketing in the world, but if you can’t fulfill orders, your company will collapse. Order fulfillment requires warehouse staff.

“[Fulfillment officers] choose the necessary products for each order, pack them, and guarantee that they arrive on schedule. Warehouse workers are also essential for inventory management. They keep their colleagues or systems up to date on stock levels, in order to ensure that companies don’t oversell or undersell.

“Except for those who solely dropship, all ecommerce businesses will employ warehouse workers.”

• Alex Claro | VPN Analyst, CreditDonkey

“A Product Manager will lead the vision and strategy for your digital offering. What are your customers trying to achieve? How can you help them do it in a technically scalable and commercially viable way? These are the key questions a PM is always trying to answer.

“Typically, a PM will work closely with one or more developers – possibly alongside a product designer, data analyst and/or user researcher. No matter the size of your product team, however, the role has the same goal – to understand your customers’ problems and needs, and deliver impactful solutions for them.”

• Tim Kitching | Senior Product Manager, MVF Global

“A Customer Services Manager enables you to build out a dedicated customer services team, and thus accommodate your ecommerce business’s growing number of customers. The more customers you have, the more people you have to accommodate. You can never avoid complaints and inquiries!”

• David Clelland | Director, Infiniti Tracking

“As your ecommerce business grows, a substantial IT infrastructure becomes even more important. After all, many companies utilize a variety of software solutions, and have a large amount of hardware in their offices and warehouses.

“An IT technician is responsible for providing critical technical support. The more complicated the infrastructure, the more critical this technical assistance becomes.”

• David Fernandez | CEO & Founder, Capital Dealer Solutions

“With so many potential customers using Google or other search engines to research purchasing decisions, you’ll need a Technical SEO Manager who can work closely with your Web Developer or Product Manager; both so that your website can be found, and to increase your organic search traffic.

“A Technical SEO will help ensure that Google can efficiently and effectively crawl your website, without getting lost among increasingly large option sets for your products. They’ll also help you to optimize your landing and product pages, ensuring Google can understand your website better. This, in turn, promotes it higher to its users – and your potential customers!”.

• Cam Blair | Head of SEO, MVF Global

“You’ll most likely outsource this work at first. However, there will come the point when you’ll require the services of an in-house accountant.

“An accountant will handle your market speculation, financing, and Profit and Loss (P&L) reporting, and provide revenue and expense reports and listings. They’ll also collaborate with other positions and departments, such as the Director of Ecommerce, as well as the Inventory Manager.”

• Tal Shelef | Realtor & Co-Founder, CondoWizard

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Choosing the right people is important. But to do that, you’ll need to place them in the right roles, too – meaning that settling on your ecommerce company’s hierarchy, team structure, and division of labor is a crucial task.

But remember, not allof the above roles will be right for your business. Many you won’t require until your ecommerce business is more established, while some you won’t need at all. The trick here, then, is finding the balance between keeping costs low, and pursuing your ambition – that all-important equilibrium of stability and scalability.

We’ll leave you with the thoughts of Damian Enderle, the founder of ecommerce company Adult Diapers 365, to demonstrate the point:

“I started with just two other employees – both relatives of mine. The three of us looked after finances, digital marketing, and the website, as well as customer service. 

“During our first few months, business was slow, so the three of us could efficiently handle the burden. However, as the business grew, we’ve now expanded to a team of 20 people, including: Content Writers, Human Resources Executives, Finance Associates, Business Development Executives, and Social Media Experts. Our company is now split into four departments: Finance, Business Development, Digital Marketing, and Human Resources.

“Speaking from my personal experience, the first few months are hard, with financial constraints and a shortage of talented employees. Therefore, you’ll need to focus on the jobs without which survival is not possible.

“At my company, we focused on finance and marketing – the main areas which would help actually generate sales for our ecommerce business. Therefore, your small organization should first prioritize your goals, and then hire people accordingly – remember, too many cooks spoil the broth!

“Later on, when the organization starts turning a profit, you should increase the size of your workforce. Focus more on digital experts and writers, who can actively contribute to the aggressive marketing of an ecommerce business – you want staff that are young, fresh, and creative!”

Liked this article, or have your own quotes about ecommerce job roles that you’d like to put forward? Drop us a line in the comments, and let us know your thoughts. Until next time!

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Online shopping and ecommerce have totally transformed the fashion sector. Shoppers no longer need to browse rails of clothes, bags, and shoes in person and instead have hundreds of thousands of options at their fingertips, all shoppable from anywhere. 

The global fashion ecommerce market is valued at an estimated $812 billion and by 2027, it’s expected to be worth almost $1.2 trillion. It’s no surprise, therefore, that everyone wants a piece of the pie and starting an online fashion business is a popular choice. 

Why? Because not only is the market clearly huge, but you don’t need to pay out any costs for a traditional brick-and-mortar store. You can also manage stock levels and inventory easily, and turn around new styles and garments quickly.

When we talk about the future of fashion, one of the major trends is sustainability. Already a key focus for both the fashion industry and shoppers, sustainable fashion is only going to get bigger.

In an eco-conscious world, shoppers are looking for sustainable choices. The fact is, the fashion industry is one of the planet’s largest polluters. From the factory gases emitted to the air miles most garments rack up as they move from factory floor to wardrobe, and of course, the millions of fast fashion items that end up in landfills every year, fashion has not been known for its sustainability.

But this is changing. Shoppers are looking for fashion brands that are as ethical as possible, keep their carbon emissions low, and treat their staff fairly. 

Not only is it about finding new, sustainable ways to create clothes, but it’s also about reducing quantities and creating garments that are made to last, not items that will fall apart after one round in the washing machine.

Secondhand clothing is also growing at pace, with Shopify suggesting that the market increased by 24% in 2022 alone and is expected to be worth a whopping $218 billion by 2026.

People are looking for a more sustainable way to shop and giving new life to pre-loved clothes ticks all the boxes. And brands are taking note.

Worn Wear by Patagonia offers pre-loved/secondhand versions of the brand’s clothing at a reduced price.

Further Reading

What to start your own online thrift store? Our expert guide has all the steps and tips you need!

With so much online competition vying for fashion shopper’s attention, you need to stand out from the crowd and offer something unique. You need to offer a personalized shopping experience. 

The Demand for Individualized Experiences

Customers want a personalized shopping journey for two reasons. They want to feel recognised by a brand, rather than being seen as just another number, and they want an easier consumer journey. 

Personalization offers items on a plate. By displaying items you think your customers will like based on previous purchases or making it easy to finish incomplete purchases, you can create a tailored experience that makes the lives of customers easier.

Fashion is driven by our own creative desires, likes and dislikes. By offering a personalised experience, you’re more likely to provide users with product recommendations aligned with their own unique sense of style, therefore encouraging them to make a purchase.  

AI-Driven Personalization

With major advances in Artificial Intelligence in ecommerce, it’s never been easier to offer a personalized experience to customers.

Machine learning algorithms have the ability to scan through masses of customer behavior data – far more than a human could get through – and understand key behavior trends that allow them to predict the individual tastes of a customer. 

Fashion ecommerce stores can use AI to create a personalized experience via product recommendations, dynamic pricing, and chatbots. Alternatively, you can use AI in customer service. 

Customization Options for Consumers

Shoppers are increasingly looking for unique, one-of-a-kind items to add to their wardrobes and what’s more bespoke than creating the garment yourself?

That’s right, the future of fashion will allow people to customize items, designing their own clothes online. 

This online fashion store lets shoppers customize and design almost every aspect of the dress.

How much control you offer customers is up to you. Some brands allow customers limited options (e.g. colors and lengths) while others give free rein, effectively allowing a customer to create their piece from scratch.

Personal Stylists Powered by Technology

Making use of personal styling services is no longer an option solely for in-person shoppers. Thanks to the rise in AI and AR (Augmented Reality), virtual stylists are becoming more and more common. 

Virtual stylists offer personalized outfit recommendations to users, often after they have answered key questions and provided information on what they are looking for. 

Augmented Reality is becoming more common on ecommerce websites, particularly in the fashion and beauty industries. In the years to come, customers will expect to be able to “try on” the items virtually before they make a purchase. 

Social media is changing the way we do so much. How we search, how we communicate, and, most importantly, how we shop. 

The Role of Social Media in Shaping Fashion Trends

Social media plays a huge role in fashion trends and what’s popular with shoppers. 

The rise in influencers on platforms such as Instagram and TikTok means trends and popular items are being led by real-life shoppers and content creators instead of the catwalk. 

Social media is now one of the top places that people turn to for style inspiration, trend intel, and shopping ideas.

User-generated content is key to shaping fashion trends and if the right accounts share your items, they can go viral and sell out within hours. 

Shopping on Social Platforms

Social platforms are no longer just for browsing either, users can now shop directly from feeds. 

Shoppable posts and direct purchasing options on platforms such as Instagram make shopping even easier for consumers. Having everything all in one place is only going to become more of a consumer demand with time. 

Many brands are positioning their social channels as a place to shop, spotlighting products and making it easy to complete a purchase in as few clicks as possible.

The Metaverse will also continue to impact social commerce, with virtual realities, avatars, and online wallets all working together to offer new ways for consumers to shop online. 

Community-Building Through Fashion

Building an online community is central to brand success, and fostering an online community around fashion interests can help to add social leverage to your brand. 

One of the best ways to build an online community is via influencers. If you’re able to collaborate with the right influencer – ones that align with both your brand and your customer – the impact on sales can be monumental. 

You’ll be able to open your fashion brand up to a new audience and create the potential for trending and viral moments. 

The Influence of Social Commerce on Purchasing Decisions

Reviews will still play a huge part in the future of fashion ecommerce and users will always look for recommendations and opinions before making a purchase.

J Crew is a great example of a fashion brand that has built a strong identity and community on social media with over 2 million Instagram followers!

As mentioned above, social media is one place that consumers will turn to more and more. As a store owner, having an engaged social media presence can therefore be the difference between a user making a purchase or abandoning their cart – especially when it comes to Millennial and Gen-Z age groups. 

An engaged and up-to-date social media presence that aligns with your brand ethos adds valuable social proof to your brand, helping users determine if you’re relevant and in line with their own identity and style.

AI is fast becoming a key part of almost every industry, including fashion. In fact, it’s hard to envisage the future of fashion without the presence of AI. 

AI can help at every step of the fashion industry process, from design creation and garment production to supply chain management and customer service. 

Speaking of the customer, AI-driven innovations such as chatbots and product recommendations will only enhance the customer experience.  

Fashion has always been an event. Catwalk shows and brand showcases have long been a mainstay of the industry but thanks in part to the 2020 pandemic, brands have adapted to online events. This means that fashion events will continue to be digital-led.

By blending online and offline events, fashion brands are able to address two of the main industry concerns, accessibility and sustainability, whilst embracing a modern option for the digital age.

For small fashion retailers wanting to get to grips with future fashion trends in order to achieve online success, we’ve compiled some of our expert advice:

• Leverage niche markets – customers are increasingly looking for bespoke products.
• Provide unique selling propositions that make you stand out from the crowd.
• Embrace technology and online platforms for growth to offer the best customer experience.
• Put sustainability and accessibility at the forefront of your plans. 

The fashion ecommerce industry is competitive, but that doesn’t mean you can’t start an online store and attract customers. You just need to stay ahead of the latest trends and technologies. 

The future of fashion is exciting! At least, that’s what we hope you’ve taken from this article. 

With so much room for evolution, the industry will continue to grow and thrive, and the best way for small businesses to be a part of that growth is to be ready and willing to adapt to a changing landscape and embrace new technologies. 

To recap, the key ecommerce and fashion industry trends to be aware of are:

• A focus on sustainability.
• Offering personalized experiences.
• Using social media to drive sales.
• Embracing AI to transform the whole process of creating and selling clothes.
• Adapting events for the digital age.

Ready to open your own ecommerce store? Take a look at these fashion website templates to help get you started.