Everything an eCommerce Site Needs
Having an eCommerce site is a great way to boost your business and get your products and services out into the world. With the ease of eCommerce web hosting options available, and dozens of applications that make design a breeze, almost anyone can set up their own online shop. But being able to set up a shop and setting up a good eCommerce site are two different things. When you’re getting ready to host your eCommerce site online, make sure that you’ve included these online store essentials.
User Accounts
User accounts are recommended for many types of sites, but none more so than eCommerce sites. When users shop online, they like having their own accounts they can log into for a variety of reasons. Not only do user accounts benefit the shoppers, but it also helps benefit your company as well.
User Benefits:
- Keep track of orders and shipping
- Save items they like for future purchases
- Acquire points for coupons or other special discounts
- Repurchase favorite items
Company Benefits:
- Collect emails and other contact information for marketing campaigns
- Reward return shoppers and entice further return shopping habits
- Improve customer support and satisfaction
- Offer special deals on items you want to push
- Encourage last-minute add-ons with cart-related item display
- Encourage future purchases with wish list/save for later capabilities
When you have user accounts on your eCommerce website, you enhance the shopping experience and help your business grow further. Many third-party applications and widgets help make user accounts easy to set up and control, so you don’t even need to spend extra time or money on developing the code for them. With user accounts in place, your eCommerce site is already set up for success.
eCommerce Web Hosting Blog
It may not seem like the most obvious need for an eCommerce site, but a blog can be extremely beneficial to your website. Blogs are useful for all websites, even if it’s just a small blog you update twice a month. Each blog post contributes to your SEO score, and a good blog can boost your online presence. But having a blog alone isn’t enough; you need to curate the content to fit your website.
Blogs can be simple, especially for eCommerce sites where the focus is more on the objects than the story. Blog ideas for your online shop could include:
- Announcements for new products
- Announcements for sales/discounts
- Gift idea lists
- Detailed product description/spotlight
- Guest blogs for related websites
- Product reviews
The important thing to remember when putting together your blog is to make sure that your content matches your website. For example, if you sell clothing, you don’t want a blog post that reviews the latest New York Times bestselling book. If the content on your blog doesn’t match the content on the rest of your website, search engines are likely to flag it as spam, making sure it doesn’t show up when people search for that content.
Streamlined Checkout
There’s nothing more frustrating than putting all of your carefully chosen items in a cart, only to have to spend the next hour trying to actually check out. The checkout process is the last place you want to lose customers, but it’s often the place where many businesses do. Here are some of the common mistakes online shops make when setting up their checkouts:
Too many ads – The checkout is a great place to put some targeted ads about items related to those in the cart. But too much of this can be a burden on the shopper and makes it seem like you’re desperate. The best way to run ads at checkout is to place just a few to the side when the customer is reviewing their order. Pop-ups and additional pages promoting more items are just crowded and annoying.
Complicated Forms – Yes, you do want to collect all the information you need to get the item to the customer, but sometimes these checkout forms can get a little tiresome. This is also where user accounts come into play, as customers can only have to fill out their form once, then just sign in to get their order ready. When collecting a user’s information, try to contain it all to one page instead of five different pages, each with a new list of boxes to fill out.
Slow Service – The spinning wheel of doom has given anxiety and stress to many online shoppers. Nothing sows the seeds of despair or doubt more than clicking ‘pay now’ only to watch the browser try to process it all. Shoppers are likely to assume their order didn’t process or that their card was charged but no items will be sent. Always make sure that your eCommerce web hosting plan is upgraded to keep up with the amount of traffic you expect. If you notice lagging or other issues on your site, it’s time to upgrade. It may be costly at first, but it helps you secure payments and future orders.
eCommerce Web Hosting with Cirrus Hosting
At Cirrus Hosting, we’re dedicated to helping online shops get the most out of their eCommerce venture. Our eCommerce web hosting plans offer full security and quick connection speeds, with the ability to upgrade or downgrade as needed. Our platform allows for third-party integration with dozens of popular eCommerce web-building tools, so you’ll have an easier time getting everything transferred and set up. If you’re ready to take your shop online or just want to spruce up and simplify what you already have, browse our available eCommerce hosting plans online or give us a call at 1-647-478-9984 if you have any further questions.
