Whether you’ve chosen a ready-to-use e-commerce platform or opted for custom software development, you need to keep in mind several things to launch your website successfully and provide your customers with value.
We’ve crafted this quick e-commerce website checklist to help you launch your online store smoothly and start gaining profits from the start.
E-Commerce Website Checklist: Top Things to Consider
1. Standard pages
Home page, About Us, Contact, FAQ, Terms & Conditions, Privacy Policy, Shipping, Return and Refund — these may seem like obvious mentions, but in reality, many store owners forget about them or neglect adding them.
Your e-commerce website needs to share information about everything your business is offering and contain other crucial elements necessary for proper functioning and good user experience.
2. Design
Each page on your e-commerce site serves a specific function for a user. So, create a consistent look that embodies your brand and provides the best possible customer experience. In addition, make sure the design is responsive on any platform and provides clear navigation.
Then, put effort into optimizing your store for conversion—upload high-quality product videos and images and include social sharing buttons.
3. E-commerce SEO
37.5% of all traffic to e-commerce sites comes from search engines. When you own an online store, you must have a robust SEO plan in place to get more visitors and improve your website’s presence.
Make sure to incorporate quick-win keywords, optimize your pages in terms of speed, generate a sitemap, add alt-texts, meta titles, and descriptions, and check that your website has no duplicates. Only after that, submit it to the search engines for crawling and make the most out of your SEO content strategy.
4. Essential integrations
A good e-commerce store should provide as sophisticated functionality as possible to cover all actual users’ needs and preferences. That’s why you should look for the most in-demand applications and plugins and integrate them into your store, e.g., marketing tools, SEO plugins, and customer service apps.
5. Help desk
Customer retention and revenues increase when you provide excellent service. Adding a support desk to the website can increase engagement, convert more sales, and solve numerous customers’ problems, improving users’ trust and loyalty to your brand.
6. Payment methods and checkout
Make sure to optimize your checkout process to minimize cart abandonment rates and avoid any errors at the purchase stage. In addition, include several payment methods to allow customers to easily buy your products without facing any troubles. Consider offering such payment methods as Shopify Payments, PayPal, Stripe, credit/debit cards, Google Pay, Apple Pay, and cryptocurrency.
7. Email marketing
Welcome emails, surveys, card abandonment and thank-you emails, order confirmation, sales promo offers, and re-engagement emails—there are numerous ways email marketing helps you increase your e-commerce store’s conversion and maintain good relationships with customers.
8. Sales channels
To boost your sales, you need to cover as many popular sales channels as possible. For example, consider promoting your brand on Amazon, Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, TikTok, and Google Shopping. Study various platforms to understand which will bring you the best results and coverage.
9. Analytics
Setting up analytics tracking and monitoring is the fundamental step in the e-commerce website checklist. Analytics will provide you with valuable insights into your website visitors, particularly their demographics, behavior, and interests. So, configure Google Analytics as well as Facebook Pixel for efficient traffic tracking.
10. Marketing plan
You must develop a well-thought-out marketing strategy before the website launch to define how you’ll promote your items and persuade customers to buy. Ensure your plan describes SMART goals, target customers and markets, channels, and tactics for successful execution.
11. Tests
Conduct different types of software tests to ensure the functionality and appearance of your website are flawless before the launch. Check everything from buttons to subscription forms and payment processors and fix every detected bug.
Conclusion
We here, at 42 Coffee Cups, hope this e-commerce website checklist will help you build your path toward a successful launch! With these simple tips, you can be sure to create a high-converting online store on any e-commerce platform. Check in on all listed aspects from time to time to ensure your website stays up-to-date and convenient for your clients.
Need Help?
Find out more about what we do for e-commerce at E-commerce Solutions with 42 Coffee Cups.
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