Six components of a good e-commerce site
By Nowshade Kabir, Rusbiz.com
Many of your competitors are already doing business through the
Internet. You read that yearly growth rate of e-commerce is over
25 percent. E-commerce segment for the businesses that sells to
other businesses or B2B, as it is called, is escalating even in
a better pace. Naturally, at one point, you too decide that you
need to have a piece of this action! But, what are the main
characteristics of a good e-commerce site that you must consider
even before you build one?
A small research will show that there are numerous choices for
you to make your business presence online. In fact, you can be
overwhelmed with all the possibilities that are available on the
Internet to build an e-commerce website.
However, it is important to plan your website before even shop
around for tools to build your site. There are some basic
components that all e-commerce sites include, such as product
or service description pages, a shopping cart - so that buyers
can select and keep items from your product list till they
generate a purchase order or an invoice, a payment mechanism:
so that buyers can pay for your products online or offline.
But, you also need to pay attention to the following crucial
aspects:
1. Product information
Buyers take their decision whether to buy a product from your
site or not depending on the information that you provide.
That's why the product should have a clear and high-quality
picture, short and detailed specifications. If necessary add
attachments of diagrams, sketches, video etc. along with the
product specification. Write clearly and prominently all sales
terms and after sales supports terms, etc.
If you have many products, it is better to use an industry
standard classification system to categorize your products.
The goal is to have all the information related to the product
available on the website, so that the customer can take a
positive buying decision instantly.
2. Different Ordering Methods
The ultimate goal of your e-commerce site is to make sales.
Many people still do not feel comfortable to make payments
through online transactions. You would be better off if you
include ordering processes by fax, telephone and ordinary
mail. In fact, to have a telephone number for customer support
and order is a must for any e-commerce site as it gives buyers
some extra feelings of security. That way they know that they
can always talk to a live person if anything goes wrong.
3. Different Payment Methods
Although credit cards are by far the most acceptable means of
payments on the Internet, you should definitely consider other
methods as well. For small payments, Paypal is becoming
increasingly a popular mode. All e-commerce sites should
integrate this to their payment methods. More options include:
Electronic checks, e-bullion, Offline bank transfer etc.
4. Shopping Cart with Tax Calculation
In your search for shopping carts look for the ones, which
have different tax calculation mechanisms inbuilt. If you
are located in a province or state where your regional tax
gets calculated on top of the federal or vice versa, your
shopping cart should have the ability to calculate them
correctly.
5. Guarantees
As money back guarantees are becoming increasingly common
on online sales you should consider prominently posting
your money back guarantee on you website. Be sure to make
your money back guarantee generous! Customers are becoming
pickier on this issue. For example if you sell knowledge
base products like e-books, reports etc. make your hundred
percent guarantees at least of two months. For tangible
products, after sales warrantees should be also considerably
generous. Customers should feel completely secured to buy
at your website.
6. Privacy Policy
Your website must have a privacy policy. Customers are
very concerned about the information that they are
relaying to you. You must clearly explain them what you
plan to do with the various information that you collect
from your customers. If your site is planning to use
cookies, make sure that you covered this aspect in your
privacy policy too.
7. Security
If your website collects sensitive information from
your customers, you should use security systems like
SSL (Secure Socket Layer). This guarantees that the
data provided by your customer will not fall into the
hand of a malicious hacker while transferring from his
computer to the web server. This also will reassure your
customers that you are truly concerned about the security
of their personal and sensitive information.
Once you know how to handle all the above mentioned
aspects, go ahead and look for a great tool to build
your dream e-commerce website and make money online!
About the author
Nowshade Kabir is the founder, primary developer and present CEO
of Rusbiz.com. He has Ph. D. degree in Information Technology.
Dr. Kabir has over 12 years of experience in International Trade
and has worked as an advisor to several government projects.
You can contact him at mailto:nowshade@...,
http://www.rusbiz.com