 |
 |
 |
Top Fifteen Mistakes Made With Ecommerce  By
Eric LeuenbergerAs an ecommerce coach and mentor, I frequently get asked questions from store owners on many different aspects of how to run a successful online business. A large portion of the questions are different, but there are a handful that always make me step back and wonder how so many store owners can make the same mistakes time and time again-not know how to, or be willing to correct them-then ask why they are unable to generate sales. In reality, this list of mistakes could be very long. There are so many factors that affect the success or failure of an online store. Afterall, running an ecommerce business is not as easy as some make it out to be-but it could be with the right blueprint. If I developed a complete list of all the mistakes I come across while working with store owners, it would likely span many pages and be difficult to determine where to start prioritizing your attention. So what I have done is taken that overwhelming list and broke it down into what I consider the top fifteen mistakes-in no particular order-that many ecommerce stores make. Here are what I consider to be the top fifteen mistakes most ecommerce stores make: • Thinking that driving more traffic to your website will increase sales. This is one I see all too frequently and is one that just drives me nuts. It's this simple, if your website is not setup to convert traffic properly (which means you must understand your target market, ideal customer demographics and profiles to speak to them properly) then it doesn't matter how much traffic you drive to your site ... you're sales will not increase. Furthermore, if you are targeting the wrong traffic type but your site is ready to convert, your sales will not increase. More is not always better-that is, unless the right elements are in place to maximize sales from it. • Weak site design in relation to your target market. Do you design your for your market or do you design your site thinking that alone will sell your product? • Not marketing enough or properly. You can't generate sales if nobody knows you exist. Marketing is critical but it must be done correctly to gain the maximum benefit. I get store owners telling me they have had a site in place for "xxx" amount of time and still no sales ... what's wrong? That's a loaded question as there is often a list of things they are missing, but I'm amazed to hear some reply "No" to me when I ask them "are you performing any marketing for your site?" Sometimes you gotta spend money to make money. If you aren't willing to spend money to advertise then your chances of success are reduced and you can't expect to magically generate sales. • Not testing your site to find what really works. Continual testing is a vital component to reaching the upper echelon of conversion rates. Another question I get from store owners is "how do these other stores achieve such high conversion rates?" Once again, the question is loaded. There a many multiple factors that contribute to achieving higher conversion rates. One of the common factors across all successful ecommerce stores who see some of the highest conversion rates is that they test all the time. If you ignore your site, you can't be disappointed when your bottom line reflects it. • Not optimizing your product pages for increased conversion. Your product page has a single overall objective with sub objectives that help support and meet that main objective. If potential customers can't get past your product page they have no chance of ever entering the checkout process (for some reason store owners have a hard time understanding this.) An optimized product page (from a conversion perspective) takes advantage of multiple factors that combined help the visitor do their job to achieve the objective. Continue reading this article.
|
|||||||||||
|
|
||||||||||||||
| --
EnterpriseEcommerce
is an iEntry, Inc. publication -- iEntry, Inc. 2549 Richmond Rd. Lexington KY, 40509 2010 iEntry, Inc. All Rights Reserved Privacy Policy Legal archives | advertising info | news headlines | free newsletters | comments/feedback | submit article |
