Digital Marketing

In today’s blog, we are sharing the WooCommerce tutorial. Creating an online business is a challenging affair. In an industry with millions of websites and thousands of competitors, creating a site that attracts customers and adds value in multiple ways is something not all brands can achieve.

One of the basic needs for an online business is an eCommerce website. This is the online platform where you sell your product or service. Just like how a physical store is a basis for any offline business, your website is what is going to pull people in to try your offerings.

You can always get in touch with expert designers to create your website. This is easy but is going to cost you. Larger businesses and businesses with financial backups prefer outsourcing website creation to those who know the process right.

For small businesses and those already struggling with the financial burdens of starting up, this can be slightly challenging. In such cases, many business owners opt to use free tools to create their websites, at least in the initial stages. WooCommerce is one such tool to help build a website and maintain it. This article will take you through a detailed WooCommerce tutorial with steps and explanations to help build your website on WooCommerce.

What is WooCommerce?

A lot of businesses are interested in creating their own websites now using one or more of the tools available in the market. One such tool is WooCommerce. This is an open-source platform for building and managing a website that runs on WordPress.

Established in 2008, WooCommerce has come a long way from just having a handful of themes for website builders to offering thousands of customizations and end-to-end solutions for small and large businesses alike. The brand calls itself the ‘most customizable eCommerce Platform’ in the market right now.

Is that true? Check out this WooCommerce tutorial and you can find out for yourself.

What features of WooCommerce make it special?

 

Comparison between WooCommerce and Shopify

All over the internet, customers who have used WooCommerce have left behind reviews and feedback for this platform, and here is a list of features that most of them have liked.

• WooCommerce is a completely open-source platform and this means that if needed, you can create a website and run it fully free. The only things you need to pay for initially are the hosting charges and a domain name. It is definitely much cheaper than its competitors like Shopify.
• WooCommerce lets you customize like crazy. You can make changes to the themes and their coding. You can use a variety of paid and free plugins available on the platform to create a website that looks and works like nothing else in the market.
• WooCommerce needs basic designing skills and technical knowledge to get it right. You, at least, need to have the patience to learn if you are using it all by yourself.
• There are umpteen numbers of paid and free add-ons that integrate third-party services and improve the features of your website on WooCommerce
• It is not impossible to create a professional-looking and exclusive website all on your own when you follow the right WooCommerce tutorial.

Shopify is the closest competitor to WooCommerce and at the end of the day, customers end up choosing between the two. Here is Netilly’s blog on a detailed comparison between WooCommerce and Shopify. You will be able to compare the pros and cons of both these platforms easily after reading this.

Basic requisites to create a WooCommerce store?

You can either create a new website using WooCommerce or extend and add more features to your existing website using the plugins this platform offers. You will need WordPress hosting to build your store. This has to be paid for. You also need a domain name of your choice. This also has to be paid for. If you want an SSL certification (HTTPS:// instead of HTTP: //), then that has to be paid for too.

Once all these are done, you can set up your store easily.

Steps to set up an eCommerce website with WooCommerce tutorial

 

Step 1: Getting started with WooCommerce

Visit WooCommerce’s website and look through the features offered, the kind of add-ons you can use, and other factors that may interest you. Before you decide to narrow down on a platform to build your store in, knowing the basics is important.

Let’s go through this WooCommerce tutorial with an example. We will try and build a jewelry brand on the platform. Different website hosts can help your startup. WordPress recommends the following.

• BlueHost
• DreamHost
• SiteGround

With BlueHost, there are a variety of plans to start with.

Choose your preferred plan. You will be asked to choose your domain name next. You can check what domain names are available easily on BlueHost. While a lot of extensions are available, the .com extension is preferred.

Next, create an account and make the payment based on what package you have chosen. Once all this is done, your hosting website, BlueHost in this example, will give you a dashboard from where you can install WordPress and WooCommerce.

 

Step 2: Setting up WordPress

You will have to log in to WordPress to start setting it up. If you use hosting platforms, they automatically install and give you access to WordPress. If not, you need to sign up on WordPress.

Once you have access to WordPress, you can go to the Dashboard>Settings and edit the general settings.

Browse through the rest of the settings and make relevant changes wherever needed.

Step 3: Installing and setting up WooCommerce

Once your WordPress installation and setup are done, you need to install the WooCommerce Plugin. In the WordPress dashboard, click Plugin and choose WooCommerce. You can also search for WooCommerce in the search tab.

Install and activate the plugin. You will have to have a business account to install plugins.

 Step 4: Access the Setup Wizard

Once you install WooCommerce, you will be taken through a series of setup processes. You will be asked multiple questions to identify the kind of store you plan to start. You can change certain key settings here and it is recommended you complete this without skipping.

Step 5: Choose Details

• Choose the Industry Choose the Product Type

WooCommerce will next ask you for details about your industry and product type. We will be choosing jewelry here.

The next question will be about the type of product you sell. We will be choosing ‘physical products’ here.

The next question will be how customers will pay for your products/services. We will choose one-time payments.

The 5^th step is how you want to install WooCommerce. We will be getting WooCommerce pre-installed.

Complete installation and the first step is set.

Step 6: Choosing a WooCommerce template & theme

There are thousands of themes on WooCommerce for you to choose from. This is one of the most fun parts of the WooCommerce tutorial. You can choose between three kinds of themes:

• Free themes
• Storefront themes
• Responsive themes

If you want a really professional website, skip the free themes and opt for the responsive ones. These look great on all operating systems and devices.

Step 7: Adding products in WooCommerce

It is very easy for you to add products to the WooCommerce dashboard. All you need to do is click on Products>Add new.

You can enter the product title, product description, category, and other details like inventory, shipping, sale price, and other attributes.

Step 8: Installing WooCommerce plugins and extensions

If there is one step that makes a difference between a mediocre and an amazing website, it is this point. In this WooCommerce tutorial, this is a step you need to spend a lot of time researching on. There are thousands of extensions and plugins for WooCommerce and some of them totally change the look and efficiency of your website.

You can use plugins and extensions to add payment options, ask for feedback, manage images, help with SEO, add pricing tables and so much more. Here are some of the best WooCommerce plugins for you in 2021.

• Google Analytics
• WooCommerce Shipping
• HubSpot
• Google Ads
• Square Payments
• Paypal

Step 9: WooCommerce Resources to grow your online store

Once your website is all set and you have added products and made it live, here are some resources you should start building to get more conversions and to stay busy selling your products and services.

• Encourage your customers to sign up and give their email IDs. A majority of people will abandon their carts and leave halfway through. Connecting via email will help get better conversions.
• Use market research to identify the right target audience. Make sure you are reaching out to these audiences in multiple ways to encourage them to try out your website.
• Create campaigns and sale giveaways to get more customers. You can install some good Campaign Monitor plugin to automate plugins and get repeat customers.

Step 10: Setup Payment Gateway

There are so many types of payment gateway extensions and plugins you can use to set up your payment gateway. WooCommerce Payments is a one-stop solution for you to collect payments, track cash flow, manage refunds, and check your revenue.

Apart from this you can install the below top payment gateway plugins on WooCommerce and make use of them to collect and manage payments.

• Amazon Pay
• PayPal
• Stripe
• Square
• PayFast

Step 11: Set up Shipping

Again, WooCommerce has its own integrated built-in shipping plugin called WooCommerce Shipping. You can install this and the plugin will take over most of the shipping processes starting from creating labels to printing shipping summary and identifying exact shipping rates. While WooCommerce Shipping is fully integrated for the US, it will soon reach the rest of the countries.

WooCommerce is also an excellent dropshipping platform. Dropshipping is a process where the business owner neither maintains warehouses nor ships from his end. Once an order is processed, sellers take over the order shipping.

Step 12: Check That WooCommerce Is Configured Correctly

Once your website is up and running, try visiting the website like a customer and order products/services. See if the website is reactive and if the payment gateway is smooth. Check for potential bugs that can disappoint your actual customers.

Once you place an order, go backend and process it. See how efficient the support and plugins are. Do this a couple of times until you get the confidence that the system works seamlessly.

Step 13: Extend Functionality Using Plugins

Even after your website is successfully running and getting you orders, you have to keep check out this WooCommerce tutorial regularly. You have to especially check the plugins. Plugins keep getting upgraded and new plugins are added every day. Some of these may be game-changers for your business. Make sure to keep a lookout for good plugins on the WooCommerce forums and other discussion boards.

WooCommerce FAQs

WooCommerce is an absolutely exciting platform to create an eCommerce store and run it successfully. Here are some additional questions that you may have about the platform.

1. Can you customize themes?

The basics of changes in themes like adding your logo and changing font sizes can be done in all free and paid themes. However, if you want to tweak the platform or the basic settings, then you should have knowledge of HSS and CSS. It is definitely possible to make endless customizations though.

2. How can you get help?

Since WooCommerce is open-source software, you cannot expect someone to handhold you all through the process. What you can do is check out the massive amounts of documentation and video helps available.

You will also be able to chat with someone from the WooCommerce team if you need further help.

3. Are plugins and extensions a one-time buy?

No. Most times, these are subscription-based charges and you will be billed for them annually. WooCommerce will get back to you in advance when your subscription is up for renewal.

4. What if you don’t like an extension from WooCommerce?

Most of the extensions come with a 30-day moneyback guarantee and you will be able to get your money back if you are not happy with the product.

5. Who are WooCommerce’s competitors?

Some of the close competitors of WooCommerce are Shopify, WPForms, BigCommerce, and Magento Open Source.

Wrapping Up

This WooCommerce tutorial must have given you complete steps and details on how to set up an eCommerce website easily. If you have been waiting to build your own website and have the time and energy to do so, definitely use WooCommerce. If you want some handholding, then there are experts who can help take over this task for you. Get in touch with us and we will help you build the best website in the market.  

Services and start an eCommerce business ideas in a day’s time! You can also send a social message to your potential customers and market your brand in a matter of minutes. All this has made the e-commerce domain lucrative for potential businessmen, businesswomen, and entrepreneurs.

Between the years 2020 and 2024, the Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of India for e-commerce sales is projected to be 13.1%. We are going to grow faster than countries like the United States and the United Kingdom in terms of CAGR.

If you are caught up in the eCommerce wave too, then here are the top 9 business ideas you can try out in 2021.

9 eCommerce Business Ideas to Try

1. Health & Beauty and Personal Care Products

Two of the top industries that are going to do amazingly well in 2021 and in the years to come are healthcare and beauty products. The Indian healthcare sector is set to grow to $ 372 billion by 2022. It is to be noted that the government of India is aiming to increase healthcare spending to 3% of the total GDP in 2022. This is going to open up newer avenues for online healthcare brands.

Did you know that between March and May 2020, about 5 crore Indians opted for online healthcare? The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed a lot of people to switch to online consultations and online purchases of medicines. The trend will keep increasing.

The beauty and personal care segment in India will be valued at $ 26,853 million in 2021. Out of these, 13% of the revenue will be generated online. That is about $3,490 million! If you are starting a beauty and personal care brand this year, you can grab a chunk of the sales out of this.

2. Clothing

The clothing industry is thriving despite the current pandemic situation. People have more time working from home right now and that’s encouraging them to consider online shopping. Most high-end apparel brands invest heavily in digital marketing to get people to buy their products online. According to RedSeer consulting, the fashion market is set to grow at 11%. The online fashion market will grow at an even higher rate of 32%.

According to this report, the online fashion market occupied 6% of the total fashion sales in 2019. In 2024, it will grab 14% of the market share.

More than 50% of the online fashion market sale is apparel. Both branded and unbranded apparel companies will do equally well in the coming years. You could be a clothing manufacturer or a distributor. Either way, this is a good time to reap profits and grow online with these eCommerce business ideas.

3. Home Appliances

Another category of products that is projected to do really well this year is home appliances.  Thanks to people staying home for the last year, appliances like vacuum cleaners, dishwashers, and cooking and baking devices have been in constant demand.

The consumer electronics industry, especially the entertainment section will also do really well in the coming year.

According to Mordor Intelligence, the home appliances industry is the largest in the Indian market. The report also mentions that the online home appliances channel is one of the vital spaces for growth in the years to come. Products like air-conditioners are largely untapped in the country with penetration of just 4% and will grow well. Do your research on the home appliances industry and see if you want to create an eCommerce business in this area.

4. Kids Games

Another category that is doing great and will continue to do well in the future is kids’ games. With online schooling right now and the fear of stepping out, kids are confined within the four walls of the house and have nothing productive to do. As a result, screen times at home have increased tremendously. This is the reason parents are ready to spend good money on toys that will keep the kids engaged.

Starting from indoor sports to educational games, all sub-categories will do well and if you are going to exclusively sell kids’ games, you will definitely reap profits.

Online gaming is also going to be a profitable business to look into. India has the highest youth population and slightly older children, teenagers, and youngsters have started depending on gaming consoles to pass their time.

The market value of the gaming industry is forecasted to be ₹250 billion in 2024. You could sell gaming consoles, games, or even develop gaming software this year to make profits.

5. Baby Products

If there is one category that will never dip low, it is baby products. Babies and their safety and comfort remain the utmost priority for parents across the world and this keeps this industry booming and growing.

According to Data Bridge, the Indian baby care products industry will be growing at a CAGR of 16.9% between the years 2020 to 2027. Some of the categories under the baby product section are:

• Baby cosmetics and toiletries
• Baby food
• Baby convenience
• Baby clothing
• Baby toys
• Baby safety and convenience
• Baby shoes

You can manufacture baby products or simply resell them. You can also be an eCommerce platform to sell products from different vendors. These eCommerce business ideas will definitely take you places.

6. Wearable devices

Wearable devices are one of the top bought products on all eCommerce sites. These devices include smartwatches and fitness bands that are equipped with various kinds of sensors and other features to make people’s life easier.

In the next five years, the wearable devices market is projected to grow at a CAGR of 40%. That is an impressive figure and this industry will open up a lot of opportunities for manufacturers, distributors, and resellers. The growth of the Internet of Things (IoT) technology will directly affect this market.

While expensive and branded smartwatches and fitness bands have their own set of loyal followers, affordable wearable devices from newer brands are going to be sold in huge numbers in the coming days.

7. Online Courses

Have you heard of Udemy, Coursera, and UpGrad? These are some of the most popular websites offering online courses for the global population. These are platforms where mentors, universities, and students come together to teach and learn. In India, brands like the IIMs, IITs, and other premier institutes also offer online courses on these platforms.

You could be a mentor in one of these places or create a similar platform and offer a space for students and mentors to communicate.

Here is Netilly’s list of must check-out list of digital marketing online courses.

8. Online e-books and audiobooks

When Amazon Kindle was introduced in 2007, people laughed at the idea of reading a book online. Right now, the e-book industry in India alone is poised to grow to $205 million in 2021. The user penetration will also increase, and the average CAGR between 2021 and 2025 will be 5.06%.

Globally, the e-book market will reach $28.73 billion. You could be a writer, a publisher, or a seller. All ways, this industry will help your business grow by leaps and bounds.

Another eCommerce business ideas you can give a shot is audiobooks. Like how people read books online, many people have started listening to books too. The global audiobooks market will grow to $20 billion in 2030. The Indian audiobook market alone is worth $1 billion.

Thanks to the COVID pandemic, people are looking for sources of entertainment staying at home and one can only watch movies and TV series for so long. Audiobooks are also used by fitness enthusiasts and those who walk and jog to pass time when they work out.

There are many audiobook production companies in India like Reado, Nirali Prakashan, Kannadhasan Pathippagam, and Prabhat Prakashan Private Limited. Apps like Audible, Spotify, Gaana, LibriVox all offer audiobooks to customers too.

9. Dropshipping

Thanks to continuous lockdowns and curfews, eCommerce has become the most common way to buy things. Your customers may need a specific ayurvedic oil from a vendor in Kerala or Khakras from a Gujarati home seller. You can be a platform where people order stuff from. Dropshipping is a business model where you will not be required to have stocks of products in your warehouse. All you need to have is a website where different vendors and customers meet. Once an order is placed, the responsibility of fulfilling the same gets transferred to the seller. You will only be on the middle platform and receive commissions for each of the orders placed.

Though Amazon and Flipkart have their own warehouses, they operate via dropshipping modes too. Dropshipping is becoming the most common fulfillment method as the capital is not intensive and starting a business is a quick affair. Dropshipping business model can be scaled really quickly too and is definitely one of the most successful eCommerce business ideas to try out this 2021.

Final Thoughts

There are hundreds of eCommerce business ideas existing in the world. These 9 are just a few good ones that are projected to do well this year and in the years to come. You could be starting a business that is unheard of. However, if you have the right passion to take it forward, you could become a business innovator.

Think about your passion. What kind of products and services interest you? What business idea do you believe in? What idea do you think you can take forward for years together without wavering passion? Only these ideas will work for you.

If you have the time and money to invest, get in touch with a market research team and understand the current market trends before you invest in an idea. We will be happy to listen to your eCommerce idea and give you a free consultation too. Mention your business idea in the comments below or drop us an email.

Image Optimization, Images are vital to any website. This is a fact and is certainly something you have been hearing over time. When you enter an apparel store, you end up choosing a product that looks nice to your eyes. The same is true for websites. Images end up converting visitors into buyers and you need to spend a lot of time and effort picking the right images for your website.

If the quality of images matters, then websites that use HD images with high pixel ratio should be doing great, shouldn’t they? That’s where things get interesting.

When you use really high-quality images, your website may look great, but the overall size of the website will increase and the loading speed will come down. If you use smaller and average-quality images, your visitors may not be impressed but your website will load very quickly. So where is the balance?

What is Image Optimization?

 

Image optimization is the process of optimizing images so they are of the smallest possible size but also are of the right dimensions, resolution, and pixel ratio so that their quality is not compromised.

In simpler words, you try to get a balance between image quality and image size so that the visitors experience great images that load quickly too.

Importance of Optimizing Images on Website

 

• Brings down page size

Page size or page bloat is the total size of a particular web page. Let’s say your user browses your website from a mobile phone with a limited data plan. If each of your web pages has multiple high-quality, large images, then the person’s data usage is going to get very high.

According to HTTP Archive, images make up to 75% of a web page’s size. When you optimize the images on the pages, the page bloat will certainly reduce and this is a positive factor to the website.

• Improves Page Load Speed

According to Moz, image optimization is one of the top ways to improve load speed. When you have graphics with more than 16 colors, Moz advises you to use PNG files for the images. When you are uploading photographs, choose JPEGs.

This SEO expert also recommends using CSS Sprites to put together all images you may use frequently like different buttons and icons. CSS Sprites will load all these images at once and this brings down page load time.

You can use Google PageSpeed Insights to check your website’s speed.

• Improves SEO Ranking

In many of our previous blogs, we have already mentioned that Google considers page load time an important factor to rank your website. Hence, the more optimized the images in your website are, the quicker the pages load and the better will be your ranking.

It is also important to use responsive images. Responsive images need to look the same on larger laptop screens, small tablets, and really small mobile screens too.

• Boosts Conversions

Conversions are the heart of any online business. You could be getting thousands of visitors every day. However, if none of these visitors buy from you one way or the other, the business cannot sustain itself.

With image optimization, your website will load really quickly and also look well-designed and attractive. Both these are vital for increased conversion rates.

According to Portent, website conversion rates drop by about 4.42% for every second of website load time. This graph shows you the average dip in conversion rate based on the page load time.

• Enhance User Engagement

Users get bored if you have no images and just a lot of content on your website. The same users close the website tab if your website takes a lot of time to load. Optimize great images and make sure they load quickly on all platforms. This is a sure-shot way to enhance user engagement.

How to Optimize Your Website Images

• Choose the Right File Format

Three file formats are important when it comes to image file format.

• JPEG
• PNG
• GIF

JPEGs give you the best quality when you compress files. The loss in quality after compression is manageable in most cases. PNGs give you the best quality images and compression is lossless. Compression also gives you really small sizes of the images with not much disruption in quality.

GIFs are perfect choices when you use animated images. Large GIF images occupy a lot of page size though. Always ensure your GIFs are small thumbnails or decoratives. Many of the free and paid image editing tools can convert one format to another easily.

• Compression Quality vs. Size

Compression is one of the most important parts of image compression. Here, your original file is compressed or reduced in size to prevent increasing your website bloat. If you download high-quality photos from your digital camera, they can be several megabytes in size. Imagine having hundreds of product images all about 10 MB in size weighing down your website?

Compressing an image can pull down its size to a couple of kilobytes.

Experts say that your landing page should not be more than 2 MB. Your landing page also should consist of the best product/service images. So the only option here is to compress images.

As long as you use the right tools to compress images, you will not notice a dip in the quality. Here are some of the good image compression tools you can use.

1. Shutterstock editor
2. io
3. Optimizilla
4. TinyPNG
5. JPEG Optimizer
6. io

• Find Out The Maximum Display Size Of Your Images

When it comes to websites, the size of your image is not measured in terms of width and length. It is more about the pixels. The better the quality of your camera, the more will be the pixel size.

Let’s say you have an image of 5800X3800 pixels. Multiply the numbers and you get 22,040,000. It means the image was captured in a 22 MP camera. Photos that you click on average mobile cameras may look great on the mobile screen. Since their pixels are low, these end up getting blurred or don’t show details when you upload them on your website. You get the drift.

Really large pixel sizes will increase your page bloat. Check the platform you are building your website on to identify the right size for banner images, product images, and thumbnails. Use a resizing tool to bring down the pixel size before you upload them.

Make sure you don’t blow up smaller images to make them bigger on the website. This will make the picture fuzzy and blurred. Always pick larger images and compress them.

• Crop and resize Images

Once you identify the correct size of an image, you can crop and then resize them to get the right final dimensions.

Start by cropping the image to remove unwanted parts out. Now, resize based on the dimensions that you want. Here is how you can crop and resize on iPiccy, an image editor tool. We will try and crop and resize a 1920X1112 image into a 500X500 image. You can use any similar tool for cropping and resizing.

(Original Image)

(Image cropped to 1112X1112)

(Image resized to 500X500)

• Set Image Optimization on Autopilot

If all these above tasks sound really time-consuming and intense, then you can try setting image optimization on Autopilot. This can be achieved by using some of the popular WordPress plugins. These plugins do all the above tasks like resizing, cropping and compressing on autopilot based on the specs you have decided on.

Doesn’t that sound amazing? Here is a list of worthy WordPress plugins you can use for automating images on autopilot.

Image Optimization Plugins You Can Use

• Shortpixel –This is one of the most popular WordPress plugins that people use to edit images in bulk. The plugin helps you achieve lossless and perfect compressions and resizes in a matter of minutes and you can edit multiple pictures all at once. The plugin can also convert one format of the file to another seamlessly.

• Smush – Smush is another popular image optimization tool that is super friendly and easy to use. This comes with its own dashboard that will tell you how many images have been edited and how many remain. You can bulk compress or resize images through the plugin and also convert files from one form to another.

 

• Optimole – If you are a professional who wants more features in your editing tool, then Optimole is the perfect option for you. Optimole ensures images are resized correctly based on the platform they are viewed in. It means the image size automatically changes for laptops, tablets, and mobile phones to ensure the quality is perfect. Optimole is so smart that when it detects your user’s network is slow, it further compresses images so the load time will not be affected. It works efficiently and offers excellent image optimization features. Definitely check it out.

Wrapping Up

Image optimization is not something you can take for granted. Check the current speed of your website and identify what kind of lag the images are causing. Talk to a UI/UX developer and see how well you can optimize the images on your website to make the site load faster.

Neither search engines nor your users like slow and unresponsive websites and the wrong sized images can bring down your conversion rate and make your website dull and boring.

You can both manually optimize images or opt for auto optimizers. Either way, do check the final website look and speed on different platforms. If your existing website is slow and you have no idea if the images are the problem, talk to an expert. You can contact us and we will schedule a free consultation for you from our end. This is a good way for you to get some clarity on what to do to upgrade your website. Get in touch with us right away.

Do you know the first thing that pushes your potential buyers and clients away from your online business? It is the speed of your website. Waiting is a thing of the past. 10 other competitive websites are waiting to lure your customer away. Even if your website takes a couple of seconds more to load, users get bored and look for other options.

The unfortunate thing about this is that the ‘lag and delay’ tag sticks with you. Your target audiences don’t give you a second chance if the first-time experience was not satisfactory.

That is why you should be taking website speed optimization very seriously. This is the process of optimizing your website’s performance and reducing the time taken for downloading and displaying pages on the website. In other words, when your website is completely speed optimized, pages are refreshed and displayed as soon as they are clicked. There are no visible delays that keep the user waiting, even if it is for a few extra seconds.

Visitor bounce rate is the percentage of visitors who leave your website after checking just one page of the site out. The more the bounce rate, the less beneficial it is for the brand. According to Google, below are the visitors bounce rates based on the mobile site speed.

 Why is website speed optimization important?

Improves conversion rate – Conversion rate is the rate of visitors who turn into paying customers for the website. You could be having excess traffic to the site. However, when none of them buy from you, the traffic is not of use. When your website speed is optimized, the pages load quicker and more people stay on your site for longer.

Google mentions that a 0.1-second improvement in the speed of a mobile website can improve conversion rates by up to 10.1%.

Improves Search Engine Optimization – The speed at which your website pages load is a direct ranking factor for SEO. Google ranks websites that have higher speed on top. This means when your website is faster, the chances of you being seen by potential customers are high.

Improves customer experience – A business is only as successful as the customer perceives it. Your customer’s experience is the most important when it comes to brand recognition and sales. Website speed optimization is a very easy way to improve customer experience.

10 Easy ways to optimize website speed

If you are looking to optimize your website’s speed, here are easy ways you can do it.

1.      Look for a better host

A hosting provider helps provide space for your website to exist on the World Wide Web. A host is a primary requirement to own a website. Now, hosts come in all budgets and bandwidths. There are three common kinds of hosting people opt for.

• Shared hosting
• Dedicated Server
• Virtual Private Server (VPS)

When you opt for shared hosting, you share the server space with other online websites like yours. Because of this, you may save money on hosting charges but have to compromise on speed. If website speed optimization is a concern, then move away from shared hosting. Both VPS and dedicated servers are much faster and are worth the money you spend on them. Talk to your hosting provider about these options.

2.      Check the image sizes on your website

A very common mistake that people make when they create their website is using high-quality, larger images on the website. Such large-sized images definitely are eye-catching. However, they make it difficult for your pages to load, especially on slower networks.

Talk to your website developer about reducing image sizes so their quality is not compromised but they occupy lesser space. You can use free websites that do the work for you.

3.      Opt for cached web pages

Website caching is the process of making a website faster to browse. Let’s imagine you have a popular website that is accessed thousands of times a day, sometimes multiple times by the same customers. Every time your website’s link is accessed, there are multiple complex steps involved and these steps can bring down the speed of the website.

When your website is cached, the pages viewed on a browser are saved as an HTML file in the Random Access Memory (RAM) of the customer’s local server. The next time the same server is used to access your webpage, the server can pick up the cached information and hence shows your web pages faster. Caching usually cannot be done when you use a shared server.

4.      Limit using custom web fonts

 

Web fonts are fonts used on web pages and when not chosen right, can cause problems in page loading. A lot of business owners enjoy picking customized web fonts that make their website look unique. The problem with this is that web fonts have to be loaded from the server every time and are not installed on the computer. As a result, when you use random fonts, they slow down the page.

There are four common web fonts used.

• Web Open Font Format (WOFF) – Common web font developed in 2009 and offers decent compression
• Web Open Font Format 2 (WOFF2) – A better version of WOFF and offer impressive compression
• Embedded Open Type (EOT) – Open Type fonts that were designed by Microsoft to be used in an embedded style
• True Type Font (TTF) – The earliest form of web font developed by Microsoft and Apple in the 1980s.

WOFF2 is supported by a majority of browsers and is compressed and better to improve website speed. This website gives you a complete list of web-safe fonts. Do have a look.

Some of the fonts that help with website speed optimization are:

• Arial
• Times New Roman
• Verdana
• Georgia
• Tahoma
• Arial Black
• Trebuchet MS
• Lucida Bright
• Garamond

5.      Limit the use of CSS files and JavaScript

CSS files or Cascading Style Sheets files decide how HTML elements are displayed on website pages. JavaScript is a common programming language that updates CSS files. If your website uses excess amounts of CSS files and JavaScript, then it is going to take a long time for the website to load. Grouping CSS and JavaScript files together is one way of improving speed. You can talk to your developer and get this done.

6.      Limit the use of Plugins

Plugins are additions to software that add extra functionalities to your websites and apps. There are a lot of third-party plugins you can add to your website to make it functional, aesthetically appealing, and usable. However, do remember that plugins can also make it difficult for the servers to quickly fetch your webpage. It is going to make websites slower.

Perform a speed test on your current website and see how fast it is. Remove a couple of existing plugins and then see how much the performance has improved.

Stay away from plugins that have a lot of styles and scripts to them. Only use plugins that are absolutely necessary.

7.      Don’t encourage redirects

Website redirects can make your webpage available via different URL addresses. When you have moved from an old web address to a new one, then you can redirect from the old address. When you have multiple redirects, they are going to negatively affect your website speed. Sometimes your website may be redirected from random places that are not worth it. Remove all these redirects and this will help in website speed optimization.

There are many plugins and websites that can help trace redirects.

8.      Opt for database optimization

If your website uses Content Management System (CMS) with multiple plugins, that’s going to affect website performance. If your website uses CMS, make sure you optimize it to remove unnecessary plugins.

9.      Use Content Delivery Network (CDN)

A content Delivery Network is a group of servers that are used in speeding up a website. Instead of trying to fetch data from a single server that could be very far away, multiple servers do the task and reduce the distance between the server and the user.

When a single server is being requested by more users, it results in delays and lags. CDN prevents this from happening.

Let’s say a customer in the United States is trying to buy something from your Indian website, when your website uses CDN, the user will have a hassle-free and quick browsing process and the distance will not matter.

10. Consider pre-fetching techniques

Pre-fetching techniques are used in anticipating a user’s next move and initiating it in advance to help with website speed optimization.

When your website is designed by the right UI/UX experts, they will know what kind of moves that users make and pre-fetch them while coding. These are also called hints and definitely help in speeding up a slow website. There are three kinds of pre-fetching techniques practiced.

DNS-pre-fetching – Here, domain names are resolved into the IP addresses well in advance.

Link pre-fetching – If you think a user will definitely click a link on your page, you can code in advance and pre-fetch it. When the user clicks the link, the page loads quickly as it is pre-fetched.

Prerendering – This is the process of pre-fetching an entire page or certain elements in the page in anticipation that the user will browse for it.

Read More: Website Design Services 

Takeaways

Right now, a time period of 3 seconds or lesser is considered a normal load time for websites. Check your website loading speed and if you don’t meet this target, then make use of these 10 techniques to improve website speed optimization.

A highly responsive and quick website is one of the best customer experiences you can offer to your use. To know more about website speed contact us.

No e-commerce brand is complete without a logistics partner. Both first-mile (merchant to e-commerce warehouse) and last-mile (e-commerce warehouse to customer) logistics are integral to e-commerce companies in the country and ensure products are safely packed and delivered to the right destinations

A buyer’s work is done once an order is placed online. It is the job of the business to coordinate with logistics providers and get the product delivered. The sheer number of steps involved between placing an order and successfully delivering it is mind-staggering.

Logistics companies in India work really hard 24X7 on all days of the year to ensure your customers receive their orders on time.

Did you know that the logistics market was valued at $215 billion in 2020? It is set to grow at an estimated CAGR (Compound Annual Growth Rate) of 6% in the next 5 years.

The first impression a customer has about an e-commerce website, even before the person sees the product purchased is how effective, how quick, and how hassle-free the delivery process was.

If an order was delayed or delivered wrong, then customers, unfortunately, don’t even give the businesses a second chance! If a customer is not able to track an order, you will have to deal with customer calls and complaints multiple times a day. If a product’s shipping cost is high, customers move away looking for other brands.

If you are in the business of selling products to your customers, then spend a lot of time identifying the logistics provider who will offer your buyers the best customer service.

We are here to make things easy for you. Here is a list of the best logistics companies in India in no particular order. These companies have made a mark for themselves in the industry with exceptional customer support, quick deliveries, and top-notch technologies.

What makes a top logistics company?

Before you look at the companies that made to our list, here are features that make a logistics company stand out in a tremendously large market.

Technology – This is vital for a good logistics company. From the minute orders are picked up from the merchant or the e-commerce seller, tracking details have to be updated online. Every step of the product needs to be tracked and updated. Order management is a huge part of logistics companies and these businesses are taking it seriously. Live-tracking also helps prevent tampering of parcels.

Human resource – In simple terms, when a logistics provider has a lot of delivery personnel working in the field, products get delivered faster.

Modes of transportation – Companies that utilize air, rail, road, and waterways to transport and deliver goods fare better and handle deliveries with ease. Natural and manmade calamities that disrupt a specific mode of transportation will not cause delays in deliveries with these brands.

Flexibility in delivery – Can the logistics provider handle fragile or dangerous goods? Can the company ship heavy-weight objects? Can the company deliver products within a day? Flexibility is an important feature in logistics companies.

Best logistics companies for 2021

1. India Post 

If experience is a feature you are looking for, how about an Indian logistics company with 166 years of experience? India Post is the Government-operated postal system in the country that delivers posts and parcels to most parts of the world. The postal system was established in 1854 and is running successfully to date.

With a sudden surge in e-commerce businesses in India, a lot of these companies have a tie-up with India Post for e-commerce deliveries. Between the years 2015-2016, the revenue from e-commerce deliveries for India Post was close to ₹15 billion. Here are some of the features of the India Post Business Parcel delivery system for e-commerce companies.

• Online tracking of consignments
• Reverse pickup facilities for returns and exchanges
• Cash on Delivery availability
• Discount rates for high volume deliveries

2. FedEx

FedEx is an American delivery service provider that was established in the year 1971 and is best known for its air-based delivery service. FedEx delivers all over India and to 220 countries globally. This global brand delivers 3.6 million shipments every day.

Top features of FedEx:

• FedEx Priority Overnight shipping for select cities
• Cash on Delivery available
• Ability to ship batteries, ancillary goods, and products that require special packaging and handling
• Expert in delivering heavyweight items
• Reverse pick from across the world
• ‘Hold at Location’ available (product will be retained at FedEx warehouse and can be collected by recipients

3. DHL

DHL is another international delivery partner and is undoubtedly one of the top logistics companies in India. The brand is around 52 years old and is based out of California, USA. DHL offers exclusive deals for e-commerce businesses that have to ship large volumes every day.

You can choose between air freight, ocean freight, road freight, and rail freight. For e-commerce businesses without warehouses, the brand offers warehousing solutions too. This brand connects 220 countries and shipping is quick and hassle-free. Below are some of the features offered by DHL.

• Cash on Delivery
• Return Pickups
• Customs, insurance, and security processes for international shipments
• Shipping dashboard for businesses

4. DTDC

DTDC (Desk To Desk Courier and Cargo) is one of the earliest delivery brands in India that has made its presence in the nook and corner of the country. Established in 1990 and headquartered in Bangalore, the brand delivers to 10,500+ pin codes and manages 12 million shipments every month. Apart from delivering all over the country, the brand also serves 240 international locations. DTDC offers the below features to e-commerce customers.

• State-of-art infrastructure and technology to handle small and large clients
• E-notify solutions
• Corporate tracking solutions for customers with bulk orders
• Cash on Delivery option
• Return pickup

5. Delhivery

This is India’s own brand, established in Delhi in 2011. The brand started its service in 2 cities and with just 5 customers. It has grown into a full-fledged logistics company in India serving 2300+ cities in the country. You can expect all kinds of premier logistics services from the brand including:

• Same day delivery
• On-demand delivery
• Oversize order delivery
• Cash on Delivery
• Reverse pick up
• Hazardous goods delivery

This brand offers real-time monitoring of orders for both businesses and customers.

6. Shadowfax

Shadowfax is one of India’s leading logistics partners that deliver to 500+ cities and more than 7000+ pin codes. This brand offers competitive prices for small business and large e-commerce companies and is the winner of the 2019 Disruptive Startup Logistics of the year award. Shadowfax offers integrated 3^rd party logistics services for e-commerce brands. The brand offers delivery services for retail chains, local stores, and small businesses. Shadowfax also offers trucks on rent for MSMEs.

7. Blue Dart Express

Blue Dart Express is one of India’s premier logistics companies that is headquartered in Mumbai. The brand was established in the year 1983 and one of the largest logistics networks in the country. The brand is listed as one of Fortune 500’s India’s largest corporations. Blue Dart offers business integration solutions for e-commerce companies around the country.

The ShopTrack feature of the brand enhances e-commerce solutions and can be customized based on the business requirements.

The PackTrack integration feature is perfect for all B2C, B2B, and C2C needs. Blue Dart offers:

• Live tracking of parcels
• Integrated dashboards for businesses
• Cash on Delivery options
• Return pickups
• Sending SMS and email tracking updates

8. Aramex

Aramex is a multinational courier and delivery service provider that is based out of Dubai. This is the first Arab company to be listed on the NASDAQ exchange. Founded in the year 1982, the brand has grown by leaps and bounds and is one of the preferred logistics companies in India that delivers quickly and with precision.  Aramex offers the below facilities to businesses.

• Warehousing for MSMEs and smaller enterprises
• Facility management services for brands with their own warehouses
• Drop and ship facilities
• Online tracking of orders
• Flexible prices for larger volumes

9. The Professional Couriers (TPC)

The Professional Couriers was established in the year 1987 and has been a preferred choice of courier service for Indians for about 35 years now. The brand has 70,000+ delivery points across India and has the ability to handle large shipments easily. Air cargo and surface cargo facilities are the brand’s strengths. Here are the features of TPC.

• One-stop logistics solutions (warehousing, packaging, dispatching of goods)
• Priority 24 hours delivery
• Cash on Delivery option
• International delivery
• Special messenger delivery for sensitive/confidential documents
• Holiday delivery services

10. ShipRocket

ShipRocket is slightly different from regular logistics brands in the way that it brings together 17+ courier partners in its platform. This company delivers to 27000+ pin codes in the country and offers automatic tracking facilities too. You can choose between courier brands like FedEx, BlueDart, Ecom Express, DHL, and Delhivery from the portal. ShipRocket is based out of New Delhi and offers the following services.

• Cash on Delivery
• Reverse pickup
• Express delivery
• Easy return management
• Try and buy facility (when certain logistics partners)

Read Also: 13 Features Every E-commerce Website Should Have

Final Thoughts

As an e-commerce company, you should think about your last-mile logistics sincerely if you want to enter the hearts of customers. After Amazon marketing entered the Indian market, next-day delivery (Prime delivery) has become very popular. For Prime members, the next-day delivery is also free, which is such a hit with buyers.

It has become common for customers to set this as a benchmark. If your delivery dates are far away, chances are the customers start looking for other brands that offer quick delivery options. When you quote really high shipping prices, it puts off people from buying too.

Did you know that up to 63% of customers abandon their online carts because of high shipping costs and tax rates?

The only way you can bring down shipping costs for customers and hasten delivery times is by working with the right logistics companies in India. Check this list out and pick up a logistics provider who will satisfy your needs. All such brands are open for negotiations when it comes to business deals. Set up meetings, explain your needs, and find the best possible prices that work for you and your brand.

 

 

ecommerce  Ideas are everywhere. In the startup field, new ideas get generated by the minute and entrepreneurs keep finding gaps in the market where their products/services can make a difference.

Do all ideas work? No. If they did, we will have more successful businesses than human beings in the world.

Right now, it is very easy to create an eCommerce website. Pre-designed themes are available in plenty. Did you know that there are anywhere from 12-24 million eCommerce sites registered across the world?

Out of these, only 1 million of the sites record sales of over $1000/year. What happens to the remaining websites? They either stay stagnant or are closed in a few years of time. This is what happens when you create a business without validating the idea or understanding of the idea is viable.

What is viability? Viability is the ability of an idea to survive and grow.

What is market validation? This term was first used in a book named ‘If You Build It Will They Come? Three Steps to Test and Validate Any Market Opportunity’ written by Rob Adams. Validation involves a series of steps taken to identify if there is a market for what you plan to sell.

Your eCommerce idea may be grand and really unique. Will you be able to convert the idea into a successful working business model? Will the business model give you profits? Does the business have the bandwidth to grow and sustain?

All these are questions you should ask and research before you take any idea forward. Here are things you should research to know if your idea is validated and viable.

Keyword analysis and search volume analysis

Keyword Analysis is a popular SEO technique where the optimizer identifies keywords that people search for and use those words in the website. By adding the most searched terms on the site, chances are the website ranks better on search engine searches. There are a lot of tools that help identify keywords for a particular domain or product/service.

You can use keyword analysis to know if there are people actually searching for whatever you are planning to sell. If there are no search hits, then it could mean there is no market or the market space is very narrow.

Search volume analysis is another vital thing to research when you are trying to find if your eCommerce idea is viable. Search volume analysis tells you how many times a particular keyword is searched online on search engines.

The more the search volume, the more popular a product or a service is. If the top keywords analyzed for your business idea have higher search volumes, it means you have a ready market waiting to embrace you.

There are a lot of tools that you can use for both keyword research and search volume analysis.

Check out Netilly’s detailed blog on the 7 best keyword research tools you can use. It is very easy to analyze possible keywords and their search volumes for your business idea on these platforms. Check the screenshots below.

These tools give you valuable data like the search volume, competition for the particular keyword, Click-Through Rate (CTR), and SERP rankings.

Trend analysis – using Google trends

‘Trending’ is a term every business owner wants to hear. When something is trending online, it means a lot of people are searching about it, interested in it, and sharing it across different social platforms.

You can use Google Trends, a tool that tells you what is trending in different parts of the world, to research your business idea.

Here are different ways to make use of Google Trends for an eCommerce idea.

1. Identify demands

What do your customers want? What are they searching for now? Knowing this will help refine your idea and cater to existing needs.

Let’s say you want to start a blog page that talks about the COVID pandemic. Go to Google Trends and search for COVID 19. You will instantly know if people are looking for this information and if so, what kind of topics they are searching for.

2. Compare different products/services

Let’s assume you have narrowed down on an industry in which you want to manufacture products. You want to know what kind of products people are searching for. On Google Trends, you can compare different products and know if the product you want to produce is being searched by the common folks or not. Check this comparison on Trends between N95 masks and cloth masks. People have obviously been searching more for N95 masks than cloth masks in the last year.

3. Longevity of trends

Something could be trending and you can decide to start a business based on it. What will happen once the product or service stops trending? Do you want to build a brand that lasts for years? Then check the longevity of the trends. In other words, look for how consistently the keyword has been searched and has remained popular.

For a period of several years, the searched term needs to maintain a consistent or a rising graph. If you see high peaks once in a while and low flat lines otherwise, it means a fad. These are not ideas worth investing in.

Check the graph for COVID 19 safety. Obviously, the graph remained flat all through the years before 2019 and is peaking now. We will need to wait for a couple more years to see how the graph progresses.

Now, let’s search for Valentine’s Day gifts. Look how it peaks only during February every year!

Now look for flower bouquets. This obviously is a hit business idea and has been trending continuously since 2004.

On Google trends, you can filter the trending topics based on location, year, and categories too. Give this wonderful free tool a try before you validate your idea.

Market research – research on market size, competition

Market research is one of the most important pre-startup needs. Starting a business (offline or online), without proper market research is like gambling in a casino. Most times, you will end up losing your time and money.

Here are things market research will tell you.

• Market demand
• Present and future market size
• Market saturation (a condition where the present market does not produce any more demand)
• Competitor analysis

All these are extremely important in designing a business plan from an eCommerce idea.

It is not easy for your internal team to conduct market research if they don’t have the expertise. It makes sense to hire market research experts to do the job. These experts will ask for basic details like your business idea, target audience, the industry your business will be based on and come back to you with clear recommendations on whether the idea is viable or not.

If the idea is viable, the market research team will give you the below details.

• Existing competitor market shares
• List of direct and indirect competitors
• The advantage price point you should opt for
• Your opportunities and threats when you enter the market
• Newer markets to look at

Voice of the Market – survey by speaking to the target audience

 

At the end of the day, your eCommerce idea is only as successful as your customers perceive it to be. If your target customers don’t want what you sell, you will lose out in the market.

A lot of brands spend money, time, and effort is building a brand and only later realize that the market did not actually want or was interested in what they offered.

Be a smart eCommerce business owner. Make sure you analyze the voice of the market before you even take the first step towards building a brand.

A good voice of market report will tell you the following.

• Are customers looking for what you are offering?
• What can you do to make the lives of customers easy?
• What are the behavioral and spending patterns of your target market?
• Will customers need your products/services regularly?

Once you identify a broad set of target audiences or markets, start by interacting with them. Surveys are easy ways to know what’s in the mind of your customers. You can post the survey online on social media platforms and get the potential audience to answer them.

You can also work with market research companies who do this work on a larger scale for you.

If you are planning on a small startup for your neighborhood, you can even go out giving physical copies of surveys and get people on the streets to fill them up for you.

Analyze the survey and understand if people will respond and commit to your eCommerce business when you go live.

Analyze the numbers

Get some number crunching done before you understand the viability of your eCommerce idea.

Let’s say your market research team comes back to you saying the organic apples you are planning to procure and sell need to be priced around ₹250/kg. This is the average price of other top brands that are in the same industry.

Now, you have to calculate if this is possible. Consider the costs of buying the apples from farmers, transporting them in chilled containers, storing them, and shipping them. You also will incur internal costs like maintaining the website, paying for your employees, and warehouse charges if any. All these, put together, is called the landing price of the product.

So what will be the average landing price for a kilo of organic apples? Will you be able to make profits if you offer them for the selling price suggested?

If you price them higher, what extra do you offer to validate the high costs? Here are some other questions you need answers to before you consider your idea viable.

• How many products do you need to sell a month to break even?
• Does the market have the capacity to buy the extra products that come from your brand?
• Do you have the bandwidth to offer sale deals and discounts?
• Do you have a Unique Selling Point (USP)? This is your own unique factor that makes you stand out in the crowd of other competitors.

Sometimes, businesses may realize that even though their product/service idea is great, they can never break even considering the competition and the ability of other brands to offer low prices. In such cases, it is smart to let go of the idea and move on.

Conclusion

‘New ideas pass through three periods – It can’t be done. It probably can be done, but it’s not worth doing. I knew it was a good idea all along!’

These are the words of Arthur C. Clarke. Ideas have helped the human race progress from being cavemen to stepping on the moon.

All ideas are amazing. However, when it comes to investing money and time in an idea, you need to know if the idea is worth it.

Here are common reasons why businesses fail.

• The business did not solve a problem
• The business did not identify if the problem was so big that it needs to be solved by a brand
• The business did not care to check if better brands are solving the problem
• The brand did not talk to their target audience to understand if they needed help in the first place

If you have a business eCommerce idea and you want to talk to someone about it, get in touch with us. We have a group of experts with years of hands-on knowledge about eCommerce businesses and know what works and what doesn’t. We will be happy to schedule a free consultation with you.

Do you have a great business idea? What stage is it in the process of getting implemented? Mention in the comments below.

The e-commerce industry is one of the fastest-growing industries in the world right now. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, or maybe due to it, more people have moved on to online shopping. In India, the e-commerce industry was worth $30 billion in 2019 and experts predict that the segment will grow at a rate of 27% CAGR and will reach $99 billion by 2024.

For an online business, an e-commerce website is one of the most important assets. The quality of your website, the ease of using it, and the design all play a role in deciding the traffic you get and the subsequent sales. What are the features that an e-commerce website should have? What features make the difference between a moderate and a great website? Take a look.

Being User-Friendly

Now, this is a no-brainer, isn’t it? Just like how a brick-and-mortar store has to be designed to look and feel friendly, your website has to be user-friendly too. According to HubSpot, 76% of customers want websites to make it easy for them to find things.

Let’s say you are looking for XL-sized pants on a website. How many steps does it take for you to find the right products? The lesser number of steps it takes, the better it is.

There was a time when websites were designed to be all fancy, sophisticated, and complex. People assumed serious-looking websites were more professional and worthy of their money. That’s not the case now. The process between adding products to the cart and completing a purchase has to be seamless and quick. Most of the top-selling commerce brands have simple, unfussy, and straightforward sites.

If you think your website is lacking the simplicity of good e-commerce websites, then get in touch with a design team who can check your existing website and suggest changes to the UI/UX that can make the site more user-friendly.

Supporting Mobile Users

M-commerce is a term that talks about online purchases through mobile phones via browsers and apps. There has been a steady rise in m-commerce sales volume. In 2020, the volume of e-commerce sales via mobile phones was $38 billion. Thanks to affordable network providers, the number of Indians with internet access on their phones has increased drastically.

Some websites that look great on a computer’s screen may look very cluttered or unresponsive on smaller mobile screens. As you design your website, it is also very important to ensure it is responsive across different platforms and Operating Systems (OS).

Good quality Photos & Video

Users want a realistic shopping experience when they buy online from eCommerce websites. Bad photos and videos are an instant put-off. Some brands sell really worthy products at affordable prices but are unable to convert traffic into sales, thanks to their sub-par product photos.

It is absolutely necessary that you hire a professional to click product photos and shoot videos for your website. Make sure products are shown at different angles with close-up shots provided too.

While the photos have to be of high resolution, make sure the photos are optimized for the platform they are shown in. Very high-resolution photos may take a long time to load on phones and can be a turn-off.

Enticing Offers and Deals

Now, this is something that is a deal-breaker! The right offers and deals can mean the difference in your conversion rate.

Customers always love deals that ensure they spend less on a purchase. Your e-commerce website should definitely have offers and deals mentioned. You should not stop at just creating a tab for this and leaving customers to search for the same. Make sure offers and deals are mentioned on the home page, as soon as a customer visits your website.

Create countdowns for epic sale periods and let the counter run live on your website. All these are amazing ways you can promote deals that your customers may be interested in. Such offers and deals help with eCommerce promotion too.

Amazon comes up with lightning deals and limited-time deals that last only for a specific period of time. This timeline pushes people into making a purchase quickly without overthinking.

Recommendations for Related Items

Every brand sells products that customers come searching for. Really smart brands manage to sell products/services that the customers had no idea they wanted in the first place!

Let’s say you own a fashion website that sells clothes and accessories. A customer comes searching for a silk saree. You show them all the right options and inside individual product pages, there are recommendations for jewelry pieces that suit the sarees. How cool is that? Customers who did not visit your site for jewelry will end up choosing one just because it suits the saree of their choice.

All top eCommerce websites offer recommendations on their product pages. You can see the ‘Frequently bought together’ sections on Amazon and Flipkart here.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

All websites have a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) tab. Why is this one of the major features of an e-commerce website?

You have to remember that, unlike a physical store, no salesmen and women are standing  to assist when customers shop online. They are only armed with the description and other resources you provide online. It is also not easy for customers to call you or email you for every small query they have. It is hence more practical to arm them with answers to all frequently asked questions that they may have.

Make sure your FAQ section includes details about your brand, your products/services, payment methods, shipping and refund options, and maintenance tips. Check the detailed FAQ section of this website below. Something like this will benefit your customers and also prevent you from having to answer the same queries multiple times.

Well-thought-out Shipping Information

Did you know that a lot of carts are abandoned online because shipping costs are not informed early on?

Let’s assume you search a jewelry website for a long time and end up choosing a neckpiece worth ₹400. You proceed to the payment and that’s when an additional ₹149 is added for shipping. That sounds like a lot doesn’t it? It also adds to the disappointment and irritation of the customer who was not prepared for this extra 37% of the cost price added as shipping!

As a result, carts are abandoned without converting into sales. According to Statista, 63% of people in the USA abandon carts because of shipping costs!

Experts suggest that you mention the shipping prices clearly along with the product costs. This way, customers will adjust their budget before adding a product to the cart.

If you sell all over India and shipping rates vary, then have a calculator that determines shipping costs based on the area/zip code.

Easy and Clear Return Policies

You don’t have to offer free returns and instant refunds to customers if you cannot afford to do so. However, having a clean return policy page on your website will help build trust. A lot of small brands require their customers to pay for return shipping. Other brands that sell baby products, lingerie, and food products don’t offer returns and exchanges at all.

All these will work when you tell your customers about this early on. A Simple ‘30-day returns’ or ‘no returns’ or ‘only exchanges’ logo on your product page will do the trick. You can have a detailed returns and exchanges page linked to the home page to provide more details.

Authentic User Reviews

What is the first thing people do when they shop for something on eCommerce websites like Amazon and Flipkart? Look for ratings and reviews!

Ratings and reviews tell customers how popular the product is and how many people have bought and used them. Bad ratings can totally affect sales.

However, you know what else pulls down your sales? Completely positive reviews and five-star ratings throughout! This makes customers assume you have tempered with the review section.

It is good to have mixed reviews with the graph slightly leaning towards positive comments and ratings. Customers can easily identify if a review is authentic or fabricated. As a seller, one of the features you should strive hard to have in your eCommerce website is authentic reviews from real users.

You can send emails or reminders to your past customers to leave you a review. You can also offer a discount coupon for people who review you on your website. Building this helps your website in the long run.

Social Presence

Social presence does not have to do anything directly with creating and maintaining your website. But it helps a great deal in generating traffic and pulling potential leads into checking your e-commerce page.

• Have official brand accounts on all social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest
• Keep posting regularly on these pages
• Make use of influencers to talk about your brand and your products/services
• Share content that people relate to
• Share content that people can use

All these help build trust and a better relationship with customers and help you grow organically.

High-End Security Features

All online websites have a payment gateway integrated into their page. This makes it easy for customers to pay for their purchases. Ensure you engage with payment gateways that are reputed and highly trustable. Customers who lose their money or are victims of hacking because they used your website will never come back to you!

Also,

• Definitely invest in an SSL certificate
• Prefer using two-factor authentication when customers sign in or pay

Add Find-in-Store options

If you have a physical store or a chain of stores, then ‘Find-in-store’ is a very important option you have to add to your website to make it more user-friendly and practical. Some people may require a product right away and cannot wait for you to ship it.

In that case, adding a list of local stores where the product can be found is a great way to boost sales and help your customers. You can also allow customers to pay online and pick up the product from a nearby store. Check how Walmart offers this feature to customers.

Conclusion

A website is not just a tool to sell your products and services. It is the heart and soul of any online business. All these 13 points may sound simple but these, together, work in improving user experience and converting traffic into sales.

It does not matter if you are a small home startup or a multibillion-dollar business. Your website has to work for you the right way.

If you are building your website now, make sure you integrate all these 13 features into it before you go live. If you already own a website, check if these 13 features work right. Making small changes to these features can improve the shopping experience on your website.

 

 

All businesses –big and small, need eCommerce websites. There are no second thoughts about this. However, businesses stall in the process of creating their website. How should they go about the process? Should they make use of established eCommerce applications/platforms to host their website or should they build a website from scratch on their own hosting platform?

The first method is definitely quicker, hassle-free, and effective for businesses that want to start right away.

An eCommerce platform is a software tool or application that you can use to create a website and manage its various processes like marketing, sales, customer support, and other operations.

Two major eCommerce platforms that are quite popular right now are Shopify and WooCommerce. This article will help you compare the various features of Shopify vs WooCommerce and help you decide which platform would work better for you.

What is Shopify?

Shopify is an all-in-one eCommerce platform that will help you create a website and manage it effortlessly. Based out of Ottawa, Canada, the brand was established as an Application Programming Interface (API) in 2006 and allowed different developers to create applications on the website and sell them.

As of now, Shopify powers about 1,000,000 businesses online around the world and recorded a revenue total of 1.578 billion USD in 2019.

Between 2016 and 2019, the brand helped businesses contribute $319 billion in economic activities.

As of now, the brand aids businesses in setting up their online presence, creating marketing strategies, planning branding, and managing processes like payments, shipping, returns, and customer support.

What is WooCommerce?

WooCommerce is also an eCommerce platform that helps businesses build and manage their online websites. This brand makes use of open-source software based on WordPress to create websites and tools. The brand was established in the year 2011 and became very popular because it was simple to use and lots of tools and add-ons were available for free.

As of 2020, it was estimated that WooCommerce had 3.9 million websites that used their application.

What to Look for in Your eCommerce Platform?

Here are some of the features you should look for in an eCommerce platform.

Ease of setup – A good eCommerce platform needs to be simple and easy to set up and use. When there are too many complexities and multiple steps, it will drain you of your excitement and energy. Look for platforms that give you pre-set templates to choose from. This brings down half your work. You shouldn’t be an expert to set up an account and create a website on these platforms.

Platform security – When you have an online website, your end goal is to get customers to pay for your product or service. Payment security is of utmost priority. Look at platforms that offer HTTPS/SSL certification and those that are integrated with well-known and reputable payment gateways.  When it comes to Shopify vs WooCommerce, both platforms are known for their secure checkout processes.

SEO compatibility – When a website is SEO friendly, it lists better on search engine rankings and is also easy to navigate through by customers. Both Shopify and WooCommerce platforms are built to adhere to basic rules of Search Engine Optimization.

When you choose to build a website through these brands, things like Meta title and description, headings, URLs, website structure, crawl ability factor, and speed and uptime are carefully curated to help you rank better.

Is it mobile-friendly? – According to Statista, the Indian m-commerce market was worth $38 billion in 2020. This number is only set to increase in the coming years. When you look for an eCommerce platform, make sure it helps you build a mobile-friendly site.

Flexible features and pricing – This is quite important when you look for an eCommerce platform for long-term association.  Your website may be dealing in multiple currencies or running a specific kind of promotion that is not very common. In such cases, the platform should let you customize features and charge you accordingly.

Customer experience – Customer engagement has to be smooth, easy, and friendly. What kind of features do these platforms include to make your customer’s experience better? Check these details before choosing a solution provider.

Pricing-features balance – Pricing always plays a vital role in finalizing a provider. While some platforms may offer solutions at really low prices, their features may not be great. In finding the right balance between affordable pricing and the features, you actually might want to hit the jackpot.

Shopify vs WooCommerce: Pros and Cons

We have made it easy for you to compare Shopify vs WooCommerce. Here is a list of pros and cons that you should be looking at when you are choosing between these popular eCommerce platforms.

Ease of Use: Shopify vs WooCommerce

Shopify – Shopify is a fully-integrated, well-thought-out platform. You do not have to install any of the applications and learn its processes to build and maintain your website. Everything is offered on a silver plate and all you need to do is pick the features you want.

There are a lot of pre-designed themes to choose from. It also has an easy drag-drop interface. With Shopify, you don’t have to be a professional developer or designer to build and manage a website.

WooCommerce – WooCommerce is an open-source software application. This means that there are so many tools and updates available on the website and you may have to spend more time picking what works for you. You may have to browse through hundreds of free and paid plug-ins to narrow down the right choices for you. There are more than 55000 plug-ins available on the website.

You should be using a separate builder app to create your website and there are no easy drag-drop options here.

Shopify is certainly better in terms of ease of use.

Payment Methods

Shopify – Shopify has its own Shopify Payments tool. With this, you have to neither opt for third-party payment options nor worry about the security of the payment gateway. Everything is pre-set for you and ready to use. All you have to do is turn on the payment mode on the platform. Shopify Payments offers:

• PCI compliant servers
• 3D secure checkouts
• Data encryption for payments

Do know that Shopify Payments charges you transaction fees in addition to the amount charged by your bank. In case you decide to opt for third-party payment gateways, there are more than 100 options to choose from too.

WooCommerce – WooCommerce also has its own payment tool – the WooCommerce Payments. Apart from this, there are more than 100 payment gateways to choose from.

You can also use payment extensions on your WooCommerce-powered website including Amazon Pay, Paypal, Square, Stripe, and PayFast.

Since WooCommerce is a self-hosted eCommerce platform, it does not charge you any transaction fee. All you need to pay is your bank’s transaction charges.

 

Shopify vs WooCommerce Dropshipping

Dropshipping is a trending eCommerce model that is perfect for businesses without warehouses and stocking options. Here, a business has multiple vendors. When an order is placed on the website, the detail is passed on to the vendor who takes charge of the shipping to the customer. Giants like Amazon and Alibaba also have dropshipping modes on their websites.

Shopify – With Shopify, you can integrate a lot of dropshipping apps like Aliexpress and Printify to your account and directly work with these apps. Your customer will see the front-end of your website designed like any other eCommerce website. Once an order is placed, you can seamlessly work backend on the dropshipping processes via Shopify and connect with your vendors.

WooCommerce – The WooCommerce dropshipping management tool is super powerful and does the following.

• Manages your dropship store from end to end
• Notifies vendors automatically when their products are ordered
• Makes relevant changes to inventory
• Send auto order-notifications to vendors
• Integrates with dropshipping apps like Aliexpress and Amazon Affiliate Support

When you compare Shopify vs WooCommerce, they both perform equally well with dropshipping.

Scope for growth and expandability

Every business runs with the hope of growing big and expanding in the future. In such a case, is your eCommerce platform equipped to handle your growth? How will your website fare when you suddenly see thousands of people visiting the site every day? What happens when your catalog doubles and triples every month?

Shopify – Shopify is specially created to handle business with rapid expansion plans. The brand offers multiple plans for businesses of different sizes and you can easily upgrade your existing plan as you grow.

You can look at the exact features under each of these plans here. As your business grows, the infrastructure grows too and you can also get help from Shopify’s professional team every step you progress.

WooCommerce – WooCommerce was mainly created to offer the opportunity for everyone to customize and create a website without having to spend a lot of money. As a result, you cannot expect handholding every step of the way here.

As you grow and expand, you will be responsible for identifying better plug-ins and tools to make your website better. You have to worry about security and hosting plans. Scalability is also something you should invest time and effort in and identify better hosting providers to handle your increased web-load.

When you compare Shopify vs WooCommerce, because of the increased efforts and thoughts that go behind WooCommerce’s websites, Shopify gains a slight advantage here.

Support Options for WooCommerce vs Shopify

Shopify – Shopify has a vast and detailed help center where you will be able to find answers to most questions you have. The help center is well-structured and easy to navigate through. If you cannot find answers to what you were looking for, you can always contact the customer support team. The team responds quickly and is very helpful.

You can reach them via email, chat, phone, and social media platforms. They are available 24X7.

WooCommerce – WooCommerce also has a help center with a lot of basic FAQs answered. They have documented extensive videos, tutorials, and self-help guides for both developers and clients. Since WooCommerce is a self-hosted platform, your developer will be able to answer your queries better instead of the WooCommerce team.

 

You can, however, reach out to the WooCommerce team if you are unsure how to find relevant help. They are usually quick to guide customers.

WooCommerce vs Shopify: Pricing Differences

Shopify – Shopify comes with a basic pricing plan depending on what kind of business you are and there are additional charges and transactional fees involved every step of the way too.

There are no setup fees involved. The basic Shopify plan for smallscale businesses starts at $29 a month. Advanced plans cost $299 a month. Apart from these, you will be charged certain amounts per order if you use Shopify Payments.

If you opt for Shopify POS Pro, a store management tool for physical businesses, that is $89 a month extra.

WooCommerce – WooCommerce is free, open-source software. This means that they don’t charge you anything to set up a website. However, there are other costs involved that you should be aware of.

• Host and domain fees (Every host charges differently based on features offered)
• While there are hundreds of free themes, few paid themes are to be paid for
• Payment gateway costs (transactional fees will be charged for every order)
• Costs to secure the website (SSL certification costs)

Shopify vs WooCommerce: Which one is right for you?

Have you been able to easily compare Shopify vs WooCommerce now? There is no right or wrong choice here. It all depends on what you are looking for from an eCommerce platform and what you are affording to pay for the same.

If you are a beginner with no basic knowledge of website development or management or don’t have a large team to help you manage your website, Shopify is definitely a better choice for you. It is easy to understand and you can create and manage your website hassle-free. Shopify Plus is an add-on that offers enterprise solutions and dedicated experts who can handle high volume merchants and large business enterprises like a pro and leave you to concentrate on your strength – scaling up your business.

If you want a lot of customizations on your website and are truly interested in what freelance developers offer to your site, then WooCommerce can be a better choice. Shopify is too constricting in terms of tools you can use and customizations you can make. WooCommerce gives you free rein. It is also possible to find free or cheaper tools and plug-ins on WooCommerce that bring down your final cost of running a website.

Still unsure how to go forward? Get in touch with us. Our team will contact you for a free consultation and help answer queries that you may have.

 

 

Content creation is one of the most important marketing practices. It is now common to take the help of the internet to answer the questions people have, to entertain, and to even diagnose health symptoms.

When you provide quality content to your audience, you build a solid pool of data and information that can and will be used for years together and keep attracting traffic and leads for you.

According to DemandMetric, 60% of people check out a product or a service after reading relevant content about them. Also, businesses can generate 3 times more leads with the right content marketing strategy when compared to other traditional marketing methods.

Finding new content ideas is a common challenge business and content creators have as they grow. How do you consistently find ideas that click with the audience and don’t end up creating redundant content that gets lost in the sea of information available online?

All content creators, even the most experienced ones, need to put time and effort into identifying promising and potentially good leads for new content. Here is a list of 11 top ways to find new content ideas that will help you keep creating valuable, interesting, and high-reaching content for your target audience.

Use Google Image Tags

Google is one of the best places to find out what people are searching for. A very interesting way of finding new content ideas is to make use of the Google Image Tags. Here is how you go through this.

Step 1: Open ‘Google Images’ and search for a particular keyword or a broad topic you may like to create content in. Let’s search for Artificial Intelligence.

Step 2: Check out the tags on the top. Fifth-generation, deep learning, big data, automation, business are all keywords that are used along with artificial intelligence by people who browse the search engine.

Step 3: Swipe through to look for hundreds of such keywords.

Step 4: Combine your keyword and the suggested ideas to create a new topic. It could be ‘Use of artificial intelligence for businesses’ or ‘Big data in artificial intelligence.

You get the drift.

The Google Image Tags keep changing regularly based on what people search for. Make sure you go through the process fresh every time you are looking for ideas.

Facebook Ad Library

The Facebook ad library is a place you can find what ads your competitors and industry leaders are running on Facebook at any given point.

This is a great place to find what kind of blogs and content that your competitors are promoting. Usually, blogs that do really well are promoted on social media pages to get them more visibility. Find new content ideas from this space and you will get your hands on topics that are already being searched and looked at extensively.

Step 1: Visit the Facebook Ad Library

Step 2: Enter the name of the competitor of your choice

Step 3: Ignore the ads that promote products and services. Pick up ads that promote blogs and topics

Step 4: Pick up possible content from here and curate your own version of the same

Reddit Keyword Research Tool

Reddit is a common discussion forum where people come together to share ideas, discuss issues, and offer solutions as a community. Reddit had 1.73 billion visits to its website in December 2020.

This is one place where you can authentically find what people are looking for and what interests them.

The Reddit Keyword Research tool is a smart free tool that will help you analyze the search patterns on this platform.

Step 1: Visit the Reddit Keyword Research tool and enter a broad keyword of your choice

Step 2: Look through the specific keywords used on the platform, their search volume, and their context in a matter of seconds. The search volume is pulled up from the Google Keyword Planner.

Let’s say you want to create content around the diet plan ‘Keto’. You enter the keyword on the tool and below are the results the tool generates.

When you click on ‘Context’, you will find exact topics that used the keywords. This is a great place to instantly find new content ideas with minimal effort.

Here is a list of other popular keyword research tools you can check out too.

Exploding Topics

Exploding Topics is an advanced technology tool that can be used to find topics that are getting popular and a lot of traction before your competitors identify and make use of them.

There are so many categories to choose from. If you are a skincare brand, here are some upcoming topics that you can choose to create content with. These keywords have had really high search volumes in the past and have high projected growth rates in the future too.

If you click on a particular keyword, you can find out how much it has grown over the past years and its growth projections for the coming months/years. The tool also gives you related topics you can use to create more content.

Read Through Blog Comments

What better way to understand what your readers/users want than by reading through your blog comments? When you start creating genuine blogs that add value to your readers, they will get back to you with additional topics that they want you to work on. Check out Netilly’s blog for instance. We worked more on PPC advertising after people posted about how they kept looking for that topic.

You can go one step further and look at blog comments in the competitor blogs to pick up possible content ideas too.

Let’s take up the example of PPC advertising. Check out the blogs of top digital marketing brands like Moz and HubSpot. Check this comment by a user on one of Moz’s blogs.

Your next idea for content could be different software tools to assist in PPC management!

 

Browse Through YouTube Channels

YouTube has become one of the most popular platforms to create new content. This is also a great place to find new content ideas. Here is how you can use the platform to your benefit.

Step 1: Know a broad idea of what you want to focus on

Step 2: Identify bloggers and brands that are popular on YouTube in your area of interest

Step 3: Check out their video listings

Step 4: Sort the ‘most popular videos.

Step 5: Get ideas for new content here.

Let’s see this with an example. Imagine you are a food blogger and you want to know what kind of recipes to post or cooking ideas to take up.

Check out channels like ‘The Food Ranger’. Below is a list of videos that have had millions of views in the past.

Look for inspirations here. The topics of the videos can be used to create interesting content that your audience will love.

Google Analytics Landing Pages Report

If you have a Google Analytics account, you can check out the landing pages report here. The landing page report tells you which landing pages of your website or blog get more visitors. It tells you where traffic is coming from and what kind of content your audience prefer on your pages.

Assume a skincare brand posts a lot of content in its blog regularly. Analyzing the Google Analytics landing page report tells the brand that topics with keywords like ‘organic’ and ‘natural’ have more views and traffic. This means the brand should concentrate more on creating content with similar themes.

Related Searches on Google

Almost all brands and marketing teams make use of the Google search engine to find new content ideas. How can you take this a step higher?

Search for a particular keyword or a broad idea on Google.

Scroll down to find ‘Related Searches’. This will give you more idea on what else you can create content on.

If ‘Low Carbohydrate diet’ is a possible topic of interest, you can also consider creating content on the below topics.

 

Check Some of The Potential Low-Competition Keywords

Low competition keywords are those words that are not much used by competitors and are not widely targeted. While most of these keywords may not be very useful, if you can sort low competitor keywords based on high search volumes, you can end up with something that can be valuable as a content idea.

Check out this search for kids’ books on the SEMRUSH keyword magic tool. The ‘Com.’ Is the competitive density here. To make sure the keywords are worth something, the ‘CPC’ (Cost Per Click) has been kept high here.

Podcast episodes and descriptions

Podcasts are audio recordings of talk shows, blogs, stories, and other kinds of audio files that are available free for people to listen to. Podcasts are very popular in the United States with a growth rate of 37.5% in the last three years (2017 to 2020). In India too, more people are aware of and using podcast apps.

Download some of the popular podcast apps out there and find shows of your niche. You will be surprised at the wide variety of content people talk about there.

Browse through the popular podcast episodes in this niche and you can find good content ideas here.

Revisit and revive your old content

When none of these ideas take root and you are struggling to meet a deadline to launch something, consider revisiting and using your existing content. Pick up some old content of yours and try tweaking the graphics or updating data for today’s market.

You would be surprised to see that reviving old posts helps improve your organic traffic and views. Readers who don’t make the effort to go back to your earlier posts and blogs can also be exposed to these posts when you re-launch them.

Give this a try.

Take Away

Content isn’t the king anymore, it is the whole kingdom!

Your readers and users are looking for valuable content from you that helps them in some way. Creating such content is like making the right investments. They grow over time and make you rich and prosperous.

You can also ask your social media followers what they want from you. You will be amazed at the number of content ideas you get from your readers directly.

Are you struggling to handle content the right way? Are you not able to build content ideas that help you grow? Let us know. Our team offers free consultations to businesses of all sizes to help them approach content the right way. We will create a customized content management plan for you to build your content value.

Branding is one of the most vital features that help you stand out in the online medium. The right branding can mean the difference between a customer buying from you or walking away.

In 2015, Neilsen IQ, a consumer intelligence company conducted a survey asking people what drove their decision to choose one brand over another. 68% of customers mentioned that they prefer buying from a brand they know and associate with.

Let’s go through the idea of branding in digital marketing slowly, understanding what this means for individual companies.

What is Marketing?

“Business has only two functions – marketing and innovation.”

These are the words of Milan Kundera and they hold true now and forever! Marketing is the process of selling a product or a service that you have.

Sounds simple, doesn’t it? The process comes with its own set of challenges. Everything starting from understanding your customers, building relationships, and maintaining your customer pool are all parts of marketing.

What is Digital Marketing?

 

 

Digital marketing is a term that’s been trending since the late 1990s. Digital marketing started making sense as soon as people started shopping online.

Digital marketing is marketing done online through various digital channels like email, social media platforms, and websites.

Big brands invest in different teams to handle their traditional and digital marketing processes to ensure they get the best results offline and online.

What is Branding?

Branding is a really special term. It is something that converts a business or a company into an actual brand. Branding includes creating a special set of features and attributes to your brand to ensure it stands out from the rest of your competitors.

Over time, your customers will identify, relate and associate you with these features. Branding is a long-term effort and needs to be done right from the beginning.

Check this fact out – About 77% of customers purchase a product solely based on its brand name! How many times have you visited a shop and asked for ‘Maggie’ instead of ‘instant noodles’? That’s the power of branding.

What Is Branding in Digital Marketing?

Branding in digital marketing is also called ‘digital branding’. This is the process of using different digital channels and platforms to create your brand identity and maintain it.

According to Statista, the size of the e-commerce industry in India in 2020 was worth USD 64 billion. The same industry will be valued at USD 200 billion by 2027. If you have not considered investing in digital branding before, this data should encourage you to take the right step ahead.

Difference between Digital Marketing and Branding

Is digital marketing and branding the same concept? They complement and support each other but both of them offer strikingly different values to the brand.

 

 

Features	Digital Marketing	Branding
Definition	The process of selling using digital platforms	Creating values and features that help people associate with your brand
Attention	Digital marketing techniques aim at getting a customer’s attention	Branding aims at retaining the customer’s attention
Goal	To create awareness about your products/services and encourage people to buy them	To build long-term relationships with customers, become a recognized brand, improve loyalty
Tools used	SEO, SMM, Paid Advertising,	Influencers, Word of Mouth, Loyalty, Engagement, one-to-one interaction
Order of implementation	Digital marketing after creating strong branding makes better sense	Creating strong branding ensures your digital marketing efforts pay

 

Importance of Strong Branding in Digital Marketing

• Branding helps customers recognize your brand easily on digital platforms
• The right kind of branding ensures people trust you easily and makes the task of marketing easier
• A brand with the right brand value is quickly embraced by the audience and marketing strategies work more effectively and reap better benefits
• Branding ensures organic marketing and advertising happens through word of mouth, natural link building, and brand awareness
• It is easy to get a newer audience when your branding is strong. More audience means a higher chance to convert them into customers

When you concentrate on building strong branding first, here are advantages you can get while digitally marketing your products/services.

• Stand out among them with confidence – Let’s assume you have already spent considerable effort creating a brand value. People recognize your brand name, your logo, and your values easily. Now you start with digital marketing strategies. You can target the audience confidently, assuming you are not reaching them out of the blue.
• Convert Buyers into Loyal Customers – Most brands initially invest a lot of money in paid digital marketing strategies and do get considerable traffic and sales on their site. What next? If you have not invested in branding, the traffic will dwindle slowly. You will have to again pay to get more traffic. This is a vicious and unhealthy cycle. With strong branding, first-time buyers come back to you and end up becoming loyal customers (assuming they like your product and your service).
• Earn Recognition from Branding – Recognition – Is this not something every brand is after? Brand recognition directly converts to better organic traffic, better reach, and more interest in whatever you have to offer to your customers.

When you are listed on an online marketplace, brand recognition will ensure people choose your products over other similar ones.

In 2014, Consumer Reports organization conducted a country-wide survey and concluded that McDonald’s serves America’s worst food when compared to 21 other fast-food chains. Why is McDonald’s doing so well despite this? – The answer is brand recognition. People recognize the brand so well that they walk into the restaurant easily even though they know the food isn’t that great. That’s how powerful brand recognition is.

Branding in Digital Marketing – How do you go about it?

Every company plans its digital branding differently based on its industry, its values, and its target audience. Here is a list of common steps that make up branding in digital marketing.

Step 1: Get your basics right

The basics of branding remain the same whether you do it for digital platforms or traditional marketing. Design your logo, think about the brand name and tagline, and plan the color themes, orientation, and style of your branding. It would do better if you worked with a branding agency to get this done. Your branding is going to follow you all through your journey. Take time to do this right.

Know more about branding here.

Step 2: Work on your website

 

Just like how a physical store is at the forefront of any offline business, your website is your online forefront. Design your UI/UX with the help of an expert and ensure the website is easy to navigate through and quick and responsive.

It is a smart move to ensure your website works perfectly in all mediums including mobile phones, tablets, and computers.

Concentrate on inbound and outbound links that will encourage people to explore all that you have to offer. Make sure you have an active blog page too.

Step 3: Practice SEO branding

SEO is one of the most vital parts of digital marketing and it is important for your brand image too. SEO branding focuses more on improving brand recognition, creating loyal customers, and helping your brand name reach the masses instead of just focusing on sales.

While you already might be practicing SEO to improve your revenue, consider the same practice for branding in digital marketing too.

Step 4: Get active on social media

 

Getting active on social media does not mean bombarding your followers with sales-posts every one hour for 365 days a year. It means practicing the art of connecting with your followers in real-time, with complete conviction, and ensuring you use platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat to interact with your audience and offer them something interesting and worthwhile.

GoPro is a brand that creates action cameras. The brand was established in 2002 and they took up branding on social media big time. Do you know the number of followers they have on social media now?

All these followers are constantly aware of what the brand is up to, their new products, their endorsements, and offers. It’s not surprising that GoPro is instantly recognized amidst tech enthusiasts now and their revenue percentage keeps increasing every quarter.

Step 5: Build a digital community

Having a community is a great strategy for branding in digital marketing platforms. A community is a group of followers who actively engage with you, share your content, and act as your endorsers, without expecting you to pay them.

All that’s needed is for you to create engaging content, build your followers, and keep them excited about your products and services. Be true to them. Transparency takes you far when it comes to brand loyalty.

Apart from sharing mere product/service posts, make sure you share emotionally strong content, moving stories, great videos, and experiences that pull followers towards you. Use these digital marketing platforms to build your brand value.

Step 6: Maintain a great relationship with your customers – past, present, and future

 

Once you have established yourself as a recognized brand on digital platforms, you can start practicing digital marketing strategies to get more customers and more sales. Your branding work does not stop here though.

Ensure you keep building new relationships, maintaining past relationships, and scouring potential customers all on different online platforms. Work hard in giving your followers a reason to remain loyal to you.

Branding in digital marketing is a continuously progressing feature and you will have to keep investing time and energy in improving your digital presence.

Conclusion

 

Branding in digital marketing is not just about selling what you have to offer. It is about creating a large group of loyal audience in various online platforms who buys from you but more importantly, believes and trusts you as a brand. Reaching this pinnacle of branding is difficult but not impossible.

It definitely takes time and you will need the patience for it. When you try and do everything yourself, you may have to reroute, go back, start over, and waste precious years that you could have used towards growth.

By starting to work with a digital branding expert, it is easier to take the correct steps ahead and win over your online audience with awesome products/services, great growth strategies, and a lot of right values.