Common Mistakes in E-commerce Websites to Avoid

There is a bleak statistic: of the 10 selling websites created using the template, only 2–3 survive by the end of the year. Websites that remain afloat, as a rule, also do not bring serious income. Novice entrepreneurs continue to make the same mistakes and hope that they will be lucky. However, a successful business is not random luck!

“The one who owns the information owns the world.” Nathan Rothschild.

These wise words are the key to solving our problem too. Ignorance of market mechanisms and an unwillingness to study the specifics of promoting a business online naturally lead people to failures. Of course, most of us do not have the time to study these issues in depth. Therefore, we suggest you familiarize yourself with simple but important points based on our experience in creating websites and on common sense.

1. Haste

Most people want to get everything right away. This is the thinking of the consumer, not the visionary businessman. People with such thinking grab onto any suggestions to make a website quickly in one day or entrust its promotion to just about anyone.

The same hasty approach prevents people from looking into the future — they are too busy with the present. However, it is the ability to anticipate that distinguishes a good businessman from a second-rate one.

Creating a selling website or online store is not “one step”, as the manuals say. It is a process. Misunderstanding this is a common cause of failure. You can’t create a website in three clicks and sit back happily waiting for sales. If you are really interested in receiving profit, be prepared to work with your website for as long as your business exists.

Starting a profitable website is a process that takes time and effort. And the point is not only that you need to spend time on market analysis, design, and development. Practice shows that fast product launches are a common cause of failure. A guarantee of success is creating an early version of the product (Minimum Viable Product) and its testing, collection of information, and trial run. It is no coincidence that investors prefer to finance products with MVP. In any case, you need to carefully plan a good website and entrust its development, design, and promotion to specialists.

This leads to a simple conclusion: try not to rush and spend time on the important stages of project development.

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2. Unjustified thriftiness

The desire to save money when developing a project is completely reasonable and natural. Nevertheless, you need to understand where you can save and where you can’t. Someone may be tempted to entrust the work to an unfamiliar low-cost freelancer and “one cool coder” recommended by a neighbor. These people can know their job very well, but for serious business, you need the work of a team and the kind of capabilities that amateurs do not have. An amateur website is doomed to become another item in the sad statistic of sites that have not survived beyond a year.

Thus, remember that money spent on analytics, website development, and work of good performers will later be redeemed in spades.

3. Not understanding the website creation process

This is not about specific details of a web design and development, but rather the lack of understanding of their close interrelationship and what it entails. It is this ignorance that prompts people to order analytics at one place, make the design at another, and take it to third parties for development. None of these people are responsible for the work of their predecessors. Everyone is interested only in their task. As a result, the project loses its integrity and does not work as efficiently as when one team is responsible for its creation and launch. Designers and developers need to work together from the start. Even Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak alone could not build a successful corporation, but they did it in tandem.

The logical conclusion is to entrust the creation of the website to one group of employees that are responsible for all stages of development.

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4. Not understanding the specifics of online trading

It’s a mistake to think your online store is the equivalent of a real store. You will be able to succeed online only if you consider the online store a completely new business. You will have new customers, other consumption scenarios, a different range of products. For example, you can sell something offline for $10 and something similar for $100 at the same market square, located in different zones. Online, everything is one zone, and by offering cheap items you are likely to deprive yourself of the sales margin.

This is why you should learn as much as possible about virtual sales.

5. Unwillingness to change

Many people successfully sell goods offline and understand the logic of selling online. However, they face the fact that their website is inefficient, traffic is lost, sales are insignificant. The reason is usually the website itself. Its web design is dull, its functionality is cumbersome for users, the navigation is difficult. As a rule, the owners of such websites do not understand how important the web design is, and consider it no more than a decoration. It doesn’t occur to them to put themselves in the user’s place and see how it would be easier to achieve their goal. They admit their old car needs repairs but do not believe their website needs a redesign. On the Internet, things are changing faster than in the world of old cars, and you need to react to stay afloat. It is useful to watch the websites of your competitors periodically to check whether your website is becoming obsolete.

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6. Grand scale

Some entrepreneurs are eager to create a full-fledged project from scratch, considering it the key to high income. They launch an online store of 100 items or offer an extensive list of online services. But the bigger the business, the higher the costs, and the more problems. Such a strategy often results in funds running out before the business even becomes profitable.

We would advise to start with small projects, then test and develop them. It’s better to launch a project in stages, having previously estimated the costs of each stage.

Afterword

To create a good website, you should think through each step, conduct a market analysis, and study the specifics of online trading. It’s better to entrust your site to a professional team in which designers and developers work in tandem. Think like a businessman, but look at your website through the eyes of the user. And most importantly, remember what Nathan Rothschild said.

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