15 Steps to E-Commerce Success (Part 1 of 3)

15 Steps to E-Commerce Success (Part 1 of 3)
Proven strategies for increased sales,
which most storeowners repeatedly overlook,
and when utilized make customers of visitors.

We have put a great deal of emphasis on Customer Conversion in our e-commerce development and x-cart mod creation. If your in business to make money, you must focus on your customer conversion. Below are proven strategies to increase customer conversion along with pre-built x-cart modifications developed to aid with implementation (see below for a discount coupon toward mod purchases).

KNOW YOUR CONVERSION RATE

If you're like most store owners you attempt to increase sales by increasing your number of visitors; you spend a great deal of time, effort and money doing search engine optimization, pay-per-click advertising, and various forms of advertising to get people to your website... and you have no idea what your conversion rate is, or what people actually do once they get to your website. If your spending money on getting people to your site, and have not maximized your conversion rate, you're wasting your money.

Your customer conversion rate is key to profit, and is the most important number you need to know about your website. To determine your conversion rate, take the number of orders you receive per month, divide it by the number of unique visitors you receive per month, and multiply by 100. For example, if last month you received 120 orders from 10,000 unique visitors, your conversion rate would be:
120 / 10,000 * 100 = 1.2%
According to research carried out by shop.org, the average sales conversion rate is 1.8% while rates tend to vary from 0.5% to 5%. Knowing and monitoring your conversion rate allows you to understand the effects of website changes on customer purchasing habits. You can then make changes you expect to increase customer conversion, as detailed through the remainder of this article, and know their exact impact.
Mods for increased customer conversion:
Customer Conversion Package
Personal Recommendations
Marketing Manager
IDENTIFY YOUR TARGET MARKET(S) AND SERVE THEIR PURPOSE

Author Washington Irving wrote, "Great minds have purposes, others have wishes," and the same is true of great websites. A properly structured e-commerce website should guide the visitor from entry through completion, assisting them with cues and reassurance along the way.

Difficulty in achieving purpose often arises when there are several different target markets, and/or competing purposes. Word-processing software for example, is a product that has appeal to a large horizontal market - businesses, schools, government agencies, students, etc. - and the problem solved by the software is different for each.

If your business appeals to multiple markets, be sure to clearly identify them and create flow charts for each. The flow chart should indicate where they will start on your website, and what process they will click through before reaching a desired action. Create different sections of your website for each market and provide relevant information, products, and web copy, to funnel them to an end purpose. You can then use web analytic software (discussed later) to determine what stage of the process people are dropping out at, and make changes to increase the likelihood of users reaching the desired action.

Likewise, if your website serves a single purpose, be sure to create flow charts and funnel your visitors through your website with very distinct cues.
Mods for improved customer navigation:
Advanced Mini-Cart
Remember Me
WEB COPY

After identifying your target audience and desired responses, effective web copy will be required to engage the visitor and motivate them to action. To determine web copy effectiveness, create multiple pages and monitor customer conversion to see what works and what doesn't. As many marketers will tell you, the three secrets to marketing success are test, test, test.
MAKE IT EASY TO FIND PRODUCTS

A visitor can't purchase what a visitor can't find, so make sure that your products are easy to identify and locate. Best seller, featured products, and new release sections are great methods of highlighting specific products, while search is the #1 method used to find products.
Category Structure
Establish your category structure in alignment with your target market(s) and make certain the naming structure is intuitive.
Site search
Search is now the number one method used by visitors on e-commerce sites to find the product or products they're looking for - and if they can't find it immediately, chances are they will move onto a site where they can. Make sure your site search can be seen on the top of every page of your site, and ensure that it provides accurate results.
Mods for improved product locating:
Relevant Search Results
Advanced Instant Product Search
Newest Added Products
PRODUCT DESCRIPTIONS AND DISPLAY

When a potential customer arrives at your product page, they ask themself a pivotal question - "Do I want this product?" You will increase the likelihood of a purchase by offering an attractive presentation which allows the customer to easily understand the product and be drawn to it's most important features. Additionally, ensure the Add to Cart button is prominent and inviting, and take steps to reduce the customers risk in purchasing this product. We'll look at these topics in more depth over the proceeding ten steps of this article.
Mods for improved product display:
Multiple Product Templates Package
Tabbed Product Menu

Next month, in Part 2 of 3 of this article, we'll look at the area between product display and customer checkout to help maximize your profit.