Introduction to eCommerce
Through a systematic approach, e-commerce can be both fun and profitable. With a little planning, a lot of effort in the beginning stages, e-commerce can be very fulfilling. If you are starting a new business, you know it’s going to cost money, you know it’s going to take hard work and the whole experience can be very rewarding. You know this going in, so let’s try to make it as painless as possible.
Drawing on 20+ years of experience, I teach an online class that covers the 12 business areas of Ecommerce that will create the road map for launching a successful and profitable online store.
Below are a few (favorite) resources for the 12 functional areas of Ecommerce to help with the road map for an online business:
1. Ecommerce Business Plan
2. Ecommerce Budget
3. Ecommerce Software selection
4. The Website Design Process
5. Search Engine Optimization
6. Search Engine Marketing
7. Merchandising
8. Distribution
9. Marketing
10. Website Analytics
11. Behavioral Targeting
12. Customer Lifecycle Management (B2C & B2B)
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1. Ecommerce Business Plan
In any business you need a strong Business Plan to lead you through the life-cycles of your business.
An Ecommerce site gives you the ability to develop a specialized strategy for each type of customer, a specialized strategy for each kind of product and a specialized strategy for each ‘gift giving’ occasion. Here are a few helpful resources:
Dropship Business Model – Access over MILLION wholesale and dropship products. We can supply your online business with the best dropship products at the lowest wholesale prices. Click on one of the links below to find out how to run a dropship eCommerce business.
Looking for products to sell? Use the free Inventory Source dropshipper directory and tools to automate your dropship business.
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2. Ecommerce Budget
A well allocated Ecommerce marketing budget is a fine balance between investing in new customer acquisition and retaining the existing customer base (churn rate reduction). In the dynamic world of selling online, you’ll need to readjust your budget quite often, much more often than once per year like a lot of companies do.
Splitit is a global payment solution enabling customers to pay for purchases with an existing debit or credit card by splitting the cost into interest-free monthly payments, without the need for additional registrations or applications.
Here are a few helpful resources:
Microsoft Excel 2016 Step by Step – Now in full color! Easy lessons for essential tasks Big full-color visuals Skill-building practice files The quick way to learn Excel! This is learning made easy. Get productive fast with Excel 2016 and jump in wherever you need answers-brisk lessons and colorful screen shots show you exactly what to do, step by step.
Excel 2016 PowerPivot, PowerMap, PowerQuery, PowerView & BI – Enter the sizzling hot world of BI, Power Pivot, DAX, and big data. Excel 2016 Power Tools are a total game changer!
Microsoft Excel Data Analysis and Business Modeling – Written by award-winning educator Wayne Winston, this hands-on, scenario-focused guide will help you apply Excel 2016’s most valuable innovations for data analysis and business modeling. It’s packed with realistic problems and solutions to help you gain mastery – including over 150 that are new or revised.
3. Ecommerce Software selection
When choosing Ecommerce software, there are a number of things business owners should consider. The software should incorporate all aspects of creating and maintaining an Ecommerce website, such as hosting, website design and SEO integration. Here are a few helpful resources:
Feature-rich Web Hosting and Design: StudioPress
E-Commerce WordPress Website: The Complete Course – Build ECommerce WordPress website with WooCommerce, Payment Gateways, Pricing Tables, Multi-Currency, Order Management
Create a Beautiful Online Store with Shopify – Fast & Easy – With this step-by-step course, anyone can create a beautiful online store. No technical or design skills required.
Introduction to Magento Community Edition For Beginners – Learn how to install Magento. No previous knowledge required Perfect for beginners to Magento eCommerce & online selling.
4. The Website Design Process
Visual communication on the World Wide Web is perhaps the most important form of communication taking place when users are surfing the Internet. When experiencing the web, one uses the eyes as the primary sense and therefore the visual display of a website is important for the users understanding of the communication taking place.
Here are a few helpful resources:
The Complete Web Developer. Be the best – Become a full-stack LAMP developer in no time (the same stack that WordPress uses!)
The Complete JavaScript Course For Web Development Beginners – In this course students will learn the basics of JavaScript and beyond to help them in their web development needs.
5. Search Engine Optimization
The most common dilemma about Ecommerce SEO architecture: do you develop websites for human beings or for search engines? While it seems unforgivable to forsake the human reader, SEO compulsions make it impossible to ignore the search engine either. Great websites are built from search up…start with a good SEO foundation. Here are a few helpful resources:
SEO for X, or SEO for Anyone, is a website that aims to raise awareness and capacities of business people and enthusiasts in regards to most recent digital marketing trends, with special emphasis on Search Engine Optimization. SEO for X serves as an informational platform for anyone that is interested in SEO, social media marketing, and anything else digital that can help you grow your business.
SEMRush is an essential tool for competitor and keyword research and the most powerful and complete online marketing tool out there for monetizing your website. If you want to drive more traffic to your website use this tool.
(NEW) How I Hit #1 on Google: The 2016 Complete SEO Course – Secrets to Improve Search Position, Conversions, Traffic, Sales, Page Speed, Content, Shares & Links.
SEO Training to 10x Your SEO Traffic – SEO Training: Create a winning SEO strategy from scratch with keyword research, content SEO optimisation & backlinks.
SEO For WordPress: Learn SEO Strategies To Gain Traffic – SEO training and strategies for WordPress websites to increase your Google SEO rankings, and grow your SEO traffic.
6. Search Engine Marketing
Email marketing has evolved rapidly alongside the technological growth that has occurred consistently throughout the 21st century. Pay per click (PPC) is an Internet advertising model used to direct traffic to websites, where advertisers pay Google (or another search engines) when the ad is clicked. Content plays a big role in the success of a website. Foundational and Community Building content has to be created and constantly added to. Internet retailers who are actively considering the launch of an affiliate or performance marketing program to help promote their products, know they need to choose a network that can deliver the sales and conversions (and insights) it needs to manage real-world business and its bottom line. Here are a few helpful resources:
Automated Marketing
Online marketing has gone beyond just broadcast emails. We can now send intelligent campaigns using email, Facebook, and more that adapt to your customers’ interests and behavior. Everything from automated workflows to lead scoring.
Email Resources
In email marketing, it’s important to remember that permission is key. Email Service Providers (ESP) can help you create personalized, seamless experiences across all customer touch-points from a single, integrated digital marketing platform.
Powered by MailchimpAdvertising: how to write converting headlines & ads to sell
Discover advertising secrets to making ads and headlines that sell your products: generate more leads & sales!
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7. Merchandising
Merchandising managers need to execute programs utilizing speed, agility and flexibility by giving each program the time and attention required while exceeding projected sales revenue by product line and category. Profitable sales margins and reasonable return on investment start with the decisions made by merchandising management. Here are a few helpful resources:
Mastering Small Product & Jewelry Photography – Make More $$ With Better Photos.
Mastering Photoshop Actions Course (91 Actions Inside) – See how you can professionally improve photos and save time by creating actions and automation + get 91 actions inside.
8. Distribution
Order fulfillment can make or break an Ecommerce business. For fulfillment to be effective, an Ecommerce business must pay attention to all of these: speed, accuracy, scalability and surge. Here are a few helpful resources:
Selling on Amazon – Learn how to run a successful Amazon Store. Learn the Ins and Outs of Amazon Seller Central.
Microsoft Access: Beyond the Basics of Access Bundle – Access Database Insights: Save time with dozens of tips, create macros to automate your database, & learn SQL scripting.
9. Marketing
Create a Multi Touchpoint Experience that impacts Business Development (add value), Branding Reinforcement (build brand), Demand Generation (drive sales) and Audience Engagement (build loyalty). Here are a few helpful resources:
Using LiveChat you can chat with your website’s visitors in real time. Sign up now and get all the benefits of instant communication.
Learn the Basics of Programming for Marketers – Learn how the web works, how to use tools like Terminal, Git & GitHub, and how to install and use Open Source Libraries!
Writing For the Web – How to Write Great Content That Sells – Create great website content that will save time, increase profits, and impress your current and future customers!
Learn Google Adwords & Save Thousands on Agency Fees – This course will help even a complete novice to build, maintain and optimise Google Adwords campaigns that make money.
10. Website Analytics
Web analytics is the measurement, collection, analysis and reporting of web data for purposes of understanding and optimizing web usage. The goal is to measure and analyze each step for continuous improvement. Here are a few helpful resources:
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Correct Google Analytics Setup – Start trusting your data – Learn to setup Google Analytics the right way – Specifically designed for Web Designers and Agencies.
Google Analytics – Beginner Strategies for Google Analytics – Quickly cover the basics of Google Analytics & learn beginner strategies to get more traffic & earn more money!
11. Behavioral Targeting
Behavioral targeting comprises a range of technologies and techniques used by online website publishers and advertisers aimed at increasing the effectiveness of advertising using user web-browsing behavior information. In particular, “behavioral targeting uses information collected from an individual’s web-browsing behavior (e.g., the pages that they have visited or searched) to select advertisements to display”. Here are a few helpful resources:
Marketing Automation for Startups – Implementing email and social marketing and more to run a successful beta program.
Online Business Sales: Marketing Automation that Sells 24-7 – Marketing Automation, Sales Funnel and Relationship Marketing Program to Increase Sales While You Sleep.
12. Customer Lifecycle Management (B2C & B2B)
Customer lifecycle management or CLM is the measurement of multiple customer related metrics, which, when analyzed for a period of time, indicate performance of a business. The overall scope of the CLM implementation process encompasses all domains or departments of an organization, which generally brings all sources of static and dynamic data, marketing processes, and value added services to a unified decision supporting platform through iterative phases of customer acquisition, retention, cross and up-selling, and lapsed customer win-back. Here are a few helpful resources:
Microsoft Excel Data Analysis and Business Modeling – Written by award-winning educator Wayne Winston, this hands-on, scenario-focused guide will help you apply Excel 2016’s most valuable innovations for data analysis and business modeling. It’s packed with realistic problems and solutions to help you gain mastery – including over 150 that are new or revised.
Excel 2016 – The Complete Excel Mastery Course for Beginners – Learn Excel 2016. Training for PC includes spreadsheet basics, formulas and functions, templates, tables, pivot charts.
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Affiliate Disclaimer: Using these links may result in a small commission for Eugene L. Brill, LLC., but it doesn’t change the price you pay. And I’m not using any of them because of the commission, it’s just a nice bonus that comes from sharing the tools I use and love!