Online store, this word solves lots of traditional store problems like time, money, manpower, no physical barriers, customers from worldwide, no middle man, easy transactions and much more….
New online store case study
A few days ago one person(can’t disclose client details) contacted us from our IG handle and shared his entire story like how he switched his traditional store into an online store in the year 2020 in a pandemic crisis. They mainly sell god’s idols and accessories in Vrindavan, Uttar Pradesh, northern India. But after a few months of launching his online store website, he didn’t get any orders. He spend some of his savings on social media ads which are also do not work well and finally he found us on Instagram and contacted us.
We have worked on his website, analyzed his business & customers for 2-3 months. Done some AB testing and SEO optimization on his website and found lots of technical issues with his online store website.
- No HTTPS Security
- Site Isn’t Indexed Correctly
- No XML Sitemaps
- Missing or Incorrect Robots.txt
- Meta Robots NOINDEX Set
- Slow Page Speed
- Multiple Versions of the Homepage
- Incorrect Rel=Canonical
- Duplicate Content
- etc
After working on that online store we have learned a lot about “How to grow your online store even it is not making any single $ in an entire month or so” and decided to share that valuable experience on the internet.
So in this detailed article, we will discuss the deadly reasons for not growing an online store and how you can solve those problems to grow your online store. I have some bonus ideas also for your online store.
Reasons, Why your online store is not growing?
just started selling with an only social media page
Yes, you have to have a simple eCommerce website with your product catalog to start an online business. So people start selling their product from social media account like Facebook on Instagram page. No this will don’t work to grow your online business. Let’s understand this with two different examples.
Social Media Example
I want a cupcake and I will open Instagram then search for a cupcake and IG will show me a list of personal accounts, business accounts, and hashtags now I will click and check one by one on every profile DM them to order my cupcake and still I don’t know they are nearby my location or not 🙁
Cupcake Online Store Website
If I want a cupcake I will open google ask for “cupcakes near me” and Google will show me the website related to cupcakes and then I will buy a cupcake. That’s how a website will work better than a social media page.
Just designing an eCommerce website only will not give you the exact result of sales that you want. You have to follow some guidelines to develop your eCommerce website which is as follows.
1. Sell your product on your personal domain and also sell your product to different marketplace too like amazon, Flipkart, Myntra, IndiaMART, etc.
2. Optimize your website so anyone can understand the navigation and flow of the product checkout process, must have delivery information page, contact page, terms, and conditions page, etc.
3. If you sell or promote your product on social media be active and reply to every comment.
4. Product descriptions play an essential role in your e-commerce website. If they do not have the appropriate keywords, information, and facts, they may not compel the buyer to purchase the product.
5. The customer testimonial page shows the trust of existing customers to attract and impress new customers, So make sure your customer provides product feedbacks on your website.
6. Create GMB(Google My Business) page for your business.
7. Add a live chat on your website so customers will never leave your website with any queries and confusion and there are more chances to convert that website visitor into a loyal customer.
8. Make sure your website looks good on different screens like desktops, laptops, and smartphones.
Not releasing new offers/ festive offer/ social media offer
In every business or we can say in sector changes and improvement is necessary to achieve new goals. It is just normal human psychology that we humans get attracted very easily with new offers and deals even if it is not required for use. Anything that’s new, different, or unusual is bound to catch our eye.
In a traditional store, business owners mostly focus on the market, store location like roadside area, and crowd locality to grow their business. Actually, this is the best way and limit also to scale and grow your traditional(local) store business.
But in an online store business, you can use infinite experiments, tips, tricks, hacks, and resources to grow your online store business which is as follows.
A. Release new offers on regular bases
In an online store business, you can release new offers every month or so. According to INC.COM 2021 survey report in online business 80% of customers come from deals and offers. 2021 survey report in online business 80% of customers come from deals and offers.
Even some giant businesses run 5-6 offers and deals every week like nyka.com, myntra.com, reliance digital, Vijay sales, wildcraft, and others.
List of different types of offers
- Cash Discount
- Percentage Discount
- Free Shipping
- Value-added offers
- Member-exclusive rewards
- Product bundling
- Referral Offers
- Feedback Offers
You can try these different types of offers one by one to drive new sales and customers to your online store.
B. Target festivals for more sells
As per our Indian culture, we have more than 4-5 festivals in a single month.
| Month | Festival | Date (2021) | Day |
| January | Makar Sakranti | 14th January | Thursday |
| January | Pongal | Begins on 17th January | Sunday |
| January | Basant Panchami | 16th February | Tuesday |
| February | Maha Shivratri | 11th March | Thursday |
| March | Holi | 29th March | Monday |
| March | Mewar | Begins from 27th March | Friday |
| April | Baisakhi | 14th April | Wednesday |
| April | Bihu | Begins on 13th April | Tuesday |
| May | Thrissur Pooram | 3rd May | Sunday |
| May | Buddha Jayanti | 7th May | Thursday |
| May | Eid Ul Fitr | 13th May | Thursday |
| June | Ratha Yatra | 23rd June | Tuesday |
| June | Hemis | 30th June | Wednesday |
| August | Rakshabandhan | 22nd August | Sunday |
| August | Janmashtmi | 12th August | Wednesday |
| August | Independence Day | 30th August | Monday |
| August | Onam | Begins on 23rd August | Monday |
| August | Ganesh Chaturthi | 10th September | Friday |
| October | Navratri | From 7th to 14th October | Thursday |
| October | Durga Puja | 15th October | Friday |
| October | Dussehra | 30th October | Friday |
| November | Diwali | 4th November | Thursday |
| November | Gurupurab | 19th November | Friday |
| December | Christmas | 25th December | Saturday |
According to Forbes(American business magazine), online retailers are expected to generate about $6.5 billion in sales in the Indian festival which is around 4,86,00,50,00,000.00 in Indian Rupee.
We have some clients who don’t generate income from their business from January to September month but they generate whole years profit in Octobers “Navratri Festival” and Novembers “Diwali”. So there is a lot of win-win situations in the online store business in India, even we have helped lots of proprietors to set up their online store. Contact us if you are planning to launch your online store.
So take advantage of these festive sessions and launch the best offers to attract customers to boost your online store growth.
How does social media matter for your online store business?
Don’t ignore social media, now Instagram has roughly one billion monthly active users. In some cases or businesses, social media play a vital role to reach a broad audience to promote your product and services.
We have seen some businesses who just post product images daily but still, they don’t get any customers even any likes and comments on their social media page.
You to be very transparent with your fans and customers who love your product/service on social media. Try to reply your them in the comments. Go to other similar categories or niche accounts and give some valuable comments to appreciate their work.
Inform your followers about restocking, promote giveaways and new offers in Instagram stories with the relevant hashtags.
Still not using easy and fast payment options for your online store?
In simple words, a payment gateway is a third-party platform that helps businesses to accept online or offline payments from customers. But lack of awareness about payment stack and technology business owner only offers COD(cash on delivery) method for payment only.
There are lots of best payment gateways available in today’s online market like Instamojo, Razorpay, PayTM, PayPal, etc. As a Digital agency, we recommend to our clients Instamojo and Razorpay.
Let’s take a brief comparison of these two payment gateways.
| Benefits | Instamojo | Razorpay |
| Transaction Fee | 2% + ₹3 (For customer/ free for store) | 2% (3% on credit cards) |
| Payment Modes | UPI, Domestic Debit /Credit Cards, Pay Later, Netbanking, Wallets, International Cards, American Express Cards | UPI, Bharat QR, All major debit and credit cards, 50+ Netbanking Options, Mobile Wallets, Credit and Debit Cards, International Included, NEFT/RTGS/IMPS, PayLater |
| Goal | Simple, flexible, and safe online payments for your eCommerce business. | The easiest integration, completely online onboarding, feature-filled checkout, and best in class performance |
| Customers | 20,00,000+ | 50,00,000+ |
Ask your customers to share ratings and reviews
In an online business, customer reviews matter to increase sales and profit. Because studies show 92% of online buyers hit the BUY button after looking and researching for product reviews and ratings. Some big eCommerce businesses encourage customers to click and upload delivered product pic in reviews so they can win hart of new buyers.
I have seen some businesses that showcase customers reviews, ratings & good comments on social media posts.
Customer reviews boost your Search Engine Optimization(SEO).
Let’s understand it with an example. I want formal shoes for myself so let me ask google for shoes and see which websites google will show me.
So you see google also promoting those products on top of the first page of result who has star ratings.
You can also create a GMB(Google My Business) to get reviews and ratings from local guides and customers. It will build a loyal trust asset on the internet.
There are lots of other Product Reviews Software also available on the internet to accept reviews from customers.
List of customer review platform
– Trustpilot
– Bazzarvoice
– Yotpo
– G2 Deals
– Reviews.io
– Feefo
– Shopper Approved
Etc.
I hope now you will never ignore your customer’s reviews & ratings.
By the way, we also have a Trustpilot rating page you can leave a review.
How to make free online store
Read more….
Do you provide after sells service for your customers?
Ask for buyer feedback
Once you received the order from your online store just pack that product and send it for delivery as fast as possible yes I can understand you can’t beat Amazon and Flipkart but you can do your best at least half of amazon and Flipkart or even more if the customer is nearby your business.
When your product is delivered to your customer call them personally and ask for delivery experience and product feedback. It will give a personal touch to your customer, and this is what every human deserves.
You can also ask them for review and rating for your product on the website it will generate trust for other website visitors.
Inform about new products, discounts and deals
Don’t just leave your customer leave alone to search and find a new online store for the next occasion. So what you can do for your existing customers, you can inform them of new deals and discounts. In India, we have lots of festivals you can wise them and share the latest festival discounts. You can call them or shoot a mail because they have registered to your website with their email id and contact number.
In India, phone calls are much effective as compared to email. And you can also share about the latest product and offers through social media this is the new planet where today’s generation spent their time.
Contact customers on special dates
Don’t forget to wish your customer on special days and festivals like Diwali and Ganesh Chaturthi, etc. Send them designed banners and post on WhatsApp or social media. we also send greeting posts with good wishes to our regular clients. see some example festival posts below.
If you don’t know how to design this type of banner for your business you can simply contact our agency, which will help you to make your festival banners.
Send personalized emails
Sending a personalized email to your customer on his/her birthday, whether it is digital or physical. Yes we know it is a little bit difficult to remember every customer’s birthday, So we recommend setting a reminder on your phone or google calendar so you don’t have to remember it. And don’t just send them “Happy birthday” text, you some copyrighting formulas to feel them personal and give some special birthday discount so they can buy something from you. It is a win-win situation for both sides. Don’t sweat it if you don’t have copyrighting skills, we have designed a free birthday template for you.
Birthday wish template 🎈🎁💐🎉🎂🥳
Happy Birthday,
Dear [customer-name]
Have a wonderful birthday!
We wish you every day to be filled with lots of love, laughter, happiness, and the warmth of sunshine.
Take an extra 20% off
Just log in to [website-link] and apply your code at checkout.
Code: HBIRTHDAY20
Have an efficient support service.
Providing the best support to your customers is as essential as your product. Ex. we are a software development company in Mumbai, after deploying a new software for a business it is not easy for non-technical people(staff member & employee) to understand it quickly they need clear guide and documentation. This is the reason why we provide call support, forum support, email support, video tutorials and we also help them by sharing screens with anydesk. You might be thinking that we really need all these?
😅😆😂😝 According to our 4+ years of experience in this software development industry, we have faced lots of smart and dumb people who don’t understand the process and flow of the software. And this is normal, all humans are not equal we are unique and that’s why we have an equal amount of opportunities and failures in market competition. So be active and give as much as customers support and develop a better relationship with your customers.
Easy and fast process for refund and return.
You might have seen some online stores that don’t provide refunds & return facilities. I have also found a manufacturer who sale handmade home decoration accessories online through social media and I found he also don’t servers refund & return facility as mentioned in Instagram Bio so reached to him through Instagram DM(direct message) and after a few conversations, he says that delivery is so costly and we can’t afford as a startup. One delivery for shipping and one for return, that’s why we don’t offer refund returns.
But as an experienced digital agency we arranged the middle way for this specific problem. Which is as follows:
Mention shipping and return refund policy for your online business because sometimes you receive orders from near your location or some time far from your business location. There are most chances on the internet that your customers are mostly nearby your locality. why because Google or major social media apps shows nearby activities according to your location.
So when you receive an order from your locality try to manage your time and deliver the product to your customer by yourself, not by the delivery agency. By doing this you have saved you extra expenses which you will pay to the delivery agency. Now in any case when a customer as for a return or exchange you don’t have to pay extra delivery charges because your customer is located near your business location.
And when you receive an order which is far from your business location, in that case, contact your delivery partner to deliver that product.
That’s how you can grow your business to the next level and you still facing some issues regarding your online business you can contact our agency UD IT SOLUTIONS you love to help you.
Best online product delivery partners for a small eCommerce store.
1) Pickrr
2) Shyplite
3) Enviashipping
4) Shipyaari
5) Ithinklogistics
6) FedEx
Provide on website live chat support
Website live chat support is a modern and fast way for customer support. Live chat is something like a chat system that is used to give super-fast customer support service. In case of customer calls, emails, or visits to your location live chat support is a much better way for customer support.
Now a day there are lots of chat systems available for every type of website or web app.
As an IT consultant, we recommend Twalk.to software to our clients because it has every feature which is required for customer live chat support like multi-level chats, live analytics, user locations, and much more.
Perfect live chat plugins for websites
How to convert social media followers into customers.
A few days ago an eCommerce entrepreneur contacted us on our Instagram page and said that they are very consistent for the last 6months on Instagram but still have not converted any leads yet.
As an IT and Digital marketing consultant, We have analyzed their Instagram account and found some serious mistakes which are as follows:
- They are trying to sell at very cheap prices which creates droughts in customer’s minds for product quality and durability.
- Not taking product reviews from existing customers to attract new customers.
- Just posting good product images and ignoring captions and CTA of the product post.
- Their Instagram account is not switched to a business account by default it is a personal account.
- Mobile number is not added in the call to action section.
- Just selling from Instagram, they don’t have other social media accounts and website.
- Not following new trends, according to market and youth.
These are the major reasons why some efforts not converting in results. So be smart and consult with industry experts.
Offer reasonable warranty service
A genuine and reasonable warranty creates better relations and trust in loyal customers. In India customers always ask for warranty schemes and product durability.
Some well-known smartphone brands have multiple service centers in cities because they also know the value of customers. Sometimes customers pay extra money to upgrade the warranty period.
One of my friends owns a smartphone repairing store in Mumbai and he offers his loyal customers free home visits for smartphone repairing year 2017 and now he receives more than 260 calls every month for home visit service. This offer works well because their customer completed his mouth-to-mouth marketing in connections.
Help them to understand the product features
In our 4+ years of experience, we have seen an average of 40% bounce back on eCommerce websites. After understanding more than 120 websites AB testing reports and online surveys. We have found that every visitor and customer is a different human and you know that every human is unique and different.
So how we can convert those visitors into customers?
The simple and smart way is to convert most visitors into customers, is to make everything simple and on point.
- Keep your eCommerce website user interface simple and understandable for everyone.
- Simple process and steps for checkout like(single-click checkout, multiple payment methods, checkout without account).
- Live chat support for any query.
- Video explanation and documentation for products like (hardware tools, electronic products, etc)
These are a few reasons why your website is not converting many visitors.
Must have blog articles on the website
Yes, this is something that lots of businesses ignore, and another side they pay extra to bloggers and influencers to do the same.
Let me help you to make this easy to understand how big companies use blogs to grow on search engines and convert more sales.
Blog topics for eCommerce websites?
Normally you don’t have to research other products and services to start a blog. Start from your one product and service. Let’s understand this with an example. Ex. If you have an online store for wristwatches. Then peak your one product and write everything about that product in a detailed guide and put CTA(call to action) buttons in between lines. Like the style of that watch, durability, suitability for which age, etc.
Easy & fast checkout process
Once the customer is decided to buy then it’s your responsibility to make every step easy and simple. Because any single mistake can change his mindset. Sometimes our third-party payment gateway plays a Vitale role at this moment. This means if you have integrated any cheap payment gateway that throughs errors sometimes and server down issues. Then your business will not grow in long run. So choose reputed and better payment gateways like Razorpay and Instamojo.
create easy ways for customers to reach you
Put some simple CTA or a contact form on the website so anyone can easily contact you with any possible opportunities related to your business. For websites, live chat systems are the best way to contact and solve small queries. On social media put a simple WhatsApp link or website link.
Bonus points
Use influencer marketing
In influencer marketing, you just have to find some social media personality how has 5k-10k followers or more according to your product niche. And tell their users about your product so the interested followers can convert to your customer and you have to pay a certain amount of money to that influencer. Usually, this type of marketing generates better sales compared to Google ads and FB ads.
Sell Wholesale to Other Retailers
Selling directly to the customer is a single way to execute business but there is a lot more to do in one business. Like you can make your competitor into a partner by selling them bulk quantity product or row material. Or find small retailers who are always looking for better opportunities and sell your product. By doing this you are offering your same business to 3 different buyers customers, retailers, and competitors.
Conclusion
Congratulations 🤩🎉 yes congratulations because you just completed and learned the detailed guide about how new online stores failed. This completed article is like a whole course on how to grow and make more revenue from your online store business. And still, you are facing any problems regarding the online store and growth, you can contact us at +91 79777 31361.