Step-by-Step Guide: How to Build an Online Store from Scratch in 2024

Since online shopping has grabbed the maximum attention of people worldwide, this data should not come as a surprise to you. By 2023, eCommerce retail purchases are expected to increase from 14.1% to 22%.

It is predicted that eCommerce sales are predicted to hit $6.5 trillion by 2023. Shocking, isn’t it?

So, if you are selling your products through a brick-and-mortar store, then you are missing out on a lot of benefits. With an online store, you can reach a wide audience across the globe and generate more sales.

Being a non-technical person, if you face challenges while setting up your online store from scratch, we are here to help you with how to create an online store. So continue reading this blog and explore 16 simple steps to build an online store from scratch successfully.

Let’s Discuss Each Point in Detail

1) Do Some Market Research

Doing primary market and competitor research is significant as it will help you understand what your competitors are doing, what works for them, and whatnot. Know the challenges that they are facing.

If they are performing well, then know the reasons behind it. What’s their pricing strategy and product personalization option on their product pages.

Also, don’t forget to research the payment gateways and shipping methods they provide to the target audience. Try to get answers to all these questions and then make a plan, considering different parameters.

2) Selecting the Right Domain Name for Your Web Shop

Once you have done all the required research and identified all the products that you want to sell on your web shop, the next step is to purchase the domain name to be used for your eCommerce website.

A domain name is an address where Internet users can access your business website. Selecting the right domain name around your business industry is very important as it adds credibility to your business in the long run.

You can buy a domain name of your choice from various sellers available in the market like Godaddy, Bigrock, Namecheap, and such as others.

3) Prepare an Effective Business Plan

Starting a web shop is definitely a great idea with lots of opportunities but with technological advancements, the market is changing faster than ever and a clearcut business plan would help you to stand out.

Market and competitors research is being performed on a priority basis will help you to prepare a solid business plan with essential considerations of potential customers. Understand their needs when they buy online and what you should offer on your website to deliver them the best shopping experience.

Your webshop will have an impact on almost every area of your business including Sales-Marketing, Customer Service, Accounting, and Information Technology. When you start to put a plan together, understand how your eCommerce web shop can reach each corner of your organization and help your business to grow in long run.

4) Choose The Best eCommerce Platform

The next step is to select the best eCommerce platform suitable for your business needs. Selecting the right digital platform to build your web shop can have a huge impact on the success of your online business.

Since many different platforms are available in the market, it can be challenging to select the platform that effectively fulfills all your needs and fits your budget. So, browse through some of them and check which ones offer the best features that meet your needs.

For example, if you want to sell products with different variations, then look for a platform that lets you do that (Shopify does). On the other hand, if you have no experience in website development and design, it’s best to choose one with lots of themes/templates (BigCommerce has more than 100).

If you want an all-in-one solution that combines online stores and other sales channels like eBay and Amazon, then look for one with multi-channel selling capability (Volusion has this feature).

Here are Some Points that You Need to Consider while Selecting an eCommerce Store Solution:

– Pricing
– Flexibility to implement custom designs and features
– Possibility and ease of third-party system integration
– Mobile-friendliness
– In-built marketing features are available
– Ease of order & inventory management
– Possibility to scale as your business grow
– SEO friendliness
– Security

If you are starting with a small amount of inventory and you don’t need much custom functionality, any WooCommerce development company will suggest checking WooCommerce as it has all the functionality a standard webshop needs.

And If you are a well-established business with big SKU numbers and need lots of custom features to provide your end-users with a wonderful shopping experience, Magento and Shift4Shop are the best eCommerce platforms available in the market.

There are some other good self-hosted eCommerce platforms available that you should explore too.

5) Designing an eCommerce Website

It’s not that tough to design a simple CMS website but designing a fully functional eCommerce website has lots of challenges as it is built not only to showcase your products and services, It is built to motivate your users to shop online. Consider hiring an experienced eCommerce website design company to design your webshop.

A great design is attractive and easy to read with intuitive navigation. Your customers should be able to easily find what they are looking to buy or they will switch to your competitors. The usability of your webshop can be increased by displaying product and service information clearly and concisely.

Here Are Some Tips for Designing a Great eCommerce Website:

• Keep it uncomplicated and straightforward for users
• Make your business’s branding a priority
• Easy to navigate categories
• Make checkout a zap simple
• Make it responsive
• Adding social proof

6) Developing all The Front End and Back End Functionality

Once the design of all the webshop pages is done, the next step is quality development or coding on the eCommerce platform you have selected. There are certain features that every eCommerce website should have to stay competitive.

The success of your ecommerce website is determined by not only the products & services you offer and how well the website is designed, but also by the features your website offers both for the customers and the website owner.

Effective product pages and intuitive checkout are the most important part. Never make it hard for buyers to select required product options and checkout with the minimum steps possible.

Quick loading time for every page is very crucial and one of the most important factors behind loading speed is how effectively your website coding is done. Hire experienced eCommerce developers who can build your website with all the coding standards in place.

7) Decide Product Categories

The better the product categorization is on your eCommerce website, the easier it would be for your customers to locate specific products that they need.

Irrespective of the product you are selling, it is crucial to know how your users will search for your products and develop a well-organized product categories structure.

An accurate category/subcategory structure will not only help you to improve the user experience on your website, but it will also help to rank your site high on search engines for certain keywords.

There are a number of different ways to categorize your products, consult a professional SEO services agency to further understand and implement category structure in the best possible manner.

8) Prepare Product Pictures & Videos

You should discuss with your Magento 2 certified developers about the required picture size on different sections of the new webshop and start working to arrange it when the development is in progress.

A good picture speaks a thousand words. When someone lands on your website, their attention first goes to the pictures that you have used and if they like what they see – they will browse more on your website. Good quality product pictures on your eCommerce website will help you to convert more visitors into buyers.

According to recent research, about 71% of consumers think that video explains products better. Product explainer videos on your website will make it easy for users to understand everything about your products and help them to make a buying decision. You won’t deny the fact that people these days like videos more than reading long texts.

9) Write Product Descriptions

eCommerce website owners usually underestimate the importance of quality content. Though you use good quality product pictures or product explainer videos, your customers will have lots of other questions about your products which you can address by writing detailed product descriptions.

Unique and user-friendly product descriptions will help to boost the search engine ranking of your product keywords.

Relying on a product description generator can make things a lot easier. It can help you create compelling product descriptions by highlighting the key features and benefits.

Here are some points to consider while writing a product description:

• First of all, explain who this product is for.
• List out the important product characteristics.
• Make sure that your description helps your buyers to make a decision.
• Suggest when someone needs this product.

Refer to know more detailed information on how to write effective product descriptions.

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10) Setup Payment Gateways

Payment gateways are an integral part of the eCommerce webshop checkout process. If you don’t offer the right and easy payment gateway options to your customers, your eCommerce business will not be successful.

You should offer your customer all major payment gateway options such as PayPal/Braintree, stripe, direct bank transfer, Credit & Debit Cards, and more.

While selecting the payment gateway, you should check for PCI compliance and SSL certificate in order to avoid any security problems in the future.

11) Configure Shipping Options

Most online buyers care about the shipping options you provide and the delivery fees you charge. According to the UPS survey, 45% of shoppers abandoned a cart when the order value didn’t qualify for free shipping. In fact, unexpected shipping costs are the most significant reason shoppers abandoned their carts.

Therefore, you should integrate shipping methods that offer your customers faster and cheaper delivery options on your website. If you are unable to satisfy your customers in either area, then you will lose the sale.

You should clearly specify order delivery dates with the live order tracking feature. A positive delivery experience will increase the trust of customers and encourage them to shop again.

12) Web Hosting and SSL

Web hosting is basically a space on a server where your website lives. You need to buy a reliable hosting service to make your new webshop available to the public.

Your web hosting service will have a huge impact on the performance of your webshop so be careful while selecting a hosting company. Consult with your web design company to get their advice regarding required hosting package specifications suitable for your business needs.

You would also need to integrate SSL on your website to offer your buyers with a secure shopping experience. You can get an SSL certificate from your hosting provider.

13) Search Engine Optimization – SEO

SEO is the process of improving the organic search rank of your webshop using some set of tactics. If your potential customers cannot find your web shop on search engines, you will lose a big opportunity for sale.

eCommerce business owners generally ignore SEO just because they do not know how important it is for the long-term success of the business.

SEO should be integrated with your webshop design and development process. If you don’t know how to do it, here is our ultimate eCommerce SEO guide.

14) Testing

Your ecommerce website development team will do the testing of the site on different browsers and devices but you should also keep testing the things on your end to make sure that each section of the website is working very well before it is launched.

A website that has not been properly tested may look fine in one browser and device but break apart in another and if any functionality doesn’t work – users will simply go elsewhere.

Once the webshop is live, you should keep doing A/B testing to identify what works and what does not. Here are some tools that can be used to test an eCommerce website:

• UsabulityHub: This tool helps you to improve the UX of your eCommerce websites.
• FiveSecondTest: Using this tool, you can make sure that your message is communicated effectively. It gives an idea about what any person recalls about your website design.
• Optimizely: It allows you to test track, conversions, clicks, or anything that is important to your eCommerce business.

15) Content & Social Media Marketing Strategy

Only building a good web shop is not enough, you should plan to market it well for success. Content marketing and social media marketing are the two most important pillars of your ecommerce marketing strategy.

Content marketing is all about creating useful content for your target audience and distributing it through different channels.

Creating & sharing valuable content on regular basis will help to increase customers’ trust in your brand and represent your business as an authority in your niche. It will also help to boost conversions and search engine rankings.

Social media is another important channel to engage with your buyers and ultimately increase sales. Integrating social media into your ecommerce store marketing is very crucial.

16) Regular Maintenance

Your job will not end when the design and development of your webshop are finished. In order to run it smoothly, it is important to monitor and maintain it regularly for any possible issues.

Implementing and maintaining a website is not a simple task. It requires a lot of effort to ensure that it runs smoothly. As the site grows bigger, it needs more time and attention to keep it completely functional, secure, and up-to-date.

Moreover, it is important to monitor your website regularly for any possible issues. If you fail to do so, you may face many serious problems. You will lose your customers, and it will be difficult for you to get them back.

A poorly managed site can also negatively affect your position in search engines. This means that you need to employ good website maintenance strategies for the better performance of your website.

Our eCommerce website maintenance guide will help you to maintain your webshop well.

Conclusion:

The success of your ecommerce website is dependent on many factors like the quality of your products, easy-to-use web shop, competitive pricing, customer service, your marketing strategy, etc and if you follow all these steps properly, you will be in a good position.

In this age of high competition, eCommerce Business is all about creating value for customers, and the more value you can provide, the more chances your business will be successful.

If you have any other questions about how to build an online store, please feel free to write in the comments section below and our eCommerce consultants would be happy to assist.

FAQs (Frеquеntly Askеd Quеstions)

Q1. Which eCommerce Platform is Best to Build My Store?

Answer: There are many great eCommerce platforms out there to build your eCommerce website. You need to choose the best platform based on many factors such as the numbers and types of products you are looking to sell, features and flexibility that the platform offers, payment methods and shipping options it supports, marketing and promotions options it offers, monthly or yearly cost for the platform, the level of support it provides, etc. Shopify or Woocommerce can be a good platform for small to mid-level business owners with limited custom features and Magento Commerce can be good for businesses in need of a highly customized website.

Q2. What is the Cost of Building an eCommerce Website?

Answer: Well, The price to create an online store depends on the needs of each individual project. Every website required different features based on products to be sold and users to target. A simple shopping cart website costs much less than a website with a lot of custom features. You can approach a professional eCommerce design agency to get a customized quote to build your website.

Q3. Is SEO Important for eCommerce?

Answer: Yes, It is very important. Without doing SEO – your end users won’t find your business on Google or any other search engine. It helps your business keywords to rank higher on search result pages.

Q4. What is the Advantage of a Custom Website Over Using a Readymade Template?

Answer: Custom design websites are built from scratch based on unique business needs and branding strategies and without the use of any premade templates so you have complete control of the design and functionality of your eCommerce website while with a pre-made template you won’t have unique design and there will be limited functionality.

Q5. What are some platforms to build an online store?

Answer: You must choose a platform to build and create an online store before starting. Some examples are BigCommerce, WooCommerce, or Shopify. You must subsequently design your store, incorporate products and payment methods and promote your online store using social media and SEO.

Q6. How should an online store be made?

Answer: Individuals can utilize Shopify, Wix, or WooCommerce platforms if they are looking at how to build an online store from scratch. These online platforms allow non-technical people to build online stores with simple interfaces.

Q7. What are the steps to start an online store?

Answer: Here is the description of starting and building your own online store:

1. Select an e-commerce platform.
2. Build your store by selecting one of the predesigned themes and customize it per your brand.
3. Include images, descriptions, and products.
4. Add different payment methods and provide shipping configurations.
5. Leverage the emails, SEO, and social media marketing to promote your store.

Q8. How do I choose an e-commerce platform to build my online store?

Answer: Consider price, offered features, usability, security, and payment options; moreover, customer support integration with other applications is also important. Furthermore, mobile optimization, SEO support, and popularity should also be considered when selecting an e-commerce platform for building your own online store.

Q9. How do I design my online store?

Answer: Before creating your online store, select a theme from your selected e-commerce platform. Layouts, colors, fonts, and images can be modified. Include segments like the hero banner, about us, products, and reviews. Ensure to keep the design mobile-optimized. Construct captivating product titles and descriptions. Add buttons for social sharing. Ensure a seamless user experience via navigation, calls to action, etc.

Q10. How to add items to an online store?

Answer: Here are the steps to add items to your online store:

1. Set up your dashboard with categories and subcategories.
2. Upload images of products of superior quality.
3. Compose full descriptions that encompass features, material, sizing, and more.
4. Include pricing and stock information.
5. Additional options, such as dimensions and color, can be adjusted.
6. Provide essential details, like tax and shipping configurations.

Q11. What different payment options should be available on my online store?

Answer: Accepted payment methods for an online store encompass credit cards processed via PayPal, Stripe, and similar platforms. You can also accept bank transfers, cash on delivery, and buy now, pay later options. Incorporate widely used electronic wallets such as Google Pay and others, contingent upon the preferences of your target demographic. Ensure payment page security with an SSL certificate.

Q12. How do I promote my new online store?

Answer: In addition to optimizing links, pages, and content, SEO is a viable strategy for promoting a new online store. Implement advertisements on Facebook and Google and collaborate on influencer marketing initiatives. Seasonal discounts and promotions can be smart tactics to attract your target audience and utilize your blog, social media profiles, and email list for brand promotion. Focus on testimonials and customer evaluations.

Q13. How do I manage my online store?

Answer: To effectively manage your online store, utilize a dashboard to monitor sales, orders, and inventory. Deliver exceptional customer service via an array of communication channels and analyze average order value, best-selling categories, and top-selling products. Get shipping and delivery integrated and manage returns, refunds, and exchanges by company policy. Expand and optimize continuously by conducting market research.