What are the Challenges of Running an E-Commerce Store?

Your e-commerce store might have the best storefront and website across the whole of the internet, but this does not secure its eventual success. Website design is not the only factor that drives the success of your online store, and if you are planning to host an e-commerce store using a WordPress extension or using an e-commerce hosting platform, it is important that you understand some of the challenges that you face when you choose to open a digital business.

1.    Competing with Large Brands

The best website in the world will not help you beat competition from the digital giants like Amazon and Google. However, although this problem does not show any signs of disappearing, smaller e-commerce stores are now starting to find ways to deal with this. For instance, you may be able to attract customers away from larger companies by offering them a personalized service, such as developing a quirky image, giving great customer service to your customers, or creating custom products for them.

2.    Communicating with International Audiences

If you want to expand your small online store in the future, one of the best ways to do this is to connect with an international audience, with some of the biggest markets located abroad. However, communicating with international audiences can be difficult, and a large part of this is due to language barriers and the difficulty of remaining high on Google search rankings in other countries.

However, digital marketing agencies like Click Intelligence can help you communicate with audiences around the world through their multilingual SEO strategies. These techniques help you overcome any challenges in communication and ensure that you can remain high on search engine listings at a global level.

3.    Maintaining the Trust of Customers

The major downside of opening an online store is that great website design will not protect you from security issues, such as hackers and malware, which can easily infiltrate your website and cause data breaches if you are not able to take the right steps to stop this. The best action that you can take to maintain the trust of your loyal customers is to use SSL encryption, web application firewalls, and to choose a web hosting provider who has crime-proof security features.

4.    Dealing with Shipping Costs

One advantage of brick-and-mortar stores over online alternatives is the fact that shipping costs can severely dip into your profits and prevent you from making an extensive profit. There are a few ways that you can reduce these costs as much as possible though, and these include getting quotes from different carriers before committing to one, factoring in shipping when you price your products and using the packaging that your carrier offers.

5.    Providing a Great Customer Experience

Lastly, the lack of face-to-face communication can make you feel as if you are distanced from your customers. However, you can give customers just as great an experience online as you would in the real world. For instance, you can use live chats to respond to their queries immediately, communicate with them directly on social media, and create an easy-to-navigate website for them to enjoy. After all, according to some surveys, 94% of customers say that websites must be simple to use.