10 Steps to Starting an E-Commerce Business Online

Starting an e-commerce business online isn’t necessarily something that you can do overnight, but the process doesn’t have to be difficult either. If you start with a solid plan and follow it step by step, there’s no reason why you can’t be profitable in as little as six months! In this guide on how to start an e-commerce business online, we outline 10 steps that will help your business get off on the right foot from the very beginning!

1) Define Your Why

You need to know what your purpose is. Start with why: ask yourself why you want to start a business, who your customers are, and how you plan on getting your product or service in front of them. Defining your purpose makes it easier for you to define what success means for you. You should also think about how much money you’re willing to lose before giving up, because it’s going to be awhile before all that time and effort becomes profitable. But, don’t forget – if money isn’t important, then money can never be enough!

2) Research and Shop Around

First, conduct some online research. Find out what your customers are searching for and where they’re shopping online. Maybe you can make a better product or find a more efficient way of selling your product than what is currently available on retail sites or Amazon. Do some competitive analysis and make sure you know who your competitors are.

3) Set Up Shop

One of your first steps in starting a business is choosing where you’ll sell your products. Setting up shop is no small matter, but it doesn’t have to be daunting. You can get started by looking into resources that are dedicated to supporting small businesses. For example, if you want to start a brick and mortar store, go through Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs) or take advantage of online tools such as SCORE and Webgrants4you. If you’re going online, remember that even though e-commerce may sound straightforward, there are still plenty of things you need to consider before jumping in—things like inventory management systems and shipping services.

4) Get a Good Night’s Sleep

Getting a good night’s sleep helps your body and mind recover from an entire day of activity, giving you more energy and creativity during your waking hours. However, while it’s important to get a good night’s sleep every night, getting one doesn’t mean that you can skip out on sleep on other nights. It’s also important that you don’t make sleep your enemy; try not to focus on not being able to get enough shut-eye or dwell too much on problems that have taken place during previous nights. Instead, try thinking about how great it will feel when you do finally fall asleep—and stay asleep!

5) Schedule Time For Success

One of the most common reasons entrepreneurs don’t get started on their idea is because they feel like there isn’t enough time. But anyone who has ever successfully created a business—or even done anything worthwhile with their lives—knows that finding time isn’t really a problem. Anyone can find 30 minutes in their day to get started on something new and productive. Finding success is simply about scheduling it in and making sure you follow through, one day at a time. Here are some tips for how you can schedule your success for e-commerce

6) Always Be Testing

Just as it's important to change your landing page frequently, test out new pages and messages from time to time. Look at what's working for other companies. Ask friends and family for feedback. Look for patterns in why people leave your website by using a tool like Google Analytics. It all adds up to giving you more insight into what people are looking for, what their needs are, and how you can solve those problems with your business. And that’s how you start building products customers will love.

7) Treat Your Store Like A Baby

It may sound cliché, but treat your store like a baby. You want to handle it with care, you want it to grow into something wonderful, and you don’t want anyone else caring for it! Your baby will need lots of love and attention (that’s why we call it ecommerce!), but if you take good care of your store from day one, then hopefully by now you are starting to reap the rewards. Spend time getting educated in marketing techniques that work well for ecommerce businesses.

8) The Best Feedback Is Direct

When you start your own business, it’s important to talk to experts and mentors. They can help with useful advice and tips, which will provide a general overview of how things work in your industry. But when it comes time for real feedback, you’ll want to make sure that you’re not just hearing it from someone who is looking at your business from afar. For many reasons—including creativity, productivity and efficiency—the best advice is coming directly from those who are working on your company day in and day out. If there’s one way businesses have changed dramatically over recent years, it's because of technology that makes communication easier than ever before.

9) Have Fun!

If you’re not having fun, then you’re in trouble. Running a business isn’t easy, and if you aren’t passionate about what your doing, then you might as well quit now before it starts affecting your relationships and quality of life. One way to make sure that never happens is by keeping things fun! You don’t have to take yourself too seriously. You don’t have to keep a dead serious face at all times. Mixing things up with some levity is important—especially when running a business requires so much dedication and hard work—and can actually help keep things fresh while at work. Plus, it helps keep people on your team happy too!

10) Take Action

Don’t let a fear of failure hold you back from pursuing your dreams. Like anything else, it takes time and effort to start a business online. You will fail at first. Sometimes you’ll be discouraged and wonder if it’s all worth it. But if you push through, I promise things will get better. Start small with something that excites you; learn how successful entrepreneurs do what they do and apply those techniques in your business! If you take action on your dream today, what would success look like? How much money would you make? Where would you live? What would your life be like? Write those down as goals and begin to work towards them every day until they become reality!