Start Your Online Business Using E-commerce
I am sure you have wondered about how to make money online, by just chilling at your home.
When a mix of calculations, doubts, and preconceived notions drench your mind, you finally come to the conclusion that it is impossible to do so. Like many others, you’ll just give up before even trying.
This is due to the fact internet is such a misunderstood concept. It is sometimes regarded as just a means to gain access to social networking websites, news outlets, or data bases full of information.
However, if one digs a little deeper, it also can serve as a powerful tool in facilitating business processes.
As a result, the term ‘E-commerce’ comes in as more and more people are putting it into good use.
This is because setting up E-commerce store is such an easy process that can be achieved with a simple push of a button. Thus, it saves people, the time, energy, and money compared to when starting an actual bricks-and-mortar business.
In addition, a physical store only grants you access to the market located in your geographic location. Imagine if you have the right product or service and you are unable to market it to people who have high demand on it. E-commerce abolishes such a problem since it can function at an international scale.
With global online transactions soaring above 1.2 trillion dollars in one year, and low barriers to entry, the potential of an e-commerce store is quite unbelievable.
After reading this, it is hard to assume that you are still not interested in e-commerce. Therefore, I have set up this concise introduction to provide you with digestible insights about E-commerce.
E-Commerce Store: What Is It?
Short for ‘Electronic Commerce’, it is a tool to sell or buy products and services over the internet. Thus, E-commerce store is a virtual shop that operates using a website.
For instance, eBay, amazon, and Alibaba can fall into this domain. Even businesses with an offline presence possess online e-commerce stores. For example, Mizalla, Walmart, Mozaico, and Tesco can come to mind.
Can You Open An E-commerce Store?
The answer is: Sure you can!
Just as stated earlier, the barriers of opening an online business are non-existent.
All you need is a functioning website that costs the fraction of the price of opening a traditional store.
Keeping this in mind, basically anyone can initiate an e-commerce business. Since not all people have appetite for risk, or the financial means, that a traditional store requires, it is much more viable option.
How To Get Started?
I am sure you are aching to know how to get into e-commerce. However, please keep in mind that e-commerce has two basic principles similar to offline businesses.
Have A Product
That’s right. Just like any other business, you must have a product at your disposal. It can be either manufactured by you or outsourced from other businesses.
If you choose to be an online retailer, you are not limited to online suppliers. You can also make use of offline suppliers to deliver the product for you. However, in most cases e-commerce owners do business with online suppliers.
In any case, the process of finding the right product for a physical store is very similar.
In addition to the capability of selling physical products online, E-commerce stores can sell digital products such as eBooks and downloadable music and videos. Therefore, having a tangible product is not necessary if you have a digital product.
Have A Website
Just as traditional businesses require a physical store to run, you need an online domain to get your e-commerce business going. In other words: you need to have a website.
You should be wary of how you design your website. The more attractive it is the more customers you will get.
At this point, you might be thinking about how to actually open a website. At first, I am sure you will consider someone with web development skills. However, you will soon realize that it is such an expensive endeavor.
Luckily, there exists a little something called CMS (Content Management System) that can allow you to build your own website. Be assured you don’t need any web development or programming skills to use them.
This article has just served as a general introduction for e-commerce. Its purpose is to give you an idea about the subject and what you need to run such a business. However, this is just the tip of the iceberg! I didn’t go into details so that not to overburden you. Please visit the other articles for more in-detail info.
Please leave a comment in the section below, if you have any concerns. Good Luck!
