Why Ecommerce is Important for Businesses

So you have started a website and unlike most websites you want to sell online and are struggling at figuring out if it is the right choice. You probably are unaware of things but ecommerce has become one of the biggest driving forces around the globe.

Why ecommerce is important for business? Ecommerce allows customers from across the globe which opens up business to globe trade rather than local. Any business which can take payment through a credit card processor online can sell a product or service which can be served to people around the globe. Because of this, ecommerce has become one of the most important pieces for running a business.

If you want to learn more about why ecommerce is a driving force, then stay tuned as we give you some stats behind ecommerce and why you need it. Every business is bound to need ecommerce in the future.

The day brick and mortar businesses died

Ecommerce killing brick and mortar businesses

To be fair brick and mortar businesses are alive and well, in my city we have tons of brick and mortar. However, with that said we have seen an increase of businesses close of up in the wake of Amazon.com. Amazon has changed the landscape of business forever and it started out.

Amazon originally just wanted to sell books online, and that’s where it all started. The goal was drive bookstores out of business by making prices so cheap online that they couldn’t compete. Well, in 2019 you hardly see any bookstores left except for a few and most have had to shift their strategies.

Amazon changed everything because they tried and that turned into today where people push a button and the next day (or sometimes same day) the product is at their doorstep. We now live in an economy where you can have a driver pick you up without calling anyone, have food delivered to your door and even have someone wait in line for the next iPhone release.

So I know what you are asking, what does this have to do with ecommerce? Think about it, all these things are done online with human interaction. That’s ecommerce in a nutshell, it doesn’t require a human to ring you up; you buy the service and you are done.

The rise of ecommerce

The rise of ecommerce

I have a fair amount of thoughts that lead me to believe that one of the big reasons ecommerce is on the rise is because of a little website builder called WordPress. WordPress lowered the bar to entry for everyone with easier ways to sell online than ever. This evolution of WordPress continues to this day which shows that ecommerce is showing no signs of stopping.

WordPress has taken over as far as websites are dominating the market. Woocommerce which is a WordPress plugin is one of many plugins which turn WordPress into a fully functioning store. Once again because of how easy this is people can build a store overnight and be open for business with the whole globe.

When you look at Amazon, you can see the rise of ecommerce is very real. Walmart will now allows grocery delivery online, which is technically ecommerce since you do all your shopping through their website. Waitr will allow you to order food from any restaurant is on their app without talking to a single person.

Ecommerce is showing no signs of stopping if you look around and try to figure out what type of business you want to run. 

How ecommerce is changing businesses

Because you can now do businesses virtually rather than having someone standing in front of you, many jobs are becoming virtual. This move to digital is one that can not be avoided as self driving cars and self publishing continues to grow.

Brick and mortar businesses are seeing sales dwindle down compared to the brand new start-up that opened last night for no money next door to them on the web. Overhead of an ecommerce store is much cheaper than one that has a bunch of overhead.

It’s this that drives more people online every year than spending anytime in a store. When you can work digitally, why would you ever waste hours of your life in lines or waiting for someone when you can just buy what you need when you need it.

The dark side of ecommerce

All of this comes with the fact that you hope businesses will be forthcoming and fair. Problem is many businesses such as Amazon dominate the market so much that Amazon is trying to get in everyone’s household. This evolution of business scares people who think these businesses could grow too big.

Which is a true statement, who controls and monitors this level of success to make sure what they are doing is fair? This is one of the biggest drawbacks of a free market system which allows anyone to compete with anyone. The problem is until something comes along better than Amazon, guess what people will shop on Amazon.

How can you tap into this market

The easiest way is to start with an ecommerce website that sells something interesting. You can’t be a me too business, we have a ton of those already. You need to make your ecommerce website really stand out from the crowd.

Ever heard of the website potato parcel? They are a company that will write a message for you on a potato and send it to someone through the mail. Or what about the little girl that will create passwords for you? She was making $12 an hour at 11 years old through the power of ecommerce.

These are just a few of clever ideas that are excellent examples of people who have found holes in the market that allow them to thrive. You can find that hole and once you do, tap into it by building a quick website and testing your idea.

The cheap ways of building an ecommerce website

Building a Business Website using Brizy

The best way to add ecommerce to an existing business or website is to have a WordPress website. These websites are so flexible that you can turn it into whatever you want to turn it into. This gives you a great amount of power to test ideas without trying to full commit to something.

You could also do this with the website Shopify if you don’t have an existing website. Shopify is strictly for ecommerce, so if you had a t-shirt business or something that you could buy off Amazon, Shopify makes a great solution for that. Most of these can be down with very low cost if you can do some of the work yourself.

The key to ecommerce is testing and more testing

A-B comparison. Split testing. Concept with desktop computer vec
A-B comparison. Split testing.

As with business, ecommerce has a lot of pitfalls that can cause your great idea to crash and burn. Therefore, many people will use something similar to the Lean Startup method. If you have never read this book, you need to. It explains why so many brick and mortar businesses of the past have failed and why so many digital businesses fail.

You need a proof of concept and then you build on that based upon what the market tells you. You don’t have to spend millions of dollars to develop something only to find that that the market likes B more than A. This type of thinking can help you succeed more often with less waste.

Related Questions

But I have a business that doesn’t sell anything online and I can’t see how this can help me? Think about if one day customers stopped showing up on your doorstep. Now think in your mind how if you open the doors to the internet you are allowing any person to buy what you sell. You can go from limited customers of a community to billions of potential customers.

I got quoted thousands of dollars for my ecommerce website! Sure, that can happen. If you have big ambitions and you want the world, then I would not be shocked if you got quoted $20,000 or $50,000. You are on a pizza budget but want something that will cost a lot. Scale back your desires and do it the dirtiest way possible, manually.

Conclusion

I hope this article has made you believe that ecommerce is something that is growing and you need to watch out for it. It will only continue to get bigger and bigger as time goes on.

If you enjoyed this article and want to learn more about building your own websites, check out our other articles on the website.

Patrick McCoy
Patrick McCoy

Patrick is a web designer with over 20 years experience in websites and design. He spends most of his days writing content and enjoys tinkering with anything web or design related. When he isn't work he is often watching a good movie.

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