Website as
Storefronts
A customer walks into the store, browses through products and
shelves, picks up items, inspects, considers the prices,
chooses a product and takes it to the cash register to pay. Now
if you want to sell your products online, then your site must
be enabled for e-commerce, where you must have the following
features:
-
You need to provide plenty of content and product
description like sizes, dimensions, colors and
comparisons with other similar products. It must
allow the customer to choose a product, get a clear
pricing and shipping costs on the product, complete
the transaction and get an order number, and/or
invoice confirmation via email. Allow your customer
to choose a shipping method.
- You must tell the customer if the item is
in stock or delivered against order. Ideally, you should
have an email contact or live help if the customer has a
question. Most importantly you must respond immediately! If
you want to provide your own live chat and help desk
services on your website, specialized softwares are
available for purchase.
- Be sure your customer service links are
large and clearly marked, so your client does not have to
dig around to find information.
- Provide an ‘about us’ section
or a section about your policies. If you have privacy
statements and customer satisfaction policies, your
customer will feel better about shopping in your
store.
- You probably want to have customer quotes
and references on the storefront page, as well, to let your
prospective client know that others are happy with your
service.
- Provide an FAQ with information about
your return-back policies, guarantees, shipping prices and
insurance charges if any.
- If you are so inclined, you can offer a
print catalogue if the customer prefers to order one from
your storefront and shop in the privacy of their
homes.
- Do
not annoy your customers by presenting products that
are marked ‘sold’ or pages that say ‘under
construction’ or ‘coming soon’.
- Do
add new content frequently, so your returning customers
will not be bored by seeing the same products they saw
four months ago.
- If
your site has got a date tag or has current references,
be careful to change these references frequently so you
don’t give the perception that nobody is attending or
reading your site.
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