Choose the Right Digital Team for eCommerce Success

Who Might You Find in a Digital eCommerce Team?

While an eCommerce team in its entirety comprises HR managers, accounting/finance specialists, logistics experts, and inventory specialists, different people play a role in the creation and success of an eCommerce website. For example, the role of a digital marketer continues long after the creation and launch of an eCommerce platform. Here are the common eCommerce team roles and responsibilities.

eCommerce Web Designers

Until not very long ago, businesses that needed eCommerce stores turned to traditional web designers. They specialize in creating layouts for websites and typically focus on designing aesthetic and user-friendly websites.  Now, most businesses use the services of UI and UX designers to serve specific purposes.

User interface (UI) designers work on presenting visual elements in the best possible manner. They tend to address aspects such as layouts, colors, graphics, typography, and mockups. The focal point of user experience (UX) designers is interactions. They tend to specialize in charting user journeys and user flows, creating wireframes and prototypes, and planning information architecture.

No matter what the specialization, all good web designers aim to create user-friendly websites.

eCommerce Web Developers

After the designing of an eCommerce website, its development follows. This involves collaboration between front-end and back-end developers.

• Frond-end developers. They develop elements that shoppers interact with on an eCommerce website throughout the buying cycle. These include animations, button, links, shopping carts, and more.
• Back-end developers. Back-end developers create the server side of websites that remains hidden from online shoppers. This primarily helps in the storage and arrangement of data.

Digital Marketers

Having a great looking and highly functional e-commerce website will not serve its purpose if it is unable to attract the right kind of audience. This is where digital marketers enter the picture. However, since digital marketing varies greatly in scope, a digital marketer might have expertise in one or more areas. These include:

• Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
• Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
• Pay-Per-Click (PPC)
• Email Marketing
• Social Media Marketing
• Mobile Marketing
• Influencer Marketing
• Content Marketing

Content Writers

Data collated by AX Semantics shows that close to 90% of consumers feel product-related content is very important when making purchase-based decisions. It also suggests that consumers discontinue purchases if they find inaccurate or incomplete information about products they wish to buy.

Content writers who specialize in eCommerce work on creating text for various marketing campaigns and they come up with enticing product descriptions that highlight benefits more than features. They are also the ones who create content for eCommerce websites with the aim of converting visitors into leads and leads into customers.

eCommerce content writers understand the intricacies of different types of consumers and buying journeys. In addition, a good content writer should be able to:

• Adapt to your brand’s voice
• Understand the nuances between B2C and B2B marketing
• Write for consumers in different stages of the buying cycle
• Create readable and relatable content

Business Analysts

Understanding metrics is crucial when it comes to achieving eCommerce success. A business analyst who specializes in eCommerce works on measuring key performance indicators (KPIs), objective key results (OKRs), and how you fare against your competitors. You may expect a good eCommerce business analyst to:

• Analyze, synthesize, and present data that project managers may use to improve performance
• Present performance reviews through various metrics, KPIs, and OKRs
• Create process- and automation-optimization tools to collect and analyze consumer data

Should You Hire an eCommerce Specialist?

If you don’t have an in-house eCommerce department or an eCommerce operations team, it’s ideal that you let a specialist handle this aspect for your business. One of the important benefits that you will enjoy if you let professionals handle your eCommerce web design and development is that the navigation will be easy and all the elements will appear professionally done. This will make your website aesthetic to look at and user-friendly.

A team of experts will ensure that it uses the latest in technology to create your eCommerce website and that all your needs are met. This will increase the probability of achieving the goals you set within a short period of time. When an eCommerce team is up-to-date with current technologies, it guarantees you of high-quality results.

Selecting the Right Digital eCommerce Team

If you plan to launch a new eCommerce website or revamp an existing one, it’s important that you work with web designers and developers who know what it takes to succeed in this realm. More often than not, it’s ideal that you partner with a digital agency that understands eCommerce well. The agency you select should be able to create a user-friendly website, make the buying process simple for your target audience, give your target audience information it may use, increase conversions, and then some.

Aspects that need your attention when selecting an eCommerce digital agency include:

• The portfolio. Going through an agency’s portfolio gives you an indication of its expertise, and also highlights if it has any experience in your niche.
• Communication. The agency you work with should be timely and transparent in its communitarian, and you should ideally have a single point of contact that can help address all your queries.
• Time to launch. This refers to the time an agency might take to launch your new eCommerce website.
• Pricing. The adage that you get what you pay for usually holds true when you look for a digital agency to create an eCommerce store. Bear in mind that creating a new eCommerce website takes time, effort, and skills. Consequently, it’s best that you don’t cut corners if you’re looking for eCommerce success.
• Content ownership. It’s important to determine if you will own the content that the agency creates for your eCommerce business. If you don’t hold intellectual property rights to the content on your website or other platforms, you might have to face problems later.

Benefits of eCommerce for Your Customers

While some consumers turn online only once in a while, there are others who make most of their purchases through websites or mobile apps. In both cases, giving them the option to buy your products online comes with multiple benefits.

The Time Factor

There are many advantages to enjoy by including eCommerce in your business. One of the major benefits is that the buying process for your customers becomes faster. This is because eCommerce helps centralize all buying processes through an easily accessible online portal. Your customers can then access the portal, choose what they want to buy, and complete the process in a matter of a minutes.

Bear in mind that several people don’t have the time to shop around the conventional way. Consequently, they will find your website convenient if they can complete the buying process without spending a great deal of time or having to visit a brick-and-mortar store.

Round-the-Clock Availability

Another distinct benefit of eCommerce is that its gives consumers the ability to learn about your offerings and make purchases at any time of the day, without having to worry about when your store opens and closes.

The Cost Factor

It’s fairly common to find online stores that offer lower prices than their brick-and-mortar counterparts. This is because online merchants do away with different overhead costs associated with physical stores. These could be in the form of rent, employees’ wages, and utility bills. When businesses are willing to pass on these savings to their customers, the result is lower prices.

No Unsolicited Advice

Several buyers don’t want any interference or guidance when they’re making in-store purchases. Unfortunately, the age of the over-eager salesperson looks like it’s here to stay, and it’s only fair to be wary of unwarranted questions and unwelcome advice.  When you have an eCommerce website, you give your target audience to go through your offerings without worrying about such situations. In case consumers have any questions, they can always ask by using a chat feature, via email, or through your social networking accounts.

Easy Access to Information

Data shared by Think With Google indicates that close to 80% of consumers spend more time researching a product or a brand online than in a physical store. With an eCommerce store in place, you get the ability to give your target audience all the information it seeks in an easy-to-understand manner. This could be by describing your products’ features as well as highlighting their real-world applications and benefits.

Advantages of eCommerce for Business Owners

Business owners may look forward to multiple benefits by turning to eCommerce, and all are co-related. This is how you may expect it to work.

• Larger target audience. The online world gives you easy means to reach out to a larger target audience, and you may even start selling your products internationally. Besides, you will have more customers since people are in search of an easy way to shop.
• Increase in customers. When consumers get the feel of convenience, it is highly likely that they will recommend your business to others. Besides, with the speed at which people share information online, it will not be long before more consumers come knocking.
• Lower costs. If you compare the cost of setting up one or more new physical locations or launching an eCommerce for, you’ll notice that the latter is much easier on the pocket. This is because you’ll not need as much space or as many employees. Besides, you get to save on other overhead costs too.
• Round-the-clock availability. This is a benefit for business owners too because t gives them the ability to collect leads and make sales at any time of the day or night. It also helps foster a better relationship between your business and its target audience.
• Create a customer database. It’s common for eCommerce stores to ask consumers to part with some type of information. With this data at hand, marketers can maintain contact with probable leads, and also tweak offers based on their preferences.
• Personalization. Modern-day eCommerce involves monitoring user behavior and customer experiences by using various tools. This gives businesses the ability to provide personalized content as well as send out personalized email and offers.
• Scalability. If your physical store experiences a significant increase in the number of customers, managing them might be challenging if you have space constraints. Besides, scaling up a physical store requires extra space and manpower. Expanding an eCommerce store, on the other hand, is much simpler. While you will, in all likelihood, need extra server space as well as more web designing and development, the cost will pale in comparison to what you might need to spend to expand a physical store.

There’s a co-relation between these advantages because the more customers you get, the higher your profits, and the bigger your business will grow.

Conclusion

If you run a physical business, it’s important that you turn to eCommerce for more sales and profits. However, the idea of incorporating this crucial process in your business is not enough. You also need to choose the right web design and development team to work tirelessly on building a website that will deliver results and serve its purpose in the long run.

Remember that what you do at this point in time will have an effect on where your business goes two, three, or five years from now.  As a result, working with a qualified team to build your eCommerce website might be in your best interest.