Is Your Business Ready to Leverage the Boom in Ecommerce Market

The global pandemic has led people to believe eCommerce will sink deep down. But, take it from us, eCommerce is not going anywhere, not anytime soon. In fact, according to a study by Space Shop Commerce, global eCommerce sales may reach $3.9 trillion this year. And by 2021, this number is about to touch $4.5 trillion!

Are you curious to know which factors are operating behind it? Which sectors are benefitted the most? And more importantly, do you want to leverage some benefits, but clueless where to start?
No worry. As a reputed eCommerce website design company, we will help you to take a closer look at it.

Factors Playing a Key Role in the Growth of Ecommerce  

Convenience is the very first reason behind the growth of eCommerce. People don’t have to waste time and energy in visiting multiple stores for purchasing something as they can easily buy these with a few mouse-clicks (or finger touch!) and get the delivery at their doorstep. Further, with enhanced mobility bandwidth a la 4G technology, the entire browsing and purchasing process has become faster.

The availability of numerous eCommerce stores has spoilt potential buyers with choices. Different discount offers, coupons, and promo codes also help in slacking some budget. Free shipping beyond a certain price is yet another alluring factor.

Most Benefitted Sectors

The following sectors have benefitted the most due to the rapid growth in eCommerce:

• Grocery
• Apparels
• Jewellery
• Electronics
• Food
• Cosmetics

Other than these, pharmacy too is witnessing a rising growth in eCommerce sales, especially in the urban area.

How can You Leverage Its Benefits  

This is the most interesting part. As you can understand, it’s high time to convert your brick and mortar shop to an online store. It will not only allow you to reach a wider audience but you can also notice a positive impact on your revenue. Here’s what you can do:

1. Design an Ecommerce Website

Ecommerce website design is the first leap to take. An attractive and optimized website will drive more leads and boost your ROI (Return on Investment).

2. Design an Ecommerce Mobile App

If you already have a site, take your business to the next level with an app. This will further enhance convenience for the users. You can also create an app independently.

Remember, mobile commerce accounts for over 50% of total eCommerce sales (source: Bigcommerce). So, the professionals at any mobileapp development agency remind you not to neglect this part.

Now, designing an eCommerce website or app must be hectic and you may miss something or the other. Relax! We got you covered! All you need is to minutely go through the following passages and make sure your site or app incorporates these features. 

Must-Have Features in Your Ecommerce Site or App

1. Responsive Design

If you are designing a website, make sure it is responsive so that anyone can access it via any device. The first element of a responsive site is its scalability. Constantly pinching the site on a mobile screen to adjust its visuals highly affects the user experience.

2. Loading Speed

Usually, people don’t spend more than 3 seconds for a web page to load (source: Hobo Web). Especially, a significant part of online shoppers comprises impulsive buyers. You surely don’t expect them to wait for 10 minutes while your webpage loads.

So, optimize your page loading speed. The same thing is applicable for your app as well. If it takes a long time to load, people will stop using it and subsequently uninstall it.

3. Quality Pictures

Pictures play a key role in alluring people to make a purchase. So, ensure that your store has high-quality and attractive pictures of the products. But there’s a catch. Large pictures often slow down a site and contribute to increasing the bounce rate.

This is why you better engage a professional eCommerce website development company to optimize the images.

4. Save the Shopping Cart

With so many shopping sites available in the digital ecosystem, you cannot expect potential buyers to see one item on your store and go straight to the purchasing process. They spend significant time in browsing multiple sites, check the rates, often think twice whether to buy – and all these may take more than two to three days before they make a purchase. During this process, your store must save the items that are already added to the cart.

Wish list functionality is yet another must-have element in your e-store. If any of your products is out of stock or too pricy for some customers at that point of time, they can save it in the wish list and purchase later. It doesn’t clash with the cart.

5. Don’t Delay Conversions

Delaying the conversion is the worst mistake you can make and a compulsorily sign-up form works as a catalyst in this. Your intention should always be to reduce the steps before someone can make a purchase.

People often find it inconvenient or time-consuming to create an account. And the guest check out option can be a rescuer at this point. To reduce friction, you may enable easy checkout only with contact details (phone no. / email id) and payment mode.

6. Include Reviews

More than 50% of online shoppers purchase a product based on its reviews (source: Pew Research). So, customer feedback should be an integral feature in your online store.

7. Stay Available

Your potential customers may have any query or confusion and you need to resolve that as soon as possible. Make sure to keep your contact information visible. Ideally, you can install an automatic chatbot on your e-store. This will help to resolve general confusions without any hassle.

If you want to increase your revenue from your e-store, you’ll find this blog really effective - cool hacks to stop shopping cart abandonment.

Conclusion

Remember, the competition is quite steep once it comes to eCommerce sales. According to 99firms, the contemporary global digital ecosystem is crowded with 12 to 24 million eCommerce stores. If you want to create an impactful presence among these, you need to deliver a top-notch user experience.

So, it is better to engage eCommerce website design services or hire the professionals at any mobile app development company to build an attractive and feature-rich site or app along with the above-mentioned features.

What’s your take on our article? Comment below and share your thoughts.

A Video Testimonial by Dr. Satya Kumar Saraswat on Webguru Infosystems

Impact of Email Response Time on Brand Impression

“The growing popularity of social media will suppress the relevance of emails.”

Numerous self-proclaimed tech-gurus predicted this statement more than a decade ago.

Current situation? 58% of people check their mail inbox the first thing in the morning. And globally, a striking figure of 269 billion emails are sent per day!

Take it from us. Email is not going anywhere, not anytime soon. In fact, according to the experts at any digital marketing agency India, this is one of the best marketing tools in the contemporary digital ecosystem.

And we also cannot undermine the importance of prompt email response to build a superior brand impression. Wondering how? Stick to the end!

Email Response Time

You already know the importance of personalized email to draw attention. If you succeed to compel the recipients to check your mail instead of tagging it as spam, we appreciate your potential to curate a catchy content.

But this is not the end. The consequent activities will determine the strength of your overall business strategy.

If the recipients choose to respond, your response time may decide whether they will convert or not.

Remember, people want a reply, and they want it now.

According to a study, 11% of the people expect a response within 15 minutes, while 19% may wait up to one hour. So prepare yourself to meet this level of expectation.

Here’s a striking fact: the companies that respond to the inquiries within an hour have 60X higher chances to earn leads than those taking about 24 hours (source: Time to Reply)!  

So, What Does a Timely Reply Do Anyway?

Evokes a Sense of Reliability - Once you are sending email acknowledgements, you are letting people know that you are proactive, responsive, and trustworthy. This will also create a positive impression of your professionalism and reflect a higher level of dedication to your business.

Compels You to Act - If one person has faced an issue, others can face it too. Be it the slow loading speed or cluttered information on your website - a feedback mail from the end-user can help you identify the potential issues present on your site or app.

If you take an action immediately and fix the issue, it will only enhance the user experience on your portal.

Advances Your Business - If the sender shows interest in your products or services, don’t delay to provide the necessary information. It can produce a positive impact on your ROI (Return on Investment).

Now that you have understood the efficacy of a prompt email response, here are the two time-tested ways to accomplish that. Check these out.

How to Respond to Emails Quickly

1. Employ a Dedicated Team

We understand sometimes it becomes difficult to respond to all the emails at once. This can be a potential problem in large companies. That’s why you should invest in a dedicated team to coordinate with the leads.

Also, if you miss out a mail by mistake, don’t forget to apologize.

2. Use an Automated Tool

There are several Artificial Intelligence (AI) powered email auto-response tools that scan the incoming emails and send prompt and customized corresponding replies. Much like a drip campaign, you see!

Two such examples include GetResponse and RoboResponse. These are capable of engaging leads in an email discussion 24x7.

Here’s a quick tip: Sometimes, it may take you a while to solve the mail sender’s query or concern. In such a scenario, assure him or her with a quick and short reply that your team is on it and you will get back shortly.

This little gesture of acknowledgement can go a long way in generating trust about your business.

Conclusion

Customer Experience (CX) is a crucial factor in the contemporary digital age. In fact, 80% of the people are more likely to convert if the business meets their expectations.

And email response time has a major role to play in enhancing or reducing the CX.

So make sure to deliver a prompt reply and solve any user query. This will leave a positive impact on the psyche of your audience and help in the growth of your business.

Ultimate Checklist for Responsive Website Design

The buzz of responsive website design had already started some time back, but has reached its zenith this year.

The traditional way of designing a site for desktop and then making it work on mobile (or other) devices is simply not working anymore.

The bottom line is, and we cannot stress this enough, smart device-first is the ONLY way to go.

Wondering why? Because almost half of the web traffic is generated through a mobile platform (source: Search Engine Watch)!

Leveraging such a wide audience can produce a great impact on your business. But for that, you need to have a clear insight into making a responsive web design.

Of course, you can seek assistance from the experts at any website design company, nevertheless, you should do your homework first.

So, let’s start from the basics.

 

What is a Responsive Web Design - An Overview

Once upon a time, responsive web design used to suggest mobile-friendly websites only. But with the advancement of technology, the term received a greater connotation. Now, it indicates the sites that can be accessed on any smart device.

A smart device can be as small as a watch or as big as a TV. The responsive websites can easily adjust to the specifications of multiple smart devices and remain equally functional and appealing across any device platform.

So, businesses need to ensure their sites look presentable and navigable across various smart devices, browsers, and operating systems.

But the real problem is how would you understand whether your site is working across devices?

No worry! We got you covered. Here is the ultimate checklist for a responsive website.

1. Run a Thorough Visual Testing
The images and texts should be perfectly aligned. Ensure that the content doesn’t exceed the edges of the screen.

If some part of the content is less important, you may choose to keep it “out-of-sight” on small devices. However, make sure the important part of the content remains visible across all platforms.

2. Mind the Typography

The typography must be compatible with varied platforms. The content is the heart of a website and should be readable and presentable across devices.

3. Test the Site on Multiple Devices and Browsers

This is a crucial part. Before your site goes live, it’s important to check its availability across browsers and devices. It will give you a clear insight into how the users can access your site.

Enhancing the User-Experience (UX) is central to a business. If you find any technical glitch while operating the site, you need to fix the issue ASAP.

4. Assess Traffic Data
Avail mobile and web traffic data from Google Analytics. Here you will learn which mobile devices and browsers are mostly used by the visitors to access your site. Now check how your site looks on these devices and browsers.

5. Check the Loading Speed
Do you know that 47% of people won’t wait for a page to load for more than 3 seconds! So, optimize your site loading speed if you don’t want to increase the bounce rate.

Compress large resources to display them appropriately on smaller devices. However, ensure that the quality is not reduced. You may also boost the site’s performance by using cache data.

6. Ensure Smooth Navigation for the Site 

The navigation element must not overlap the edges of the screen. You may use the hamburger menu icon for hidden navigation. Such an intuitive interface can enables visitors to easily navigate through the website.


7. Examine Interactivity

Various control instruments like keyboard, stylus, mouse, and even fingertips are used while interacting with devices. Keep an eye on the accessibility and responsiveness of your site through these control means.

8. Review the Site Pop-ups

You should check whether the inline pop-ups and browser window pop-ups are responsive.

Now that you have learnt analyse your site’s responsiveness, let’s dig deeper.

In the next passage, we will explore the consistency in design assets. Your brand must maintain consistency in design across various media platforms. This is a crucial element in responsive web design.

Why?

Let’s explain it with an example. The moment you hear “Nike”, ”Apple”, or “Coca-Cola”; immediately you can visualize the logos of these brands, right? This is the power of memorable, strong, and consistent designs.

The design assets must look consistent across various platforms even after resizing or scaling. From icons to typography, colours to font - every aesthetic element of your site come under this category.

To avoid a negative brand impression, carefully test the following:

Fonts

Some fonts are likely to look uneven or clumsy when they are scaled up or down, or viewed on different browsers and devices.

For instance, Mac OS can properly set font-weight, whereas Windows cannot. Again, the fonts may appear to be somewhat slimmer on Safari as compared to Chrome.

So make sure to test fonts and evaluate them on the basis of the above-stated parameters.

Media Files and Colour

Make sure that different versions of an image are compatible with multiple browsers, viewport and device resolution.

You may use the Chrome Developer tools to check if the images can adversely affect the performance of the website. 

Also, identify if there are colour inconsistencies and fix them. For a better understanding, you may take a look at the importance of colour theory in website designs.

Code

Here’s a basic checklist to support you in the code-testing procedure:

-Check if several browsers support a particular JS, HTML, or CSS property.

-Look for any visual discrepancies after writing the codes. Pay proper attention to the following:

• Spacing - The elements or content must not run over each other.
• Alignment - Ensure that the dynamic elements are aligned properly.
• Layout - Check if the entire layout is compatible with various sizes of the viewport.
• Horizontal Scroll - Look for the long links that make horizontal scrolling mandatory on the small-sized screens. These may affect the readability and user experience. Also, test text legibility on different browsers and viewport.
• Adjustable Format - Make sure to adjust the site elements on the basis of the viewport size. Check if the elements can be easily made to hide, appear, or get re-sized.
• Responsive Image - The images should adequately fit within their allotted spaces. Optimize the CSS and JS images; compress or minimize them without affecting quality.

Note that several factors including the browser engine, display resolution, and GPU play a significant role in determining how the end-users perceive the site. So, if you are not much tech-savvy, it’s better to consult a reputed website development company.

Conclusion

Responsive web design needs to be updated regularly depending on the technological developments. Continue to test your site for responsiveness on various devices, browsers, and operating systems.

Remember, an eye-opening survey by Infront reveals that about 94% of people won’t rely on a website if it has poor design and accessibility!

So, put your best efforts to set the first impression. And for any little help, we are always there!