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How to Build an eCommerce Website? Step-by-step Guide

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26th Sep, 2023
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    How to Build an eCommerce Website? Step-by-step Guide

    Before proceeding to the step-by-step procedure to build an Ecommerce Website, let us understand what E-commerce is. Ecommerce is referred to as electronic commerce or internet commerce. Here, companies or individuals buy and sell their goods or services using the internet by transferring money and data to execute these transactions.

    A few years ago, creating an E-commerce Website would require finding an application development company or an agency that helps with digitalization or recruiting a set of developers who develop e-commerce websites. Today anyone can ideate and build their own full-fledged Ecommerce Websites. If you are planning to step into the era of Ecommerce and make a small impact on ever-growing growth, this is the best time. This article will guide you on how one can build an Ecommerce Website and the useful tools and technologies which are needed to build an Ecommerce Website.

    Why Create an Ecommerce Website?

    If you are planning for an easy and manifest way of increasing your revenue, e-commerce is the way to go. Small vendors are facing a new truth, i.e., the world itself has moved online. Consumers are always on their mobile phones.

    Starting an ecommerce business exposes a lot of opportunities and flexibility as it will not require physical locations or actual stores. As launching a store online is way easier and more affordable. Also, partnering with other service providers will make online businesses sell globally by attracting a  huge customer base.

    Below are a few points that say why an ecommerce website can instantly grow one's business and increase revenue. 

    1. Online websites attract all types of customers with search. 
    2. We can earn money online. 
    3. Convenience to customers, as it avoids running to stores. 
    4. Speedup's business operations 
    5. Increases brand recognition. 
    6. Less financial risks 
    7. Give a variety of available options to customers. 

    So, having an ecommerce website of your own is an important part of growing your business and strategies. It is a great way of building and adding popularity to your brand. With the plethora of available best full-stack developer courses, you can equip yourself with the necessary skills to create and maintain an outstanding ecommerce website that reflects your brand identity and drives success. 

    How to Build an Ecommerce Website Step-by-Step

    Creating an ecommerce website might be simpler than we imagine. There are plenty of ecommerce websites that do most of our work, but still, there is a need to know what the prerequisites the website requires. Research on the topic or the content with respect to the subject of your website helps to add business growth tremendously within a few years. Here are a few steps that one can follow.  

    1. Choose the perfect ecommerce platform. 
    2. Purchase a domain name for your website. 
    3. Build a research and development team or an individual contributor 
    4. Select a suitable theme 
    5. Choose and customize the template. 
    6. Add your products. 
    7. Set up payment gateway options. 
    8. Add the filters to sort based on the shipping 
    9. Do a test, preview and validate all cases. 
    10. Publish your online store.  

    You can also take a Certification for Full Stack Developer and learn how to develop an ecommerce website on your own. Now let us go through the entire process step by step.

    1. Find Your Perfect Ecommerce Platform or Web Technology

    The first step in building an ecommerce website is finding the perfect ecommerce website builder. It is important to have the best ecommerce website builder or contributor, or development team who can meet the strategies and needs of your brand and product. 

    Below are the types of available ecommerce platforms. 

    • Open source 
    • SaaS 
    • Headless commerce 

    Open source 

    As the name says, open-source application codes are available freely and can be used by everyone to use. It is free to customize and install. Also, using an open-source application requires an advanced coding knowledge to customize and build.

    SaaS 

    SaaS stands for – Software-as-a-Service. It provides subscription services. The SaaS systems are easy to handle with good security, scalable and robust to use. As the SaaS applications are designed mainly for ecommerce, they handle the payment process, checkout process and other logistic processes also to create a website to sell products free.

    The main cause with SaaS products is - pricing strategies, as it adds transaction fees and monthly subscription fees and it also adds plugin expenses. Also, SaaS, for some of the services, provides branding limits as it adds a watermark of the brand at the bottom of the screen. So, it leads to promoting your brand with the other brand given at the bottom of each screen. The premium service of SaaS gives more flexibility and provides a great look that can reflect the brand.

    Headless Commerce 

    In headless commerce, it keeps the ecommerce sites like display pages, shopping cart, and view pages separate. That is nothing but using CMS – Content Management Systems, DXP – Digital Experience Platform, PWC – Progressive Web App and many more technologies on the frontend view and other technologies can go with the backend.

    Headless commerce enables plenty of creative control over a website. It enables us to identify customer-facing changes more quickly. Headless commerce lets companies get into the market faster, with less total cost.

    2. Purchase a Domain Name

    Courtest - triggergrowth.com

    Domain names play an important role in building an ecommerce website. It gives instant credibility and puts you in the online marketplace.

    While providing a domain name, try to avoid creative spellings, the domain names should be easy to read and remember. Also, avoid hyphens and numbers because it makes it difficult for people to search and remember. Avoid common names which already exist as it may confuse people while looking for your website.

    Aim to keep your domain name between 6 to 14 characters. It will be easier to remember and are straightforward with perfect intentions.

    3. Get all the paperwork you need for a legitimate business

    A non-disclosure agreement is the first piece of paperwork that you need to reach out to when you are dealing with any clients or with investors. These documents of startup business help to ensure the privacy of the company, also about the third-party vendors. NDA papers are not just limited to customers but are also a set of assets to keep the bond with the customers or the employers. 

    4. Find a Developer

    A developer or an application builder can make the process of making an ecommerce website simpler. They will have a technical idea of how to set up an ecommerce website and build an ecommerce website from scratch. 

    When choosing the developer, know their timelines for building the application pages and APIs and adding images and building each module at a time and about the launch date for the completed applications. Also, make sure your budget and what you are looking for can be provided by the developer beforehand, covering the ideas. If you are willing to do it yourself, refer to Java Full Stack Developer Learning Path. You can build ecommerce websites with Laravel, WordPress, NodeJS etc. and you can get a hands-on learning experience of these with our Online Web Development Course

    5. Pick Your Templates: Find a Theme that Matches Your Ecommerce Website Vision
    Source - kwokdesign.com

    Themes and templates are readily built pages that can be customized to suit your brand and make your website look good without any design and coding skills. Few points to keep in mind are -

    • Application Navigation bar

    Easy navigation is required to get the customer excellence. If a customer is not able to find what they are looking for they can navigate to the home page or any other pages via navigation bar.

    • Homepage design

    Design of homepage and the color combination, font and the images should align to give an immersive UX. It is good to include the on-demand products on the home page, review sections, frequently purchased things etc. It is recommended to include your social handles to connect with your customers with ease.

    6. Add Your Products

    Product pages are the most critical pages on the websites. It displays what you are selling on your website. Before adding any products, make sure about the quantity, quality, their availability and its requirements. 

    • Description of the product

    Product description is an essential part of the product page as it helps customer to know about the product they want to purchase. It should describe the usefulness, colors, textures, what it is made of, brand of the products and everything which is related to products. 

    • Images of Products

    The product images should be clear and high quality with good resolution images should be added. And it should be added in an attractive manner. Also make sure all images are of the same size. Add image slider to get into the next images of the same products. 

    7. Set up Payment, Tax, and Marketing Tools

    The proper payment method is where trust is created with the customer. If the payment method is non trusted or complicated customer can remove their products in cart and might not like check the website again to purchase any products. Make sure you have a secure website. 

    The most used of payment gateways are: 

    • Redirects 

    Redirects makes the customer to redirect to the third-party payment applications like PayPal all over the world, UPI payments in India. So, it will redirect to that payment applications and once the payment is done, it redirects to actual website. You can also choose options like single click checkout to ease the checkout process.

    • Onsite Payments 

    Onsite payments happen within the applications. It gives complete control to the customer and the responsibility to complete the payment. It is mainly used in large scale applications where huge sets of payment transactions will happen.

    8. Sort out Your Shipping Settings

    Shipping is another critical component in ecommerce websites. Customers want their products promptly, so choose the proper shipping settings. Make sure about the shipping policy, The shipping policy should include the fees and all details of shipping like shipping charge, if no shipping, free shipping details and so on. Check out the solutions for ecommerce shipping, where some of the software works seamlessly on the shipping page, so you can take care of only other pages of the application.

    9. Preview and Publish Your Online Store

    Before publishing and launching the website, make sure all the functionality, links, redirections are working properly on the website. If any of the links are broken, it takes away the trust and confidence of the customer who uses the website, also it again consumes more time and releases with new version after the fix.

    1. Make sure the product images are loading properly 
    2. Does all Homepage include all introduction contents? 
    3. Double-check the payment methods and their transactions 
    4. Do a proper check with shipping details  
    5. Make sure the website is responsive, supports all types of mobiles, desktops, and laptops.

    Also, you can learn and implement these things by involving yourself in KnowledgeHut Certification for Full Stack Developer courses, which guide you to understand each concept in detail.

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    Ecommerce Selling Statistics

    As ecommerce is growing tremendously every day, it offers more unique ideas and inventions to connect with their target audience. A well build application can benefit from providing continent shopping options. Sales in online stores and their applications are targeted to reach up to 22% of global retail sales by the end of 2023 compared to previous years from 2019.

    Image courtesy - BigCommerce

    Conclusion

    A good ecommerce website is more than selling and buying products online. It provides the brand names, increases marketing growth, brand strategies, popularity and many more. So, choosing the most suitable ecommerce platform and knowing about the marketing strategy gives a successful online Ecommerce Website.

    Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

    1Can I build an ecommerce website on my own?

    Yes, one can build an ecommerce website on their own, but one should have the knowledge of handling the scenarios. Knowledge of technologies like building e-commerce websites using node JS etc. Also, one should have the basic idea of each page, like the shipping page, payment page, cart page and many more.

    2How much does it cost to make an ecommerce website?

    On average, the cost of making an ecommerce website will be around INR 40,000 – 50,000. This cost can vary as per the business requirements and ideas.

    3Which is the best platform to build an ecommerce website?

    Some of the most suggested best ecommerce websites are 

    • Shopify for setting up and selling quickly 
    • Square for selling in person and online. 
    • Ecwid for starting with free plan 
    • Biocommerce for large-scale applications 
    4What are the 3 types of e-commerce?

    There are three major types of e-commerce. They are: 

    • Business to Business – B2B  

    Ex: Shopify, GoDigital 

    • Business to Consumer – B2C 

    Ex: Websites such as Amazon, Flip cart, Myntra  

    • Consumer to Consumer – C2C 

    Ex: eBay, Meesho, OLX

    Profile

    Anusha SP

    Author

    Senior Software Engineer, with good hands-on experience and knowledge on Tech stacks and Project Management. I’m a technical blogger and content writer. Like to involve myself in learning and upgrading myself in the activities where I can contribute.

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