Lisa SimsBuilding Your Online Store With WordPress and WooCommercehttps://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4842-3846-2_2

2. Planning Your E-commerce Strategy

Lisa Sims¹

(1)

Conyers, GA, USA

In the previous chapter, you gained a better understanding of e-commerce and its impact on local and global economies as well as local businesses. E-commerce retailers such as Amazon.com, eBay, and Walmart.com have dominated the virtual marketspace and changed how consumers shop and how enterprises conduct business. You also learned more about its history than you probably wanted to know, but it helped you understand the foundation upon which the e-commerce that we know today is based. After reviewing its history and its current state, there is no denying that advances in technology have brought us to a place many never thought was possible. By now, you probably have already determined that you need to add e-commerce to your business, but you still might be unclear as to how to do that. Where should you begin?

Why Create an E-commerce Strategy?

The appeal of e-commerce’s low startup costs, ease of entry, and potential profits can make anyone want to immediately launch a web page with some PayPal “Buy” buttons on it and begin selling products and services online. Although this approach might yield some short-term sales, it might not be as successful in the long term. Why? It wasn’t based on a solid foundation that was well thought out and will eventually fail. Does the saying, “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail” ring a bell?

When deciding to implement an e-commerce strategy, planning is crucial (Figure 2-1). It allows you to take an eagle-eye view of your company and its products and services to determine the best way to present and sell them to your target audience. It also helps determine whether your products or services would be a good fit to sell online. Even though technology gives us the ability to create online stores to sell anything to anyone doesn’t necessarily mean that we should. Some things don’t sell well online. As a result, money and time are wasted trying to entice people to buy things that don’t interest them when it could have been better used elsewhere.

So, what makes a good plan? Before the days of global positioning systems (GPS) in cars and on mobile devices, we used good old-fashioned maps or an atlas to help guide us to our destinations. We’d unfold it, spread it out, and chart our course by identifying our starting as well as ending location. As we drove along, we would review the map to verify that we were traveling in the right direction before we veered too far off course. If we found ourselves lost, we would either pull over and look at the map again or ask for directions (depending on your sex). Once we were back on track, we felt confident and assured that we would reach our destination.

The same way that you would use a map or GPS for a trip, your e-commerce strategy would be your map. It will guide you to your end goal so that you can be successful. Along the way, you might venture off course, but you can always review your strategy and make the necessary corrections to get back on track. The good thing about your approach is that it not only meets your current needs, but it also anticipates and grows with your future needs. This is called scalability. According to Techopedia.com, scalability is “an attribute that describes the ability of a process, network, software or organization to grow and manage increased demand.” For instance, you might only have physical products to sell right now, but what if you want to sell digital products? Did you plan for this? Could your e-commerce solution handle this? These are the types of things that your strategy can help you identify so that you can acquire the necessary resources. A good strategy or plan is never complete. It is always a work in progress that must continuously be reviewed and updated.

../images/465965_1_En_2_Chapter/465965_1_En_2_Fig1_HTML.jpg — Figure 2-1
E-commerce Planning Stages

Planning your e-commerce strategy also helps your business adapt to changing market conditions so that you can stay competitive. Within the e-commerce marketspace, competition is fierce and continuously evolving. Many brick and mortar businesses are steadily transitioning themselves into click and brick stores. Click and brick stores have physical store locations but also offer customers the ability to shop online and have items either shipped to their homes or picked up at a store location. Trends change so rapidly that you must stay well-informed of what is going on in the market to compete for and hold on to your market share. Otherwise, you and your business could get left behind without a chance to recover. Before you know it, you could be forced out of business and left wondering what happened.

Creating Your E-commerce Strategy

Before you begin creating your e-commerce strategy, you need first to ask yourself one vital question: Why do you want to sell items online? In other words, what’s your purpose for creating an online store? You might be wondering why you should ask yourself this question, but depending on your answer, it could save you some time and money and help predetermine your business’s e-commerce success or failure.

E-commerce is not for the faint of heart. To be successful, it will involve a lot of research along with hard work. We look at success stories such as Amazon.com and think that we can do it too. There is nothing wrong with having that positive vision, but we must realize that everyone wants to become the next Amazon. Just like Amazon didn’t become a success overnight, neither will you. Competition in the e-commerce marketspace is fierce. Success comes at a cost. You will pay your dues through trial and error, sweat, and tears until you perfect your strategy. Even though today’s e-commerce solutions such as Shopify and PayPal make it easier than ever to set up online stores, that’s only one piece of the puzzle. It will still take time to see success.

Many businesses want to sell products or services online but haven’t thoroughly planned their strategy. This is like building a house without a blueprint. Who does that? Even though you might make a home, you don’t know if it was built correctly or how long it will remain standing. The same principle applies to creating an online store. By understanding your purpose for starting an online store, it will keep you focused on your end goal and not just profits. Not to say that gains are not essential, but to keep them consistently flowing, you must be diligent.

SWOT Analysis

Your next step will involve taking a high-level, objective look at your business and its internal and external processes. By doing this, you will be able to discover the feasibility of e-commerce for your business. Just because you can create an online store does not always mean that it is in your best interest to do so. An excellent tool to help determine this is a SWOT Analysis. A SWOT Analysis is a study undertaken by an organization to identify its internal strengths and weaknesses as well as its external opportunities and threats. For instance, if you are a brick and mortar or click and mortar store, e-commerce will more than likely be an additional sales channel for your business, which can represent an opportunity. On the other hand, if you will be conducting all your e-commerce online, you will be considered a pure-play organization that can represent many strengths such as low overhead costs. Regardless of your business’s type, it is crucial that you learn about your business through your SWOT Analysis so that you can plan your strategy around it (Figure 2-2). If you search for SWOT Analysis in Microsoft Word, you will find a free PowerPoint and Microsoft Excel template. You can also Google to find many free step-by-step articles and tutorials.

../images/465965_1_En_2_Chapter/465965_1_En_2_Fig2_HTML.jpg — Figure 2-2
SWOT Analysis can help plan your e-commerce strategy

Goal Setting

How will you know if your online store is a success or not? If you are like most people, you will probably say, “by looking at the volume of sales.” Although this is important, it is not the only measure of success. In addition to having an end goal, you will want to create some other goals to help evaluate your progress and success. We’ve all heard the saying, “A goal without a plan is just a dream,” and to have a positive return on investment (ROI), you need to establish some goals. As with any goals, they need to be SMART:

Specific
Measurable
Attainable
Relevant
Timely

These criteria will help you evaluate whether your goals are realistic or whether they need to be revised. Once you have created your goals, you must review them periodically to make sure that you are still on track.

Budget

Wouldn’t it be great if you didn’t have to worry about money? Absolutely! Unfortunately, being an entrepreneur or small business owners means that you must watch every dollar and use it wisely. One way to do this is by creating a budget.

Establishing a budget is another critical component of your online store. We’ve all heard that it takes money to make money, but until you can get it flowing into your business on a consistent basis, you will want to create and stick to a budget. Although we will be using WordPress as our e-commerce solution, which is open source software and free, there are still other expenses that you might not be aware of that you will need to budget for such as:

Web Hosting
Domain Name
SSL Certificate
E-commerce Theme
E-commerce Plugins
Marketing tools and materials
Search engine optimization
Merchant account and fees
Credit card fees
Employee costs
Warehouse space (if applicable)
Analytics software to track visitors and their movements on your store

Of course, there will be more, but these are just a few to get you started. By being aware of them ahead of time, they won’t come as such a surprise when they occur. You will already be mentally and financially prepared. Throughout the book, we will discuss many of these budget items in detail.

Inventory

An online store is only as good as the items that it sells and who knows your catalog better than you. You probably already have a pretty good idea of the things that you want to sell. Typically, they will fall into one or all of these categories:

Physical products
Services
Digital media

Offering physical products allow consumers to see images of the item before making a purchase. They also require shipping. From a business standpoint, you must determine which shipping methods will be used, along with the cost. You also must decide where you will store the products until they are purchased. If you operate a brick and mortar or click and mortar store, you already have inventory storage available. However, if you are a pure-play retailer, you will have to find a room, which could involve additional costs. With services, you don’t have to worry about storing or shipping anything. Services are intangible, so the only thing that needs to be provided is the service.

Since mobile technology has made the shift to digital media products and services more accessible to retrieve and receive, you should determine whether your product offerings will consist of digital products, physical products, or a combination of the two. Based on your knowledge of your customer base, you should be able to decide.

Timeline/Project Schedule

In the IT field, whenever you ask someone, “What’s the deadline for this project?,” the answer was always “yesterday.” When it comes to launching your online store, you might feel the same way. However, if you want to make sure it is done the first time correctly, you will need a project plan or schedule. Otherwise, you can end up spending more time and money than you originally anticipated.

Most people think of Microsoft Project when they hear the words “project plan.” Although it is a useful project management tool with many advanced features and capabilities to use to plan your project, it is typically used in larger companies for larger projects. Occasionally, it can be overkill for smaller projects, especially if you don’t know how to use it correctly. Not to mention that there is also a learning curve that goes along with it that you don’t need while creating your online store. You need a simple way to record all the necessary tasks, their estimated duration and along with their start and end dates, and the person assigned to them. Depending on the size of your business, the person designated could be solely you or other people, but at least you will know. Some free and low-cost tools for creating your project schedule include:

Microsoft Excel
Libre Office Calc
Google Sheets of GSuite
Zoho.com
Trello
Basecamp
Asana

Other online project management software can be found by Googling. Likewise, mobile apps can be found in Apple’s App Store or Google’s Play Store. It doesn’t matter what application you use if you are comfortable with using it.

Once you have all your project tasks recorded, you will be able to determine a projected completion date for your online store. This date is not set in stone but gives you an idea of your potential time frame. Your project plan now becomes your road map and will guide you to the finish line. This plan must be reviewed and updated periodically to reflect your project’s progress accurately. Otherwise, it is an ineffective tool.

Things to Consider

During the planning phase, it is not uncommon for some requirements to get overlooked. These oversights can make a big difference and could negatively affect your bottom line. If you are not careful, they could even cost you extra money, which could affect your budget. Here are some items for you to consider as you think about your online store.

Online Store Planning Checklist

Have you purchased a domain name?
How much have you budgeted for web hosting?
What payment gateway will you use?
Will you need to acquire an e-commerce theme for your store?
Is your e-commerce theme responsive or mobile ready?
Will you need an online merchant account?

Target Audience

Who is your target audience ?
How will you attract your target audience?

Product/Service Selection

Will you offer digital or physical products or both?
How many products or services will you start with?
How often will you update product or service offerings?

Customer Service

How will you handle customer service issues?
What will be your refund policy?
What will be your privacy policy?

Marketing

How will you market your online store?
What techniques will you use for customer retention?

These are not all the questions you will ask, but at least these will get you started. In the next chapter, we will take a look at WordPress and how it can help you start to build your e-commerce strategy and solution.

Summary

Planning is the cornerstone for any effective and successful e-commerce strategy. No one builds a house without a blueprint, and no one should build an online store without a plan. Nothing good ever comes from haphazardly creating an e-commerce strategy. Short-term results might be achieved, but for long-term results, a solid plan is a must. Other planning components that should be considered include: