Optimized e-commerce website development is essential to reach a wider audience, build customer trust and ensure an increase in sales revenue.
The E-commerce industry has defied all odds since the emergence of COVID-19, with its global reach of retail sectors expanding to an approximate of 24 million websites.
In this fast-paced digital era, adapting to the constant swerves of the technological landscape is essential. The establishment of e-commerce websites has increased brand visibility, streamlining the generation of revenues up to US $1,318.7 billion in 2023 and an expected increase of US $2,088.2 billion by 2027, according to a study conducted by Statista.
Defining E-commerce: Understanding the Essence of Web Development
Given the steady growth of online sales, business owners and start-up entrepreneurs have come to acknowledge the need for their own e-commerce websites instead of third-party stores. E-commerce website development is the strategic approach of designing, coding and deploying an online store which facilitates the journey consumers take to purchase a product of their liking. As online shopping gets to the forefront and becomes the new norm, it’s crucial to capitalize on the prospect of increasing website traffic and potentially climbing the conversion ladder to amplify revenue.
From Concept to Creation: How to Develop an E-commerce Website
With the amount of information available online merely through a few clicks, it is often more overwhelming than it appears. To make things easier, we have sorted out the common pain points encountered in the development process of an e-commerce website: from initial thoughts to consider to the deployment of the final product.
- Plan ahead
Determine brand strategies tailored specifically to your enterprise before initiating the designing processes. In this stage, a company’s target audience and the industry they intend to explore are established. Having a clear vision will help ensure your website reaches the aimed audience and captures their interest. One way to facilitate this hassle-free is to narrow down the following:
- Your target sector: Business-to-Business (B2B) or Business-to-Customers (B2C)?
- Consumer expectations: Defining prerequisites is an indispensable part of developing e-commerce websites as it facilitates the extensive road to consumer satisfaction. The goal is not to perfect the appearance of your website, rather it is to make it uncomplicated to navigate.
- Market research: Taking into account the ever-shifting e-commerce market landscape by gathering significant data on consumer demographics, determining potential growth trends, and monitoring competitors’ marketing strategies to uniquely differentiate your product listings.
- opting for a platform
In the era of digital solutions, building a website from scratch is no longer a daunting task. The existence of several website creation software has streamlined the design and development stages in terms of cost optimization, customization, time efficiency, and scalability. The key to developing a good website depends almost entirely on condensing the intended goals in pursuit of an ideal web development platform.
Platforms like Adobe e-commerce (formally Magento), Shopify, Squarespace, GoDaddy and Wix are known for their popularity through consumer preference. Apart from this, business owners are often inclined to pursue the traditional route to building a website, relying heavily on code. Open-source platforms and SaaS solutions grant access to a complete codebase, allowing consumers to build their e-commerce website with no limits on customization features. Mainstream open-source software includes WooCommerce, OpenCart, WordPress, and PrestaShop.
- website design
Optimized website layouts can make or break a design. First impressions mean everything when it comes down to leaving a lasting impact on consumers. A study conducted on user experience (UX) reveals that 75% of judgements made on credibility could be swayed through a refined user interface (UI). As online shopping grows in demand, it is inevitable for users to expect a smooth transition from viewing products, adding it to cart to eventually proceeding unto payment gateways. A cluttered structure with the absence of responsiveness, complicated navigation, unorganized search features and excessive ads will most likely discourage the consumers from choosing your E-commerce web store. Ensure correct placement of pages and content within the website and avoid adding broken links.
- Homepage with current best-selling product listings.
- Categorized section for detailed pricing descriptions and CTA options.
- Checkout page and Shipping policies with secured protocols and clear terms & conditions.
- Customer reviews with videos or photos to establish store credibility.
- Contact and FAQs addressing frequent inquiries.
- Code
Now, onto the most exciting and fulfilling part of the development process! Coding fascinates both tech enthusiasts and non-tech individuals alike. With the appropriate mastery of tools, it opens ways to sophisticated designs and functionalities that were otherwise illustrated as impossible. Much like user interface (UI) development, there are plenty of ways to code a website from scratch.
For entrepreneurs leaning towards the conventional approach, they may either hire contracted full-stack developers for the duration of development and consistent maintenance or allocate a team of full-time IT software engineers. Web developers work with a codebase predominantly consisting of HTML (Hypertext Markup Language), CSS (Cascading style sheets) and JavaScript forfront-end development. Without either of these languages, a website’s end interface would not be completely optimized. HTML and CSS are utilized to create the structure and design of a webpage, wherein JavaScript adds the functionalities.
- TESTING AND LAUNCH
Toward the final stages of developing an E-commerce website, it is imperative to validate the inner dynamics and operations of the webpage, widely referred to as quality assurance (QA) testing in technical terms. QA testing encompasses various levels of tasks ranging from functionality assessment of product listings, descriptions, and user account management, browser compatibility, speed testing (page loading time), verification of responsive adaptation across multiple devices, resolving security vulnerabilities to protect sensitive information against cyber threats and extensive review on the relevancy and credibility of content. Once the testing results are satisfactory, all that’s left for a successful launch is a marketing plan to oversee uninterrupted workflow. We’ve put together the following checklist:
- Create exclusive pages across different social media platforms to draw attention and potential traffic to your website before its launch.
- Invest in promotional content and provide premium offers to the first category of subscribers/followers. This would help build a stable network of your target audience.
- Create a landing page ahead of website launch to generate leads.
- Prepare to host a virtual/on-site event on opening day with exciting 24-hour sales.
- Collaborate with industry-leading influencers through PR opportunities.
E-commerce Best Practices: Essential Functionalities
SEO
Implementing SEO strategically can drive mass traffic to your website in a cost-effective manner. Ranking highly in Google’s search results will drastically improve website credibility, in turn, boosting sales.
- Perform a keyword research before enlisting products on your E-commerce store to identify the search intent (Navigational, informational, commercial, and transactional) of consumers and tailor inventory accordingly.
- Add meta descriptions to stand out from the services of other web stores. Make sure to keep it concise as Google curbs its display limit to 160 characters including white space.
- Incorporate target keywords in your page URLs (Uniform Resource Locator) for easy navigation. Declutter it from irrelevant symbols or special characters to keep it as original and descriptive as possible.
- With high-quality product images, ensure adding relevant keywords and alt text as various search engine crawler algorithms leverage descriptive text to enhance user experience.
Content Management System (CMS)
Think of a CMS like that of a database holding records of multiple different data allowing for efficient storage and regular updation without any hassle. Content management systems are a clever alternative to coding a full-stack website from square one, especially if you are on a time constraint and wish to build an e-commerce website without dwelling on bugs and technicalities. Content delivery application (CDA) and Content management application (CMA) are the two main components of a CMS, seamlessly handling back-end operations such as plugins, approvals, database queries, user analytics, and API integration. CMS is a user-friendly interactive devolvement environment providing users with drag-and-drop features to alleviate the necessity of coding in HTML, CSS and JavaScript.
Responsive Design
Nothing says “Website down” faster than an unresponsive layout. 49% of online shoppers prefer to browse product listings before their purchase on their smartphones and it is projected to significantly escalate with e-commerce sales exceeding $710 billion by 2025. To reach a wider audience, it is important to acknowledge that the highest amount of website traffic is generated through mobile phones with a current statistic of 58.22%.
- Take into consideration the different screen resolutions for a better adapted website structure. Some of the most common smart phone resolutions are: iPhone 14 Pro (393 x 852), Android phones: 360 x 800, 414 x 896, 412 x 915, and 384 x 854.
- Align your e-commerce platform consistently with device page speed.
- Make sure to test the responsiveness of your website prior to launch.
Are you looking for ways to implement responsive website design? Cogent’s here to assist you!
Concluding Insights
Embarking on the journey of starting a business is not as easy as it may appear. As we come to a close on the discussions revolving around e-commerce website development, we can confidently acknowledge that commanding attention through great website design requires a combination of a user-centric approach, creativity, and a relentless foresight to customer satisfaction. Cogent IBS provides a comprehensive range of professional services comprising cutting-edge domains like Application development, Artificial Intelligence, Performance Testing, Product engineering and IT staffing. Cogent is committed to delivering optimized solutions through AI and maintaining a robust IT workforce with tailored approaches to its clients.