Referring to an ecommerce checklist is a must to limit the overwhelm that comes with running or launching an ecommerce store. There’s a lot you need to consider. If you are just starting out, it’s easy to get swept up in the excitement and overlook critical aspects, but an ecommerce checklist can come in handy.
While good-quality products are essential, an equally impressive website is needed to showcase them. Multiple factors, such as highlighting the product, user-friendly navigation, and responsive design, play significant roles in driving sales.
Thus, having a comprehensive ecommerce checklist ensures you get all the essential details. It helps you stay organized and focused, streamlining the launch process.
In this article, we’ll walk you through 15 steps for launching and managing your online store effectively. These steps can set you up for long-term success and reduce the hassle.
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One of the first steps in creating a successful ecommerce store is having a custom domain.
This serves as the foundation of your online identity. A unique and memorable domain name makes it easier for prospects to remember your site, strengthening your brand.
It’s also important to conduct a domain search to check if the name is available. Domain availability tools like Namecheap, GoDaddy, and Domain.com can help with this search.
Once you confirm your domain’s availability, you can go ahead and purchase it. You can do this either from a third-party domain provider or directly on your chosen ecommerce platforms, such as BigCommerce or Shopify.
These, on the other hand, are considered bad custom domains:
fastfoodrestaurantnearme.com
discountgadgetscheap.com
best-clothes-for-you.com
myonlinestore.com
123electronics.com
Clearly, the first set of domain names is short and simple, making them easy to remember.
2. Choose your web host
To make your website available online, you need to choose the right platform to host your store.
A reliable web host will ensure that your site has minimum downtime, is secure, and is easily accessible. This can help maintain a positive user experience.
There are multiple web host providers you can consider and the popular ones include Shopify, WooCommerce, Magento, Wix, BigCommerce, and Hostinger.
Here is Hostinger’s dashboard showing the necessary aspects of an ecommerce website:
To pick the right host for your ecommerce website, consider the following criteria:
Customer support: Choose a host that offers 24/7 customer support
Scalability: Opt for a platform that can grow with your business
User-friendly interface: Choose a host provider that makes it easy to set up and manage your business
3. Secure your website
One of the most important points for an ecommerce checklist is the security. For every website, it is paramount to protect your customers’ sensitive data. It can also keep your website safe from spam bots and fake signups and help build trust with your customer base.
Here are the key steps to ensure that your website is secure:
Implement a Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate: It encrypts data transmitted between your website and your customers, reducing the chances of a security breach
Conduct regular updates: Ensure that your website’s software, including its themes, plugins, and content management system (CMS), is up-to-date so that you have the latest security measures in place
Leverage security plugins: These plugins include firewall protection, malware scanning, and login security that can help prevent unauthorized access and other malicious activities
4. Integrate a content management system (CMS)
When launching your online store, consider adding a CMS to your ecommerce site. It’s a tool for creating, editing, and publishing content on your website.
CMS can simplify your content creation and management process, boost your site’s visibility, and seamlessly integrate with other marketing tools.
Some of the popular CMS options are:
Shopify
Magento
WordPress + WooCommerce
The image below shows a product page for WooCommerce with product data, add-ons, and other categories like inventory, shipping, and linked products:
A secure payment gateway is a necessity for every ecommerce site. You should carefully check the transaction fee of the platform, security, and ease of use before integrating any payment solution into your store. This will ensure that your customers can smoothly and quickly complete their purchase.
Setting up the right ecommerce payment processing solutions begins with choosing the right services to handle customer payments. Some widely used payment options include:
PayPal
Stripe
Square
Apple Pay
Google Pay
Once the payment is confirmed, don’t forget to send out automated order confirmation emails. These emails serve as a receipt for your customer, assuring them that their payment has been successfully processed.
6. Draft terms of service
An ecommerce checklist is incomplete without terms of service. They outline the rules and guidelines that govern the use of your online store and can help protect your business legally.
Well-drafted terms of service provide transparency to your customers regarding their rights and responsibilities, making them confident to purchase from you.
The terms of service should include:
A clear description of your products or services
User responsibilities
Detailed pricing and payment methods accepted
Refund and return policies
Circumstances that may lead to the termination of a user’s account
Multiple tools can help you generate basic terms of service for your ecommerce store. The common ones include:
Termly
TermsFeed
Enzuzo
Shopify
GetTerms
While these terms of service generator tools can be helpful, it’s essential to consult a lawyer to establish strengthened rules. A legal expert will help keep your business legally sound and protect its interests.
7. Develop a privacy policy
Another legal document for ecommerce checklists is a privacy policy. It informs users how their personal information is collected, used, and protected.
In fact, companies are required to be GDPR and CCPA-compliant to avoid any legal implications.
To ensure transparency, you need to create a privacy policy that clearly outlines:
The type of data collected on your site
The purpose of collecting the data
How the data is stored and protected
Users’ rights regarding their data
There are several privacy policy generation tools with customizable templates to help you create a privacy policy suitable for your website. For example, you can use Lubenda, PrivacyPolicies, GetTerms, or Termly. Termly’s homepage clearly states how Termly is an all-in-one compliance solution for small businesses:
A complete ecommerce checklist also includes a thoroughly written return policy. This describes the rules that the customers need to know about when returning the products.
Having a return policy can help reduce uncertainty, making customers feel more secure about purchasing from your site.
When drafting the return policy, these are some important elements you need to include:
Return conditions: Specify the state in which items must be returned
Refund methods: Explain how refunds will be processed
Time frames: Clearly state the window within which returns can be made
To further improve customer trust and convenience, consider adding a summary of your return policy in your order confirmation emails. This will let the customers know about all the important details right after they’ve placed an order.
9. Streamline the checkout experience
Most cart abandonment incidents happen on the checkout page. You’ll want to review this page carefully. Make it as user-friendly as possible.
Simplifying forms: Only ask for essential information, such as the names, shipping address, email address, and payment details
Providing multiple payment options: This will help cater to the diverse preferences of your customers
Ensuring mobile compatibility: Verify that your site is mobile responsive and the checkout forms are easy to navigate on small screens
A streamlined checkout process will help reduce cart abandonment and ensure a smooth shopping experience for your customers.
You can further reduce cart abandonment by sending well-crafted abandoned cart emails. They serve as timely reminders and can greatly increase your chances of recovering lost sales and persuading customers to finalize their transactions.
Omnisend offers email automation for cart abandonment. If a user doesn’t buy items in their cart, Omnisend will send an automated email reminding them that they haven’t completed their purchase.
Enhance your checkout process with automated abandoned cart emails from Omnisend
This is another crucial element that should be included in your ecommerce launch checklist.
Certain pages are essential in informing your customers that you’re running a legitimate website. They can refer to these pages whenever they want to reach out to you.
Don’t forget to add other important pages like the shipping and return policy page, checkout page, and landing page.
Omnisend makes it super easy to create a detailed landing page with a lead capture form to help you capture leads and provide information on products you want to market. This will grow your subscriber list and keep prospects engaged.
11. Optimize for search engines (SEO)
Keep SEO in mind when you design your ecommerce store and write content. This helps your online store attract and retain organic traffic, improve visibility, and increase sales.
Here are the top SEO practices you can implement for your website:
Building high-quality backlinks from reputable websites
Incorporating relevant keywords into your content
Creating informative and relevant content that aligns with user intent
Linking to high-priority pages like category pages and product pages
12. Implement analytics tools
Tracking and analyzing website data is key to the success of any ecommerce business. These tools provide valuable insights into your visitors and customers. That’s why setting up an analytics tool is an important part of an ecommerce website checklist.
The analytics show you how people interact with your site, what products they are interested in, and where they face challenges.
With these insights, you can make the required changes to your business as it scales.
With these tools, you can monitor key metrics like conversion rates, cart abandonment rates, traffic sources, and average order value (AOV).
Here’s an image of the Google Analytics dashboard. It shows the number of users that visited your site. It also shows their activities, total number of sessions, bounce rate, and session duration:
Emails are an effective way of sending offers, additional information, and providing customer support. Thus, setting up email notifications with triggers plays a key role in keeping your customers updated about their journey and product on top of their minds.
You can set up emails as per your business needs, but here are some of the most common ones:
Order confirmation emails
Shipping updates emails
Welcome emails
To increase your email open rates, keep the following tips in mind:
Personalize email content
Keep the message clear and to the point
Ensure all your emails reflect your brand’s style, colors, and tone
Omnisend provides multiple pre-built automated emails, including welcome emails, holiday greetings, order confirmation emails, and more.
Experience seamless email marketing with Omnisend’s powerful automation features
The secret to a successful ecommerce store doesn’t only lie in having quality products and a great website design. You need a marketing plan that’ll put your products out there and convince prospects to buy.
A marketing strategy is a crucial item in the ecommerce checklist. Let’s take a look at the common marketing channels we can use.
Marketing channels to consider
Your marketing strategy can include a wide range of marketing channels like:
Email marketing
This type of marketing is considered one of the most effective for nurturing customer relationships and driving sales. Personalized newsletters, email campaigns, and promotions can keep your customers informed and engaged.
Omnisend can be a tool in making your email marketing strategy a success. It offers advanced automation features and seamless integration with ecommerce platforms like Shopify, WooCommerce, and BigCommerce.
The tool makes it easier to deliver personalized and timely messages that make for effective email campaigns to drive traffic and engagement.
Sign up for Omnisend today to enhance your email marketing efforts
This involves creating valuable and relevant content to attract and engage your target audience. This can include a variety of formats, such as blog posts, infographics, guides, and videos.
They’re all designed to inform and captivate your viewers while establishing your expertise in the field.
Social media
Social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok are an important addition to the ecommerce checklist as they can greatly enhance your outreach efforts.
By consistently sharing posts, stories, and targeted ads across these platforms, you’ll not only boost your brand’s visibility but also engage deeper with your online community.
Being actively present on social media enables you to interact directly with your audience. It also helps you gain valuable insights and build lasting relationships that strengthen brand loyalty.
Paid advertising
Consider investing in paid-per-click (PPC) campaigns on platforms like Google Ads and social media to reach your potential customers faster. Effective targeting and compelling ads are key to maximizing your return on investment.
Influencer partnerships
Influencer collaborations are important for expanding your brand’s reach. Partner with influencers who align with your brand values and have a loyal following.
By leveraging their influence, you can amplify your message and connect with a broader audience. This will ultimately increase your brand’s awareness and engagement.
15. Ensure mobile responsiveness
With a large portion of online transactions happening on tablets and smartphones, optimizing your website for mobile is non-negotiable. Users should have a seamless experience on your site, regardless of their chosen device and screen size.
You can ensure mobile responsiveness by:
Using the correct size of images and media so pictures and videos on your site can scale on smaller screens
Compressing images and leveraging browser caching to improve performance
Making sure that the texts on your site are legible without having to zoom in
Wrap up
Today, launching a successful store demands attention to several critical details. This comprehensive ecommerce checklist covers 15 essential steps to guide you through the process.
From choosing the right platform to ensuring that your site is mobile responsive, each tip is tailored to enhance your store’s performance and longevity in the ecommerce field.
By implementing these expert tips, you’ll be well-equipped to design and manage a thriving online store.
Karolina is a writer, content marketer, and email enthusiast at Omnisend. When she's not curating articles, you can find her in the woods challenging herself in hiking boots or off-roading her bike.
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