E-commerce is a growing market. 16% of retail sales in the second quarter of 2020 came from e-commerce in the US. Given how rapidly the market is growing, there are bound to be some challenges. On top of that, the market is becoming pretty saturated. Not only are there e-commerce stores competing against each other, but there are also brick-and-mortar stores with a growing online presence.
Here are seven of the biggest e-commerce problems and ways to fix them.
1. Meeting increased demand
The pandemic accelerated digital adoption. One of the challenges that e-commerce companies have is to increase production when supply chains have been severely affected. Stocking inventory is also another problem due to the rapid growth. But for retailers that sell clothing and accessories, this can be solved largely in part by using a print on demand service.
Say you sell T-shirts online. Instead of ramping up your own production line, upload your design to a POD site, and you can create print on demand shirts so that only when the order is placed, the shirt is printed.
2. Making sure to pivot
Given the rapidly changing consumer behavior, companies that can’t adapt and pivot may be losing out. Let’s take the example of the clothing store again. Say you have some predefined designs that you offer, and you make a decent profit off it. But what if you realize that your audience wants custom designs instead? Along with what your user wants, you should look at the market trend.
The custom t-shirt market globally is expected to cross 10 billion dollars by 2025. Based on this, it would make sense to give users the option to design their own custom shirt and make it part of your new strategy.
3. Protecting user data
One of the challenges that e-commerce companies face is data breaches. This is a significant problem because this means sensitive user data can be leaked. It is very difficult to regain your users’ trust after an incident like this, so online stores with smaller in-house teams must make every effort to create a secure platform.
4. Offering a great customer experience
One of the stark differences between physical and online retail is that you can touch and try the product in a store. You can’t do that online. This hinders the customer from getting the full shopping experience.
Many companies have taken to Augmented Reality (AR) to offer users the chance to “try” on a product. For instance, if you are buying furniture, you can see what it might look like in your space through AR. Certain filters can also let you try on makeup or clothes.
Apart from this, you can also optimize your site for mobile, which is also important from a search engine optimization standpoint, recommend products based on their shopping history and offer help when they need it to create a streamlined shopping experience.
5. Keep up with the competition
Remember when we said that the market is saturated? It is imperative for e-commerce brands to analyze their competitors and the industry that they are in to stay ahead of the competition. You could also conduct audience research to find out what compels your users to make a purchase in the first place and what they like and dislike about shopping on your site.
Apart from competing with other sites, you may also have to go up against retail giants like Amazon that offer free shipping on products. So, you can tackle that by making your website’s navigation easier and offer better quality products, or you could list your product on Amazon and let new customers find you on Amazon.
6. Finding the right technology partners
Since e-commerce stores typically have hundreds of products, you need to have a robust technology stack to manage inventory, automate ads on social media and manage customer service. For small stores with a growing presence, there are plenty of no-code tools that help you take care of the basic needs like invoicing, help desk, and social media ad automation.
You should look for a tech partner that allows you to scale so that you don’t have to find a new platform and have to deal with switching to it when you start growing rapidly.
7. Dealing with poor conversions
Your e-commerce site may get a lot of traffic, but that traffic does not equal revenue. If you have poor conversions, check if your site has an error during checkout. Other possible reasons could be that you’re attracting the wrong audience, your page is not optimized to sell your product, or your UI/UX needs improvement.
To sum up
Staying relevant in the e-commerce industry requires a consistent and detailed strategy given the rapid growth and market saturation. Create scalable processes and leverage insights from your customers to drive your marketing and customer acquisition strategy.
