Ecommerce,

This is the second part on things to consider before you start an ecommerce website, if you have not read the first part, please check it out before reading this post.

Continued from the previous post, here are more things that you need to ask yourself before you plunge into ecommerce website development.

Logistics

  1. Where is your warehouse and how you keep your inventory?
  2. How are you going to fulfill the inventory?
  3. Who is handling the logistics?
  4. How do you control the inventory?
  5. Do you have a inventory system in place?
  6. How you are going to ship the products?
  7. Who are your shipping carriers? E.g. UPS, FedEx
  8. What are your shipping charges?
  9. How would you like to calculate the shipping cost? E.g. Flat Rate Per Item, ship by weight, ship by order total or flat rate per order.
  10. How are you going to charge for rush shipment?
  11. Which countries do you charge tax rate?
  12. Do you have accounting system to record your transactions?

Customer Service

  1. What are your customer service contact details? e.g. telephone number, email or live support chat
  2. Do you have a hotline or customer service support number to call?
  3. What are your return policies (if any)?
  4. Who is the main contact person for customer service support?

Marketing & Promotion Strategy

  1. How to attract customers to your ecommerce website?
  2. How to increase awareness and visibility of your store and products?
  3. How to build up your brand?
  4. What is your marketing budget?
  5. What monthly promotion will you have?

Maintenance of the eCommerce Website

  1. Who is the person in charge of day-to-day operation of the ecommerce website?
  2. Who is responsible for the sales & marketing of the ecommerce website?
  3. Who is responsible for the logistics and fulfillment?

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If you can invest adequate times and efforts on the above questions, you will find that your ecommerce store will bring in profit faster than you expect. So, rather spending time worrying about the ecommerce technology and design, why not spend adequate time thinking through the holistic aspect of the ecommerce business. You will gain more insight and knowledge towards your ecommerce business which will help you when you develop your ecommerce website.