With the luxury of ordering food, to selling used items, to buying new items, to calling for cabs online, and a lot more, the increased penetration of internet connectivity has transformed the businesses and lives. As per the recent statistics from Statista, there will be a 246.15% surge in worldwide ecommerce sales, from $1.3 trillion in 2014 to $4.5 trillion in 2021. With such massive growth anticipated, venturing into an ecommerce business today can ever be so lucrative.
Now that you are into the world of digital selling, the next big and vital decision to figure out is the right ecommerce platform for your company. While choosing an ecommerce platform, one must know that there’s no perfect/ one-size- fits all criteria to choose one.
Here are few guidelines to consider while choosing an apt Ecommerce Platform:
- Skills, Capital and Size of your company: Depending upon the kind of seller you’re – a new /beginner/ established, small/big company (how big/small the budget is at your disposal), you should consider choosing a platform. If you’re an established firm with huge budget at your disposal, then your website can be developed by your own IT team. However, if you’re new in the sector, with a limited budget and zero technical know- how, it’s desirable to use already prepared ecommerce platforms. If you’re an established ecommerce business, you will want to consider having open source platform, which will ensure a full and smooth control over your website.
- Know your business goals and objectives: It’s important to identify the goals before choosing a platform. Are you looking to build a simple self- service model for purchasing products, or a complex catalogue system, or any other. Based on your goals/requirements, you should choose a platform that has to offer you required solutions.
- Products: Depending upon the products you’re selling, whether physical or digital, will determine the platform you choose, for there’s a distinction in the platforms that cater to different types of transactions.
- Mobile friendly platform: The fact that 70 % of all ecommerce transactions happened through mobile and 60% the searches are made through it, it becomes essential to use a platform that’s mobile friendly.
- Better Integration: It’s important to select a platform that integrates with other software. It should be taken well into consideration that your platform should integrate well into your fraud mitigation stack and management server.
With so many factors to keep in mind, and a plethora of choices available, it is essential to choose a platform that suits your business strategy and needs and is profitable to you in the long-term.