Online business owners and merchants: now that you have traffic driven to your website and your services are available for all to see, the next obstacle to conquer is to be able to make that sale, over and over again. Attracting customers is relatively easy compared to building a loyal customer base; however, with a little creative marketing and profit flexibility your business can have a repeat consumer clientele by trying these indispensable retention methods.

To start, as a business, you will want to be able to make your product or service as well-known to the largest audience possible; while avoiding out-of-pocket costs. Consider promoting a special on your site offering a certain percentage off of the first purchase (usually 10%) for customers who sign up for your email lists. Additionally, you may wish to include a notation on the email list, when sent, that an additional 5 or 10% off a future order is available when a customer is referred, places an order, and uses their name as the referrer. You can generate a specific code or manually look-up a customer’s order to verify details and send an online coupon code to the intended referrer. This method is an excellent way to retain customers while expanding your customer base by using word-of-mouth marketing.

Another way to retain long-term customers is to offer a loyalty program. Loyalty programs can vary but the premise is after a designated number of orders, or by spending a specified amount of money, a customer is eligible for an incentive, usually in the form of a certain percentage off of the next order, a fixed dollar amount off of the next order (ex. take $5 off of $50 order), or a coupon for the next order to either ship free or have upgraded shipping. Depending on the type and nature of the goods or services sold, all businesses can accommodate loyal customers by offering one of the suggested loyalty rewards.

Above all, remember that the customer is number one. If conducting business in the virtual world, just as with a brick and mortar business, keep in mind that a customer’s first-hand experience can either help or hurt a business. More importantly, in the online world, word-of-mouth can travel faster and reach more people than ever; so be sure to excel at customer satisfaction and your consumer base will be around for a very long time.

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When it first came by, people saw opportunity. Now, they are dismayed. Competition thrives online and e-commerce isn’t an eBay story for everyone. For every Amazon or eBay, there are scores of commercial websites beating brows to figure out ways to make it to the top or in some cases, make enough to survive. Merchandising online needs to be reinstated and done with a few points to bear in mind – just what needs to be done to heat up the cash registers?

1. Guide your user to buy using enhanced site usability, navigation and sorting the clutter: The facts first – the web surfers are notoriously impatient,; have no or little loyalty to any one e-commerce site and they feed on information. Now that you have them, what can be done? Simple. Provide simple access to what they need by focusing more on getting the relevant products or service right up, within 3 clicks from the word go. If you can manage with lesser number of clicks, it’s all the more better. You can achieve maximum focus by leveraging technologies like Search engine Optimization and Marketing, Pay for Click campaigns which are much targeted and can help you ascertain Return on Investment.

2. Adopt a structure because business can’t thrive in chaos: The world has a structure. Our biological systems have a structure and there are reasons for it. If your website has no structure and if the products and services are not laid out in a logical and precise manner, it would be chaos and people don’t like to deal with it. Even chaos sometimes has structure but your website might never have it if you don’t take steps to incorporate it. All the products or services with the associated content must be adequately categorized and segmented. That’s structure for you and it affects your sales conversion.

3. What have you got that they haven’t got? : Online sales are driven by content. You must choose to employ content that is top-notch. Your content must set you apart from the scores of similar sites offering the same products but aided with shoddy, repeated and duplicated content. Either that or the content is just not enough to justify a “buy” decision.

4. Employ visual content such as video and virtual modeling: A real person talking through audio or video can be very re-assuring and if you can keep this kind of content along with some expertly rendered text content for relevant products, you are hitting on the nerve center of your customers and making it easy for them to trust you, like you and what’s more, buy from you.

5. User generated content is a real value driver: Well-moderated user generated content can take your site to the next level simply because it is the users themselves who are helping generate the content and this is supposed to come with the priceless attribute of real experiences which bring about dollops of trust. Product sales just become a habit then notwithstanding the brand identity that is developed, thanks to the ever powerful force of user generated content.

E-commerce is here to stay and is indeed the future of world’s shopping. What’s likely to fade away in an ephemeral state of euphoria is your business’s profits. A few small tenets is all that you need to pay heed to and you shall see your business soaring like an unfettered spirit after a 100 years of binding.

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Step 1 – Prepare your Business Plan
Preparing a business plan should always be the first step to starting a successful business. A business plan will help determine if you are dedicated to your proposed business.  Businesses take a fair amount of time and preparation, and a proper business plan will help you map the progression of building and establishing a business. A business plan will also help you see if your business is viable and has the potential to be profitable!

Preparing a Business Plan by Small Business Administration (SBA)

Step 2 – Decide the Structure of your Business

When starting a business there is a wide array of  formations to consider.  Formations you may consider include a Limited Liability Company, LLC or C-Corp, Inc. or even a S-Corp, Inc.. When deciding on which type of structure fits your business best, you need to know the advantages and disadvantages of each possible formation. This important decision can be aided by either consult a lawyer (which is typically more expensive) or by utilizing online service such as My Corporation by Intuit.

Another resource that can help you determine which structure fulfills your needs can be found here:
Corp. vs LLC Comparison

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