What is eCommerce? (eCommerce Beginners!) - YouTube

hi everyone thanks for checking this video  out today we will be talking about e-commerce  

for dummies this is going to be an extremely  dialed down discussion on the absolute basics  

of e-commerce let's get started ecommerce stands  for electronic commerce all it is is selling  

a product or a service online e-commerce has  expanded exponentially in recent years and will  

only continue to do so and the more it continues  the more it will continue small and medium-sized  

businesses all the way through to large  corporations and even independent freelancers  

have benefited from e-commerce their products and  services are now so easy to discover and purchase  

at any hour of any day from almost anywhere in  the world the possibility to scale in this day  

and age is like no other ecommerce is the fastest  growing retail market so why wouldn't you want to  

be a part of that there are loads of benefits to  hopping on e-commerce bandwagon with e-commerce  

being electronic you have a global market this  multiplies your target audience exponentially  

you'll also choose who your customers are and  define how to target them with your store being  

online you're essentially open 24/7 365 days  a year there's no need to flip that sign on  

your front door that states open on one side and  closed on the other customers can purchase your  

goods all day any day you also have the ability  to work from anywhere in the world provided that  

you have an internet connection you're also going  to require a lower investment and encourage Oost  

costs compared to a physical store so who can open  an ecommerce store anyone really provided that  

they have the few essentials to get started these  essentials include a product or service to sell a  

place to sell them a means to process payments  and a marketing strategy to attract customers  

let's discuss each of these a little further so  right off the bat you're going to need a product  

or service to sell you can either make something  yourself or you can source it from somewhere else  

some things you want to keep in mind your are who  you want to sell your product or service to is  

this other consumers or is this other businesses  you also want something unique you don't want  

to sell something that every other Tom Dick and  Harry is selling what's the point this means more  

competition and less chances of sales also try  and think of a product or a service that solves  

someone's problem no one likes having problems  so if you have something that can solve enough  

people's problems you're a winner finally the  cost of your goods and your selling price you  

want to price your products at a low enough  rate that you remain competitive to similar  

products on the market however you don't want  to price yourself too low that you don't make a  

sufficient profit to keep operating on the other  hand you don't want to price yourself too high  

otherwise no one will purchase your products and  we don't want that next you'll need to figure out  

where you will be selling your goods the nature of  e-commerce is selling online so you're not going  

to be looking for a brick-and-mortar location or  physical storefront you'll need a website or an  

ecommerce platform to sell your products from  you can either build your own website or use a  

CMS content management system a CMS provides the  basic framework for your website and allows you  

to add and edit your products accept payments and  manage your online store some examples of these  

include Shopify Magento and big commerce just to  name a few beginners generally start here versus  

building their own website factors to keep in  mind when choosing your CMS platform are pricing  

scalability flexibility and ease of use keep in  mind that your website or CMS platform is acting  

as your physical shop this is where people come to  interact with you and purchase your goods this is  

where you influence them this is where you impact  how likely they are to convert from a visitor to a  

sale and hopefully a repeat sale so the decision  of where you will be selling your goods is one  

of the most important ones that you will make  choose wisely the next thing to think about is  

how you'll be transacting with customers this is a  really important decision your payment provider is  

someone that needs to be credible and trustworthy  because after all there are the ones handling your  

income important points to keep in mind here  are compatibility with your ecommerce platform  

availability in the countries that your business  is targeting the ability to accept payments in  

different currencies the fees charged reliability  and reporting and usability and customer support  

some payment processes that we highly recommend  are stripe and PayPal lastly you'll need a good  

marketing strategy to attract your customers  let's face it if you don't attract customers to  

your online store you aren't going to make sales  it's not like having a physical storefront where  

people may just stumble upon you you have to bring  your customers to your online store this area will  

need a good amount of work if you're going to be  successful it's also an area that constantly needs  

to be revisited reviewed and adjusted based  on what's bringing your traffic and what is  

not there are a few areas of focus for this one  social media social media has become a channel  

of digital influence and is a brilliant tool for  building brand awareness it's almost impossible  

for new brands to be successful online without  some sort of social media presence Facebook  

Twitter Pinterest Instagram and other networks  can be used for almost everything from specific  

targeting and real-time engagement to customer  service and direct sales it's a no-brainer to  

stay heavily active on these platforms and the  best part of these are they're free number two  

SEO which stands for search engine optimization  this refers to techniques that help your business  

rank higher in search engine results pages this  makes your website more visible to people who are  

looking for solutions that your product or service  can provide think about how often you click onto  

page two or three of a Google search to find what  you're looking for hardly ever so we don't want  

our websites to be ranked there because no one  will ever find us the first page is where you  

want to be or at least and to be number three  email marketing don't underestimate the power  

of emails it is a highly successful tool to keep  your audience engaged you will however need to  

find a balance between keeping your audience  educated and informed versus overwhelming them  

with too many emails start working on building  your email list right from the beginning there  

are some great affordable tools out there that  can help you they help you manage the list of  

your email contacts segment your email list they  allow you to customize emails create save edit  

and manage multiple email templates as well as  get detailed reports on the effectiveness of  

each campaign some recommendations that we  have for email marketing are MailChimp and  

clay view ecommerce is a big playground of its  own but it's a playground that anyone can play  

on yes there will always be bigger older kids  playing there too but when did that stop the  

smaller younger kids from playing don't be too  intimidated small kids grow into big kids they  

grow and learn along the way if you want to play  on the playground go for it we hope you've shared  

enough insights to lead you in the right direction  let us know if we did like and share this comment  

below and subscribe to our channel for more  ecommerce videos coming your way until next time