Sole Traders: The DIY shopping cart myth

Sole Traders: The DIY shopping cart myth

When starting up a new business, a common misperception is that because you’re a sole trader that because your budget is tight you must do everything from sourcing your suppliers to designing your logo yourself. The time that it takes to do this is rarely taken into account, nor the fact that fast, efficient and professional suppliers can actually save you time.

Even if you have the skills to design your own website, build it, and create your own logo, and install a shopping cart website on a server, that doesn’t mean it’s the most efficient way to get your business started.

Leaving the work to specialists can save you time and money as you can focus on the most important part of getting your website set up – displaying your products, writing your product descriptions, and marketing your website.

On an ongoing basis, you also save yourself either having to keep up to date with a wide number of potential security issues that need to be addressed on a daily basis, and have someone at hand to deal with technical support (saving you an IT staff).

We cannot stress how important good marketing is for your website. A fantastic design and strong, highly performing shopping cart package will not perform unless you have a strong focus on how you will market your product in the market.

Marketing covers more than submitting your site to search engines or throwing up some Google Ads, it is the total process of:

  • Understanding your market (your competitors, the trends in the market, where new customers come from and what motivates them to buy)
  • What is your particular niche? How does your product differ from what your competitors offer? If you are selling products that everyone else is also selling, how are you doing it differently? You need a point of difference if you want to have anything to promote
  • Pricing your products competitively, both now and in the future. What is your overall pricing structure in relation to your competitors? When will you run sales?
  • How will you promote your point of difference with your competitors?
  • Why should customers trust your website?
  • What will people search for to find your business? How will you get your site to come up in searches on these phrases (this is the process called “Search Engine Optimisation” or SEO – it involves content editing and link building)
  • What specific tactics will you use to drive more traffic to your site? What will your domain name be? Where will be the points of entry to your site and how will you get them to checkout?
  • What off-site work will you be doing to draw in more customers and get them to buy? (e.g. newsletters)
  • What is your social marketing strategy?

A solid plan is essential but the key to getting a plan that you can implement is overcoming the myth that EVERYTHING you have to do yourself if you are a sole trader.

Ozcart Ecommerce

Ozcart has been in business since 2006 and is an online, hosted shopping cart that you can use for your current or new online store. We offer so many features for the same low price. In fact, we are addicted to adding new ones to ensure that we remain one of the best choices for a shopping cart. https://ozcart.com

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