Have a clear goal in mind

It is important to limit the number of objectives; reaching all objectives will be difficult when they are linked to a set of actions to be taken. Because of that, managing a project with 10 or 15 objectives will be challenging.

We suggest starting with something simple. This could be a clear goal that is directly linked to your E-Commerce business's success.

  • Monthly turnover/cancellation
  • Number of orders
  • Number of new customers
  • Number of subscribers to your newsletter

Choose the right platform and partner to help you

Choosing the right platform and partner is key to building your E-Commerce project.
Depending on the size and requirements of your project, different platforms can suit you best. Current examples of popular E-Commerce platforms include Spryker, Magento, Salesforce Commerce Cloud, Contentful, Woocommerce, Shopify and others.

Liip has chosen Shopware as our main E-Commerce-Platform and dedicated a whole team to the software. There are several main advantages to Shopware. It’s a very solid e-commerce platform with a reasonable price. This makes Shopware a perfect fit for many projects.

Other advantages of Shopware are:

  • Integrates swiss payment providers
  • Handles taxes and invoices
  • Multiple languages and countries
  • API first and headless
  • Open-source with a big community
    Key is also that Shopware provides extensive support, making them attractive for our clients and us to work with them.

Your website is a key element, but you need more than that

Having a running shop on a website is one thing, but running a successful E-commerce business is much more than that. You need a dedicated internal team to run the store. Just like in a physical store, running it uses resources.

A good team responsible for customer success, purchasing, product administration and marketing is crucial for an Online-Shop. Be sure to have people in marketing dedicated to performance marketing, social media, social commerce and SEO.
Besides that, you will need a tech team that constantly adds new features and works on the platform. An agile mindset is also required, not settling but innovating in this growing and still relatively new market.
Last but not least, you will need a solution for your logistics. Find a partner for outbound (like Die Post or DPD) and decide whether to run your own stock or outsource it.
You can start off with a small team, but be aware that there’s usually a lot more to do than expected.

What features do you need?

When it comes to E-Commerce websites, it’s all about conversions. As long as conversions happen, we don’t care about features. There are must-haves if you’re running an online business. But it's also important to be aware of all the features you don't need.

Successful E-Commerce websites rely on extensive features and functionality to maximize conversions, encourage repeat customers, and grow sales.
When choosing an E-Commerce platform, focus on these features first:

  • Robust catalog and product management
  • Ease of use
  • SEO and marketing features
  • E-commerce analytics
  • Customization capabilities
  • Payment gateways
  • Speed

Launch as soon as possible and iterate based on customers feedbacks

There is a famous quote from Reid Hoffman, the founder of LinkedIn, that really resonates with some entrepreneurs: "If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you have launched it too late." Reid Hoffman's words reflect a growing movement within the entrepreneurial community to "Iterate Fast and Release Often". Basically said: Fail Fast!
The basic premise of this philosophy is that it is more important to launch a product and new features and iterate, than to take the extra time needed to "perfect" a product or feature before launch.

At Liip, an iteration typically takes 2 weeks, with each iteration we add new features or enhancements that bring maximum value to the end-user and our customer. This allows us to receive feedback from the market quickly. We can then continue along the path we had planned or modify according to user feedback.
The term "agile" defines an approach to project management that moves away from traditional sequential waterfall approaches - to think more in terms of "product" than "project". After all, the objective of a project is to release a product. The agile approach proposes to involve the client from the beginning to the end of the project by adopting an iterative and incremental process. It considers that the need cannot be fixed and proposes instead to adapt to its changes.

Start Marketing immediately

If you have no visitors, you won’t sell. So marketing will be very essential to your shop’s success. If you start your business from scratch, be sure to validate your business model idea before pouring money into marketing channels.
If you have a running business, start with one or two of the following channels and add more as you grow.

  • E-Mail marketing
  • Onsite Search engine optimization (SEO)
  • Social media (Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok, etc.)
  • Pay-per-click advertising (FB / Google Ads / Google Shopping).

Be focused while having an agile mindset and trying out new things.
Measure your success for all your marketing channels in common KPIs: Visitors, CR, CAC, CLV, and more.
Do you want to know more about our services in e-commerce? Feel free to contact us.

(Picture credit: Bench Accounting)