Adding E-commerce to an Existing Website: A Step-by-Step Guide

Adding e-commerce to an existing website and sell online: Improve your website today

With the exponential growth of Ecommerce over the past five years especially, more and more people are looking to jump on the bandwagon and monetize their creative talents or sell products to a potentially global marketplace. Chances are though that with the growing popularity of content management systems (CMS) such as Word Press, many people will already have an existing website or blog that may have accumulated a sizeable following and popularity among their readership. Furthermore, depending on the quality of the content, the seniority of the website or blog as well as the time and money already invested over its lifetime, it may have established a good reputation and solid Google ranking for certain relevant keywords that cannot be easily replicated by starting over.

Should this be the case, especially if you have a limited budget, it may be beneficial to build on your existing success by seeking an option that allows you to maintain and continue to grow your existing website or blog by simply adding a well-adapted Ecommerce solution. Online stores can work in various ways so it is necessary to first establish whether you wish to build a complete Ecommerce store or simply add Ecommerce to your existing in-store sales. In this article we are going to discuss the three main options that are open to you.

Third-party retail Ecommerce solutions

One of the simplest and fastest options available to you to integrate Ecommerce into your existing website or blog is to take advantage of third-party websites that specialize in Ecommerce. Two of the largest and most successful websites that offer this option are Amazon stores and EBay stores. Should you choose to go down that route, the key advantage is that it saves you the hassle and time of building and maintaining the website yourself. What is more, you benefit from linking in to an existing target audience of potential customers that have come to either EBay or Amazon in order to search for products similar to those that you are promoting on your website.

Adding online ordering or a shopping cart to your website or blog

Another possibility you may want to consider is to insert the option to order online or add a shopping cart capability directly to your blog or website. This solution is often recommended for small scale online stores that offer a limited number of products and lines. In this case, providers such as Web Shop Manager give you the simple ability to insert an external shopping cart and buy button to your website or blog. This solution is well adapted and geared towards non web developers by taking care of the overly technical aspects while enabling you to embed a storefront directly into your existing blog or website without an advanced knowledge of computer coding.

Sell Online : Integrated online Ecommerce stores 

The third possibility to start selling online is to build and maintain your own Ecommerce store. The simplest way to do so is to go for ready packaged out-of-the-box solutions that can be found online. The alternative if you are looking for something more personalized is to opt for a reputable Ecommerce platform provider. Although this may be a more expensive option initially, it will be easier to scale up and adapt in the future once your sales start to grow.

Whatever your choice, you should keep in mind that the success of your online store depends on attracting targeted traffic while ensuring that the customer experience is in line with your expectations and marketing targets. It is important to maintain quality content and consider including images and video to push sales. Hosting options are many and need to be adequate and adapted to your volume of traffic and sales.

Good luck in your endeavors from the team at Web Shop Manager, and be sure to visit our website regularly for tips and advice on how to maximize your success!