Here at Tower Systems we develop POS software for small business retailers. We are grateful to serve 3,500+ customers in Australia and New Zealand. We also develop beautiful websites for small business retailers.
Leveraging that experience, we have evolved a suite of knowledge about works for small business retailers going online. We have plenty of advice to offer retailers about going online.
Today, we flip that consideration, we want to take a look at common mistakes retailers make when they go online, mistakes that can cause their shop connected websites to fail or, at least, to not achieve what they hoped for.
These are mistakes we have seen retailers make, advised against and, often, had to fix once the retailers agree they were mistakes. They make our mistake list once corrective action is shown to fix an issue, thereby proving the first move was a mistake.
- Poor navigation. A site that is hard to get around will see people leave quickly.
- Unclear shipping charges / policy. People want to know what it will cost.
- Inadequate payment options. Credit card is as essential as PayPal, buy now pay later like Afterpay, ZipPay and Humm, Apple Pay and Shopify pay.
- Using photos are are blurred or with more than. one product in them. Good photography is key – yes, you can do it yourself.
- Using stock photos that are already on many other websites. Google likes unique photos. Take them yourself.
- Using the same text that is on plenty of there websites. Google likes fresh text, fresh content. Write this yourself and follow consistent standards.
- No chat. Chat is key because shoppers have questions.
- Secrecy – not including an email address, phone number and actual street address. People want to know they can trust you.
- Having no USP – unique selling proposition. Really, why should people shop with your website if your website offers nothing unique.
- Poor fulfilment. If you take too long to fulfil, people will know and they will complain to others.
- No support. Your website needs support online and elsewhere, so people can find it. This could be marketing, links on other sites, links on socials and more.
Our advice for small business retailers with websites goes beyond the 11 points we have noted here. Take these as a start. Anyone with a website can address these without additional cost. Fix these mistakes and you should start to see growth non engagement with the website. This is another step to growing online sales.
Tower Systems is grateful to serve thousands of small business retailers. Working with them helps us learn every day, which we love.
