Having an online store exposes your products and services to a larger number of internet users and that’s where your business needs to be!
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With the internet boom witnessed in 2020, it would be impossible for businesses not to establish online stores. However, the best stores take time, effort, and plenty of technical preparation to set up an ecommerce website. Building an ecommerce website has become essential to the success of enterprises, startups and established entities.
Ecommerce has made it easy for businesses to sell products online. It has also enabled the customers to enjoy the convenience and the flexibility of shopping online. Besides that, the need to establish one arises from the fact that setting up an online store is cheaper than having a storefront. Additionally, having an online store exposes your products and services to a larger number of internet users and that’s where your business needs to be!
This article therefore seeks to explore FIVE basic technical aspects that you should be aware of when creating an ecommerce website.
1. Website hosting.
A website host provides you with the space and support that your online store needs. There are two different forms of web hosting:
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Hosted website; where you pay a company to provide and maintain the software and hosting for your website. Hosted website is often preferred by new stores due to the ease of set ups, and the availability of support staff.
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Self-hosted website; where you have your website totally under your control. It is upon you to pick and pay for your webserver, install and maintain the software by yourself.
2. Website security
During a buyer’s interaction with your website, there is a lot of digital information exchanged and stored on your website. Personal information such as credit card numbers, phone numbers, and home addresses are prone to hackers. This is the reason why you need to have a web security and firewall in your website. It is advisable to learn of ways to limit cyber theft. For instance having a secure sockets layer encryption certificate (SSL) secures credit cards and other sensitive transactions. Also, have a secure password requirements and storage. For instance, do not allow '1234', as being a customer’s password.
3. Website performance.
When choosing your website host, you should check on the performance of the server host. There are different features that can make a quality host such as; its inherent features, reviews from other users, maintenance price, ability to grow. If you have chosen the hosted path, you should look into website upgrades that your provider might offer.
4. Payment options.
Your online store is not complete until you have a secure payment option. The type of payment systems that you can employ on your site should be the one that your target buyers can use with ease. For instance, you can have a payment gateway system, which would be to authorize and process all credit card transactions within your store. It should also encrypt sensitive information. There are other gateways available depending with region and the kind of currencies accepted.
5. Automated Backups.
When dealing with digital stores, one may accidentally delete the necessary files or customer details by a single click. It happens. You should ensure that your site has an automated online backing schedule before selling a single product.
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