Cut the Intermediate: Why You Definitely Want Your E-Commerce Website

Last year, 14.1% of all retail sales worldwide were made through e-commerce websites and online marketplaces. At the beginning of the year, experts already forecasted incredible growth in the e-commerce sector. And the coronavirus accelerated this growth by five years, with millions of customers staying at home, and millions of stores closing their locations and taking all their activities online.

In this context, many small and growing businesses have had to undergo an emergency digital transformation. This digital transformation may have involved joining an online marketplace like Amazon, eBay, or a local equivalent. Some businesses decided that it was time to get a website.

Having an online presence may not be new for small businesses. For instance, an online boutique may have managed their sales partially through their social media presence, using Instagram and Facebook as both a digital storefront and their first point of contact with new clients. But operating fully online has its own challenges.

For starters, those relying on online marketplaces or social media profiles are missing out on a great opportunity. Even if it’s not your sole sales channel, your e-commerce website can be a launchpad for incredible growth.

In this post, we’ll take a detailed look at why your business should have its own e-commerce website.

Say Goodbye to Platform Commissions & Fees

Selling through an online marketplace usually involves platform commissions and fees. These fees added up to your costs, payment processing fees, and taxes can inflate your price. For instance, while individual Amazon sellers that sell fewer than 40 units per month pay 99 cents for every item sold, professional sellers must pay 39.99, plus additional selling fees. These fees will be transferred to your customers, making your prices less competitive.

Online marketplaces have their clear advantages: For example, access to millions of customers who are already there. But they also leave businesses in a vulnerable position. Your business’s performance is left in the hands of another company and could be affected by anything from algorithm changes to the company rethinking its strategy.

Don’t Compete on Price

Another downside of selling through an online marketplace is that you have to compete on price. Our brand differentiates ourselves from our competition, projecting our values, and building trust. But, on online marketplaces, our branding decisions are limited. Shoppers won’t see us, they’ll just see our product, our price, a similar product, a lower price, and we’ll have lost a customer.

An online marketplace compromises our profit margin while inviting our customers to pick cheaper options instead of ours.

Customize & Exceed Customer Needs on the Spot

Being able to set your prices without worrying about platform fees is important. But having your own e-commerce website also allows you to offer a personalized and memorable experience to your customers. This personalized experience in itself can be a competitive advantage. A survey conducted by Salesforce found out that 76% of customers feel that they can easily take their business anywhere, as soon as a company fails to meet their needs.

Likewise, customers want to be treated as people, not as numbers, with an overwhelming majority expecting personalization at every turn:

“70% of customers say connected processes — such as seamless handoffs or contextualized engagement based on earlier interactions — are very important to winning their business.”

Regardless of the content management system you pick, you should be able to offer a beautifully designed website and a shopping experience that’s every bit as memorable as visiting your store.

When you’re selling on your own platform, you can detect and address customer needs without having to bargain for control with third-parties. If you find that your competition is offering better shipping or payment methods, you can adjust accordingly. If your customers are requesting an extra service (such as BOPIS - buy online and pick in-store), you can seamlessly add it to your sales process in no time.

Know Your Customers

Your own e-commerce website is a platform that you can control. It gives your business independence, allowing you to sell and manage customer relationships in your own terms.

It also helps you set yourself apart from the competition, with a distinctive and scalable platform that’s definitely your own.

By running your own website, you also have direct access to your customers’ information. You can compile and organize information about your customers’ behavior, segment them, and direct your marketing efforts in an intelligent and information-driven way.

Knowing your customer, how they arrived at your website, and how they interacted with it gives you room for improvement and growth. By operating on a third-party platform, all this information is kept from you and used to benefit the platform. A platform that has to work for both you and your competitors.

Turn Visitors into Loyal Customers

You can’t establish lasting customer relationships on a third-party platform. Because, to build a relationship with your customer, you need to communicate with them even when you’re not explicitly selling them something. For instance, 92% of marketers see the content their brand creates as an important business asset.

Online marketplaces don’t offer businesses an opportunity to create and share valuable content. With a platform of your own, you can create interesting marketing campaigns, craft content that turns your customer into a fan, and even diversify your business without arbitrary technical constraints.

An E-Commerce Website Automates Your Sales Process

An e-commerce website makes it possible for your business to be open 24/7, 365 days a year. Your e-commerce shows your brand, displays and explains your products, and handles relevant customer information for you. This already saves you a lot of time and can kickstart growth beyond your expectations.

If you’re using WooCommerce, most of the processes related to keeping a healthy and functioning shop are already automated. But, through plugins, you can automate everything from sending emails to registered customers with abandoned carts to creating shipping labels.

Key Takeaways

While online marketplaces can be a good first option if you’re just starting to sell online, in the long run, it can do more harm than good. An online marketplace prevents you from building a recognizable and scalable brand, it prevents you from recognizing client expectations and adapting to them, and it compromises your profit margin.

With an online store of your own, you can forget platform fees, stop worrying about eventual changes in other company’s priorities or technology, and take your branding and marketing efforts to the next level.

Building an online store of your own may be daunting at first. But there are numberless tools and services that can help you along the way. For instance, you partner up with a hosting provider that’s specialized in serving small businesses.