If you own a business with a physical outlet, you may already be aware of the essential factors in your space that contribute to your company’s overall success. These factors include the types of products available, their arrangement within the store (or how easily they can be found by customers) and the layout and design of the location.

Much like that, the design and layout of your online storefront are vital in attracting and retaining customers.

To help your online store stand out, you need to utilize the right software tools.

Platforms such as Builder.ai can help build an online store while keeping in mind the unique features your online storefront needs.

What Features Do You Require?

An eCommerce business requires specific features to operate efficiently. For example, you need a platform that allows you to develop and customize all aspects of your online store. This will enable you to adapt the website’s design according to your unique requirements.

For new users with little experience in eCommerce app development, selecting a platform with an easy-to-use interface would be a great idea. In contrast, experienced online sellers can also benefit from the comprehensive feature list on offer.

These features include monitoring orders and shipping, customizing your storefront, integrating add-ons as supplementary tools to enhance customer experience, payment processing through a built-in shopping cart or a third-party app, and reasonable maintenance costs.

What is your design requirement?

Once you’ve studied competition, chalked out your own strategy and established the basic features and functionalities required for your eCommerce business, you need to consider your website’s layout and design. 

An excellent place to look for inspiration is the design of the leading eCommerce platforms in the market.

From there, you can mix and match various design features from different websites as required. You can also choose a ready-made template based on the layout of one of the industry leaders, like Builder.ai offers.

eCommerce businesses need to consider their unique business practices when designing their website as well. For example, suppose you want to include the option of auction bidding or store credit functionality?. Then you need to integrate these features into the app’s design to provide your users with a seamless experience.

Are you choosing the right platform?

The choice of platform, Android, iOS or Windows, is essential to any online platform’s success, as it determines the number of potential customers you can target. Selecting the right platform for development is also  influenced by the nature of your eCommerce business.

You can carry out an analysis of your market requirements to decide where you can reach a majority of your target customers. You also have another choice: to make- go niche, or go mass?

While creating a proprietary app is an excellent option if you plan on catering to a niche audience by providing specialized services. If you want to cast a wider net, you could use hybrid apps that function on both platforms. However be warned that this all-purpose approach can come with the drawbacks of reduced speeds and inconsistent UX.

How will you track the deliverables?

Once you’ve selected your platform, you can track the progress of your app’s development by using a product roadmap. This provides critical information about the deliverables of your project.

The first stage is the development of your MVP or minimum viable product. This is the most basic version of your app and allows you to identify features you are happy with, as well as areas of improvement. This phase is mainly used to garner feedback and implement it into the final product.

Can you afford software development?

Building a complex software application can be an expensive undertaking, so it’s important to budget accordingly. eCommerce platforms such as Builder.ai provide you with relevant financial data to make the budgeting process more straightforward.

This includes the maximum price and the total duration of the project, which allows for the necessary accounting calculations. In addition, you can also opt for weekly payments to stay flexible.

Conclusion

Once you’ve completed these initial steps, you should be ready to start serving your customers with your new eCommerce platform.

To ensure that your app runs smoothly and can scale according to your business’ growth, you can take advantage of the supplementary features eCommerce platforms as Builder.ai provide.

These include Builder Care, which is the 24*7 aftercare for your platform and Builder Cloud, which can help you host your website and scale it cost-effectively.

Building an online app to expand and digitize your eCommerce business has never been more straightforward, so get started today!