If you’re in the Ecommerce business, your long-term success is tied to your ability to skillfully use web technologies.
Whether it is tools like your on-site Ecommerce system, your email marketing campaign manager, or Google Adwords tracking tools, you will live or die by the way you harness all the the available technologies to present your products and offer good old-fashioned service and value to your customers.
Are you still doing the same stuff, with the same tools, as you were five years ago on your website? Maybe, today, this approach is still producing the revenue levels that you need, but chances are you won’t be able to stand still too much longer before competitors who “get” the latest technologies and are able to deploy them will leave you in their wake.
So what is a small business owner to do?
1. Realize that success in the Ecommerce industry is about continually learning and taking action. If you enter the game with that mindset, you will be off to a great start.
2. Don’t get so wrapped up in technology that you forget the core values in your business and you end up pursuing technology for technology’s sake. You need to be up on technology, but charging after every bright and shiny object that grabs your attention is a recipe for disaster.
3. You don’t need to be a technology expert yourself, but if you aren’t, you should surround yourself with people, resources, and tools that keep you where you need to be on the technology front. There are so many great resources available. My favorite site for the ecommerce site owner is http://www.practicalecommerce.com
4. Watch the competition closely. The Internet is the greatest research tool out there. Do your best to glean what your competition is doing on their sites. You might even be able to do some searching of competing site owners’ names and learn from some of the thoughts they are sharing about doing business.
5. Embrace the changes that are happening in the social world. This doesn’t mean that you need to rush out and spend all your time Tweeting or posting on Facebook. But you do need to understand the rapid shift that is taking place in the relationship between buyers and sellers and the role technology is playing in that process.
Does this challenge sound exciting and fascinating or like a form of slow torture? Of course it helps if you love the web, computers, technology, and all that these tools have to offer. If not, it could be time to seek out some help from the pros or start grooming your ten year old to be your chief technology officer.
