Small businesses have witnessed tremendous growth since the great resignation. Small business is on the path of growth regardless of the tough global economic conditions.
Increased small businesses also result in greater competition amongst the businesses. Most small businesses have no online presence which results in their businesses being less viable.
Small enterprises must have an online presence as it is proven to increase exposure and increase conversion rates. These help the businesses grow and become profitable. There are platforms dedicated to small business owners such as Bigcommerce that help these businesses maintain online stores.
Since online sales are expected to reach 22% of all global retail sales by 2023, going digital seems to be a necessity and not an option anymore. It is best for businesses to hire a Bigcommerce company to design and maintain their online stores to keep up with the competition.
Why BigCommerce is the Best Option For You To Launch A Small Company?
Bigcommerce is a platform that is one of the best options for small businesses that are just starting to establish their businesses online. The platform has multiple features and benefits that make it the first choice of small businesses.
1. Customization of websites
Bigcommerce is a platform which is a highly customizable platform. The Bigcommerce Stencil framework allows the customers to provide fast-loading website templates which complement their business requirements.
These highly responsive templates allow the store to be built quickly and easily and resonate with the customer and increase sales. The framework also allows the developers to customize the shopping cart templates for more control as well.
2. Analytics for optimization
The platform has built-in analytics that can organically increase business exposure. The analytics dashboard provides valuable customer insight and clear visibility into the products and page performances. Bigcommerce continues to improve the dashboard as it is a key feature of the platform.
3. Inventory and Payment Management
Bigcommerce support multiple third-party payment processors. They accept payments from several major service providers such as Stripe, PayPal, and Pay with Amazon. This feature allows small businesses to make decisions that are best for their business.
The integration with multiple payment processors gives the customer opportunities to receive flexibility in payments, a very critical aspect of online businesses.
Unlike other platforms, Bigcommerce does not penalize non-standard payment processors and can also help with inventory management from a single location. Third-party applications can also be integrated so the business can grow.
4. Integration with applications
The platform is flexible and can easily integrate with third-party applications such as CRMs and ERPs. Bigcommerce also has an active community to help businesses meet their needs. These also ensure customization to improve the sites.
For example, Hubspot CRM can be integrated with the Bigcommerce stores. This will allow the store owners to recapture revenue that was otherwise lost to abandoned carts and also manage the customers using segmentation, automated emails, and seamless workflows by integrating and using the Bigcommerce data.
With its enhanced features, Bigcommerce is able to provide its customers with multiple benefits for the online business. It provides benefits to store owners which takes the small business to new heights.
To make complete utilization of the benefits, it is best to hire a Bigcommerce web design company to design and maintain your online stores.
5. Customer purchasing analytics
Conventional retail sales are quite limited when concerning analytical capabilities. Customers don’t really provide their personal information at checkouts and tend to make cash payments.
Website analytics speak much more about customer buying behaviors which can be exploited by online businesses. Online store owners can learn valuable pieces of information from the customers which include the:
- Average time spent by shoppers shopping.
- Views of the landing pages. How many times a customer does visit a page on the site.
- Clicks on particular offers or products. How many times does a customer click on offers or products?
- Shopping cart abandonment statistics. This represents how often a customer fails to complete a transaction.
- Products were frequently purchased together. What products are bought in common bundles?
- Bounce rate. This states the percentage of customers who enter the store but leave soon without visiting other pages on the site.
These are important details that are crucial to how customers can choose to operate their businesses and make well-informed decisions. For instance, trends can be uncovered to check which items are purchased together to create new promotional deals around this pattern.
6. Automated engines for marketing
The marketing option is not only limited to advertisements on televisions and sales signs. Digital marketing is becoming extremely popular due to targeted advertisements that expand business reach, target the ideal customers, and grow the online store visibility.
This e-commerce platform has functions that provide all-in-one automated marketing engines which provide a way to drive advertisements and direct traffic to boost sales. Online purchases don’t require customers any physical activity.
A customer could click on your advertisement, be redirected to your shop on a landing page, and then make the purchase easily. Then email marketing can be used to reach the customers with other potential products which the customers might find interesting.
This is a benefit that is otherwise unavailable in conventional shopping, and businesses that fail to embrace these opportunities will cost the business a sizeable chunk.
7. Utilization of the Search engine traffic
Almost half of all online shoppers perform digital research on search engines such as Google before they make a purchase. This digital footprint is what they leave behind which can be used to our benefit. Your store can use these keywords to increase your store exposure.
According to research carried out by MarketingSignals, 90% of all e-commerce startups fail within the first 4 months, and the major factor is a lack of search engine optimization which represents the complexity and importance of creating site traffic.
Several factors such as relevant keywords, mobile responsiveness, page loading speeds, and website structure will all contribute to SEO ranking. There’s much to consider when optimizing the store.
Bigcommerce provides built-in SEO tools that make the life of the store owner easier. The platform offers unique URLs, optimized URLs, a content delivery network, 301 redirects, UR rewrites, and microdata.
It also provides landing pages, product pages, and descriptions, all for SEO purposes. The site can attract users that are searching for options and also serious buyers.
8. Better Mobile Usability
Mobile devices are used for e-commerce transactions by as much as 50%. Mobile e-commerce is growing at unprecedented rates. It sees a year-on-year growth and store that cater to mobile devices are more likely to be ranked on those devices.
Most of the users have smartphones with us 24/7 and this further helps in increasing the mobile traffic. According to Statista, mobile commerce sales will make up to 10% of all sales by 2025, which would be a growth of 7% since 2018.
9. Improved customer experience
Perhaps one of the most important reasons to create an online store is to create a better experience for the customers. Online stores allow your customers the freedom to shop from the ease of their own homes 24/7. This saves time, travel costs, and is absolutely hassle-free.
An online presence can also show your customers the store products and prices which provide customers with an enhanced Omnichannel shopping experience. The sales channel can be diversified for in-store and online sale opportunities to create a better user experience.
The customers don’t want a limited option page and contact information, they want an Omni channel experience that is robust. You will have to build trust with your customers since the customers can’t feel your products online.
You can provide virtual try-on, try-on-at-home offers, or provide a flexible return policy that makes sure that the customer is just as comfortable purchasing products off your store as they would be when shopping in-store physically.
How To Realistically Start A Small Business With BigCommerce?
Starting a business online has never been easier. There are simple steps that can be followed to set up the business online. You can follow these steps if you want to start a small business yourself with Bigcommerce.
- Create a Bigcommerce account online. This will then take you to a dashboard.
- If required, add users to the store such as developers and managers.
- Configure the settings of the store. Here add the name of the store, the country, and the contact information.
- Make a category for the products that you will sell.
- List your products on the store.
- Set up the payment methods that will require safe and secure payment processors.
- Set the configurations for sales tax.
- Provide customized shipping options.
- Set the themes and configure them such that the store theme complements the products.
- Create an information page for the store.
- Add the navigation menu on the page.
- Make sure that you link the store to social networks.
- Preview the store and make sure everything is in order.
- Publish the store and go live.
It is this easy to set up an online business that can get the online platform up and running.
8 Factors To Consider While Assessing The Benefits & Drawbacks of BigCommerce
When considering which platform to choose to set up the online business upon, a businessperson always performs research to get to know the strengths and weaknesses of the platforms. Likewise, for Bigcommerce it has its own pros and cons.
1. The Pros of Bigcommerce
The benefits provided by Bigcommerce alongside its useful features make it more than just a plain website builder. It has the ability to provide general functionalities to non-functional requirements such as security, scalability, and safety, which are all extremely critical for online stores.
Bigcommerce provides the users al the essential tools needed to operate and expand the online business seamlessly.
2. SEO Benefits
Search engine optimization is a critical feature of marketing the business on the internet when considering traffic to the store.
The site optimization will impact where the store ranks on the search results and will eventually determine how many people will end up finding and purchasing your products.
3. Highly Customizable & Basic Functionalities
The software of Bigcommerce is designed such that it is able to improve all the different aspects of your online store. The platform allows the user to customize the website such that it can serve all the personalized needs of the brand and your preferences.
4. Supports Omni-Channel Selling
The platform is able to provide the users with the option to sell products using an Omni-channel business approach by connecting with modern buyers.
This integration allows the users to create a multiple channel experience for the customers. This reaches the customer whether they choose to purchase products in brick and mortar stores or online stores.
5. Safety & Security
The security of a store is a major requirement as customers enter sensitive data that must not be exposed. The Bigcommerce security and hosting features make it use that the customer’s site has quick content delivery, several domain names, shared SSL certificates, and unlimited bandwidth.
6. BigCommerce Cons
Every platform has its strong points and weaknesses since they serve different purposes. The weaknesses are not a negative thing essentially as the platforms cannot serve all the various types of online businesses due to their diversity.
7. Limited Free Themes
Bigcommerce offers several customizable free themes that can fit the brand, but unfortunately, only 77 of those themes are free.
This is a limited number which means that several businesses must purchase themes which can be an added cost for most small businesses. The bigcommerce price range of these paid themes is from $145 to $235 which is a burden for small businesses.
8. Particular target market
The Bigcommerce platform is most feasible for small business startups. If you already have reached a level where your company is in the upper class of business which has multi-million dollar sales, Bigcommerce may not be the best suited for your business.
This platform is best suited for companies that are looking to accelerate their growth and deliver the best value for their business. The different plans do a great job to serve different clients with different needs.
Examples of small BigCommerce Brands
Some examples of small Bigcommerce brands are:
- Solo stove which specializes in camping stoves, grilling equipment, and fire pits.
- Revelry sells bridesmaid dresses.
- LARQ sells environmentally friendly water bottles.
- Burrow sells modular furniture online.
- Skullcandy. They sell high-end earphones and headphones.
Read Also:
- The TOP-10 Best eCommerce CMS in 2022
- How to Solve IT Challenges for Your E-Commerce Business
- How To Apply eCommerce Marketing Strategy That Increases 10x Customers
Author: Javeria Gauhar Khan
