2. Create a User-Friendly Site
Your site must be user-friendly.  Not everyone is a computer expert so making your site as intuitive as possible is very important.  Customers should be able to find items they are searching for easily and the checkout process and shipping and return terms and policies should be laid out clearly.  As a merchant utilizing e-commerce hosting services, you should also have your site organized in an easy to understand fashion so that items are easily found when users are browsing through categories.

3. Site Speed
The speed of your site is highly important these days and it is becoming more important everyday.  Google and other search engines are using site speed as a ranking factor in the SERP (search engine results pages).  Moreover, online shoppers conduct business online to save time so if you have a slow site, they will simply move on to your competition.  Let’s face it — people shop online to save time.  Customers do not like a slow site.  You will need to make sure that your business web hosting provider has fast servers and that your site is performing to the best of its capabilities for the amount of traffic you generate.  Make sure that you choose a web host that can expand with you as your business grows or that understands how to deal with increasing traffic to your site.  For example, many e-commerce businesses experience traffic bursts during the holiday season.  You do not want to lose valuable sales because of lagging servers and the like.  It is worth paying a few extra dollars in hosting costs in order to make sure your site is operating to the best of its ability. 

4. Provide Meticulous Details
Another key to online business success is to provide detailed product images and descriptions.  Online customers want to know as best as they can what they are ordering or else they will not feel comfortable ordering from your site.  You should have high-resolution photos of your products as well as detailed text descriptions.  In fact, there is no such thing as too much detail.  When a shopper cannot physically hold the product they are purchasing in their hands, they need to know as much information about it as possible.  Keep in mind that you can also include videos of your products.

5. Reviews & Testimonials
One of the most important features to include in your website is customer testimonials regarding your products and/or services.  If a person does a web search for your company and “reviews,” you never want anything negative to come up.  Negative reviews can last forever and are very detrimental to your site.  If you can place a page of positive reviews and testimonials on your site, people will take notice.  This is also important in establishing customer relationships because people like to know that their opinion matters and this is an excellent way to get referrals and repeat customers.  These opinions are also crucial in developing your marketing strategies.

Follow these tips and you will be on your way to e-commerce success!

• Create a site search function so shoppers can easily find items or services with little effort.
• Put this search function on all pages of your site.
• Organize your site with easy to navigate categories.
• Look at your site from a shopper’s point of view and make sure that shopping from your store is simple.

2.  Give Your Products and Services Extremely Detailed Descriptions.

• Online shoppers cannot physically see your offerings so provide high quality images of each item for sale.
• Give your clients the option to zoom in on and rotate images so they get the full picture.
• If selling used items or goods with any sort of imperfections, make sure that these defects are clearly visible.
• Use videos to show your products or services whenever possible.  This will often trump your competition.
• Along with video, use audio whenever possible to describe your products or services.

3.  Guarantee Site Security.

• Ensure that your site is PCI and PA-DSS Compliant.  Remember that not all hosts or shopping carts are compliant.  Miva Merchant 5.5 will be fully compliant with the PA-DSS by the July 2010 deadline.
• Install valid SSL Certificates so that confidential information is properly encrypted.
• Create a “Contact Us” page.  Customers will trust you more if you provide a physical address and telephone number.

4.  Supply Customer Reviews and Testimonials.

• Put a review system in place on your site.  There are review modules for Miva Merchant 5.5 on the market.
• Positive reviews of your products and service are perhaps the most important tool in establishing a successful online business.
• If a client sees that their opinions matter to you then there is a greater chance that they will become a repeat customer.
• Taking your customers’ ideas and opinions into consideration can greatly aid you in your marketing campaigns.

5.  Increase Your Site’s Speed and Page Load Times.

• People shop online to save time. They will generally be turned off by a site with slow load times.
• Use a qualified and knowledgeable business web hosting provider that has fast servers and an uptime guarantee.
• Ensure that your hosting plan provides adequate bandwidth for the amount of traffic your site receives
• Make sure that your host is willing and able to grow with you as your business grows and generates more traffic.

6.  Perform Proper Market Research.

• Study in-depth what your competition is doing including their marketing, pricing and basically all aspects of your business.
• Institute price-matching programs to keep up with the pricing your competitors are offering.
• Conduct research to find your target demographic and market accordingly.

7.  Properly Promote Your Business.

• Make sure you are reaching your target audience by listing your site in respective directories.
• Utilize site statistics tools such as the free Google Analytics to develop proper marketing plans.
• Conduct smart Search Engine Optimization (SEO) campaigns to get to the top of the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) for targeted keywords including link building, directory marketing, social networking, article marketing, forum and blog posts and many other techniques.
• Properly use meta descriptions and tags to guarantee the correct indexing and ranking in the search engines.

8.  Clearly State Your Shipping and Return Policies.

• No one likes any kind of hidden fees so be upfront about these policies.
• Offer shipping discounts for the purchase of multiple items.
• Offer free shipping whenever possible for customers that spend a certain amount of money with you.
• Be frank about who is paying for shipping when it comes to returns.

9.  Make Plainly Visible What Methods You Accept For Payment.

• Put accepted methods of payment on your home page.
• For smaller merchants, services like PayPal and Google Checkout may be sufficient.
• In order to be widely successful, realistically you will need to be able to accept major credit cards.
• The more payment options you offer the better.

10.  Devote a Page to Sale and Discounted Items.

• An abundance of online shoppers will jump straight to the clearance section just like many customers do in brick and mortar establishments.  People are drawn to bargains.  Simple as that.  Especially in today’s economy.
• Highlight your discounted goods as much as you can.

Properly following these steps will help any e-commerce merchant be on their way to running a successful online business.  Good luck!