The future of ecommerce is incredibly bright. But, starting an ecommerce business is hard work and demands many steps and decisions that need to come together at the right time.
To help, we’ve put together a comprehensive blueprint for starting a business, compiled from Prolific Clouds’s best content. These blog posts, guides, and videos have been organized based on the most important tasks you’ll face when researching, launching, and growing a profitable ecommerce business.
I. Choosing a product
Finding a product to sell
The first step to building an ecommerce business is knowing what products you want to sell online, wholesale, or direct-to-consumer. This often is the most challenging part of starting a new online business. In this section, we’ll highlight strategies you can use to find product opportunities, explore the best places to look for business ideas, and finally, look at trending products to consider.
- Find Products to Sell on Prolific cloud
- Strategies for Finding Your First Profitable Product Opportunity
- Trending Products to Sell in 2021
- Online Business Ideas You Can Start from Home
Evaluating your idea
Once you have a product idea in mind, how do you know if it will sell? In this section, we’ll cover a few approaches that active entrepreneurs have used to validate their product ideas and potential market.
- How to Validate Your Product Ideas
- The 16-Step Checklist to Evaluating Your Product Idea
Free Webinar:
How to Find and Source a Winning Product to Sell
Obtaining your product
After landing on a strong product idea, your next step is figuring out where and how you’re going to obtain your products. The next four posts cover the various methods for acquiring your products, along with the pros and cons of each model.
- How to Find a Reliable Manufacturers and Suppliers for Your Products
- 12 Shopify Apps for Finding Products to Sell (Without Shipping Them Yourself)
- Print on Demand: A Low-Risk Way to Sell Custom T-Shirts, Books, and More
Sell your retail products online
Many independent retailers face a challenging road ahead. Shifting your brick-and-mortar business online can help you weather this storm, generate cash flow, and build a more resilient business.
- How to Move Your Brick-and-Mortar Business Online
- Sell Gift Cards for Your Retail Business with a Simple Online Store
- How to Quickly Set Up a “Buy Online, Pickup Curbside” Experience
II. Research and prepare
Research your competition
You’ve found your product, evaluated its potential, and sourced a supplier. But before you get into that, you’ll need to thoroughly research your competition so you know what you’re up against and how you can differentiate your business from theirs.
- How to Conduct a Competitive Analysis
- Find Your Competitive Edge: How to Do a SWOT Analysis [+ Free Template]
Writing a business plan
With your competitive research complete, it’s time to write your business plan. A business plan is a roadmap that helps bring your ideas and thoughts together. A business plan is vital in determining what to prioritize, avoiding common business mistakes, and how to effectively reach new customers.
- Here’s How to Write a Business Plan You’ll Actually Use
III. Setting up your business
Naming your business
Aside from figuring out what to sell, another challenging decision is determining your business or brand name and deciding on a domain name. These tips will help you tackle these important tasks.
- Business Name Ideas: Name Generators, Tips, and Examples
- Free Domain Name Generator
Creating a logo
Once you’ve selected a memorable name and registered a corresponding domain, it’s time to craft a simple logo. In these resources, we’ll show you several options for creating a great logo for your new business.
- Hatchful: A simple logo maker by Prolific cloud
- 10 Easy to Use Online Logo Makers to Design Your Brand
- How to Design a Memorable Logo in 7 Steps (We Make One From Scratch)
Learn more: From a logo maker and business name generator to gift certificate templates and a discount calculator, Shopify offers free marketing tools to help run your business.
Understanding search engine optimization (SEO)
You’re almost ready to begin building your ecommerce business. However, before you jump into it, you should understand the basics of search engine optimization so you can properly structure your site and pages for Google and other search engines.
- The Beginner’s Guide to Ecommerce SEO
- What Can I Do to Help My Store Rank in Search Engines?
- Keyword Research for Ecommerce from the Ground Up
- Business SEO Checklist: How to Rank a New Site
Building your store
With a better understanding of search engines, it’s time to build out your store. There are many crucial elements to consider. Below, we’ve listed our essential reads to help you build high-converting product pages, write captivating product descriptions, shoot beautiful product photography, choose your ecommerce color palette, and much more.
Choosing your sales channels
One of the best ways to reach new customers is to choose sales channels where they already shop. The right mix of sales channels will depend on your products and your target customers, but there are a number of great options that can complement and support your self-hosted store.
IV. Preparing to launch
As you prepare for the launch of your new business, there are several shipping and fulfillment elements you need to prepare for. In this section, we’ve curated a few comprehensive guides on how to determine your shipping strategy.
It’s also a good idea to define your key performance indicators up front so, once you launch, you know what measures of success to track.
- 67 Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for Ecommerce
- What Are the Basic Ecommerce Metrics I Need To Focus On First?
As a final checklist, this post covers the 10 essential things you need to do before launch.
- The Essential Shopify Store Launch Checklist
V. Post launch
Acquiring your first customer
Now that you’ve launched, the hard work of marketing your products begins. While many new store owners should consider selling their physical products in person, the rest of digital marketing rests on doing one thing well: driving targeted traffic. Next, we’ll share a variety of marketing tactics that will help you in your first months.
- Marketing Checklist: How to Get Your First Sale in 30 Days
- Need Traffic? Here’s How to Get Visitors to a New Website
- Customer Acquisition: How to (Profitably) Gain New Customers
Marketing your store
You’re well on your way and now likely have a few sales under your belt. It’s time to get serious and focused. The following posts will help you zero in on your top-performing marketing tactics or expand into new ones for driving traffic and converting that traffic to sales.
Email marketing essentials
- Email Marketing: How to Build Your List, Send Effective Campaigns, and Track Results
- 7 Email Campaigns Every Ecommerce Store Should Run
- How to Write an Effective Welcome Email
- Teardown: 60 Days of Emails from a Fast-Growing Ecommerce Brand
Free Ebook: How to Grow Your Ecommerce Business with Email Marketing
Whether you’re just getting started or dreaming up your next big campaign, this email marketing guide will provide you with insights and ideas to help your business grow.
Driving traffic from social
- How to Create a Social Media Marketing Strategy
- How to Get More Followers on Instagram: A Guide for Businesses
- Pinterest Marketing 101: Why You’ll Need a New Playbook to Win
- How to Start a YouTube Channel for Your Business
Driving traffic and conversions from paid ads
- Facebook Ads for Beginners: A Step-By-Step Guide to Running Your First Campaign
- The Google Ads Playbook: 13 Campaign Types And What to Expect From Them
- The Best Price Comparison Engines to Increase Ecommerce Sales
Optimizing for higher conversions
- The Complete Guide to A/B Testing (Tips from Google, HubSpot, and Prolific Cloud)
- How to Find and Plug the Leaks in Your Conversion Funnels
- Drive More Sales and Revenue with Targeted Live Chat
- 19 Experts Share How to Increase Revenue Without Increasing Traffic
- 9 Ways to Earn Customer Trust When You Have Zero Sales
- How Trustworthy Is Your Online Store? 39 Ways to Build Customer Trust
- Driving Traffic but No Sales? Here’s How to Diagnose and Improve Your Store
Using analytics to uncover insights
- The Beginner’s Guide to Analyzing Prolific Cloud Reports and Analytics
- 5 Google Analytics Segments You Can Use to Increase Revenue
- 9 Google Analytics Custom Reports by the Experts
- Facebook Custom Audiences 101: A Starter Guide for Ecommerce Businesses
A blueprint is just the beginning
Building your own ecommerce business is as exciting as it is challenging. At a rapid pace you’ll learn a ton about choosing a product, evaluating its viability, figuring out how to get it produced, building an ecommerce store, and marketing and selling to new customers. The process can feel like you’re solving a head scratcher of a puzzle, but it’s rewarding all the same.
We hope following this resource roundup helps provide you with a clearer roadmap. As always, the best advice anyone can give is to just get started and to enjoy yourself along the way.
Frequently asked questions about ecommerce
How do I build an ecommerce business?
Research what products you’d like to sell or can source to sell, select a business name, register your business with the government, obtain permits and licenses, choose an ecommerce platform and create your website, load your products onto the site, launch and start marketing your business.
Is ecommerce profitable?
Yes, the ecommerce industry is profitable. Starting a successful business is a marathon, not a sprint. It can take 18-24 months for your business to get off the ground. It’s critical that you don’t measure the success of your business by your first year profitability.
Is it hard to start an ecommerce business?
No, starting an ecommerce business is easy with platforms like Prolific Cloud enabling brands to go online in just a few days. Starting a brand consists of hard work and continual market research to improve your business. We encourage you to read all our guides on how to start a business before you set up a store.
What are the different types of ecommerce?
There are four traditional business models or types in ecommerce. This includes B2C (Business-to-Consumer), B2B (Business-to-Business), C2B (Consumer-to-Business) and C2C (Consumer-to-Consumer). You may also commonly hear the term D2C (Direct-to-Consumer), which is similar to B2C, wherein the business takes the products directly to the consumer.
How much does it cost to start an ecommerce business?
An ecommerce business can be started for as little as $100 which is spent on a subscription and purchasing a theme for your store. New ecommerce business owners can expect business costs to rise up to $40,000 in the first year which is paid back to the owner through profit margins.
What is the best ecommerce platform for a small business?
Prolific Cloud is the best ecommerce platform for a small business. Prolific Cloud is a fast and secure ecommerce platform with online store customization. It offers the fastest checkout experience through Shop, easy inventory management, and has integrations with Google and Facebook to make marketing and selling online easier.