3 Steps for Launching an Ecommerce Store in One Day

Trying to launch your own ecommerce store can seem like a daunting task, but it's really not. This essential part of building your business can actually be accomplished in a single day. And don’t worry -- I’m not going to suggest simply throwing low-quality work onto the web.

Launching a functional, great-looking ecommerce store in a single day may sound impossible, but when you take the correct steps in the right order, you’ll be up and running in no time at all  -- without any cash investment.

1. Pick a design.

While some companies choose to invest quite a bit of money into building a custom store design, it’s much easier -- and cheaper -- to rent a ready-made design using Shopify or a similar service. Of course, you need to select a design that will mesh well with your product and encourage customers to buy. In general, it’s best to choose a theme with a simple, conventional design and mobile functionality to give your shoppers the best user experience.

Fancy banners and animations may seem like a good idea, but for many ecommerce stores, this ultimately distracts from the main purpose -- selling your product. When browsing design templates, consider how your store will appear when the template has been filled with your own product images. A simple, clean design will place the focus where it belongs and be more visually appealing to your customers.

2. Fill in content.

Once your design is in place, the next step is to fill your store with content. This doesn’t just mean to fill out text for product pages, either. Many ecommerce design companies help you add return policies, terms and conditions and other important common text to your site in minutes. And while it’s up to you to write your own about us, shipping information and individual product pages, this information doesn’t necessarily need to be completely finalized to make your store go live.

This doesn’t mean you should just throw up the first thing you type without checking for grammar, spelling or clarity, but you can have more peace of mind knowing you can always go back and adjust your copy as necessary later. At this point, the most important thing you can do is decide which products will be included in your store and write direct, engaging copy that will encourage shoppers to make a purchase.

3. Add products and prepare shipping.

A functional ecommerce layout is great, but without products and a method to ship them, your store won’t do much good. Thankfully, drop-shipping apps have made filling your store with products and getting them delivered to your customers easier than ever. After receiving an order, all you need to do is confirm the order via your drop-shipping app, and your product will be sent to the customer.

Installing this app on day one ensures that you’ll be ready to start filling customer orders right away. This is the final step to creating a fully functional ecommerce store.