Whether you’re selling products or services, an eCommerce website can be the perfect addition to your business. However, if you’re starting, you may be overwhelmed by all of the moving parts of setting up an eCommerce website, like making payment gateways, what hosting service to use, and how to design your theme to look beautiful and modern.
In this guide, we’ll show you how to create an eCommerce website with WordPress from start to finish to get your products online as soon as possible without wasting any time or money or partnering with a top WordPress website development company.
Overview
Starting an online business can be incredibly lucrative, but getting your website up and running can seem daunting. If you’re thinking about launching a new site, there are a lot of tools and options out there—making it hard to determine what’s best for your needs. You might have heard of various tools that promise big benefits but don’t deliver on those promises.
Studies show that many small businesses fail in their first year because they overspend on ineffective marketing strategies and poor web design. So we’ve created the ultimate guide to help you avoid these pitfalls and start building a successful online store with the popular website development platform WordPress!
Steps to launching your e-commerce website with WordPress:
Setting up a hosting account
You’ll need a hosting account for your site. There are plenty of options; you can use a service like Bluehost, purchase your domain name, and set up hosting yourself. Whatever option you choose, make sure it offers solid storage space and bandwidth.
Install WordPress
WordPress is a free CMS (content management system) that’s easy to install, even for non-technical users. Once you’ve logged into your WordPress dashboard, click on Install. A window will pop up; ensure that you’re installing WordPress on your server or domain by checking it off. Then, fill out all of your basic details to finish installing.
Choosing A Theme
When you set out to make a website, one of your first decisions is to choose a theme.
Although many free, premium, open-source themes are available, they make setting up an exquisite online store incredibly easy. Themes also come in different designs; some emphasize blogging while others aim at e-commerce or business sites.
Purchasing a premium theme ensures that you get exactly what you want from your site. By purchasing a premium theme, which includes layout customization, fonts, and other details, instead of going through all those tasks yourself, your time will be better spent adding content on your site or marketing your brand on social media.
We recommend you choose a responsive theme because they’re mobile-friendly and look great on any device your potential customers might be using.
Choosing Plugins
A website is useless without features. Fortunately, there are a number of plugins available that can add thousands of features to your website. So no matter what you want to do with your site, there’s sure to be a plugin that can make it happen.
From integrating PayPal payments and creating opt-in forms for your users, all the way down to developing unique design templates and a customized content management system, plugins are how you make WordPress work for you.
Add Products
Products are key in any e-commerce business. But, take it a step further, and you’ll have a successful online store. Once you create your product, please insert it into your WordPress post by clicking add media (located between insert/edit link and insert caption) and choosing products from your computer.
Setting up Payment options
Setting up a secure payment platform like PayPal and allowing users to pay for your product in multiple ways (e.g., credit card, PayPal) is one crucial forcing your online store. Depending on how big you want your business to grow, your payment options may include Apple Pay, Android Pay, or other forms of digital wallets.
Using such platforms can help you attract more customers and make it easier for them to spend money with you.
Conclusion
If you follow all of these steps, your new website will be a success. With over one-third of Americans shopping online every week, it’s time for you to join in on that action. Even if you had never had a website before or maybe even touched WordPress before, follow these easy steps, and you’ll have your online store up and running in no time. In addition, the launching of E-commerce WordPress websites will allow your customers to purchase items conveniently from your website while saving money on their purchases.
