How to create and open your online store

Both experienced business owners and novice startups want to go online. However, both categories often make common mistakes that significantly increase the costs of launching an online store (including money, time, and energy). As a result, owners of online resources are forced to shut down their websites, and sometimes their businesses as a whole.

So the question arises: how to open an online store in Ukraine from scratch and make it profitable?

Today, we will tell you how to open an online store: what you need to think about before launching an online project, how to create a good online store step by step, and how to increase the chances of its success.

Step 0: Determine whether you need an online store

Selling in an online store solves many business problems:

• sales automation,
• accounting for the range and availability of products,
• online showcase for the entire range of products,
• marketing tool,
• analytics of key sales indicators.

But is your business ready to invest in online sales? Is it worth opening your own online store? Will it be profitable to sell online?

The cornerstone of creating an online store should be an understanding that your range of goods or services will be sold, and perhaps there is already demand for them offline or on social media. The most successful online stores are those that complement physical outlets and are already familiar to customers, as well as those that invest heavily in advertising.

Opening an online store will reduce your time and energy costs. But there are still a number of business aspects that you will need to address:

• selection of goods,
• working with suppliers,
• procurement and delivery,
• administering an online resource,
• marketing and turnover increase,
• logistics,
• order processing,
• delivery organisation,
• legal and tax issues.

If you are ready for the feat of opening an online store, the step-by-step guide below will be your guide.

Step 1: Find your niche

Answer the main question: what kind of online store should you create? Not only the success of your business as a whole, but also the further action plan depends on what you will sell:

• search for suppliers,
• procurement of goods,
• positioning,
• working with clients,
• advertising

and much more.

When choosing a product, you need to understand whether it is already in demand on the market:

If the product is popular, you will definitely make a profit, but you will also have many competitors. To stand out in the market with a popular product, try to choose a narrower topic. This will attract more customers. For example, if you are interested in working with women's clothing, then a narrower focus is swimwear or underwear. Make your niche even more interesting to customers by offering swimwear or underwear with individual tailoring or handmade.

If the product is little known or a novelty item, you will encounter few or no competitors. But you will also need to invest a lot of effort in promoting the product and making a profit. If you cannot allocate a lot of money for advertising, promote your product through people: word of mouth, bonuses and discounts for good reviews on social media.

These are the main tips on how to choose an initial niche and decide which online store is better to open:

• A narrow focus will help you avoid high competition.
• Products that you are well versed in will help you understand the needs of your customers, provide them with better service and better products.
• Small-sized and easy-to-transport goods will allow you to organise a warehouse at home. This will save money at the initial stage.
• Products that are difficult or impossible to find from competitors will increase demand.
• Consider the seasonality of demand.
• Products that can be purchased repeatedly increase the number of regular customers. For example, buying decorative or care cosmetics is a regular and never-ending process.

So, you have decided on a niche. But don't rush to sell all your property to buy a huge amount of goods. Make sure that your chosen niche is in demand. To do this, use special online resources with statistics.

To understand what kind of online store to open, check the popularity of the product in the Google Ads keyword planner. In this service, you will see the average number of keyword searches per month and fluctuations in demand for a product by month. To open a successful online store, the product must remain popular throughout the year.

You can also find out whether the topic of an online store is promising by using Google Trends. This service determines the popularity of a product, analyses seasonality, and shows in which city the product is in greatest demand.

Step 2: Study your customers

To understand how to start an online store, you need to find your audience. If you start selling fancy devices to grandparents, you won't make any money. You need to analyse the following main characteristics of your target audience.

Age
Depending on their age, people can behave differently and have different priorities. For example, the older generation is unlikely to buy online because "these newfangled" technologies you have are not trustworthy. The younger generation is more spontaneous and more inclined to interact with online stores.

Financial situation.
If customers have little money, they will pay more attention to the price. It is important for them to find where they can buy cheaper, or even better, to find promotions and sales. People of average income look for quality and then pay attention to price. Rich people tend to look for interesting and exclusive things.

Family status
Usually, married people with children behave differently from bachelors and single women. Accordingly, this will affect the choice of goods and their advertising.

Interests.
One of the most decisive factors. It is unlikely that you will be of interest to people who follow a healthy diet and health, chips and mimosas.

You can understand who your customers are by answering the following questions:

• What benefit will the customer get if they buy or use your product?
• What are your customers interested in?
• Where are your customers geographically located?
• What is the gender, age, and education of your audience?
• What is the income of your customers?
• How do they usually get information, TV, social media, communication with friends?

Once you have an image of your target audience, you can adapt the design and functionality of your online store and find the right approach to advertising.

Step 3: Identify your suppliers

Finding suppliers is usually not difficult. Finding good suppliers is hard. Don't just settle for the first offer, take the time to find reliable partners.

Focus on the following criteria:

• Location.
  If you are located in Kharkiv, and your supplier is in Ivano-Frankivsk, will it be convenient for you to wait for the goods to be delivered across the country? What if the supplier of your unique product is in America or Australia? It's important to consider delivery times to avoid losing customers.
• Price and quality of the product
  One single negative review about your product can ruin your entire business. For a new online store with an unformed reputation, quality is especially important. So don't be fooled by a too low price. You might end up with a defective batch of goods that the supplier gets rid of for nothing. Of course, if you buy cheaply from partners, you can make a lower price for your customers or earn more money. But is it worth the risk?
• Working conditions
  Do suppliers work with wholesale and retail? If you are just starting a business, your budget may not allow for large purchases. There are several schemes of interaction with suppliers:
  - purchase of goods and storage in your warehouse,
  - storage in the supplier's warehouse and purchase on a stock basis,
  - dropshipping, if you are thinking about how to open an online store without purchasing goods. You buy goods from a supplier based on the orders you receive, and they ship them to your customer. For beginners, this can be especially important to minimise cash costs.
• Supply Chain.
  Evaluate the terms, conditions and stability of deliveries. It is also important to specify the packaging in which the goods will be delivered.
• Payment
  Specify not only the terms of payment, but also the possibility of deferral.
• Additional services
  Depending on the type of product, it may require marketing support or after-sales service. It is good if the supplier is ready to provide related services.

Also, don't forget to read reviews and communicate with partners in person before signing a contract.

Have you found several suppliers of goods in your niche? Great, this will allow you to avoid potential dependence on a particular company. If the supplier changes its pricing policy or there is a problem with the availability of goods, you can place an order with another partner.

Step 4: Address the legal aspects

In Ukraine, the activities of online stores are practically not monitored by the tax authorities. However, official registration will allow you to open a current account to accept payments. To do this, you need to open a sole proprietorship or LLC.

It is better to learn how to register an online store in Ukraine officially from lawyers and accountants.

Each form of ownership serves a specific purpose.

An LLC is better suited if you have a business partner. This will protect each participant officially: the documents will contain information about the obligations and shares of the founders. In case of difficulties in relations with a partner, documentation helps to resolve the issue. This type of registration is also suitable if:

• you plan to cooperate with large companies,
• there is a possibility of selling your business,
• you will attract external investment.

A sole proprietor is a registered individual entrepreneur. Suitable if:

• the company has one founder,
• the founder plans to freely dispose of money,
• there will be no documented introduction of new partners into the business,
• there will be no external investments.

In addition, do not forget that there are different taxation systems, and some activities are subject to licensing.

It is better to check with an accountant or tax inspector how to open your online store in a legally correct way.

Step 5: Choose a name for your online store

Choosing the right store sign is one of the first steps in making an online store successful.

An online store is remembered by customers by its website address or, in other words, domain.

A domain or domain name is a unique address of a website on the Internet that can be used to find the site in a browser or search engine.

If you are the owner of an existing brand, you should choose a similar electronic name. For example, if you already have an offline Silk Road store, you can register the names shovkovyy-shlyakh.com or silk-way.com.

If you come up with a name but it is already registered by someone else, don't worry. You can look for the name in another domain zone or think of an alternative spelling. For example, if you wanted mybestshop.com, then here are possible options: mybestshop.boutique, mybestshop.clothing, mybest.shop. Sometimes a thematic domain zone allows you to make your brand name even more unique.

To make it easier for people to remember, make your domain name as short and easy to pronounce as possible.

Step 6: Choose a home for your website - hosting

Hosting is a place on the server where your website is located. The cost of this service depends on the type of hosting and provider.

In short, the type of hosting you need depends on what kind of resource you plan to create. Beginners with small online stores can start with shared hosting. If the resources of the package are not enough, you can always change it to a more powerful package or type of hosting services.

It is important to choose not only the right type of service but also a reliable host. When researching hosting providers, pay attention to the following points:

• How many tariffs the host offers and how flexible they are.
• What are the technical characteristics of the servers.
• Is it possible to choose a data centre - the location of servers.
• How the technical support works: whether it is available around the clock or not, how quickly it responds, and how you can contact it.
• Whether there is a trial period and what are the terms of the refund if something doesn't work.

The choice of hosting and host depends on the performance of your online store.

For example, you decide to hold a promotion, your customers become more active and you receive a flood of orders. The server could not withstand the load and "crashed". It is unlikely that you and your customers will be happy about this.

Therefore, you shouldn't save money here, let alone fall for tempting offers like "create an online store for free". Yes, free hosting does exist.

And one more important thing: hosters often offer free domain name registration when ordering hosting. This will help you save a little money.

Step 7: Create an online store

If you need a simple online store with little functionality, you can probably do it yourself. There are a number of ready-made solutions for such tasks: website builders or CMS. Often, hosts include the ability to use such platforms in the default hosting package. The advantage of such website development is that it is cheap and fast. But the uniqueness and functionality may suffer.

Think about what to create an online store on. If we talk about CMS, the most popular platforms for online sales are: OpenCart, PrestaShop, Joomla, Magento, OsCommerce. 

Besides, do not forget about WordPress. This is the most popular CMS in the world, which also allows you to create online stores.

If you need a large and complex online resource or you are simply not very confident in your abilities, contact a professional. The developer has experience in creating an online store, but you will have to pay for this experience and quality.

When looking for a website developer, pay attention to:

• portfolio,
• reviews,
• history of the contractor company,
• which CMS are used in the development,
• average cost and terms of website development,
• provision of additional services: SEO-optimisation, technical support, store promotion.

At this stage, it is also important to think about the content, payment and delivery methods.

Each product in your store should have an image, description, characteristics and properties, as well as a price. Regardless of the size of your online store, you need to consider a convenient search and content filtering system when developing your website.

E-commerce forces sellers to constantly pique the interest of customers with new products. If you have a lot of products on your website, put the most popular or new ones in a separate category with a more detailed description and a striking design.

The next step is to set up payment methods. These can be cash and non-cash options. The easiest way is to connect a payment aggregator. It allows you to use several payment methods on your website: PayPal, plastic cards, payment terminals, SMS payments, and other options.

Speaking of delivery, you can use several options to calculate this service on your website: a fixed delivery cost and calculators of various courier and postal services.

If you organise free delivery for purchases over a certain amount, it will only encourage your customers to buy more.

Step 8: Launch your online resource

To launch an online store, it is not necessary to develop a full version of it right away. You can create a resource with the minimum required functionality and start earning money while the rest is still in the works.

But it's not enough to buy a domain and upload a website to the hosting to open an online store as a business. Without promotion, your product will be lost among competitors' products.

What you need to open and promote an online store:

• Add a website to price aggregators: hotline.ua, price.ua.
• Set up contextual advertising.
• Optimise your website for search engines.
• Engage in external SEO promotion.
• Promote your website on social media.

You can start promoting your online store on your own with the help of online instructions or hire specialists to do it.

After the launch and minimal promotion of the store, you will face such challenges as:

• constant filling of the site with goods and information pages,
• testing and improvement of the resource,
• analytics and constant promotion of the website and products,
• expanding the functionality of the site as needed and as it grows.

So, despite the way we have come, it is not yet time to rest.

Launching an online resource for a brand is part of development. Any development requires investment, and creating an online store requires time and effort. However, now you know how to create an online store yourself for free in Ukraine.

And as Scrooge McDuck said: "How did I get so rich? I was smarter than the smartest and more persistent than the most persistent!". So be patient.