Coronavirus outbreak has shaken the world’s economy and affected almost every industry, including e-commerce. In this blog, we will discuss how your e-commerce business can overcome the challenges that coronavirus has caused.
The Coronavirus pandemic is surely the defining moment of this decade. As the COVID-19 cases continue to surge worldwide, the world’s economy is also constantly falling off a cliff due to this global pandemic. Keeping the world’s health safety in mind, many countries have put restrictions and lockdowns, resulting in impacting many business sectors, including education, entertainment, sports, travel (hugely impacted), and others.
At first, many assumed that Coronavirus would boost e-commerce businesses, but the reality is somewhat more complicated. According to Marketing Land, the e-commerce industry also felt the pressure of COVID-19, such as supply chain issues, product shortages, potentially declining consumer demand and various other considerable things.
Before we dive deeper into the challenges the e-commerce industry faces amid Coronavirus pandemic, let’s highlight two major obstacles coming into the way of e-commerce businesses.
2 Major Challenges E-Commerce Businesses Face Amid COVID-19 & How to Overcome Them Easily
The Influx in Online Shopping
Demand for consumer product goods, grocery, staple items, and others are rising e-commerce sales; however, it’s a short term boost because sales in some verticals might be up but also leading to some product shortages. Due to social distancing guidelines and mandatory shutdowns, e-commerce sales are seeing a steep downfall, impacting e-commerce businesses negatively.
How to Overcome This Challenge:
- Focus on your site analytics and monitor the shopping behavior of new visitors.
- Pay keen attention to conversion rates.
- Look at the website performance and enhance load times.
- Pay attention to advertising budgets, search campaign ads, and more.
E-Commerce Delivery and Supply Chain Concerns
The ever-increasing demand is great, but figuring out how to have your supply meet demand is difficult. The early days of the Coronavirus outbreak disrupted the availability of inventory and delivery times in China. According to Emarketer, e-commerce will grow as people avoid brick and mortar stores, but e-commerce will face logistical challenges because transport routes are affected.
How to Overcome This Challenge:
- Keep a timely check on your products to avoid running out of stock.
- Inform users about the products via emails, messages, WhatsApp, or other ways.
- Push your customer support and provide additional channels of communication to your customers.
- Work closely with shipping partners to avoid any disruptions.
6 Ways to Help E-Commerce Businesses Overcome Coronavirus Hurdles
Businesses all over the world are hugely affected by this pandemic. While some companies are adapting and staying afloat, others are sinking. Several businesses are stepping forward and turning towards a professional website development company to redefine their online business, especially e-commerce businesses.
Here, we have discussed how to overcome obstacles e-commerce businesses during the Coronavirus pandemic:
Sell Essential and Demanding Products Only
COVID-19 outbreak has decreased the demand for non-essential items and increased the online sale of products that are important for human survival, such as food items, grocery items, healthcare items, and other essential products necessary for the wake of a global pandemic.
People are more likely to turn towards your e-commerce site in need of essential items and increase your revenue as these things are crucial for human survival and cannot be neglected.
Ramp Up Your Inventory & Update Product Pages
It would be best if you ramp up your inventory because the supply chain can disrupt again at any time. If possible, stock up a larger number of products than usual. It is always a good idea to contact your suppliers and ask them to release orders early.
Keeping your customers informed with the product changes on your site is essential. Thus, keeping your product pages up to date is advisable so that your customers know what to expect.
Look for Other Delivery Options
Timely delivery is what people appreciate amid this pandemic situation. Thus, if you cannot handle all the deliveries all by yourself, you need to look into delivery options by consolidating with another company until things return to normal. Hire a driver, partner up with other companies, or more for a successful and timely delivery.
Setup a Multi-Store Website
Setting up a multi-store website will help you open up new e-commerce business horizons. By doing this, your current operations do not get affected by this new e-commerce venture, and you can keep profits for your online business. Magento development allows your e-commerce business to set up a multi-store website with Magento 2 extensions.
Invest in Clever PPC Advertising
There’s no denying that traffic and conversion of various websites are also being affected due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, e-commerce sites are accessed heavily by people from home; thus, it makes sense to consider PPC advertising if you’re not already doing it.
Be smart with PPC advertising. Ensure to watch your data closely, build a great bidding strategy, and more to make your e-commerce business profitable during this pandemic lockdown.
Expand Your Customer Support Team
Your customers are as worried as you are about delivery issues. Expand your customer support team to solve every query your customer has regarding any of your services. Answer the customers patiently and give them a genuine reason for shipment/delivery delays; the product is out of stock, or so.
Conclusion
To conclude, we would say that COVID-19 has affected many people and businesses around the globe. As we discussed Coronavirus’s impact on e-commerce business and showed you how to overcome the hurdles coming in the way of e-commerce businesses, we have to figure out how to handle the changing situations calmly and serve our customers in the best way possible.