See Also   Introduction   Selecting a location   Laying the foundations   Designing the store   Receiving orders   Getting Paid   Keeping it secure   Promoting your store   Links   FAQ

Establish credibility
Although internet scams and rip-offs are greatly exaggerated by the media, they do exist and unless you trade under a major brand name you will need to convince customers that your not going to take their money and run. There are several ways of doing this, some simple and free others more complex and relatively expensive:

• Include details of your bricks-and-mortar address, telephone number and fax numbers.
• Include verifiable testimonials from previous customers
• Offer a 100% satisfaction guarantee
• Register your site with Verisign
• Register your site with TRUSTe

Offer a personalised service
If you believe all the hype, Web stores offer a marketing nirvana where what customers see in a store is fine tuned to match their demographics and previous purchasing behaviour. The reality is that this level of personalisation is still not readily available particularly to lower budget ventures. However, it is still possible to provide a degree of personalisation by collecting some basic data from your visitors and selecting and presenting information accordingly e.g. by producing newsletters with content tailored to subscribers preferences.

Pre sales support
Provide every possible piece of information about your product that a customer might need to reach a buying decision. Make yourself easily accessible should the customer require more information and respond promptly to e-mails (preferably within 24hrs but definitely within 48hrs).

Post sales support
Maintain a high level of service after you receive the order. Try and provide the following:

• Acknowledgement of each order with a unique reference number for tracking
• On-line tracking of orders or a dedicated e-mail address for order progressing
• Confirmation of despatch of goods
• An area within your site for ongoing product support

Realistic pricing
Visitors to your store know that it is cheaper for you to do business over the Web than in a bricks-and-mortar store and expect to see this reflected in the price you are charging them. This will not be a major concern to you if you are selling in to a niche market, but if you are selling a commodity item you are going to have to price your products competitively.

Remember to sell
Finally, remember that many of the selling techniques that have been proven to work in the real world will work equally well in your Web store. Contests, promotional discounts, coupons and aisle-end specials have all been used successfully within Web stores. However, don't neglect the basics - surfing through the Web it is amazing how many Web stores miss out on this, by not selling the benefits of their product or service or by failing to ask for the order.