E-commerce is one of the fastest-growing areas of online business. It has a great appeal – own your own online retail store! There are many benefits to e-commerce, one being that the ceiling is relatively high. In other words, you can make a part-time income with your store or you could make millions.

Also, it’s a business that—when set up correctly—can run semi-passively. I have several friends in the e-commerce business, and they use a part of their income earned through their stores to travel the world.

Naturally, if you take the passive route, you’ll have to sacrifice some of your income potential, but it’s always nice to know it’s an option!

In today’s article, we’ll be talking about some ways you can increase the amount of money you make in e-commerce. Although many people have stores, very few understand the basic ideas that will really help kickstart an e-commerce store’s potential.

Idea #1: Make Buying Easy

This idea is CRUCIAL, and without it, you’ll find yourself struggling to make any sales. Too often, online store owners forget that if it’s not easy for a customer to buy, they won’t!

E-commerce giant Amazon has invested HUGELY in this idea. As you probably know, buying a product on Amazon couldn’t be easier. All you do is click a few times and the product is on its way to your house.

So how do we make the process as easy as possible? Well, one of the best ways is to make things BIG. Make your product pictures big – show the customer exactly what they’re looking for.

And then make it so the customer can click on the entire picture, not just the “buy” button!

Once they click on the product, they should be taken to the product page, where they should easily be able to see social proof (reviews, social shares, etc). Lastly, checking out should be as easy as possible.

We’re creating a buying experience here. From point A (landing on the site) to point B (checking out), the experience should be fluid and natural.

Idea #2: Accept All Payment Methods

I know of many stores that only accept credit cards. And then I know of other stores that only accept PayPal. This is crazy, as only accepting one payment method means you’re leaving money on the table!

In many cases, by simply accepting additional payment methods, you can significantly boost the amount of revenue you’re bringing in. It’s a no-brainer!

Idea #3: Watch Cart Abandonment

Once you start getting a lot of traffic to your e-commerce site, you’ll start to notice that a percentage of your customers add products to their carts but never buy.

Again, if you don’t take care of this, you’re leaving money on the table. One of the best ways to encourage these customers to purchase what they put in their cart is to shoot them a quick email when they abandon their cart.

This email will simply tell them they left your site without buying the following products, and if they’d like to continue the transaction, they should click on the link in their email. Also, it can be helpful to add an incentive, as there was likely a reason they abandoned the cart in the first place.

One such incentive could be a 10% discount if they buy their abandoned items within the next 6 hours.

Be creative!

Idea #4: Make Your Store Mobile Friendly

More and more people are buying products from their smartphones now. As a result, if you’re not currently offering mobile checkout, you’re—once again—leaving money on the table. 

On average, online stores that are currently generating revenue increased it by ~30% just by adding a mobile checkout page. This is because a HUGE chunk of customers are browsing the internet with their phones, and these customers want to buy just like any other!

One thing to keep in mind with mobile is the psychological difference between someone sitting at their desk and someone on a phone. In general, people using their phones are more in a hurry and want to buy quicker – so make it easy for them to do that!