Common Problems When Selling Online (& How to Solve Them)

When you launched your ecommerce store, you probably had dreams of selling innovative products with scalable profits. Although running any business comes with its share of challenges, the ecommerce industry requires unique, proactive solutions to hurdle those obstacles. Here are some of the most common ecommerce problems & how to solve them.

POD Quality Is Unreliable

Traditional print-on-demand print quality is often lackluster at best, especially when applied to activewear & athleisure lines. You may have noticed POD activewear consists of minimal colors & simple images. CustomCat uses DIGISOFT® technology that dramatically improves the quality of color & designs on activewear & hoodies. Instead of grappling with poor quality & inconsistent prints, DIGISOFT® helps create more reliable products that your customers love. 

No One Is Paying Attention to Your Products

Your products may be profitable but in a saturated market that needs more than a fabulous design to stand out from the competition. Even the most brilliant products on the market often fall flat. With no one paying attention, how can you sell anything? Choose a marketing channel that you can put some momentum behind from Facebook ads on TikTok influencer marketing. Choose one or two outlets & see what works best, make tweaks, & try again. Just like with any area in business building, you won’t see results in marketing without consistency & effort.

Your Competition Is Outpacing You

What if you’re selling a reasonable amount of products, but your competition is rapidly outpacing you? This is the time to dig into your analytics & see what’s working in your business. Start by focusing on your store’s own results & what’s scaling. If most of your clicks & conversions are coming from email marketing, work on refining your marketing campaigns & growing your customer list. The same thing goes for what’s not working. If you find only one page of your products is selling, audit your site & figure out how to improve underperforming pages. 

Once you’ve assessed what you can do in your own business, take a look at your competition. Those successful power sellers may have more longevity in the industry or a larger staff to expand their marketing & product lines. However, there could be some clues that you can gather inspiration from. If your competition is active on social media, study what they’re posting, what their content is like, & how often they’re online & engaging with customers. 

Your Shopping Carts are Sitting Abandoned

If you’re feeling the burn of logging into your ecommerce site & seeing scores of abandoned carts, you’re not alone. Research shows that 69.57% of online shopping carts are abandoned. You can recover those would-be sales & increase your revenue with minimal effort. Capture more conversions by using apps like Rivo Abandoned Cart Recovery or exit-intent chatbot messages to prompt more sales. 

You Struggle with Inventory & Overhead

Too much inventory & overhead is a common profit-killer for many ecommerce businesses. It’s difficult to launch & scale an online store without inventory & leaves you vulnerable to debt & unsold inventory piling up. Instead of stocking your shelves, a print-on-demand, white-label, or drop shipping service can help. Expand your inventory by uploading your designs onto our production options, from hoodies to shirts & everything in between. Your products are ready to sell without compromising your overhead.

Grappling with Data Security

Data breaches & security issues are an unfortunate reality for many ecommerce sellers. However, with breaches being commonplace; there are more apps & plugins on the market than ever before. Turning on two-step authentication to your store, using a password vault, & safeguarding your site with fraud protection can all help protect your online store. 

Ecommerce sellers also have more options to sell on platforms like Shopify, Amazon FBA, eBay, & Etsy. Although you’ll likely pay more seller’s fees than if you set up your own online store, you also enjoy additional protections from a large platform with robust security measures. 

Your Customers Aren’t Always Loyal

Building customer loyalty is an ongoing journey of any ecommerce entrepreneur. If you only entice customers with sales & discounts, you may be attracting bargain shoppers. However, if you never incentivize customers to come back, they’re unlikely to do it on their own. Create a promotional calendar that blends a mix of discounts, sneak peeks, & VIP access. 

Beyond the incentives, customers are also loyal to businesses that focus on high-quality service. Make sure your communication, resolution, & refund policy is top-notch & prioritizes your customer. Engaging on social media, sending birthday shout-outs, & following up with customers about their sales are also ways to win a loyal following. 

You’re Not Generating Targeted Traffic

It’s tempting to think getting more traffic would solve all of your ecommerce woes. However, getting spammy & unfocused traffic from unreliable sources is a common ecommerce issue. Solving the SEO problem involves a consistent keyword research strategy, making sure you’re utilizing backend SEO tools, & targeting content to your ideal audience. 

Dig into your analytics & review the demographics if you’re unsure who your market really is. You may decide to tweak your dream audience based on who is already purchasing from your store. Think about where they live, their ages, & what they enjoy doing to target your content accordingly. Beyond highly-targeted copy, remember to highlight how your product enhances their lives or solves a problem, like staying warm in winter while hiking.

Your Returns & Refunds are Unpredictable

The high from selling tons of products in a single month is quickly squashed when returns & refund requests start rolling in. Make sure you limit the issue with a rock-solid return & refund policy. Explicitly state the window for accepted returns, what returns will be approved, & include a troubleshooting guide. After all, your buyers may keep their product if they understand how to fix the problem themselves. 

Keep your product descriptions, videos, & images updated & filled with helpful content. Include the sizing, color, & anything else that helps someone decide whether to purchase. Beyond all the details you include, make sure the product is also worth the sale. 

How did you overcome some of the common issues of selling online? Let us know by leaving a comment below!