Marketplaces, like Amazon and eBay, have restrictive sales policies. These marketplaces minimize the importance of branding to traders to maintain a consistent image.

Sellers who have their own Online Store have a different approach. They have full control over the experience of their customers.

Whether it's reorganizing product positioning or promoting an in-store sale, merchants can use their website to directly connect with their customers and encourage purchases.

To start attracting buyers and retaining customers, here are our 5 tips for create an online store successful and increase sales.

Play and bet on Design

Before you go headlong into creating your product sheets, you will need find the right products to sell online. Once you have made your choice, it will be necessary to design a site that meets your objectives.

For create an online store profitable, you can either pay a handsome sum to a web designer or learn to code yourself. Otherwise, you can simply get a ready-made template and adapt it to your needs.

Design elements should captivate visitors, such as using full-width images and avoiding distractions with minimal text. Your objective will be to take your visitor where you want him to go: until the validation of his order.

Write a captivating "about" page

If a visitor comes to your "About" page, it means they are already interested in you and giving you a chance to prove to them that it is your product that they need. What you need to do is make it clear who you are, what you do, and most importantly, what you offer to customers. Don't take yourself too seriously in this presentation either, a bit of humour can earn you points from customers. In addition, all testimonies, achievements and all forms of social proof are welcome.

Your contact details should be clear and easy to find on your about page and throughout your website. Be careful, however, not to overwhelm your reader with superfluous information!

Offer quality online support

Your customers should know that they will receive support after making a purchase, if needed. Ensuring post-purchase troubleshooting and pre-purchase support can turn potential buyers into loyal and repeat customers.

The most comprehensive and helpful type of support is a live chat feature that works 24/24. This tool can increase your site conversion by 7% or more. If you don't have the resources required to provide round-the-clock support, you must still provide support during working hours. In any case, be clear about this on your site.

Make the payment step easier

No online store can exist without payment. Provide your customers with a wide variety of common payment options so they can always easily make a purchase.

PayPal is the most common payment solution, but there are other popular options your business may want to consider.

Allow buyers to create an account with your store and save their payment information to make their future purchases more transparent.

Create a useful and optimized blog

Running a blog is an opportunity to drive more traffic to your site. Articles that contain keywords SEO and useful information for consumers are likely to rank well in search engine results.

Blog articles that are well referenced and that encourage people to visit your site are a good way to boost your sales.