How to Sell Online with Ecwid

So you’re ready to start selling online. Now the million dollar question… where do you start?

How do you start selling online?

Setting up and managing an e-commerce store can be a daunting task. From deciding on your sales channels to managing inventory levels, and even just selecting a payment provider. At Ecwid, we make e-commerce simple for small businesses. If you want to sell online, we’ve got the tools to make it happen. And the best part? It’s totally free to get started. And your Ecwid account grows with you, letting you add new inventory and new features to your store as easily as you can install an app on your smartphone. If you’re ready to find out how to start selling online with Ecwid, we bid you welcome, and please, read on!

Building your Online Store

When it comes to building your online store with Ecwid, it’s safe to say you’ve got some options. Like, a lot of options. But let’s start with the obvious first. Creating your e-commerce website. With Ecwid, you’ve got two main options for creating your website:

Option 1. Plug Ecwid’s shopping cart into your existing website.
If you’ve already got a website, or you’re looking for a more robust website presence, this is the way to go. Ecwid was originally designed to be a simple and seamless plugin for websites seeking an e-commerce solution, and it functions magnificently in this role. Ecwid’s “plugin” function will naturally integrate with your chosen content management system (WordPress, Wix, etc.) and instantly mimics your website’s design to make selling online from any CMS a snap. No additional coding required.

Option 2. Build a one-page e-commerce site on Ecwid’s hyper-efficient Instant Site website builder.
If you want to build a website to start selling online fast, Instant Site is your answer. It’s a one-page website builder, packed to the brim with design tools and pre-set themes to make creating your e-commerce website fast, easy, and almost too much fun. With Instant Site, you’re empowered to build a beautiful, conversion-optimized, and fully-functional single page storefront to sell online without any experience.

Get started

Things to remember when you’re setting up an online store

Naming your store: Whether you’re building a website on your own or taking advantage of the lightning-fast benefits of the Instant Site, you’ll need to think of an awesome name for your store. Your brand name could be your persona or a lifestyle (for example, “Randy’sFreshOysterDiet.com”) and you could sell products derived from that brand idea (a cookbook for your weird oyster diet). Or your brand name could be product-focused (FreshOysters.com), and you would sell products related to that focus (fresh oysters, oyster cracking implements… salt, etc.) Before you settle on a name though, do a search across popular social channels to make sure your top pick (or something very close) is still available for brand consistency. Then, of course, snatch up that name as quickly as possible.
Writing an About Us: This is an easy step to skip, but that doesn’t mean you should. Your “about us” is your elevator pitch. It’s the very first piece of written content you should create for your website, and it defines who your brand is and what your customers can expect when you begin selling online.
Product images: You can’t effectively sell online without product images. And the better your product images are, the… well, better. Set up your products in front of a neutral background with natural light. Try to get detailed, high-resolution shots of your products from all angles, avoiding shadows and focusing on communicating as much of your product through your images as possible. If you’re in a rush to get selling, break out the smartphone and start there. But if you can manage to get a nice camera and a friend with a good eye for photos, it can only benefit you down the road.

How to sell online from other sales channels

Once you build out your product catalog the first time for either your website or Instant Site, you’ll be able to automatically connect that product catalog to a variety of other sales channels, including social media like Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest, marketplaces like Amazon and eBay, Google, and even live in-person through point-of-sale systems.
Known as “omni-channel selling,” Ecwid empowers you to sell online across a broad number of sales channels from a single dashboard. Without a platform like Ecwid powering your e-commerce, each sales channel would be its own self-contained store, and you would be responsible for managing the inventory and product catalog of that store separately. Ecwid eliminates the need for extra management by connecting all your channels in a single place. So let’s say you sell out of an item on Facebook, that information would immediately reflected across all of your other channels as well (website, Instagram, Amazon, etc.).

Facebook

As a Facebook integrated partner, Ecwid empowers you to instantly upload your product catalog to your Facebook business page to sell and promote products on Facebook. And with seamless, free Facebook pixel integration, we also make managing your advertising easier too. Any changes you make to your product catalog in your Ecwid dashboard will instantly appear in your Facebook store. One and done.

Instagram

All this Facebook talk got you curious about how to sell online with Instagram? Once you’ve connected and synced your Ecwid product catalog to your Facebook business page, it’s just a couple more steps to add Instagram to your mix. Shoppers visit Instagram to be inspired. And with Shoppable Posts from Ecwid, your customers can make a purchase at the exact moment of their shopping inspiration. Shoppable Posts let you tag featured products from your product catalog right in your posts, enabling social shoppers to make purchases right in their Instagram apps. Simply link your new Facebook store to your Instagram business profile and submit your profile for approval. When Instagram sends you the greenlight, you’ll be ready to start tagging.

Pinterest

Pinterest is growing. Fast. And their audience is a market you want to get behind. Pinterest’s primary audience (women age 25-54) are responsible for roughly 80% of household buying power. And when they log on to Pinterest, there’s a very good chance they’re planning their next purchase… even if they don’t know it yet. So we integrated with Pinterest to help you get on those shopping lists early. With the Pinterest Tag, we’ll help you share promoted pins with your past store visitors (and Pinteresters like them), and keep you up-to-date on how each pin is performing, so you can discover and invest your money where it’s delivering the most impact.

Google

When you start to sell online, it becomes clear pretty quickly that Google matters. Where and how you rank on Google’s search pages can have a lot of bearing on how your online store performs. So naturally, Ecwid makes selling online with Google easier. In addition to storefronts that are designed with SEO (search engine optimization) in mind, Ecwid offers free Google advertising integration and tools to make promoting your products on Google fast and simple. And when we say “fast and simple,” we really mean it… because it’s totally automated. Effortlessly drive your products to the top of the world’s most powerful search engine; simply choose your advertising audience and the products you’d like to promote, and we’ll take care of the rest. Now sit back, relax, and track the results in your Ecwid dashboard.

Amazon

If you’re ready to sell online, you’ve probably given more than a passing thought to Amazon. With a marketplace valued at $100B+, Amazon is the world’s largest online store. In fact, roughly 55% of product searches actually begin on Amazon. Ecwid lets you quickly sync and sell your existing Ecwid product catalog across Amazon, while simultaneously relieving some of the pressures of Amazon selling through your own branded website, including: retargeting shoppers, promoting your brand, and collecting customer data. It’s the best of both worlds.

eBay

What’s an e-commerce platform without the grand-daddy of marketplaces? There was once a time when “sell online” was synonymous with “ebay.” While the e-commerce market has become more saturated over the years, eBay is hanging strong. With eBay reporting roughly 179 million active users across its properties and consistently rated as one of the biggest U.S. online companies based on market-cap, eBay is a good place to be if you’re selling online. Ecwid seamlessly integrates your product catalog with your eBay account to give you access to eBay’s 179 million active users and capitalize on the brand equity of an e-commerce platform that’s been going strong since 1995.

Get Started Selling Online

Ready to sell online? Get started by registering for your free Ecwid account. Your e-commerce journey awaits.