TM

TM

PLANNING TO OWN AN ECOMMERCE

SITE WITH MORE THAN

5000
VISITS AT A TIME?
Planning to own an
eCommerce site with more than

500 users
THINK TWICE!!! visits
BEFORE CHOOSING

at a time
YOUR ECOMMERCE PLATFORM

THINK TWICE!!! BEFORE CHOOSING

YOUR ECOMMERCE PLATFORM
M ost of the time entrepreneurs will have

great vision to take their ecommerce ventures
to greater heights but they will be running short
Entrepreneurs who
on either of these two- nance and technical
knowhow. Unfortunately, in majority of the compromise on technology
situations these two factors determine the
success of an ecommerce venture. by purchasing SAAS
or incompetent
In situations where nance is short, entrepre-
neurs will have to compromise on technology self-hosted platforms
by purchasing SAAS or some incompetent
will ultimately end up
self-hosted platforms. But ultimately they will
end up in exceeding the capabilities of these exceeding the capabilities
platforms and hit roadblock. Because these
platforms are not meant to do high volume of these platforms and
trade. The situation will be almost similar to
result in roadblocks
what will happen if you end up purchasing
some premium ecommerce platform without
knowing the crucial technical elements
required for your long-term trade needs.

The following points will act as your fundamen-

tal technical checklist to understand what all
things it will need to full your vision of a
successful ecommerce site. For entrepreneurs
who are forced to compromise on technology
you may use this material to compare and iden-
tify the best among the available options.

TM
Search Why?
As the number of products increases, it will become
increasingly dicult for your customers to nd the prod-
ucts they are looking for

Since there are several sites out there; if your customers

are not able to nd their desired products in the least key
strokes, the probability that they will leave your site with-
out buying is high

An ecient onsite search box is also a valuable way of

communicating with customers to learn more about their
shopping habits.

43%
of eCommerce shoppers head
straight for the search bar

ON-SITE SEARCH USERS THESE USERS HAVE AN 8%

ARE 4.8X MORE LIKELY 8% HIGHER AVERAGE ORDER
TO MAKE A PURCHASE VALUE

Checklist
Search Analytics- Analyse and understand customer
search trends and patterns to know your customer
buying behaviour and market trends.

Faceted search and lters- These search features will

help your customer reach their desired product with the
least eort.

Predictive search- This feature predicts the keywords

analysing customer behaviour and auto completes the
search keyword.

Suggestions- The customer may not always know what

the exact keyword is to nd the product he/she is look-
ing for. This feature will help you to set suggestions
based on keywords and could even take customer to the
right page even if there are typos.

Search time- Time taken by the platform to display

relevant results even if there are thousands of products.
Lesser the time, better the search.

Feature to set listing priority- Increase priority of the

products you want to sell more when a customer
searches for a particular keyword.

TM
 Why?
Platform Platform architecture is an approach to the design and

Architecture planning of platform. This involves technical, aesthetic

and functional criteria.
Knowing ecommerce platform architecture provides you
information regarding the stability and functional
elements.

The Platform architecture of a platform makes it scalable,

agile etc. to meet your present and future needs.

Checklist
Coding Standards-Are the standards supported by the
skills of your people

Scalability- The platform should be able to handle

millions of SKUs, users, orders etc. without any fuss.

Agile- How can you monitor customer activity on your

site, and how quickly you can then take action based on
identied behaviour? For e.g. Identify customers who had
bought a particular model of TV at a time and promote an
upgraded version that has come in recently etc.

Concurrent user management- The platform should be

able to handle the activities of millions of users at a time.
Else it will lead to slow down or the whole system will
come to a halt.
Hardware cost- Can the platform be run on a cost eec-
tive hardware.

Source code owner- In order to have full control over the

platform you buy, you need to own the source code.

Template Engine and Framework- Check if the platform

is built using standard template engines like Smarty and
frameworks like MVC. This will enable any standard
developer to make changes in the code.

Support for third party Integrations- A platform alone

wont sometimes be sucient; you may need to integrate
it with third party applications like SAP or SalesForce.

Well dened end points- Platform architecture with

well-dened end points will help your developers to
fetch important information easily. For e.g. Generate a
particular report on an accessory sold along with a
particular product etc.
Graph database- Enables you to facilitate graph search
and intelligent product recommendations.
Load balancing support- This methodology can
distribute workload across multiple Servers. Using
multiple components with load balancing, instead of
single component increases reliability through
redundancy. TM
 Why?
Business Smooth functioning of the organization is dependent on

User Control how well the duties and responsibilities are delegated to
each employee. Business control features in an ecom-
merce platform will help you with that.

Each manager should be able to access their dedicated

features without interrupting the other.

By giving user friendly functionalities to each employee

or department, you may reduce IT support for the func-
tioning of the portal.

Business users should be able to do all these activities

with full condence that they wont break the Website.

Checklist
User proles-Ability to create user proles for delegation
IT independence - Features to empower merchandisers
dene promotions and discounts on products, orders,
and shipments without IT involvement

Marketing features-Marketing team should have dedi-

cated access to vital marketing features like Social
Listing Tool, Newsletter management Module and
Analytics just by granting access to the relevant features.

Analytics and reports-Support in decision making using

analytics and reports- Analytics and reports are the most
important monitoring tools which will help you analyse
the performance of your portal and also support you by
providing data for strategic decision making.

Why?
Order Knowing the order management features will help you in

Management understanding the ability of the platform in handling

huge volume of orders.
Order management features help you with providing
multiple shipping costs based on user location and
features like same day delivery.

Equips you with easy handling of product returns and

other inventory complications, thereby reducing over
heads.

Checklist
Persistent cart- Once a product is added to the cart,
users should be able to carry it along multiple devices.

TM
 Back order facility- If multiple users place an order for
an item with limited stock, the platform should have the
ability to receive back order.

Store credit- Provide store credit to users who want

refund so that they will spend the amount in your site
again.

Product return The platform should have features to

make the product returns, hassle free.

Multiple Warehouses- If there are multiple warehouses,

the platform should be able to help you with set multiple
shipping cost based on the location of the user. This
feature will also help in providing oers like next day
shipping and so on.

Create orders using backend- The platform with facility

to add/edit order will help executives to up-sell or
cross-sell products when in need.

Product Why?
Catalogue
Product catalogue is the online repository for every item
you sell. No matter how good your platform is, if the prod-
uct catalogue isnt good your customers wont buy.

The ability of the product catalogue helps you to present

products with complex attributes and combinations
easily to your customers.

Unlike in a store where a skilled sales man will be able to

make a customer spend more, in ecommerce, upselling
and cross selling features of the catalogue facilitates that.

46%
of online shoppers keep purchases
they dont want because returning it
is too :

Inconvenient !!! 46%

Expensive $$$ 40%
CONFUSING ???
6%

89% SAYTHEY'LLSHOPAGAINATAN
ONLINE STORE AFTER A POSITIVE RETURNS
EXPERIENCE

TM
 Checklist
Capability to represent dierent types of products
with dierent attributes- Reduce the complexity in UI
so that customer nds it easy to select their desired
combination.
The number of product categories and subcategories
the catalogue will support- The platform should be
able to eciently manage hundreds of categories and
subcategories. Even a new user should be able to easily
navigate to their desired category or subcategory within
the least possible time.

Cross selling and upselling- Make your customer spend

more in every purchase session. The platform should be
intelligent enough to understand users previous
browsing and purchase decisions to recommend
products.

Amazon buy box- If you are planning to build a multi-

vendor website

Support for thirdparty inventory Integration- A platform

alone wont be sucient sometimes; you may need to
integrate it with thirdparty applications like SAP.

Widgets- A widget will help you segment and present

products in the most attractive way to your customers
like a widget displays products with seasonal oers. The
widget management system should be advanced
enough to lter products based on multiple conditions
For e.g. You should be able to display red colour bags of
a particular brand which falls in the price range $35-60 in
a widget easily.

Why?
Promotion The need for promotional tools call for no further expla-
nation, good promotional tools will help you get the word
out at the least cost and drive trac to your site.
Promotional tools will help you segment customers
considering multiple aspects like purchase patterns,
demographics etc.

Checklist
Newsletters- The platform should have facility to send
promotional newsletters to your segmented consumer
base. Your marketing team should have facility to use
multiple templates and schedule mails.

Automation- The platform should have automation

feature which lets you send automated messages. For
e.g. Reminder mailers if your customer has left products
in the cart etc.
TM
 Promo code- This is one of the most common and eec-
tive features found in ecommerce platforms. However,
the promo code facility should be exible enough to let
you create the maximum possible combination of oers.

Aliate API- The platform should have facility to provide

APIs to third-party sites. This will help you bring in trac
with least eort..
Geo targeted push notications- The mobile app
should support geo-targeting so that you can deliver
push notications based on locations. This increases the
chances of conversion.

CRM- The platform should have an inbuilt CRM or a facil-

ity to integrate advanced CRM so that you can analyse,
prioritise, segment and nurture customers.
Social listening tool- Listen and understand to what
your customers are speaking about you and your com-
petitors in social media and formulate strategies

TM

The pioneer of concept Merchant-customer engagement gives

you the power to connect with your customers through innovative
engagement solutions.

The customer engagement solutions from Oorjit are designed to

oer superior functionality and support. Oorjit brings a best-in-class
engagement platform which is fast, secure and feature-rich with
integrated extensions and analytics.

Oorjit is the perfect platform to engage your customers. It is a 100%

scalable and secure platform. The Oorjit Team is a group of innova-
tive visionaries who are keen on initiating a revolution in the
customer experience. We help our customers win over the market
and ensure that they can gain & retain customers while enhancing
customer engagement.

www.oorjit.com

TM