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Today, you’ll be hard-pressed to find anyone who hasn’t, at the very least, toyed with the idea of starting an e-commerce business. The United States is the global leader with approximately 14 million e-commerce sites, and that number will continue to increase as online selling continues to gain traction among everyone from established brick-and-mortar businesses to individuals taking their first entrepreneurial steps.
While yes, setting up an ecommerce store is easier than ever, unfortunately getting sales and being successful is harder than ever. Perhaps even more, given the growing competition. As the CEO of an on-demand consumer goods platform, I have a front-row seat to witness the trials and triumphs of today’s digital businesses. I’ve seen first-time entrepreneurs achieve life-changing success, and I’ve seen great ideas fizzle out due to poor execution and everything in between.
What I’ve noticed is that people succeed in many different ways, but often fail in the same ones. It’s hard to spot a success story before it happens, but it’s easy to tell if a company is going to struggle. With that in mind, here are the four most common mistakes people make that you should avoid when starting an ecommerce business.
Related: Entrepreneurs: Are You Making These 10 Mistakes?
Succumb to the paralysis of perfection
Some great products never saw the light of day just because the business owner couldn’t find the perfect button color for their website. It seems ridiculous, until you’re in that position, wasting countless hours sweating over the little things trying to make everything perfect.
Perfectionism is a common vice especially among novice entrepreneurs, as they have no idea what “good enough” means. People go out of their way to imitate the best examples in the industry, forgetting that larger companies often have entire teams of developers, designers and copywriters doing what the entrepreneur is trying to handle themselves. “Doing things right” is simply unrealistic.
Instead, it might be wise to take a page from a product developer’s book and focus on an MVP, a minimum viable product. The idea behind an MVP is that you do the minimum required to get a functional product or, in our case, a store. And then, once it’s up and running, you can iterate, improve, and refine it to your liking. This will help you overcome perfection paralysis and focus on what really moves the needle.
Sell to everyone
Speaking of reference points, building a brand without understanding the customer is like navigating without a compass. Sure, you could move, but in what direction? What challenges will you encounter? Should you have brought hiking boots or a boat?
The ABCs of Entrepreneurship will tell you that for your business to be successful, it must meet a real need. But it’s up to you to identify who exactly has that need. In most cases this is a small subcategory of people. (And if it’s not, that’s a red flag that you might be biting off more than you can chew.)
This audience will have unique characteristics, including demographics, preferences, pain points, and more. Successful companies use these factors to create tailored messages, choose the best advertising platforms and further develop their offering. In contrast, unsuccessful companies are unaware of who these high-potential customers are and instead opt for generic messages aimed at everyone and no one in particular.
Experience shows that a laser-focused approach overcomes a wide net every time.
Related: I Accidentally Became a Successful Entrepreneur. Here are 5 mistakes I’ve learned to avoid when starting a business
Refusing to adapt or admitting mistakes
Failure is an inevitable part of early entrepreneurship. Unfortunately, it is at this early stage that people are most idealistic. They have fixed expectations about how everything will work and have a narrow vision of bringing this specific idea to life rather than building a successful business.
As you might expect, this initial view is usually misleading. Want to stand out with a super distinct brand voice? There’s a reason no one else is doing it. Do you want to bring a product to a new audience? There’s a reason this audience wasn’t interested in that product.
The hallmark of a high-potential company is the ability to recognize when its idea isn’t working and pivot to an alternative. Yes, it’s hard to kill your loved ones, but if you don’t, you’ll find yourself banging your head against the wall, wasting resources on a failed concept.
Keep in mind that it is not just your business idea but all your business activities, including design, marketing, product, etc. If something doesn’t work, adapt.
Trying to juggle it all on my own
Going from idea to first sale requires a wide variety of skills, which means solo entrepreneurs have to wear many hats. They need to be designers, copywriters, website developers, user experience experts, accountants, partnership managers, and marketers, and all this without even mentioning the product itself, which includes design, sourcing, logistics, photography, and more.
Some people succeed, and that’s admirable. But you don’t have to face it alone.
For example, I repeatedly see aspiring entrepreneurs sucked into learning peripheral skills, such as graphic design, when, in reality, they need little more than a logo, which would cost $5 to get from a freelancer on a construction site. Worse, people burn out from constant learning and abandon their business ideas just because they can’t handle something they could have paid someone else a few dollars to do.
Sure, those who struggle like to wear their adversities like a badge of honor. Taking pride in doing things the hard way is human nature. But that’s not necessarily a good deal.