Project management allows you to be strategic in making your e-commerce business grow. It gives you a bird’s eye view of how your online business is growing. It also prepares you for any unprecedented circumstances.
Here are six project management tips that you can use for your online store:
1. Create a Budget Plan
To create an effective budget plan for your e-commerce business, here are some things you should consider:
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E-commerce platform
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Website host
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Development and design
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Suppliers and raw materials
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Manufacturing and packaging
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E-commerce fulfillment
Also, Brad Shorr has a succinct post on Forbes on how to create an e-commerce budget plan. Mind you; a lousy budget plan can be detrimental to your online store.
On the other hand, an effective budget plan allows you to dedicate your money to the most impactful business areas.
Making your business profitable is one way to make it grow. Thus, you need to keep earned value management in mind. That’s because it allows you to measure cost and track your business milestone.
2. Layout Your Web Development Plan
Here’s the thing: Creating an e-commerce website can be time-consuming. The same thing goes when revamping your existing one.
Hence, it is vital to layout your website development plan.
Your development plan should include the various parts of your online store, how it would look, and the content you will include.
It would also help if you stated who will be responsible for these parts of your website. Doing so ensures that someone will be accountable to get things done.
3. Build Your E-commerce Team
As you start to grow, you will need someone who can overlook the entire business operations. You will also need someone who will manage your website, promote your products online, track your finances, and more.
You will also need to build a customer support team. This is to ensure that you are providing the best service possible.
Because when your customers are happy, they are more likely to buy from you again. They can also spread the word about your business, which can expand your market reach.
4. Choose the Right E-commerce Platform
Sure, you may have your online store all set up. But that does not mean that you should stick to your e-commerce platform. More so, when it restricts you from scaling.
By “scaling,” we mean letting you customize how your online store will look like. It is also essential to choose a platform that allows you to upgrade your plan with ease. The latter is imperative if you intend to sell more products in the future.
Whether you already have an online store or still on the lookout for the right e-commerce platform, it is vital to keep scalability in mind.
5. Conduct Keyword Research
One way to make your online business grow is to understand market demand. And the best way to do that is through keyword research.
What you can do is check your web analytics dashboard. Check your keywords for the past six to twelve months. That way, you will gain an insight into what your website visitors are looking for.
If you have an online apparel store, keyword research allows you to figure out your most in-demand product. This lets you make an informed decision on whether to produce another batch of that particular product.
As a result, you can cater to your customers’ demands.
6. Conduct Competitive Analysis
In relation to keyword research, competitive analysis also allows you to get ahead of the competition.
Sure, you are not the only online apparel store. But that does not mean you cannot learn a thing or two from your competitors.
Here are some things that you should look out:
- Best Selling Products:
Your competitors’ best-selling products is a good indicator of market demand. But that does not mean that you should emulate it. Instead of copying what your competitors are doing, it would be best to figure out how you can improve upon it.
- Keywords:
As mentioned earlier, keywords are a great indicator of what your target market is looking for. What you can do to check your competitors’ keywords is run their website on free keyword research tools. We recommend Google Keyword Planner and Ubersuggest.
- Digital Marketing Strategy:
To get ahead of the competition, it is imperative to know where your competitors get their sales. This means you will need to check their online channels other than their website. Doing so allows you to track how they promote their business and products. This includes the influencers they partner with, how often they post on Facebook or Instagram, and what email messages they send.
As a final tip: Keep in mind that a skilled freelance project manager is a key asset for project success. If you’re in search of an opportunity freelance project manager Jooble offer a variety of options.
