The internet is booming and more and more businesses have been made possible by it. However, easy as it is to set up a website and start selling products, there are a few practical things you need to think about too.
Though all your marketing, sales and even your office might be online, you will still need to have some space to store your goods, find a way to transport them to your customers and have a space to develop and manufacture your products too. Your office might be virtual but the processes are definitely in the physical world.
While the customer experience is focused on the online aspect of the business through the website, you will still need to work hard behind the scenes to bring them the service they require. There are a lot of things to think about when setting up a business online, but here are the practical things you will need to consider.
How to Transport Your Products
One of your top priorities is to work out how you are going to transport your goods to your customers. This is important to think about now because you will need to charge postage and packing appropriately to cover your costs, but you will also need to be able to estimate when your product will arrive so that your customer is fully informed.
If you are a small business delivering over a large area, it is almost certainly best for you to outsource to a delivery company to make sure that your products get to your customers on time. You may be able to negotiate a good deal if you promise a contract with them and they will also be able to assure you that your goods will arrive safely.
However, if you are a business operating in a very small area, such as your hometown, it might be more efficient for you to make the deliveries yourself, especially if your products need to be delivered quickly. For example, if you are setting up an online business selling decorated cookies, you would need to ensure that the cookies are delivered before they start to go off.
This brings us neatly on to packaging because you must also ensure that your products are protected over the distance they are travelling. For some products, a simple box might be enough to keep it safe but for larger products or large volumes, you might want to invest in timber crates to ensure that your products are safe and won’t move during the journey.
Storage Space For Your Products
As your business grows, it is very likely that you will need to store some products before they can be shipped. This is to ensure that you are able to meet demands without a long waiting time. Though some websites wait until they have all their orders in before ordering the product themselves, the vast majority of customers will expect the product they have chosen to be in stock.
Some online businesses start by using a spare bedroom as a sort of stock room but this will only work for as long as you limit yourself to that number of products. Plus, you are probably going to start missing that spare room at some point! A better idea is to find a storage solution outside your home.
As your business is online, the storage space you use doesn’t have to be well dressed, so to speak, but it will need to be somewhere convenient for you, in a safe location and with good security. All of these things are vital because you are still leaving a large number of assets when you go home at night.
Another popular option is to build a shed in your garden if it is large enough and run the business from there. Again this is not necessarily for you but large sheds are a very affordable option for fledgling businesses and you can get to work in a matter of minutes too. Just bear in mind that as you start expanding, getting a proper storage space off your property is always going to be on the cards at some point.
Where Will You Develop and Manufacture Your Products?
Many online businesses buy their products in bulk and then sell them on at a profit, but there is no reason that you can’t set up an online business to sell an entirely new product you have designed yourself. This is a very exciting venture because you know that your product is only available on your site, which gives you a new edge.
However, you will need to think about the practicalities of developing and manufacturing something original. For example, where are you planning to create your product? How are you going to manufacture at a low enough cost to make a profit?
Developing and manufacturing a new product is always going to be a risk so you should definitely not invest in a space for production until you are confident that your product is going to sell well. Instead, you should outsource your production and may even wish to outsource some elements of design so that you can hold back a little more on your investment at this stage.
Make sure you shop around to see where the best manufacturing deal is. Remember that you need to find a good balance between the cost and the quality and always keep your target market in mind. This may mean that you have to outsource different elements to different specialist factories and then put them all together in another location for the best results.
Online businesses are hugely exciting but unless you are selling a service, you are going to have to think about all the other practicalities of the business as well. Though the customer’s experience will be entirely screen-based until the arrival of the product, you still need to think about all the different elements going on behind the scenes to get to that point in intricate detail.