Introduced back in 2008, Magento is an eCommerce platform with built-in PHP. The platform has been developed on the Zend framework and has become a go-to preference for most merchants, thanks to its page caching, enhanced performance, robust platform, and in-built snippets. 

Magento is powering 2.3% of the eCommerce websites on the internet. Furthermore, the code for this platform has been downloaded more than 2.5 million times. Keeping this in mind, it turns undeniable that you can put your efforts into Magento if you start with an eCommerce Store.

However, before you begin, there are a few points to consider. This post will find ten essential points that you should consider when planning a Magento Store. Let’s find out.

10 essential points for Magento 2 that you should consider

Strategy

Here are the following things regarding strategy to be kept in mind:

• Target Market and Audience

When developing an eCommerce store, you must keep the target market and audience. Let’s suppose you’re selling organic products online. If you want to get a considerable profit from this industry, you can provide detailed descriptions of ingredients, advantages on health, manufacturing details and more.

People interested in these products will go through all the information thoroughly before buying. 

If you aren’t aware of the audience you should be pitching, start by defining the type of people who’ll get the most benefits from your products, be it children, young adults, or the older generation. 

Next, determine their relevant characteristics, such as gender, income, ethnicity, etc. Explore as much as you can about your customers as it will help you zero down upon the tone you should be using when communicating with them. 

• Domain Name

When choosing a domain name, you must make sure that the selected one describes your business easily. To begin with, the name should be memorable and short. Also, decide upon the area where you’d like to serve. For example, if you’d like to sell your products internationally, you can go with a domain starting with .com. If you’re only shipping within your country, you can get a domain extension specific to the nation, for example, .in in India.

You can even buy domains that describe your core business, such as .shop, .photography, .guru, etc. Furthermore, when selecting a name, keep in mind that it will affect the SEO to a great extent as Google gives more preference to unique names. Thus, it would help if you avoided anything that’s already existing in the market. 

• SSL Certificate

Since you’ll be selling products on your site, you’ll need buyers to provide crucial information, such as their card details, address, phone number, email ID, etc. On average, 4800 sites are compromised with a hacking code each month. 

There is a high possibility of precious data getting stolen by troublemakers. Since many breaches have come into the limelight in the last few years, customers have become more cautious. 

Thus, it would help if you had a security protocol to encrypt the data of your customers. A Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) is the standard security form for eCommerce sites. You must get an SSL certificate installed. If not, your site will be recognized as an unsecured one and will not be considered by Google. 

• Website Structure

With Magento 2, you get an opportunity to handle multiple websites and stores in one installation. All of this will be available to you from a single administration panel. These store views and sites can share settings and designs or stay completely distinct. 

If you wish to create varying language versions for your store, you can do so in two ways. First, you can try and get a different domain for every language version. Second, you can create different store views in the same domain. 

• Catalog Structure

Every eCommerce site structure can be envisaged as a hierarchic tree. Your site menu will be a navigation map for customers to discover what they wish to buy. Therefore, it should be understandable and simple. 

Remember that 64% of the customers who are dissatisfied with a site visit are likely to purchase somewhere else. This should be enough to think cautiously about how the catalog should look. You can plan it using mindmaps to get the effectiveness out of it.

Define the categories that are a priority for you and put them close to the homepage. And then, you can group products and services on the basis of their types. Having a well-organized catalog structure can impact SEO ranking and conversion rate greatly. So, plan accordingly. 

• Hosting

Both editions of the Magento Commerce comprise cloud hosting as a platform-as-a-service. This means you can access the software on the cloud. You can also scale and configure it according to your preference. 

When launching a store on Magento OpenSource, make sure you’re looking for the best web host. Generally, hosting companies provide several types of services. The most common ones are:

• Shared Hosting

This is the most inexpensive hosting type as it’s shared hosting. It means that your site will share the server with several other sites. In such a scenario, your store’s performance will mainly depend upon the number of resources being used on the server. If you’re going to upload hundreds and thousands of products to the store, you can go with this type.

• Dedicated Server

If not the shared hosting, you can lease a dedicated server. This means that you won’t be sharing the server with anybody. You can select the hardware and an operating system to meet your requirements. This option is good for security and performance and is perfect for growing businesses.  

• Cloud Hosting

Cloud hosting means that resources for the site will be taken from wide underlying networks of physical web servers. This one is a flexible option in case you wish to scale your business and need more space. Also, cloud hosting is more reliable than the other two options since your site will be stored on varying servers. Even if one breaks down, your site will still be running. 

Design

Here are a few things to keep in mind concerning the design of your Magento store: 

• Readymade Themes

Magento offers a gamut of readymade themes that you can use to design your eCommerce store. You can either buy these themes from the Magento marketplace or a third-party website.

Generally, the cost of these themes begins anywhere from $30 and goes up to $500. However, while buying these, make sure you evaluate the theme pretty well. This is because, most of the time, readymade themes have some bugs that may impact the SEO and the performance of your site. 

Also, make sure that the theme you’re choosing the responsive enough to work on every device, regardless of the screen size. 

• Custom Themes

With a custom theme, not just you can make your site stand out but can also make the store more recognizable, which is crucial in the digital world. Today, simply attracting the attention of customers is not enough anymore. You must compel them to like your store, remember it, return there, and promote it.

Apart from that, a custom theme also has some technical benefits. For instance, it contributes significantly to your store’s SEO. With a clean code, you can easily meet all of the requirements of Google. 

Furthermore, your store will be well-organized and can be scaled accordingly. Not just that, a custom theme also ensures a secure design. There will be no issues of rigidity or bugs. 

• Compatibility

The more the number of browsers, the more is the usage. People across the world use different browsers to navigate the internet depending on their language, country, and more. Ideally, your store should be compatible with all the browsers. 

However, it could be a bit difficult to define the preferred browsers of the target audience, especially if you’re serving globally. In case you’re already running an online store, you can use Google Analytics to see the browser that most of your visitors are using. 

Otherwise, you can follow a practical approach here. For instance, if you’re targeting an older generation, it’s likely that they’ll be using Internet Explorer. If you’re targeting youngsters, you can go with browsers that are supported on the latest devices, such as Google Chrome and Safari. 

Products

In terms of the products, follow these points: 

• Types of Products

In Magento 2, you’ll find six types of products, which are grouped, bundle, virtual, downloadable, configurable, and simple. You have to figure out the one you’ll be using. Grouped products comprise a variety of simple products. For example, you can gather a camera lens, a tripod, a video camera and more to sell together. 

Bundle products define the ability of your customers to assemble a distinct product by choosing different options, such as a bouquet, a bike, etc. Virtual products are intangible, preconfigured, and readymade objects, such as reservations, insurance, etc. 

Downloadable products are the ones that are used for online software, like extensions, e-books, MP3 files, etc. Configurable products offer varying characteristics customers can select from. For example, a laptop with different colors and specifications. 

Lastly, simple products come with single characteristics. Your customers won’t be able to choose the size, colour, etc., of their products. 

• Product Data Import

If you have a few hundred products, the product data import won’t be an issue as it can be done manually. However, if you have thousands of products, the process becomes difficult. But, don’t fret! You can have different ways to import product data, such as:

• CSV Import

CSV is a type of file format where product data can be stored. This works adequately if you wish to shift your product data between the same Magento versions. 

• Data Migration Tools

These tools are basically used to migrate data from Magento 1 to Magento 2. 

• A Ready Module

This one is used to move data from a third-party system to Magento 2. You can easily find a variety of readymade solutions for popular eCommerce platforms. If not, you can even get a custom module created. 

Speed Optimization

Magento is one resource-heavy platform that needs the right set of configurations and resources for adequate performance. Even if you have a robust infrastructure, there are chances that your store could be slow. 

Thus, it is essential that you optimize the speed of your store thoroughly. Here are a few tips that can help you with the same:

• Select the right Magento hosting
• Update the Magento version
• Use Redis or Memcached to speed up Magento 2
• Keep updating the indexers
• Don’t stop inspecting third-party extensions installed in the store
• Enable Magento flat catalogs
• Use Content Delivery Network (CDN) for speed optimization

Pages

For the pages of your eCommerce store, keep these things in mind: 

• CMS

While product, category and home pages are standard ones, they aren’t enough for your store to be qualitative. You’ll also need to add terms and conditions, privacy policy, return policy information, FAQ, and the like. 

These are known as CMS pages and can be added easily from the admin panel. Sure, you can add basic pages on your own. However, if you want to get them customized, you’ll need professional help. 

• Blog

When it comes to the blog, it can become quite a bit complicated. eCommerce stores can work without a blog. However, having one would be a powerful method to attract customers. Also, search engines prefer long articles with pictures and tables. And then, quality content helps people establish trust in you. So, make sure you do it right. 

Marketing

Magento provides massive possibilities for managing the marketing and promotion of products. If you’re using the OpenSource edition, you can allow your customers to add products to the wishlist, zoon the pictures, send products to friends, see the Recently Viewed block, get discounts, and more. 

The Paid Commerce edition offers you advanced options, like sorting the catalogue by the most popular products with a click, having multiple site views for varying customers, creating promotions by segment, and more. 

Magento 2 Editions

Presently, Magento is offering three distinct options. You can have Magento OpenSource, which is free of cost. You have Commerce Starter and Commerce Pro editions, which are paid. The free one comprises a majority of useful features that you’d need for your store. For example, it lets you create a variety of product types, offer discounts, sort buyers into groups and more.

 The Magento Commerce Starter comprises all of the free features along with extra, paid ones, such as exclusive private sales, reward points, wish lists, and more. It also has 24 x 7 email support and cloud-hosting by Magento. 

The third one has an extensive range of features and contains all of the functionalities of the previous two packages along with more, like a personal launch manager, isolated hardware, multi-server setup, etc. 

Features

Magento 2 has an extensive range of features out of the box. If you need something that isn’t included in Magento by default, you can check out them as extensions. Often, merchants purchase advanced layered navigation to enhance the native one. 

This, in turn, adds a variety of useful features, such as filters dashboard, filters block, horizontal filter bar, and more. Another popular feature is Shop by brand. It lets your customers search for products through brands by adding adequate products in a navigation block. 

Integrations

Coming to integrations, here’s what you can look for: 

• CRM Integration

You must decide whether you’d like to integrate your Magento store into any third-party CRM or not. 

• Shipping Integration

In terms of shipping, Magento supports Free shipping, Flat Rate, Table Rate, FedEx, DHL, and UPS. 

• Payment Integration

You must define the method of receiving payments. With Magento, you have a variety of default payment methods, such as PayPal, Braintree, COD, Money Order, Bank Transfer Payment, Zero Subtotal Checkout, Purchase Order, Authorize.net, and more. 

Testing

Testing is an essential aspect of launching a Magento 2 store. Thus, make sure you test every page of the site thoroughly. Start with checking the design of the site. Visit every page and ensure all of the elements have been placed as per the layout. 

Then, check all the buttons and links on every page to ensure they’re leading to the right page and are clickable. Do the same for all the banners on the site. Also, don’t forget the search bar. Make sure the search button is working, and the input is validating the search. 

Likewise, check the header, site navigation, cart, checkout process, registration, account, blocks, forms, responsiveness, and other important elements. 

Easy Way to Build a Magento Store: HumCommerce

Once you’ve decided to develop a Magento store for your website, be ready to invest a lot of effort and time into this project. However, if you think you aren’t ready for it or don’t have enough knowledge, turn to HumCommerce. 

HumCommerce offers comprehensive Magento development solutions, eradicating the need to do anything manually. From HumCommerce, you can rest assured of performance audit & optimization, migration services, theme & extension development, UI/UX design, customization services, eCommerce consulting, SEO services, and more.

Last Words

Now that you’re ready to sell products on the internet, having a well-defined and optimized Magento platform is the need of the hour. So, when doing so, keep all of the important points in mind. 

If you think you don’t have subpar technical knowledge, you can seek assistance from a team of professionals, such as the one found at HumCommerce. 

The post 10 Important points you should consider when planning a Magento 2 store appeared first on HumCommerce.