It will be both a convenient and popular belief that the pandemic forced people to optimize the ecommerce revenue stream. Truth however is that the fast internet and evolution of smartphones led to a massive rise in the trend of purchasing things online. The pandemic only gave it a booster. Having presence online was merely a marketing tool no more than a decade back but the eruption of consumer internet has changed the game on its head and now ecommerce is more mainstream than the mainstream commerce.
What Makes WordPress the Go-To Platform for Ecommerce Enthusiasts?
A large chunk of the websites are still running on WordPress as we discuss. This means that the platform is not just a go-to for ecommerce enthusiasts, it is a preferred one for all business enthusiasts. The open source platform is very much popular among developers due to its ease of learning and wider compatibility. The wealth of plug-ins have enhanced the experience even further with the likes of Shopify & BigCommerce offering a complete solution to the clients without having to build their own infrastructure. But there is nothing like building your own online store right from the scratch.
What would be the must-haves for you if you were to build an online store in 2022? Apart from the technologies, what other trends do companies follow to attract maximum traffic? What could the future be for ecommerce? Let us dive a little deep into the omnipresent WordPress features and trends that you must try in 2022.
Social Media Integration
Social media drives a huge traffic through the funnel and its integration to your online store can do magic for you in more ways than you can think of. Just how we do it at an actual store, showing your favorite goods or apparels to your friends or someone accompanying you is always a popular practice. Allowing users to share the product through multiple social media buttons is a common feature these days. Just like sharing music playlists, pictures and posts, people surely love to share what they are going to buy or are buying. Adding multiple social media buttons can add layers to your web store.
Tight Security
With transactions of millions of dollars processed every day, it becomes essential for ecommerce websites to have a secure payment experience. Some plug-ins do provide built-in security features but if you are building your portal from the scratch, you need SSL/TLS certificate and strong firewall protection to be PCI compliant. But more than that, choosing a right agency that provides apt wordpress ecommerce development services that provide strong and secure hosting, provide regular updates and maintain permission settings are some crucial first steps.
E-Commerce plug-ins
Many stores or product manufacturers do not have the resources to build their own platform right from the scratch and maintain the aforementioned security measures. Developers have come up with specialized plug-ins for these customers. All you need to do is to put the content related to your products on the portal and you are good to go. No hassle for design and coding at all. Developers have also come up with payment gateway plug-ins that help you comply with the standardization and offer a smooth and secure payment experience for your consumers in case you wish to design your own platform and use just the payment plug-ins.
Exciting Content
An age old strategy to drive business traffic has been to produce engaging content. Shopping is a very unique human practice which does not have standard prerequisites. You could be reading, listening or watching an exciting piece of content and decide to buy something mentioned in that blog, video or podcast. Blogs can result in a 434% increase in indexed pages and a 97% increase in indexed links. This is a very popular trend and has been practiced by web portals for years. Producing regular and engaging content is the key to any ecommerce website.
Top Notch Hero Banner
Just how you would put your best products on your best shelf, your developers must help you put your best products on the most visible space on your website. The huge banner that appears right on the home page is fondly referred to as the hero banner. Just as the name suggests, the hero banner attracts your consumers and navigates them to the products you want them to see the most. These products can be anything from the best sellers to the ones with the best margins for you or the new arrivals. Having a unique and attractive hero banner is a must.
Countdown for offers
Survey results show that showing urgency in your communication can result in less cart abandonment and a better conversion rate. This countdown ticker is a clock that you can place on emails or product pages which can notify the customers about how and when a certain offer is expiring. There will always be some reason for companies to offer discounts and run a sale period. To put a countdown adds to the alertness and overall urgency to buy for the customers. It is a popular trend and is widely accepted by both developers as well as companies.
The Final Word
WordPress is a sky full of possibilities and remains a very popular platform for developers. The subsequent ripple effect of being a popular platform resulted in formation of a large community. This community often holds engagements with each other and discusses queries and come up with unique solutions. One of the best results of such community engagement is the range of plug-ins that they have come up with. Knowing the right balance between creating your own bespoke infrastructure on WordPress and incorporating the best plug-ins can culminate in powerful ecommerce platforms that drive businesses.
