Not overlooking the small things in online integration

We've often touted the advantages of adopting online systems in retail businesses. 

Taking this route improves accessibility, customer engagement, and can even aid in cutting costs if properly implemented. With that in mind, some seemingly small aspects of taking your business online can get overlooked.

Since missing the mark can cause serious negative long-term repercussions to the success of your business, we thought we'd explore a few simple methods to aid in building your digitally progressive brand.

Building online/offline compatibility

Having an online presence is a practical necessity, but too often we're happy to simply build a store and call it a day.

While this is an easy approach, it's also one that leaves a lot of potential on the table. Instead, what retailers could instead aim for is a way to connect both their online accounts and physical locations.

There are many methods to accomplish this feat, the basics of which include a simple customer loyalty system tied to promotions and special features.

According to Hubspot, this approach can help deliver added value and build relationships with customers, even if it's the first time they've stepped foot in your store. In terms of payments, businesses could also look into systems like Android Pay, which could help centralise and streamline online and offline purchases.

Businesses could even take a more extravagant route, using a robotic assistant like those from Tokinomo to bring the relationship to the next level. While these systems are still in their infancy, their promise could be immense.

An assistant like this could point shoppers in the direction of their favourite goods in-store, recommend new brands, or just serve as a point of curiosity.

Ensuring flexibility on mobile platforms

In 2022 we're long past the time where desktops and laptops are the only way to connect to online storefronts.

According to current stats from Techjury, mobiles now count for more than half of internet traffic, sitting at 52%. Online stores in the US receive 35% of their traffic from mobiles, with the total number of smartphone users globally reaching 3.8 billion.

With this amount of interest from the mobile market, most businesses have already operated a mobile-compatible online storefront for years. That said, not all mobile websites are created equal.

Upgrading older systems to HTML5, for example, is a modern requirement. Properly utilised, this newer technology ensures that websites scale properly to a range of old and new mobiles, while also offering full functionality.

Getting to checkout and having the website crash isn't too uncommon on older systems, and it can turn customers off your business permanently.

To illustrate this step done right, consider how a service like the slots Betway offers works. Not only does the website itself resize and scale to mobile systems, but all the games like Lucky Clucks and Arena of Gold similarly work without issue, even on older phones.

Similar praise could be given to one of the big retail sites like Etsy. Streamlined so effectively, nobody who wants to access this website on mobile will miss out, and that's incredibly important for maintaining customer engagement.

Going social

Finally, no modern retailer is going to be able to fulfil its potential without leveraging the juggernaut that is the social media sphere.

At the very least, a page on Facebook with basic contact information is indispensable for demonstrating a degree of modern aptitude. From there, services like Instagram and Twitter can also help if your business relies on visual components or quick sales respectively.

We've seen many established small businesses ignore this corner of the market, still managing to perform well on more traditional forms of visibility, but such an approach mitigates maximum performance.

Starting and updating social media presences can require only a small time investment, and it can lead to enormous boons to visibility and throughput if implemented correctly.

With these different components in mind, you should have some idea of updates and upgrades that your business could turn to. Just know that, while there is a definite learning curve, these ideas and systems are all well past the prototype phase.

Today, they're all extremely user-friendly, and the market is competitive enough that implementation is often cheap and easily scalable. Remember to take your time, make room for the occasional mistake, and there's no telling the benefits these paths could provide.