7 Things You Are Doing Wrong as an Online Vendor
E-commerce is a goldmine, full of opportunities for every vendor to thrive. Whether you have a large inventory or not, making sales online has many benefits.
However, if you’re not making sales – or not making enough – online, then there might be things you’re doing wrong as an online vendor. And figuring them out will go a long way toward helping you turn around your numbers quickly.
This article discusses seven things you’re probably doing wrong that hinder your success as an online vendor.
7 Things You Are Doing Wrong as an Online Vendor
Inadequate Product Descriptions
A clear and concise product description is vital to making sales online. Inadequate or unclear descriptions will leave your prospective customers confused and uncertain about your products’ features, specifications, and benefits.
Product descriptions are vital information that customers spend their time assessing before making a purchase. They want to know every tiny detail about a product, from color to size, weight, and texture. This gets them to familiarize themselves with the product and understand how it fits into their world. Vendors who give clear and detailed product descriptions leave no room for customers to second-guess or wonder if a product meets their expectations.
Using Low-Quality Images
Your product images might be one of the reasons you’re not making enough sales online. When it comes to online purchases, the quality of your images determines how much visibility your products get. High-quality images would always attract people’s attention and get them to pause and spend a moment admiring and assessing a product.
Images are vital for online purchases. They help the buyer create a mental picture of how the products will appear in real life. If prospective customers can visualize how your product will fit into their lives, the sale is halfway made. That’s why you must invest in taking high-quality images of your products before making them available online.
Beyond taking high-quality images, you must create images displaying the products in use to give your customers a view of what to expect. You must avoid using random pictures from the internet to represent your products because, no matter how authentic and better your products are, using the same photos as your competitors limits their visual impact.
Hidden or Unclear Product Pricing
Do you post images of your products online and ask interested customers to DM (direct message) you for prices? Do you state the price of your products only to give different quotes when customers start messaging you? If yes, you might be losing lots of sales because of that.
Many Nigerian vendors refuse to display product prices and increase or decrease them at will based on their perception of their customers’ worth. Imagine what happens when someone buys a product from you only to meet someone later who bought the same product from you at a massive price difference. That is one of the biggest reputation destroyers in online sales. It shows you’re not to be trusted as you’re not transparent with your prices, which might also mean your product qualities are not what you say.
To maintain a good reputation, vital for success in e-commerce, you must ensure your product prices are clearly stated from the onset. Apart from showing you as a straightforward and sincere vendor, it also helps you sieve out low-value customers, as only those who can afford your price will reach out.
Enforcing a No Refund Policy
Have you ever bought or tried to buy something from a vendor that doesn’t accept returns? How did you feel about it?
No refund policy is the perfect way to say, “I can’t guarantee the quality of my products,” or “getting your money is all I care about; your satisfaction is none of my business.”
Your reasons for adopting a No refund policy might be genuine, as some customers can be problematic by demanding refunds with even the flimsiest excuses. However, the policy does more harm to your business than good. It shows you’re untrustworthy and that doing business with you is a huge gamble.
Posting Only Positive Reviews
While positive reviews are good for building customer trust, allowing negative ones on your page shows you’re real and capable of handling difficult situations.
With the rise in the purchase of product ratings and reviews online, you need a couple of negative reviews to prove to your target customers that you are real. Too many positive reviews and not one negative review come off as a scam to most Nigerians. You wouldn’t blame them; the rise of online vendor scams has made everyone cautious about online purchases.
You can sometimes fall out with your customers, deliver the wrong or defective product, or make any other mistake that would result in negative reviews. Your ability to handle these situations and ensure the customer is satisfied will determine whether a prospective customer can trust you.
Poor Customer Service
One of the key advantages of online sales is the ability of your customers to reach you on all channels, including emails, social media, websites, contact lines, etc. However, it is also one of the most overwhelming aspects of e-commerce. Receiving inquiries and complaints from several platforms simultaneously can be frustrating.
The moment you start ignoring customer inquiries, providing slow responses, or refusing to address customer concerns, you’re leaving your customers unsatisfied and, at the same time, risking damaging your reputation. You must find a way to give your customers prompt and personalized attention, which is key to your success as an online vendor.
Not Using a Secure Payment Option
If you don’t have a secure payment option for your business, your target customers will find it hard to buy from you. Trust is an expensive commodity in e-commerce; you shouldn’t expect it from people who have had negative experiences or heard tales of online vendor scams.
Instead of providing your account details or giving your customers a non-secured payment link, the best way to get your customers to pay without hassle is to involve an online escrow service.
Conclusion
Running an online business is challenging, especially in Nigeria, where there are tons of tales of online vendor scams. You must make the moves to distinguish yourself from other online vendors to win the trust of your prospects easily. An excellent way to do this is to adopt a reputable escrow service, such as Peppa.io, in your business.
Peppa.io provides efficient and trusted online escrow services to buyers and sellers online, including on social media. We understand how important a reliable middleman is in the Nigerian e-commerce space, especially with the numerous scam reports, and we’re promising you a transparent and reliable escrow service.
