How to open an online gift shop

Today, it is popular among people to give gifts for a variety of reasons, or even just like that. According to some studies, the average person spends 5% of their budget on gifts, which indicates that this niche is in demand and promising. On the other hand, statistics unambiguously indicate a constant increase in the percentage of purchases made via the Internet. This trend prompts many entrepreneurs to start creating and promoting their own online gift shop. However, whether the new online store of gifts and souvenirs will be successful and profitable depends on various factors and decisions made.

For your company to be successful and guarantee a stable income, you need to figure out how to open an online gift shop from scratch . A step-by-step instruction for the entire process of implementing a business selling gifts online consists of several key stages:

1.     Choosing a strategy, as well as solving organizational issues before creating your own website.
2.     How to properly design and create a website where gifts will be sold.
3.     What should you pay attention to after the online store has started working.

In order to win the choice of customers and encourage them to buy presents from you, you should responsibly and carefully approach each of the stages of creating, launching and operating an online gift store. Let's talk specifically about what to do and in what sequence.

Features of the gift market

Having made the decision to create your own online gift store, you should not just copy the approaches applied to standard online platforms for the sale of household appliances, clothing, perfumery, food or anything else. The creation of an online gift shop has certain features and nuances that should be taken into account. When developing a strategy for your own business, pay attention to the following features and nuances of the market:

• Choose your assortment carefully. If most of the products you will be offering are no different from the range of your competitors, your new online store will have little chance of success. To win the consumer's choice, try to offer them a unique product, or at least one that is still few in your area. To do this, be creative and carefully approach the search for suppliers.
• Consider seasonality. Although people buy gifts every day, the demand for them increases in anticipation of national holidays. Make for yourself a list of "hot" dates on which people are especially active in giving gifts to each other - try to buy goods before these dates. In this case, you will avoid the fact that, due to the download, suppliers will not be able to quickly send the order. The product in stock during the period of greatest demand will become your serious plus in the eyes of buyers.
• Decide on the price segment. As we noted above, people give each other a variety of gifts - for some it is quite possible to present a diamond necklace or a luxurious car as a presentation. Nevertheless, today inexpensive gifts and souvenirs are in great demand . Therefore, thinking over the assortment, you should not chase high prices - by offering souvenirs or simple gifts, you will win a large audience of loyal customers.
• Think carefully about your packaging . When choosing a present for a holiday , most clients strive for the appearance of the gift to be worthy and attractive. If your online store offers not only interesting things, but also their festive packaging, this will become a serious competitive advantage. In addition, having received a gift in a beautiful branded packaging, a person may also want to become your client - and, after all, this is exactly what you need!

Don't neglect the issue of quality . To keep customers coming back to you again and again, offer high quality products. Thanks to this, customers will be happy with their purchase, they will definitely use your online store again and will recommend it to others.

What to do before creating an online store of gifts and souvenirs

If you have decided to start a business selling gifts on the Internet, of course, you cannot do without your own website. However, you do not need to immediately contact the programmers so that they create a website for you and ensure its promotion . There are a number of issues that need to be addressed before you even have your own website. The main issues include the following:

1.     Supplier search.
2.     Assortment of the store.
3.     Business registration.
   
   

Find a supplier

This issue deserves priority attention

For the assortment of your online store to be in demand, it must meet the needs and expectations of customers. If a client, having entered the site, does not find there something that will interest him, it is unlikely that you will have a second chance. Likewise, if a person buys a gift, but remains dissatisfied with it, it is most likely that he will never go to a certain site again. In order to offer interesting, high-quality and inexpensive presentations, it is worth choosing suppliers carefully. Here are three ideas on how to find people to work with:

1. Companies specializing in wholesales. As a rule, such organizations offer a fairly large assortment of goods at wholesale prices. In particular, cooperation with wholesale suppliers will be beneficial before various holidays, when the demand for gifts increases dramatically.
2. Small Chinese manufacturers. Often, when thinking about shopping in China, large Internet sites come to mind, in which many people buy. If you make an effort and find less well-known suppliers, you can save money and, moreover, get a product that is unique on the market.
3. Collaboration with hand made masters. The advantage of this option of working with suppliers may be that your product will be unique in the market. In addition, today many people highly value handmade goods, so such gifts can be very much in demand by your customers.

Shop assortment

A well-designed assortment is a must for a profitable gift shop. It is recommended to work through the assortment of goods even before creating an online gift shop , thanks to this, programmers will be able to register all the necessary sections, categories and subsections even at the design and development stage of the site. The assortment of an online gift store may include the following main areas.

Souvenir products . It may seem that you won't surprise anyone with mugs, magnets, souvenir spoons and plates, but many buyers expect to see such things in an online gift store, so they must be present in your catalog.

Items that are useful in the household . Today there is a fairly high demand for practical things that will not just stand on the shelf, but can be actively used in everyday life: wall clocks, vases, all kinds of coasters, pens, diaries, etc. the online store specializes in gifts, so you should give priority to beautiful and interesting things.

Hand made gifts . Many people highly value various things that are not made at a factory, but by a master himself. Today, the handicraft category can include anything from sweets to table setting items, from soap and candles to notebooks and bags. Of course, handmade gifts are not so easy to pick up so that a person would like them, but if the giver hits the target, such a gift will be simply unforgettable.

Impression gifts . Surely you will agree that good gifts do not always have to be some things. For example, there are people who, it seems, have everything - what to present to them as a gift, your clients can reflect. Therefore, in the online store, you can create a section with gifts-impressions. There you can offer: skydiving, hot air ballooning, scuba diving, organizing a dinner in a picturesque place, etc.

Flowers . Although you do not have a flower shop, we recommend that you have this category on your website. The fact is that bouquets and flower arrangements are quite often purchased as an addition to the main present.

  Festive attributes . Place in your catalog a category containing all kinds of proposals for organizing the holidays: balloons, cards, hats and clothes for the holidays, numbers and candles for cakes.

IP creation

Depending on the state, the process and requirements for registering a business may differ. Experts recommend going from simple to complex in this matter. If you are just planning to open an online store, it will be enough to register an individual entrepreneur (PE). And as the company develops, the form of doing business can be changed. In different countries, the requirements for registration of entrepreneurial activity may differ - in order to obtain complete information about the requirements and the required package of documents, you can consult with local authorities. In most cases, a passport, identification code and tax payment will be enough for registration.

Structure for a gift site

An online store is a combination of a good range of products at attractive prices and a well-designed website. The owners of the company have several options on how to get a high-quality Internet resource:

1.     You can use one of the many website builders to create your own website.
2.     You can contact a company specializing in website development or an individual who will create a turnkey online store.

When developing a website for the sale of gifts and related products, it is important to pay attention to various aspects - to take care of the availability of all the necessary categories, the necessary tools to ensure effective promotion of the resource, and also to develop a suitable design. Each of these stages should be approached as responsibly and scrupulously as possible, it depends on how attractive the site will be in the eyes of visitors and how profitable for its owners.

Much of what the developers are working on remains invisible to site visitors, but its design is the first thing that customers will pay attention to. Therefore, the development of an online gift shop must necessarily include a carefully designed design - what should it be? It is important that the site matches the mood with which the majority of visitors come to it as much as possible. When a person picks up a gift, they usually have a festive mood at that moment. Therefore, try to design your site in bright colors that blend harmoniously with each other. Thanks to this, you, as if, will be on the same wavelength with the visitors, which initially will attract many people and encourage them to take advantage of your offer.

Make sure your online store is as user-friendly as possible. A good tool for this is a convenient product filtration system. Alternatively, you can use the following filters to select products:

1.     Purpose - for whom the gift is selected.
2.     Interests - what the person is interested in (fishing, travel, housekeeping, exquisite things, etc.).
3.     Reason - use the filter for what reason the present is given (anniversary, graduation, gift for loved ones, birthday, etc.).
4.     Gift type - give visitors the opportunity to filter what they want to pick up (books, paintings, gadgets, etc.).

A large number of online stores of various types are already operating on the OkayCMS system. Many users and programmers note that one of the key advantages of our system is the ability to quickly create and configure all the necessary categories and functionality of the site on the site.

Don't think that a great assortment is all that is needed for good sales. When developing a website, you need to make sure that it is easy for customers to take advantage of your offer. There are different tools in this question:

• Work out conversion forms. Make it possible to correspond with the manager in the chat, think over a convenient shopping cart, a simple order form with a minimum number of fields to fill out, the buttons "buy in 1 click" and "We will call you back in 30 seconds" work well.
• Create an effective USP. In a few lines, describe the advantages and benefits of cooperation with your online store - this is done in order to encourage the visitor to take advantage of the offer.

For a site to be most effective, it must have a clear, well-understood structure - the easier it is for a visitor to find a product of interest, the more likely it is that a person will become your client. Alternatively, the structure of an online gift store may contain approximately the following categories, which are shown in the screenshot above:

•   All gifts.
•   Gifts for women.
•   Presents for men.
•   Gifts for children.
•   Party suggestions.
•   Gifts that differ in purpose (holidays, interests, professions, etc.).

You should not just copy the structure of the site from other online gift shops, it is better to develop it individually. To determine the optimal structure for your website, analyze what product groups you will have and what target audience you are targeting. It is important that the structure of the online store fully covers the two above-mentioned areas.

What to do after opening an online store

Opening your own online store is a joyful and important event, but you shouldn't stop there. The goal of every commercial site is not just for it to exist - such a site should be profitable. In order for gifts to be actively bought, a steady stream of customers must be provided to the site. In addition, it is desirable that the majority of visitors to the online store are the target audience - people who now want to buy a gift. How do you get the target audience of customers to visit your site? Let's consider 3 effective ways:

1. Contextual advertising. Using advertising on Google or Yandex allows you to immediately attract visitors to the site. Due to the possibility of flexible customization, you can achieve ad impressions to the maximum target audience, which increases the percentage of sales from impressions. The disadvantage of context is the relatively high cost per ad display, which tends to increase. In addition, in most cases, in order to properly configure contextual advertising, you have to contact specialists, whose services are quite expensive.
2. SEO promotion. According to market experts, SEO promotion is the most effective and profitable option for attracting customers. "Correct" SEO implies complex work on sites, which makes it attractive for both visitors and search engines. The disadvantage of SEO promotion is that it takes time to get results - depending on the site, from two to six months. This situation can be solved due to the fact that, when launching a site, in parallel to promote it and use contextual advertising. As the resource gains positions in organic search results, the context can be gradually reduced and eventually turned off altogether.
3. Social networks. A fairly large number of people actively use various social networks - the owners of online gift shops should not neglect this. It is worthwhile to purposefully search for clients on social networks. Of course, this is additional work, you may even need to find another employee on the staff to work with social services. networks, but the results are worth it. It's worth starting with creating and maintaining pages in several popular social networks. When the page is created and started to fill, it is worth taking the opportunity to advertise your posts, attracting customers.

Indeed, in order to have an online gift shop, you need to make an effort, invest in the development of your own business and spend time on it. As a reward, you can get a business that will not only bring you a stable income, but will also make you happy!