To be most successful however you need to follow a few simple rules so that you can get the desired response from your ecommerce customers.

Try not to have too many steps in your sales order process

It has been proved that there is a direct correlation between the number of clicks a person has to make in order to complete a purchase and the volume of people who abandon their shopping cart before checking out.

You need to make the checkout process as simple as possible on your ecommerce web site so that potential customers are not discouraged easily through poor navigation.

Ensure customers are aware of stock levels

Make sure that customers can check the availability of stock early on in the sales process.

You will find that there is nothing more annoying to customers than to get to the end of the checkout process only to find that their items are not available. It is a sure bet they will find another site to order from and never return to yours.

Ensure web browser compatibility

Make sure you view your site in a variety of browsers to ensure that it is presented correctly. As a minimum you should view it in Internet Explorer and Firefox, these being the two most commonly used.

Use a reliable merchant account provider

Ensure you pick a merchant account provider who accepts a wide range of credit cards and also debit cards and online checks.

Having done the hard work of gaining the customer you do not want to lose them simply because they cannot use their favorite payment method.

Double check your hyperlinks

Make sure that all the hyperlinks work on your site and that they click through to the correct destinations. Broken links give customers the impression of a poorly constructed, amateur site.

Simplify your graphics

Well constructed graphics do look very effective on your site but you must ensure that they are optimised for the web.

This means that you have to use a graphics program such as Adobe Photoshop or Macromedia Fireworks to reduce the file size to ensure that your web pages do not take too long to load.

This exercise becomes a balancing act between quality versus file size but usually a good compromise can be obtained.

Create a straightforward checkout process

The final stage of your ecommerce process is also the most nervous for your customer. You need to ensure that your customer is comforted that you have a safe and secure payment process in which they can entrust their personal details.

You need to have your website hosted on a secure server and Secure Socket Layering (SSL) enabled. Tell your customers about the security arrangements you have in place on your ecommerce web site in order to protect their personal information.

Use the tips outlined above to your advantage, you will get a head start on your competitors.

Learn from the experience Trevor Sadowski has gained in developing web sites by obtaining a copy of his free ecommerce mini course