Getting Your Online Store Ready For Back To School Shopping

As we pointed out in our last blog, back to school shopping season is here! On September 3^rd, schools all over Canada will fill back up with students and a new school year will begin. Our last blog highlighted a few reasons why gift cards make such excellent back to school gifts. Giving young people opportunities to purchase whatever they need to get ready for the new school year is certainly a great gift.

Never let it be lost on you that many young people prefer online shopping to the in-person traditional way of buying things. So, while you’ll certainly want to make gift cards available in your store, you’ll also want to ensure that your online store is both user-friendly and ready to accept payments from students everywhere.

Choose a design that’s easy for anyone to navigate.

Does your website need a little sprucing up? If you’re looking to attract students to your site for their back to school shopping needs, you’ll need to make sure it’s easy to use. As 3dcart.ca explains, you don’t necessarily need to be an experienced designer to put your website together. But you still want the site to be as easy to navigate as it is filled with highly sought-after supplies.

“You need a software platform that includes plenty of premade templates, which you can customize on some level to match the needs of your business,” the site notes, “In fact, you don’t really need any design experience—and you don’t necessarily have to hire a designer to help. To save a lot of time, you can opt for a kids website template that comes ready-to-use.”

Give your visitors good experiences.

Naturally, you’ll need to do more than simply lure back to school shoppers to your online store. As ShipGooder.com tells us, you also want to ensure that your site provides key information to its visitors. There are some features that are practical must-haves if you want to both attract and satisfy back to school shoppers.

They include an upfront returns policy (which gives shoppers more confidence to make purchases), the ability to track shipments (96 percent of Canadian online shoppers track their online purchases, says the site) and estimated delivery dates.

“Shoppers want to know when their purchase will arrive before they click ‘buy’,” reads ShipGooder.com, “Back-to-school shopping is timely — people don’t want to wait indefinitely for their order. Be sure to offer your customers estimated delivery dates at checkout so they can shop confidently.”

Offer free or discounted shipping.

Few things entice online sales more than free shipping. When you remove or reduce this additional cost from the transactions, it inspires people to follow through on their purchases. In many cases, high shipping costs cause online shoppers to abandon their carts.

“Keep in mind that 63% of shoppers will complete their online purchase when offered free shipping at checkout,” reveals ShipGooder.com, “This tactic has become common practice. In fact, 71% of merchants offered a free shipping option in 2016.”

Is your online store ready for back to school shoppers? Call Canadian POS at 1-877-748-2884 or email us at info@localhost and ask us about how you can take advantage of our safe and secure e-commerce solution!