Top 6 Reasons Why Your Business Needs To Go Online During The Times of COVID-19

Debarpita Sen
Shiprocket
Published in
4 min readJun 17, 2020
Importance of taking your business online

The COVID-19 global pandemic has become one of the defining events of 2020. The situation is rapidly changing. People no longer step out of their homes to purchase even the household items amid fears of the spread of coronavirus. Starting from purchasing products in bulk to online shopping, people are changing what they are buying, and how they are buying.

In such a scenario, businesses are trying their best to adapt to the changing purchase behavior of their customers. Starting from doing hyperlocal deliveries to contactless deliveries, they are doing everything to stay ahead in the game. Most importantly, more and more businesses are now going online to reach a wider audience. If you have still not taken your offline store online, here are the top 6 reasons why you must do this as soon as possible-

Reaching out to Customers — During the global pandemic of COVID-19, all of us are advised to stay indoors. In this situation, offline sales have been reduced drastically. People no longer want to step out of their homes to purchase items. Instead, shopping online for essential items has become the new normal.

According to Statista, global online sales are expected to reach $4.2 trillion in 2020 and is expected to grow further as we move deeper into the year.

This data clearly shows the increasing number of people interested in online shopping and why it is important for you to take your business online. You have got a behemoth of users out there looking for shopping for anything and everything online. This is the best time to tap that market.

Improving Brand Image — This alone should be enough reason to start a new website and begin selling online. It’s an extremely important factor considering that without a website, blog, or online presence, prospective clients could begin to wonder how serious you are about business. Today, companies of all sizes and industries are establishing an online presence, especially because online shopping has now become the new normal.

If you don’t have an online presence then you can’t expect your prospects to take you seriously and you will lose business to competitors that might have an effective online presence. Quite frankly, you need to have an online presence because your prospects and customers expect you to have one.

Staying Available 24*7 — A key benefit of having an eCommerce website is that your clients and prospects can read about your products and place orders at any time — day or night. On regular business days or holidays. Imagine what being open 3–4 times longer could do for your business.

Given the fact that offline sales have taken a major hit, you can generate leads and inquiries even when your physical store is closed and follow up with those prospects and customers once you open the next day. Many people will want to do their research at the end of the day when your store, but your website can operate and your 24*7 salesperson to answer questions and generate leads (or sales).

Reducing Operation Costs — Just one single task can make a significant difference in cost savings. For example, receiving orders online reduces the need for customer service staff. Moreover, during these times of COVID-19, many companies are already facing a shortage of staff.

A really good sales video, sales letter, or online webinar presentation can replace a full-time salesperson.

Making use of various online service providers, you can now take all aspects of your business online, such as purchasing, billing, order fulfillment, and shipping.

Working From Anywhere — Taking your business online gives you the ability to have location freedom so you can live and work from anywhere you want; you’re not stuck to a physical location.

As long as you have a solid internet connection you can live virtually anywhere while you conduct your online business. You can comfortably be at your home and run your online business.

Live where you want to, and let your business adapt to your lifestyle instead of the other way around.

The Internet Is Made For Business — The beauty of the internet is that your prospective client(s) can literally be just one click away from your online store. Through the internet, you can now educate, instruct, and solve clients’ problems. You can accept orders and payments and receive them directly to your inbox.

You’ll want to learn about new effective and inexpensive ways to drive traffic to your website; the more people who find you online the more leads and sales you’ll make.

These are challenging times for businesses, but the ones that are adapting to the changing needs of their customers are the ones winning over!

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Debarpita Sen
Shiprocket

eCommerce Trends Follower | Marketing Specialist at Shiprocket | Journalist-turned-Content-Marketer