How to start an ecommerce business

With 60 million ecommerce users in 2022, the UK has the most advanced ecommerce market in Europe.

And according to Grand View Research’s industry report the global B2B ecommerce market is expected to grow by 18.7% from 2021 to 2028, to £9.43 trillion.

Yet despite the ecommerce sector’s huge growth, there are challenges you need to be ready to face as you venture into the online realm.

The recession is undoubtedly forcing consumers to be more careful with their spending, so many buyers will be more selective about what they treat themselves to online.

You also need to factor in rising business costs before you get going, including huge hikes in manufacturing and supply chain prices.

While all this certainly presents some challenges, it also serves up some exciting opportunities for entrepreneurs – particularly if you’re looking to set up your own ecommerce business.

Read on to find out how, in just 10 simple steps.

Step 1: Choose your ecommerce business model

Since you’re here, we’ll assume you already have at least the faintest stirrings of an idea. What are you passionate about? What, exactly, are you going to sell? Who will you sell it to?

We’ll get to developing those ideas in a bit more detail soon, but first you’ll need to look at the how. We’re talking, of course, about your business model and logistics – the very foundations your startup will be built on. So which ecommerce model is right for you?

The traditional business models are as follows:

• B2B (Business-to-business): Businesses selling services or goods online, directly to other businesses. Examples of big ecommerce businesses that rely on this model include VoIP phone provider RingCentral and CRM software company Salesforce.
• B2C (Business-to-consumer): The most common form of ecommerce, this involves online sales from businesses to individuals. ASOS, HelloFresh, and Tenzing are all examples of successful B2C brands.
• C2C (Consumer-to-consumer): This form of ecommerce involves online transactions between consumers. It’s usually facilitated by an intermediary platform, such as Etsy, PayPal, or eBay.
• C2B (Consumer-to-business): Popularised by freelancer hiring platform UpWork, this ecommerce model refers to consumers that provide services to businesses.

Deciding on your business model is the first step towards navigating that lucrative highway to ecommerce success. The right business model is like the car that’ll drive your business forward.

But before you can start putting some miles underneath your wheels, you’ll need an engine.

Step 3: Do your research

It’s time to put your research hat on, and dig up as much information as you can related to your chosen niche.

You’ll need to find out about:

Your competitors

Competition is a good thing – in all probability, no competition means no market. You can even see it as an advantage – though you’re entering the market as a less established business, you’re actually in a better place to exploit the gaps in your competitors’ service.

What do they do well? What are they not offering that you could be? What can you do better? Do your research well enough, and you’ll be in a position to hit the ground running.

Your audience

You’ll also need to understand exactly who you’re selling to. What demographic are you targeting? What’s their purchasing power? Why do they want your product?

Creating buyer personas will help with this. A buyer persona is a generalised, fictional representation of a demographic you’re looking to market to. You can inform these by reaching out to potential customers, and to people in your wider social circles.

A buyer persona should include that ‘individual’s’ background, key identifiers, goals, and challenges. It should also include a few bullet points as to how your product or service will meet their needs.

Getting familiar with your audience also sets your ecommerce business up for success further down the line.

Rosanna Nibbs, founder of Piqant

Your suppliers

You can’t set up an ecommerce business if you don’t have anyone supplying you with stock to sell. Now’s the time to research potential suppliers – collect as many quotes as you can, and decide which ones might be the right fit for your business model and value delivery method.

If you’re dropshipping, you’ll need information about a suppliers’ packaging and delivery methods, and the exact costs for these. If you’ve opted for a wholesaling approach, you’ll need somewhere to store your stock.

If your front room doesn’t qualify, you’ll need a warehouse (or at least some kind of space) to manage it all from, You’ll also need to balance any rental or storage costs against your business’ total budget.

Your products

When you’ve chosen a supplier, you’ll then need to select the specific items you want to make available via your own ecommerce store. In other words, pick products your users will be interested in!

Small-sized, higher value items generally have the best margins. They take up less space in a warehouse, where space = money – and if they can be sold at high volume, they make for a profitable product catalogue.

Once you’ve nailed your niche, sussed out the suppliers (and the competition!), and picked out some products, it’s time to put together a business plan.

Shipping in 2024

Various business challenges, such as the Covid-19 pandemic and Brexit, created some new difficulties.

Post-Brexit, the way UK businesses can trade with member states of the EU has changed. The cost, effort and associated time of moving goods between the EU and the UK has therefore increased.

Plus, the pandemic has also created delays in shipping goods internationally, as global supply chains became disrupted by various coronavirus safety measures.

All of this means that you need to stay updated and alert to increased costs when importing or exporting goods.

It might be a good idea to look specifically for UK suppliers for this reason, if you are UK-based, as it will likely be more expensive to outsource.

Step 4: Write an ecommerce business plan

Now you’ve got an idea about how your embryonic ecommerce business will look (and hopefully a few notes, too), it’s time to document it all in a formalised plan of attack.

This is called a business plan, but you can also see it as the blueprint for how you’re going to turn your idea into a fully-fledged enterprise. A business plan should lay out your mission and vision; it should outline exactly what you’re planning to do, and how you’re going to achieve it.

If your ecommerce venture requires finance to get it off the ground, a business plan is crucial in helping you secure this. So make it concise, make it meaningful, and don’t skimp on the details – or the passion – that investors want to see.

Step 5: Choose a legal status for your business

Now, you’ll need to decide what shape your fledgling ecommerce venture will take in the eyes of the government. This means formally registering your business with the UK authorities – declaring who’s in charge, where the profits will go, and who’s responsible for paying those inevitable taxes.

Your options here are to register as a:

• Sole trader (you’re solely liable for all profits… and all losses)
• Partnership (you’ll share management and profits with another person)
• Limited liability partnership (a partnership in which the company and its finances are a separate entity to your own)
• Limited liability company (A private company in which shareholder assets are protected, and shareholder liability to the company’s creditors is limited by the extent to which they invested)

The ins and outs of business structures in the UK – and how to choose the right one for your ecommerce business – are covered in much greater detail in our bumper guide. Alternatively, you can check out this blog post written by the government.

Step 6: Register and trademark your company name

Next, you’ll need to decide on a name, and design a logo that reflects your ecommerce business’ brand values and ethos.

When that’s done, you’ll have to register this information – plus details about your legal status, share structure, and business address – with the UK government.

You can do that here, and it costs £12 to register a limited company online.

You’ll also want to look at trademarking your business’ name. For £170, you’ll get protection for your business’ name and logo for ten years, protecting your brand from rip-off merchants.

You should ensure your ecommerce business’ chosen name is available first, before jumping straight into trademarking it. You can check your name’s eligibility for free here.

Now we’ve covered the admin, it’s time for the fun part..

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Step 7: Build your ecommerce businesses online shop

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BEST ALL ROUND	BEST SALES FEATURES
Wix	Shopify	Squarespace	Square Online	BigCommerce	GoDaddy
BEST FOR All-round ecommerce platform for small businesses	BEST FOR Best range of apps and extensions	BEST FOR Best for ease of use and great design	BEST FOR Best value – start selling for free	BEST FOR Best sales features	BEST FOR Creating a simple online store
Overall Score Based on our in-depth research and user testing 4.8	Overall Score Based on our in-depth research and user testing 4.6	Overall Score Based on our in-depth research and user testing 4.6	Overall Score Based on our in-depth research and user testing 4.3	Overall Score Based on our in-depth research and user testing 4.2	Overall Score Based on our in-depth research and user testing 3.9
Pricing £16-119 per month, billed annually £14.40-£107.10 with code “TAKE10”	Pricing £19 – £259 per month, billed annually £1 for first month	Pricing £17-£35 per month, billed annually Use code “SU10” to receive a 10% discount on all Squarespace plans	Pricing £0-£64 per month	Pricing $29-$299 (around £23-£240) per month	Pricing £12.99 per month (first term savings available)

It’s time to build your online shop. This step of the process is, understandably, a crucial one. It’s how you’ll find customers, and where you’ll convince them to part with their hard-earned cash.

In most cases, it’ll be the first, most significant (and probably only) point of contact a potential customer has with your brand. You’ll need your ecommerce business site to be easy to use, nice to look at, and well-optimised for the customer journey.

So, how do you create an online store that sells? Let’s break down your options, as you can either:

• Use an ecommerce website builder – check out our top picks here
• Use a CMS (Content Management System)  
• Code it yourself

Piqant website

Use an ecommerce website builder

We recommend creating your shop with an ecommerce website builder or ecommerce platform. Why?

Well for one, ecommerce platforms or website builders are the quickest, easiest route to creating a sleek, professional online presence for your ecommerce business. With drag-and-drop functionality and a range of preset templates, you can (quite literally) pull a website together in moments. We’ve rounded up the best options in our guide to the best ecommerce platforms for small business.

Once you’ve built your website, you’ll be able to manage stock and orders through it, and analyse your sales. You can add products to your site’s virtual catalogue, and install shopping cart functionality to enable users to browse it.

It’s also easy to set up multiple business email addresses, and connect your new site to your business’ domain name (if you already have one). If you don’t, you can read our guide to purchasing a domain name, or purchase one easily through your chosen ecommerce platform provider.

Which brings us to the big question… just how do you select a provider? Browse our top picks below to find the ecommerce website builder best suited to your business:

Spotlight on Wix

Visit our dedicated Wix ecommerce review.

Wix Ecommerce Platform

4.8

Our top ecommerce platform gives you a full arsenal of fantastic features and bags of creative freedom, all for a very affordable price.

Visit Wix

• FREE TRIAL 14 day money back guarantee
• PRICE FROM £16 per month, billed annually

• Flexible pricing plans
• Perfect solution if you want more creative freedom
• Great additional features that support everything any up and coming merchant needs

Summary Wix is the most popular website builder in the UK and our top recommendation for small businesses wanting to sell online - especially if they have relatively small inventories (20 products or fewer). When we say Wix really does have it all, we mean it. Its largely improved sales features now support multi-channels including Facebook and other marketplaces. The Light plan, at only £9 per month, comes equipped with 24/7 customer support, unlimited product showcasing and the option to sell on social channels. If you want further insight into your ecommerce business and control of where you can sell, the £119 per month Business Elite plan comes with customised reports, marketplace selling capabilities and priority customer care. However, despite the product priding itself on its ease of use, a rather steep learning curve is required, particularly when navigating set "ecom" functionalities.

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Spotlight on Shopify

Visit our dedicated Shopify ecommerce review.

Shopify Ecommerce Platform

4.6

Shopify’s superb features and extensive app market give ambitious ecommerce businesses everything they need to scale rapidly.

Try Shopify for free

• FREE TRIAL 3-day free trial
• PRICE FROM £19 per month

• Preempts and predicts what a merchant might need next in all aspects of creating a website
• Best range of apps and extensions
• Perfect for dropshipping

Summary Shopify is perfect for users looking for that all in one online store solution. Its ability to predict what a merchant will need next when creating a website is a brilliant feature, and its countless apps give you complete control over your business, enabling you to grow through diverse multi channel integration options and automated SMS and email marketing. It is definitely better suited to store owners with complex, larger inventories and because there are fewer built in features, using the platform can get expensive compared to other feature-filled competitors like Squarespace and Wix.

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Spotlight on Squarespace

Don’t forget that Startups users get 10% off all Squarespace plans using code SU10. Visit our dedicated Squarespace ecommerce review for more information.

Squarespace Ecommerce Platform

4.6

It might not have the best sales features, but Squarespace’s excellent editing tools make it quick and easy to get your online store up and running.

Try Squarespace

Squarespace Ecommerce full review

• FREE TRIAL 14-day free trial
• PRICE FROM £17 per month Use code "SU10" to receive a 10% discount on all Squarespace plans

• Ideal platform for digital sales i.e online events
• Our highest scorer for ease of use
• Use code "SU10" to receive a 10% discount on all Squarespace plans

Summary Squarespace's ecommerce offering has plenty of great selling points to keep its users happy. There have been huge UX improvements since we last tested the platform, moving from 3.4 to a 4.2 ease of use score. The ecommerce platform has also greatly improved its app store and customer support. Although it's the ideal platform for digital sales (where stock is not directly needed) it falls short when it comes to stock monitoring capabilities. It also has very limited ecommerce templates compared to other competitors like Wix, despite charging a higher monthly price of £17 per month on a Business plan.

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Spotlight on Square Online: our top free ecommerce website builder

Visit our dedicated Square Online ecommerce review.

Square Online Ecommerce Platform

4.3

The best platform to use if you want to start selling for free

Try Square Online

• Free plan Yes
• Price from £0 per month

• Start selling for free
• Excellent analytics
• Supports dozens of payment types

Summary Square Online is the only website builder that allows you to start selling products without upgrading to a paid plan. You’ll still have to pay a 1.9% transaction fee for every payment processed, but you won’t find a more cost-effective way of getting an online store up and running anywhere else. It’s a great way to get to grips with things before you upgrade to one of Square's premium plans, which start from £9/month.

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Spotlight on BigCommerce

Visit our dedicated BigCommerce review.

BigCommerce Ecommerce Platform

4.2

With the most comprehensive range of sales features around, BigCommerce gives you everything you need to create a fully-optimised online store

Try BigCommerce

• Free trial 15-day
• Price from $29 per month

• Quality in-built sales features
• Excellent SEO support
• Great for scaling businesses

Summary BigCommerce is the big budget option for small businesses with big ambitions. Its plans range from £23/month to £240/month. Quite pricey, but for that you’re getting access to the most extensive range of high-quality, in-built sales features on the market. The costlier the plan, the more advanced the functionality, of course – you also increase your sales allowance. This ranges from an upper limit of $50,000 on the Standard plan to a maximum of $400,000 on the Pro plan. And if your sales are likely to be higher than that, BigCommerce offers custom enterprise solutions. Just get in touch with its sales team to find out more.

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Spotlight on GoDaddy

Visit our dedicated GoDaddy website builder review.

GoDaddy Ecommerce Platform

3.9

A simple way to build an online store.

Try GoDaddy

• Free trial Yes
• Price from £12.99

• Easy to use
• Simple pricing
• Fairly good value

Summary It lacks sophisticated sales and design features, but GoDaddy is still one of the easiest ways to create an online store. It just has one ecommerce plan, for the reasonable price of £12.99 per month.

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Use a CMS (Content Management System)

You can also build your ecommerce business’ website around a CMS (Content Management System), such as WordPress. A CMS provides more flexibility when it comes to creating and showcasing your content, and offers more technical dynamism, too.

However, it will be a lot of work to get set up, and you’ll need to be relatively comfortable with coding and web design.

Building your website with a CMS has other great benefits, too. You can utilise a range of plugins to expand your site’s functionality, and it’s suitable for multiple users – making it highly scalable.

Code it yourself

Of course, if you have the time, the money, the patience, and the technical know-how, then you can code your website yourself.

Understandably, this approach gives you the most creative control over your site and business, but – unsurprisingly – it’s the most labour-intensive, too.

As well as having to create your website from scratch, you’ll need to sort out your own hosting solution – whether that’s doing it yourself, or outsourcing to a third-party hosting provider such as Bluehost or HostGator.

Of course, if you want the level of customisability that creating your own ecommerce website affords – but don’t want to spend the time doing it – you can always outsource the project to a web developer.

If this is the route you’re keen to go down, let us help. Take less than a minute out of your day to provide us with a few details about the kind of website you’re looking to build. We’ll match you with companies that’ll provide you with tailored quotes, and help you turn the ecommerce website of your dreams into a reality.

Step 8: Start taking payments

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FEATURED PROVIDER	BEST OVERALL
Provider Square	Provider Worldpay	Provider Stripe	Provider SumUp	Provider Barclaycard
Best for Mobile businesses like food trucks	Best for Service-based businesses like salons or cafes	Best for Online businesses	Best for Businesses needing instant access to funds	Best for Seasonal businesses (such as pop-up stores)
Our Review Score 4.3	Our Review Score 4.7	Our Review Score 4.2	Our Review Score 4.1	Our Review Score 3.2
Dedicated or Aggregated Aggregated	Dedicated or Aggregated Dedicated	Dedicated or Aggregated Aggregated	Dedicated or Aggregated Aggregated	Dedicated or Aggregated Dedicated
Pay monthly or pay-as-you-go Pay-as-you-go	Pay monthly or pay-as-you-go Both	Pay monthly or pay-as-you-go Pay-as-you-go	Pay monthly or pay-as-you-go Pay-as-you-go	Pay monthly or pay-as-you-go Both
Contract Length No contract	Contract Length 12 months	Contract Length No contract	Contract Length No contract	Contract Length 18 months

Use our free comparison tool to compare quotes from the best merchant service providers Compare Costs

So you’re all set up with a website, and are ready to start selling. To do that, though, you’ll need some way of accepting credit and debit card payments.

Long story short, that means obtaining a merchant account. All businesses looking to process card payments will need some form of merchant account. This is where funds go to be cleared and verified, before they’re deposited into your business account.

You can get a dedicated merchant account from a bank, or from one of a few merchant services companies. These companies process your business’ payments through a merchant account that’s solely yours, and are a reliable option in the long-term.

Big names may include:

• Worldpay
• Barclaycard
• Instabill

Another option is to partner with a payment facilitator, a type of company that offers aggregated payment processing. This means they’ll process your payments in batched lots with those of other merchants – saving you money, but forfeiting many of the benefits a dedicated service offers.

We recommend payment facilitators for their fixed, flat rate pricing, simplicity of use and setup, and the ease with which you can sign up – even if you have bad credit.

Popular payment facilitators include:

• PayPal
• SumUp
• Square

Once you’ve signed up (and been approved) for merchant services, your payment provider will equip you with the technology you need to make your site sing.

This includes a payment gateway and a virtual terminal.

What is a payment gateway?

A payment gateway is a secure piece of software that sits on your website. It authorises and verifies the transactions you’ll be accepting online, acting as a go-between that connects your customer’s bank with your business’ merchant account.

When it comes to turning a website into a profitable business, a payment gateway is the most crucial weapon in your arsenal… so don’t skimp on picking the right one.

Here are a few things to consider before you take that all-important payment gateway plunge:

• Does it integrate with your ecommerce website seamlessly, or will you require a software developer to do this for you?
• Does it offer synergy with your ecommerce website’s shopping cart?
• Is it affordable? Some payment gateways charge a monthly fee, others a flat rate. Depending on your sales volume, the wrong fee structure could have big implications for your bottom line
• Does it accept a wide range of card types? Not just Visa and Mastercard, but popular international brands, such as Maestro and JCB?

For more information about choosing the right provider, check out our guide to the best payment gateways for small businesses.

Alternatively, provide us with a few details about your business, and we’ll connect you with leading merchant services providers. Simply let us know your requirements, and you’ll receive payment gateway quotes tailored to your ecommerce needs.

What is a virtual terminal?

A virtual terminal is a secure, web-based portal through which you can take payments over the phone. You’ll get a virtual terminal either included as standard with your merchant account, or available as an add-on purchase.

For more details, head to our page dedicated to helping you take payments over the phone.

Step 9: Market your ecommerce business

By this stage, you’re pretty much good to go. You have a stunning website that you can accept payments through. You’ve taken the sturdy foundations of thorough research and a solid revenue model, and built on it the makings of an ecommerce brand with serious potential. Nice!

Now, you need to let people know about it.

We won’t go into too much detail here (we’ve already done that at length in our guide to the latest digital marketing trends), but here are a few ways you can get your businesses name out there:

Advertise with social media

You should definitely launch social media accounts anyway (they’re free, and visible to a global audience), but you can also decide to pay for promoted Facebook or Instagram ads too, which target particular users.

You can use social media management tools to help you do this, or hire a digital marketing agency to advertise on your behalf.

Piqant’s Instagram profile

Shopify allows you to create targeted marketing campaigns through Google and Facebook, whether you have experience or not.

You can also give pay-per-click (PPC) advertising a go. It’s essentially a kind of online auction, in which you ‘bid’ for your site to appear higher on Google for keywords relevant to your audience. You’ll pay a fee ‘per click’, for each visitor that navigates to your site via that particular ad.

Use influencers

If a vlogger or blogger with thousands of followers showcases your product to your target audience, you might well see an uplift in sales. For the cost of one or two items, it’d be rude not to.

Nano influencer example

Whether you get on the influencer bandwagon or not, you should still build social sharing into your user journey. Encourage customers to shout about you on social media, and to use dedicated hashtags if they like your products.

You can also run competitions that encourage social engagement with your brand, asking users to share your post and follow you to be in with a chance to win.

Ensure your site is search-engine-optimised

Developing a strong SEO strategy will help your shop to rank better (i.e. appear higher up the list) in search engine results. All premium plans from Wix come with a range of professional-level SEO tools as standard.

Run special offers and deals

Rather than minimising your profit margin with discounts, try up-selling or cross-selling your products.

‘Buy one get one half price’ or ‘if you like this, you might also like…’ are both good examples – and there’s plenty more where that came from. You can also promote these offers through something like Squarespace’s email marketing tool, which allows you to build branded, targeted campaigns.

And remember, shopping can be seasonal.

Be sure to prepare well in advance for gift-giving holidays, such as Valentine’s Day, Mother’s and Father’s Days and Christmas. You should also prepare for big sales events, such as Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and Boxing Day, by tailoring your marketing and offering deals and special offers.

Adopt the right software

Integrating your website with a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tool can be a breath of fresh air for your sales and marketing efforts.

As well as providing insight into your leads, deals, and pipeline, CRM allows you to use customer information to put together targeted, engaging email marketing campaigns that work. More clicks, opens, and reads… what’s not to love?

Step 10: Outsource your order fulfilment

Congratulations – you’re (just about) done! You have everything you need to launch a successful ecommerce business, and it’s time to start seeing it bear fruit… right?

Right… but the work doesn’t stop there.

As your ecommerce business grows and orders start to pick up, you’ll want to look not only at implementing new processes, but outsourcing the ones you do on a daily basis.

That’s why pretty soon, you’ll want to look at hiring a company to take care of your order fulfilment (also known as ecommerce fulfilment) duties.

We touched on order fulfilment earlier. In a wholesaling and warehousing model, it means the storage, selection, packaging, and shipping of your goods. When you outsource it (to a company known as a third-party logistics (3PL) supplier), they handle all this for you – freeing up time, money, and space.

Some of the best fulfilment services for ecommerce startups include:

• Huboo (99.9% accuracy rate, two months’ free storage)
• BOXstation (no minimum fees, pay-as-you-go pricing)
• Core Fulfilment (late 10pm order cut-off)
• ShipBob (hassle-free fulfilment for UK businesses serving the US market)
• Green Fulfilment (eco-friendly approach, risk-free trial)

Utilising the services of a 3PL provider can also help your business branch out beyond the UK. Rather than pay exorbitant shipping costs to big international markets (such as the US), you can engage a US-based 3PL provider to fulfil orders from your American clientele.

Of course, outsourcing your order fulfilment may not be the right option for you right now.

Initially, most 3PL providers expect a minimum volume of around 200 parcels per month, so it’s more something you’ll look into when sales are going steady. But when you are ready to begin outsourcing (hopefully sooner, rather than later!), we can lend a hand.

Simply furnish us with a few details about your business – including your current order volume, sales channels, and delivery method – and we’ll match you with fulfilment services that meet your needs.

These providers will then be in touch with quotes tailored to your ecommerce business, and you can get stuck into growing (rather than just running) your business.

Congratulations!

You’re now the owner of a fully-fledged ecommerce business.

You did the research, carefully choosing your business model, value delivery method, and niche. You got to grips with your audience, your competition, and the seemingly interminable red tape that comes with registering an ecommerce business.

You took your creative vision and turned it into a functioning commercial website. Now you’re ready to drive growth with ongoing marketing efforts, and by refining and streamlining your order fulfilment process.

The only thing left to do now? Start selling.

Good luck!