Globalization is an on-going challenge for businesses in international markets and eCommerce adds another layer of complexity and more factors to consider. There is increased reach with the digitalization of the shopping experience, but customers still expect a consistent, though not identical, experience no matter where they are in the world and no matter what device they use. Adapting to different cultures, audiences, trends, local currencies, and holidays takes some finesse, experience, and technical expertise to pull it off gracefully and seamlessly.
Balancing Between International and Local
What makes your company recognizable is consistent branding. When you have an international business, this branding helps you make a strong impact. Localization is important because it means you’re accessible and relatable to the audience you want to reach in each individual country. Target the customer while keeping brand integrity overall with multiple websites and catalogs using multi-language and multi-currency capabilities built in, all in one platform. This makes keeping with local trends and creating and managing content simple without doing double, or even triple work.
Consistent, Not Identical
Speaking of consistent, Responsive Design is a must for your international eCommerce websites as it allows users to have a consistent experience no matter which device they choose to use. They will have the same capabilities on the phone as on a desktop. But consistent doesn’t mean identical. Subtly tweak each website’s design to show the differences but ultimately keep it feeling like the overall brand. In Nav-to-Net™, these changes can be achieved via stylesheets or even with a capable in-house team with our solution being so developer-friendly.
Reliability Worldwide
One of the challenges with international eCommerce is relying on different networks. Local networks are not always consistent, but business never stops. With time zones and seemingly random spikes of traffic and activity at all hours, eCommerce is truly a 24/7 business. Be sure to plan for when issues arise because while it may be over on one side of the world, the other side is just waking up and it can start all over again. With features like Always Take Orders™, SmartPush Technology™, and seamless NAV integration, you can be confident that no matter where in the world your customers are accessing your site, they will be seeing the accurate product, pricing, and availability information and there will be no missed orders, ever.
How to Handle Increase in Traffic and Sales
E-Commerce can open up your business to an international level. Your solution must be able to be scalable for when you are growing and expanding your business. It needs to handle the influx of sales and possibly larger volume of orders. As part of your strategy, remember that more sales mean more resources are needed in the back-end to accommodate, be it increased staff (properly trained), more reports to analyze activity, acquiring new technical skills to keep up, or even physical hardware needs.
Rules and Regulations
Depending on which country you’re in, there are different tax codes, data privacy laws, and regional laws and regulations you may have to deal with. You may even have to abide by your own specific industry standards and guidelines. When you’re mindful of these, it makes sense that your eCommerce solution should make it easy to meet those requirements. Be sure to ask about what integrations are supported in your eCommerce solution.
Support and Implementation
Worried about support? When a problem arises, you want to be able to have a team to rely on so your website can be back to optimal performance. Digital Vantage Point has a supportive and well-trained global partner network for whether you require some simple maintenance and support or a full-blown upgrade or solution implementation.
Read our case study here on how Digital Vantage Point worked with an international partner and customer to complete their Nav-to-Net™ upgrade, on time and on budget.
Keep your website and solution running in tip-top shape, no matter where you are in the world.
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