Business Opportunities Weblog

October 17, 2005 by Dane Carlson | 1 Comment

Small Business Computing:

Is there anything that really distinguishes your site from similar online merchants? If you’re merely going to sell widgets like the 14 other well-established widget sites do, your ‘me-too’ approach will limit your success. Find some way to set yourself apart so that people shop with you instead of with your competition.

Case in point: GatorPack sells packing supplies — nothing unique there. But two things keep customers coming back: the site’s design is as simple and efficient as possible — customers order right from the front page (no digging). And, the site focuses like a laser beam on filling orders the same day they get them. GatorPack sets itself apart by making the shopping experience incredibly easy and fast.

Here’s the reason originality is so important in your e-business plan: You can set up a dry-cleaning business in your neighborhood, and it doesn’t have to be any different from the dry-cleaning business across town. No imagination, but no problem — because nobody’s going to drive across town to get their clothes dry-cleaned.

But online, all businesses are right next to each other. Click your mouse and you’re there. So simply setting up the exact same online business that someone set up in 2002 is going to be an uphill climb. They’re established in the search engines, and you’re not.

Setting up an online business takes a little more originality, some kind of twist, that setting up a real-world store doesn’t.

In Ecommerce, Planning | 1 Comment