What is the most difficult thing about running an e-commerce business?

Online shopping has become a common thing in our lives. With the rise of the e-commerce industry, how to make a good product link has become a problem that troubles many people. This article analyzes this issue in an easy-to-understand way. Let's take a look.

As the saying goes: Everything is difficult at the beginning. But it is different in e-commerce. It is difficult at the beginning, difficult in the middle, and even more difficult at the end . Difficulty runs through the entire life cycle of e-commerce operations. Whether you are an e-commerce veteran with five or six years of experience or a newbie with two or three years of experience, you all have your own troubles and worries. The word "difficult" is enough to express all of them.

So which part of e-commerce operation is the most difficult? There are different answers at different stages . Newcomers may find the platform rules difficult and confusing, and they always have trouble figuring out the rules. Why are they restricted from promoting when others do the same thing?

Experienced people would think that resources are the most difficult thing. They have e-commerce skills but no competitive products to show their abilities. It is also very difficult for me. Every day when I see that the daily sales are less than 200 million (just over 30,000), I worry about when I can reach the top 1.

Some are happy while others are sad. Based on my current experience, the most difficult aspects of e-commerce operations are nothing more than these three: low exposure, low click-through rate, and low conversion rate .

1. The third place in the difficulty ranking of e-commerce operations: low exposure

I often see friends in e-commerce groups saying, "I've been planning for a long time, but why haven't I seen any exposure?" With my clicks and conversions, if the platform gives me exposure, I will definitely take off.

Take my advice, this is an illusion. I have also encountered such a plan, the click-through rate and conversion rate are above 10%, but there is no exposure.

At first I thought it was a bidding issue, but later I realized that it was actually the link that was not working. The high click-through rate and conversion rate you see are because the system recommends extremely accurate users, which makes the data look very good. The system will amplify the traffic the next day and show it to more users.

As a result, the conversion rate of the link will begin to plummet, and the system will think that your link cannot consume such a large user pool, so it will keep digging in your small traffic pool .

The final result is that the click and conversion data are very good, but the exposure is not high. What should we do in this situation? Raising the bid is one way, if you don't lose money. However, this is only a temporary solution, not a fundamental solution. The basic data of the link is not good, and the price cannot be raised later.

The best solution is to lower the price to increase the conversion rate of the link. There is a link that I sell for more than 50, but there is no exposure on the entire site. I lowered the selling price to more than 30, and the exposure immediately took off. Buyers are so realistic and rational. They don’t want high-priced ones, as long as the price is low, they will still visit Mr. Li’s live broadcast room.

2. The second most difficult e-commerce operation: low click-through rate

Believe me, if the click-through rate of your main link image is high, your exposure will definitely not be low. So how to make a main image with a high click-through rate? I have to say that this is really difficult. Because this thing is too uncontrollable. In many cases, the main image that I think is good has a poor click-through rate. The main image that I think is not good has a very high click-through rate .

I saw a main picture of a competitor, and the click-through rate has been stable for more than 10% for many years, which is already a great picture. I took down his picture and looked at it from left to right, but I couldn't see what was so attractive about it. The background of the main picture is messy, the product is not big, and there are a lot of texts. If I were to give a score, out of a full five, this picture would be at most two and a half points.

But the effect is good. Where is the point where users click? I still don’t get it. From this we can see that the main picture with high click-through rate is not subject to human will, and more testing is the kingly way .

Therefore, if you want to create a main image with a high click-through rate, there are two ways. One is to use a process-based image testing method, which is more laborious and time-consuming, and uncontrollable. The other is to use several years of e-commerce experience to create a relatively good image.

It has to be said that experienced e-commerce developers are more accurate in choosing the main image than newbies. But it is impossible to produce images with a high click-through rate 100%.

The click-through rate of the main image depends on experience, which gives people a sense of metaphysics and is highly uncontrollable. Therefore, it is difficult to do this well. Unlike exposure, it can be solved by adding money or reducing prices. The click-through rate cannot be solved with money, but any problem that cannot be solved with money is definitely not a small problem .

3. E-commerce operation difficulty ranking first: low conversion rate

Some people would say that driving is difficult. If it is Taobao operation, it is understandable to say this, but if it is Pinxixi operation, don’t say this. Xixi’s through train is the simplest in the entire network, so simple that a retired grandfather can drive it. It’s nothing more than calculating the investment-output ratio of profitability and setting the corresponding price. What’s so difficult about it? Customization is really difficult.

The exposure of your direct train is not high, and there are no natural orders. In the final analysis, it is a conversion problem. It doesn’t matter if the click-through rate of your main picture is low. As long as the conversion rate is high, the system will continue to give you traffic.

So how to improve the conversion rate? It is difficult. Why is it difficult? Because there are too many factors involved in improving the conversion rate, such as main pictures, details, SKU, comments, sales, competing products, user accuracy, customer service, etc. If you really want to increase the conversion rate, you have to optimize each of the above mentioned links. Unlike conversion rate, optimizing the first main picture will do the trick .

Most of the projects I have worked on have been stuck in the conversion rate area. Everyone knows how to make a high-click main image and the skills of driving a business, but when it comes to conversion, no matter how you explain it, it is hard to understand.

For example, in the area of ​​comments, many e-commerce operators do not have a deep understanding of the role of comments, and think that comments are dispensable or unimportant. There is no need to explain the reason, just remember the conclusion: the conversion rate of links without comments will be extremely low.

I have told many e-commerce operators that if a link has no comments and sales, don't drive it, it will waste money and give the system a bad data performance . If you want to drive it, you must ensure that all the foundations of the link are perfect. So, what is considered perfect? ​​This is a matter without a standard.

As mentioned above, the less standardized something is, the more difficult it is. When you talk about SKU layout, how do you think it is perfect? ​​Everyone writes the same price and name, but the effect will definitely be slightly different. It is this tiny difference that brings a huge difference .

The SKU effect is 1/1000 lower than that of competitors, the main picture is 2/1000 lower, the details are 5/10,000 lower, and the comments are 1% lower. When all the links are added together, the effect is 5 or 6% lower than that of competitors. With such a big gap, the system data performance is also very naked. It gives 10,000 traffic to competitors and only gives you 1,000.

Therefore, when improving the conversion rate, don’t expect a certain link to improve by one or two percent all at once. The correct idea should be to improve each link by a few thousandths. By continuously optimizing and improving, you will slowly find that the data of the through train starts to improve.

Many links that usually had poor driving data were saved by me by optimizing this and that.

4. Final

The road of e-commerce operation is full of ups and downs. Sometimes a slight change in the platform rules will bring about huge fluctuations in merchant traffic, and there is never a time to stop. In other words, e-commerce operations are always on the road of fighting monsters and upgrading, and the word "difficult" accompanies them.

However, remember the essence of operations work: when you encounter a problem, solve it. If you can solve the problem, congratulations on your success. If you can't solve the problem, there is only one result: you will be eliminated.

Author: Tiger Talks Operations

WeChat public account: Laohu Jiangyy (ID: laohujiangyy)