Planning for an eCommerce Website Development Project (Part 1 of 2)

(…or “How to save you money, time, and potential stress-induced hair loss!”) You probably heard this before: “We started with a $50k budget project and ended up spending $150k.” And when asked why that happened, the one blamed was always that developer who failed to deliver things on time or provide inaccurate estimates for the tasks. I’m not here to say that developers don’t make mistakes, we are only human after all, but let’s think about the process. The client comes with an idea such as “I need to sell online” or “I need to improve my eCommerce/online presence” but 99% of the time, the client is not a developer or does not have a dev team in house, which means that he needs to pass along his idea to a third party (eCommerce agency or freelancer) who now needs to absorb and understand everything about the business, structure, goals, and needs…all done in a handful of meetings. You probably would expect that the agency or freelancer you are working with should be experienced enough to ask you the right questions and point you in the right direction, eh? And in most cases this is true, so why on earth do projects go over budget? In more cases than not, it is because little or no time was allocated and dedicated to proper planning for the project. Supposedly, there’s an Abraham Lincoln quote that says “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.” I’m not sure if this is real or not (I’m Canadian but doesn’t mean I’m a lumberjack…), but the most important takeway here is the concept of planning. I’m pretty sure that chopping down a tree is a very difficult task in itself, but I’m 100% confident that doing so with a blunt axe will make it infinitely harder. OK, so how can you mitigate these risks?

Planning for eCommerce success

There are a few things that you MUST do before even considering involving a third party in your project.

Research

Here are some broad topics to spend some research time on.

1. Browse through eCommerce websites that you like. They don’t need to be in the same industry as yours, just start putting together a list of things you like and will be good to have on your future or existing eCommerce. This will come in handy when you are trying to communicate to the designer or developer what you’d like to see accomplished, and the type of user experience you feel will fit your business.
2. Research the different eCommerce platforms available on the market. You should not limit your research to what platform you should be using. The biggest players in the market have a dedicated marketplace where you can research extensions and integrations too.

It is important to also spend time researching and shortlisting technology partners you would consider working with on your eCommerce development journey. An experienced eCommerce agency partner will provide valuable insights and guidance to help you determine which platform, extensions and customizations you should consider using based on your business needs and goals.

Write out your plan!

Now that you have a list of items you would like to see on your project, it’s time to put together a plan. You don’t need to include every single detail, but you need to know the big picture stuff: What do you want to achieve with your eCommerce website? Look at your competitors. What are they doing? Do they have an online presence? Is there anything you do better than your competitor offline that is a must-have on your online store? Determine what kind of shopping experience you want to provide to your customer. The shopping experience of someone buying shoes should be different than someone buying chemical products, so think about how your target audience would like to buy and how you can improve or facilitate the purchasing experience.

What are your eCommerce business needs and goals?

Consider what your minimum requirements are to achieve your plan and note them down, because you will need them to inform or discuss with your chosen eCommerce website agency or eCommerce designer. Use the SMART requirements guidelines when thinking about your goals.

• Specific
• Measurable
• Attainable
• Realistic
• Time-bound

Here are some example of what specific requirements is: Bad: “I want my website to be well ranked on search engines” Good: “I would like to see the website listed on page one of Google and Bing for the terms “swimming classes for babies”, “adult swimming classes” and “Hydrotherapy classes” within six months of launch”. Another good way to prepare your eCommerce website needs and goals is by using “User Stories”. User Story is a way to describe features of a software system in a non-formal and natural language way. Each user story is created as one sentence to portray:

• Who will benefit when the requirement is implemented
• What the benefit is
• Why it is a benefit

As an , I want to so that . For example: As a website administrator, I want to assign a “free shipping” icon to specific products so that customers can easily identify which products have no shipping fees.

Don’t cut planning from your eCommerce website development project budget!

Some companies and eCommerce agencies/developers don’t see planning as a basic requirement or understand its immense benefits, thus reducing the amount of time (budget) from the discovery and planning phase. This should be a huge red flag when you are selecting an eCommerce agency to work with. Remember Lincoln’s quote? Yah sure, you might be able to save some budget by reducing the time spent planning, but this will backfire very quickly, and with most agencies working on a time and materials billing basis (charging at an hourly rate), chances are, a thousand dollars saved by reducing budget in planning will result in an extra five thousand dollars spent due to numerous CRs (Change Requests), testing, QA, and project management. Taking the steps outlined in this article will not only help you better understand what your current and future eCommerce goals are, but will also help your eCommerce agency or eCommerce developer deliver a better quality project by mitigating risks in project schedule delays and budget overruns. Need help with your eCommerce project planning? Give us a shout, we’d be happy to help! Read on for more insights on how to plan for the UX (User Experience) of your eCommerce website project.