How to open an online store without stock for free?

The advantages of opening an online store

Opening an online store without stock offers at least 3 main advantages:

Reduce initial costs

Since you don't buy stock, you don't have to no need for start-up capital. So you can start selling faster.

Greater flexibility and simplified management

When you don't have stock, you also have fewer logistical constraints. You can sell your products in any part of the world .

The only limit is the Internet. And you can work from anywhere, because you don't have to manage a warehouse.

A wide choice of products without investing

Since you don't have to buy the products before selling them, you can offer a wide range of products .

Customers will also be more inclined to increase their average shopping basket, given the wide choice of products available, so you can significantly increase your sales.

6 steps to opening an online store without stock

Here are 6 steps to start selling online without stock:

Choose your niche

The first step is to define to whom you wish to sell, in which sector of activity and type of product. focus on a niche with high profitability potential and where competition is not yet saturated.

Consider using tools such as AliExpress Hot Products, Google Trends ou Amazon Best Sellers to find popular products and study market trends.

Finding reliable suppliers

Once you have determined the type of product you want to sell, you need to select reliable suppliers In other words, find business partners who offer quality products with efficient after-sales service and on-time delivery .

Here too, there are plenty of platforms for finding this type of supplier:

• Oberlo

• AliExpress

• Sprocket

• Etc.

Choose a free e-commerce platform

There are an increasing number of free platforms, including :

• WooCommerce is a WordPress extension. However, you can integrate it on any hosting provider. The benefits? It's a beginner-friendly platform, with extensive customization options and completely free of charge.

• Shopify. The benefits? A drag and drop function to create your own pages, a marketplace, an integrated payment gateway and a free trial of days.

• Weebly . The benefits? A drag-and-drop function to create your pages, numerous designs and integrated inventory, ordering, tax management and delivery functionalities. On the other hand, Weebly isn't completely free: it charges a 3% commission on each transaction.

Apart from these three, there are other free platforms on the market.

Configure your online store

Here's our advice:

• Find out about the legal framework applicable to online shopping . In particular, you need to master the regulations governing the right of withdrawal, legal notices, the processing of personal data, and so on.

• Set up a coherent tree structure on your site . Install a payment gateway to process and receive your payments

• Ensure smooth navigation in your store and check the responsive mode for mobile browsing.

Add products

Once your online store is set up, you can present your products . To do this, give precise information about the product so that the customer can clearly identify its characteristics:

• Product name

• Its price

• Its weight

• Available colors

• Etc.

Produce product sheets

Here's how to create them:

• Add one or more product images (a main image and secondary images). Use quality images to capture the customer's attention and build trust.

• Keep your texts short and to the point. The text should be short, but with enough information to let the user know whether the product meets his or her expectations.

• Add a description with prices .

An effective product sheet must answer the following questions:

• What are the product's main features?

• What are the advantages of using it?

• What are the recommendations for use?

It must also include information such as :

• Price and delivery time

• Payment methods

• Warranties

Free tools and resources to manage your online store

Here is our list of the tools and resources you may need to manage your online store effectively:

Free online payment solutions

Payment solutions are a fundamental component of an online store. Since the aim of an online store is to sell products, it is essential to offer customers a secure payment solution.

Here are 3 of the most commonly used payment solutions:

Hero

Hero is a payment solution created in 2021 . The solution enables you to cash in on your website at up to 5x less cost than stripe.

PayPal

PayPal is the benchmark payment solution for e-commerce. Founded in 1998, it is one of the pioneers in online payments . The problem is that it's expensive (up to 2.9% transaction fees).

Stripe

Founded in 2010 Stripe is easy to integrate into e-commerce stores. Its flexibility, ease of use, variety of supported payment methods and subscription management features have quickly made it a household name.

Like Paypal, Stripe is rather expensive (up to 1.5% transaction fee).

Square

Square est another American payment processor Square first made a name for itself with its mobile credit card readers. Square then began offering online payment services, making it suitable for e-commerce.

Les outils de marketing digital

To boost your online sales, you also need to use marketing tools.

Google Analytics for SEO

Google Analytics is a free tool from the Google suite that will help you :

• Track the performance of your online store

• Analyze user behavior .

This tool can help you fine-tune your customer acquisition strategy for maximum conversion.

WordPress for content creation

To bring your website to life, you need to offer content that goes beyond your product pages. content management system the most popular on the market.

Mobile Monkey, the chatbot

Chatbots are excellent tools for communicating with your customers. They also enable you to centralize your social network and online store inboxes.

Google Ads for SEA optimization

It's the most popular tool for launching advertising and paid search campaigns. Google Ads enables you to promote your products to Internet users who conduct searches similar to the products you offer.

Mailchimp for emailing

To promote your products or keep in touch with your customers, emailing is a powerful marketing tool.Mailchimp lets you program emailing campaigns and analyze performance.

Pitfalls to avoid when opening an online store without stock

Here are the pitfalls to avoid when opening your stockless online store :

Neglecting product and supplier quality

The quality of your products and the reliability of your suppliers are fundamental for an e-commerce store. Even more so when you don't have any stock.

In fact, just as many satisfied customers are valuable ambassadors for your store Before launching your online store, take the time to choose both the product and the supplier.

Underestimating the importance of customer service

Customer service allows you to keep in touch with your customers . Before giving out their personal data, customers often need to be sure of the website's credibility. This is one of the roles played by customer service.

There are several ways to do this:

• Display a phone number on all pages of the site

• Propose a contact form which customers can fill in to formulate their requests

• A section dedicated to frequently asked questions that anticipates customer questions and takes the strain off customer service

• Have a chat and direct if your customers have any questions

Ignore logistics and delivery times

In e-commerce, delivery plays a fundamental role because the point of contact between your store and your customer . A customer who has had a bad experience in this area can quickly turn to one of your competitors.

You need to be able to offer a variety of delivery options so that your customers can make a choice:

• Home delivery via a service provider such as DHL, Chronopost or others.

• Direct home delivery made by you

• Le click and collect or in-store collection, provided you have a physical store.

• Relay point delivery involves leaving the parcel in a contained area (such as a dry cleaner's or tobacconist's) for the customer to collect at their convenience.

Neglecting marketing and promotion

Marketing is the lifeblood of online sales. In the face of increasingly fierce competition, you need to keep your prospects' attention You have a wide range of tools at your disposal, such as email marketing, natural referencing through blog articles and paid advertising (SEA).

How Hero can optimize the financial management of your online store

Hero is an invaluable tool to help you optimize the financial management of your online store.

Flexible payment solutions

Hero allows you to accept online payments at any time. by offering payment facilities to your customers . Deferred payment and payment in instalments are selling points that many Internet users are likely to appreciate.

Cash advances for advertising expenses

Hero can also anticipate payment of your advertising expenses . You can then reimburse the platform after 60 or 90 days or in 4 instalments.

Credit cards with deferred payment

Hero also offers you a free credit card, with a built-in payment facility: deferred payment . This function is ideal for preserving your WCR, and thus your company's financial health.

Our tips for maximizing the success of your stockless online store

Here are our ultimate tips to help you maximize the performance of your stockless online store:

Use SEO and create optimized content

As opposed to SEA, SEO enables optimize a website's positioning on search engines naturally (free of charge). This is also known as content marketing.

This strategy involves create optimized pages for users and search engines.

Using customer reviews and loyalty

Satisfied customers are a brand's best ambassadors. That's why a customer acquisition strategy begins with building loyalty among existing customers.

Here are some loyalty strategies you can implement:

• Customer service quality . Customer advisors who are approachable, empathetic and patient are key to building customer loyalty.

• Exclusive benefits . Free delivery, loyalty cards, discounts for newsletter subscriptions are all effective techniques for building customer loyalty.

• Retargeting or advertising retargeting to target Internet users who have carried out searches close to the products you offer.

These strategies will optimize your customers' satisfaction and generate new business. social proof It manifests itself in many ways, such as testimonials or photos of satisfied customers, figures on the success of the online store They reassure potential customers and encourage them to buy from your online store.

In a nutshell create an online store without stock is a cost-effective way of selling on the Internet. You don't need a lot of start-up capital, and you can manage your store with complete flexibility.