Can you start a successful eCommerce business in the 2020s?

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The "age of digital" has been a mixed bag for those that are actively trying to succeed online. The drastic increase in active users and frequent online shopping enthusiasts have also come with a complete oversaturation of most markets in the digital sphere.

So, this has led many people to wonder if someone entering the proverbial fray now has any chance of competing with those that have spent the past 20 years making a name for themselves in their industry.

So, is it possible to start a successful eCommerce business in our current decade? Has the digital goldrush left businesses to grapple with a No Vacancy sign on their potential success, or is there still hope for those that want to make their mark in the eCommerce marketplace? Well, that's what we're going to be discussing today. So, to start, let's look at the current landscape.

Over the past few years, getting to see eCommerce website design in Melbourne shift first-hand has shown one unavoidable truth:

Nothing stays the same for long, and that's a good thing.

The fact is that eCommerce, for all of its expansion, has changed exponentially, even in just the past few years. This is both a reflection of software and technological advancements, as well as the changing needs of businesses and audiences alike.

The thing is that there has always been a lot of competition online, in ways that people often don't account for. For example, whilst there may be more online competition to keep up with the rise in potential online customers, the internet has also shifted the way people shop away from other forms of purchasing that were still prevalent in the internet's infancy.

Physical catalogues, mail-in orders, phone orders, door-to-door sales; each of these is either practically gone or feels like a vestige of a past before the internet became our major source for, well, everything. So, for many products and services, the internet is really only competing with itself. This fact has never felt more important than now in our post-pandemic landscape.

We have never, in our lifetimes, seen something quite like the impact of COVID-19 on our global landscape, both politically and sociologically.

With many countries being placed in strict lockdowns for varying amounts of time to try and quell the virus, we saw an incredible shift in shopping habits. Those who had not adopted online shopping as a regular part of their lives were now almost solely forced to rely on it for much of their day-to-day necessities.

And with the height of the pandemic now waning, we can see that these trends were less a detour from the norm and more the beginning of a shift toward a truly digital world.

Digital shopping trends have stayed far higher than they were prior to the pandemic, and it's safe to say that, for the time being, that's how things are going to remain. Therefore, if you are newly entering the digital market, it's also safe to say that you're not alone.

Millions of people over the past few years have been made to embrace online shopping, which means that any business looking to succeed has essentially had the choice of whether to be online taken away from them. The online world is where the audience is, and if you are going to make it big, chances are your process towards doing so will involve an eCommerce website.

Whilst it is true that we've seen a massive oversaturation of the eCommerce landscape, when was the last time a market wasn't oversaturated? The fact is that, as more people embrace digital in the wake of the pandemic, and as these trends continue, it's not about whether you can, but whether you can afford not to.

Some businesses can still thrive through word of mouth, but trends are changing, and the direction is clear. If you're a business that would benefit from an eCommerce website, then there is still hope for you. So, do what you can to promote yourself, do some SEO, buy some Google Ads, and start trying to build that following. Your future self should thank you.