Is selling online the way forward?

Could e-commerce be the next step for your business? With a bit of planning you could be up-and-running faster than you thought, according to accountancy firm Carmichael Kingham & Co.

With the UK facing varying levels of Covid-19 restrictions, and businesses having to adapt to the ‘new normal’ to keep customers safe, selling through the usual real-world sales channels is currently a challenge.

Diversifying into online sales for your farm products in these difficult times could help bring in new customers and generate additional revenues.

But what digital infrastructure do you need in order to switch to e-commerce?

Key ways to embrace e-commerce

To make your move to e-commerce successful, it’s important to put some real thought and planning into this transformation of your core business. Unless you can attract customers and convert these enquiries into sales, you won’t see the true benefits. So, take your time to think through the details and form a robust plan of action.

Key elements to incorporate in your planning include:

• Define your value proposition – you need to know precisely what value your new online service will deliver, and who the core audience for this service will be.
• Product descriptions and images – spend the time early on, planning your product offering, creating descriptions and taking photos so you have everything ready to upload for your online shop.
• Sign up to an e-commerce platform – to take online payments, you’ll need a reliable payments system. This could be an e-commerce add on or a more sophisticated platform that includes inventory.
• Work out your delivery system – If you’re a small-scale operation, you may be able to hand-deliver these purchases yourself or post them manually. But if you want to scale up then you will need to work with a courier company to meet the demand.
• Track your performance and sales metrics – make sure you create trackable sales codes for your new online product range, so you can track and measure the performance of your new revenue streams. With an accounting platform like Xero, you can then get detailed breakdowns of which items are selling, to guide your strategy. We can help you here!
• Ask online customers for feedback – for any online service to succeed, you must meet your customers’ needs. The easiest way to check this is to ask for feedback from satisfied customers, and to ask for ways in which the service, products, online experience and delivery process could be improved.

Check out the Rocketspark e-commerce express playbook. It aims to help get your business online, and fast.

For accountancy help and advice visit and a no obligation free chat please visit www.carmichaelkingham.com call 020 3468 2472 or email info@carmichaelkingham.com