The importance of “getting customers on your website” is often underestimated. While there are many successful websites and webshops that attract millions of visitors and earn substantial profits, the reality is that the online market is highly competitive. Thousands of webshops offer products and services for sale, making it challenging for new businesses to stand out.

Before starting a webshop, it’s essential to ask yourself some critical questions:

1. Is my product or service already available on the internet? If yes, can you compete and are you willing to take on that challenge? If not, have you done market research?

2. What is the net profit margin of your product or service? It’s crucial to consider all costs, including investments, expenses, and overhead, to determine the actual profit.

3. Are you starting this webshop as a hobby or a serious business plan? Understanding your commitment and goals is crucial.

4. How much are you willing to invest, and what sacrifices are you prepared to make to achieve your goals?

Once your webshop is up and running, you will face various challenges:

1. Building a customer base and establishing a brand may take 2-5 years.

2. Dealing with customer complaints and issues, even if your product or service is excellent, is part of running a business.

3. Determining the duration and level of customer service you can provide is essential.

4. Handling negative publicity effectively is critical.

5. Acquiring and retaining customers require a thoughtful marketing strategy.

6. Ensuring steady income streams and long-term business growth is essential for sustainability.

7. Having a clear vision of where you want your business to be in 5-10 years is important for setting goals.

8. Having a backup plan (plan B) in case things don’t go as expected is essential.

Starting a webshop with a positive outlook is natural, but it’s important to be prepared for the challenges and responsibilities that come with it. Online webshops have at least 60% of the problems and challenges that physical stores face.

To succeed, you need to find a way to differentiate your webshop among thousands of others and attract customers on the vast internet. It may seem easy to start an online business, but it comes with various challenges that require careful planning and preparation.

If you have a WordPress website or are planning to have one, WPbeveiligen specializes in securing WooCommerce webshops, which is crucial for WooCommerce and WordPress due to potential vulnerabilities.

WooCommerce is one of the fastest-growing webshop software on the internet, and a significant reason for this is that WooCommerce runs on WordPress and is available for free download. Additionally, it’s easy to install with just a few mouse clicks.

However, WooCommerce is not entirely free. The trick lies in how the webshop operates. While WooCommerce seems comprehensive at its core, when you want to customize the registration fields or the checkout page, you’ll find that you need extensions. These customization options are not included by default in WooCommerce, and as you might have guessed, you can purchase them separately.

Does this sound familiar? Yes, it’s similar to the free games for phones with in-app purchases.

Nevertheless, there is an advantage:

Your webshop is not overloaded with features by default.

Below is a list of “extensions,” as WooCommerce calls them, that are crucial for a large webshop. Most of them can be purchased from the WooCommerce store, and we have provided links to each extension.

Essential WooCommerce Extensions

Extension 1: Customize Checkout Fields

The checkout field editor

This extension is necessary if you want to customize the fields that visitors fill in during the checkout process.

Extension 2: Wishlist

The wishlist addon

Allow visitors to save their favorite products. Without registration, they can save favorites and come back later to purchase them. The favorites are stored for 30 days, and for registered users, favorites can be saved as long as they want. It allows the customer to save for later.

Extension 3: Newsletter Subscription

Newsletter subscription

Customers can subscribe to the newsletter with just one click during checkout. This extension works in conjunction with Mailchimp.

Extension 4: Currency Converter

Currency converter widget

Visitors from other countries can choose the currency in which they want to see the amount. The currency converter widget uses a general database to display the currency at the current exchange rate.

Extension 5: PDF Invoices

PDF invoices

While you might expect WooCommerce to send invoices in PDF format by default, everything is done via emails. This extension ensures that customers also receive a downloadable PDF that can be printed or used for administrative purposes.

Extension 6: Payment Gateways

Mollie gateway

To receive payments via iDEAL and other methods, you can establish complicated connections with your bank. But this involves a lot of work.

Mollie is a Dutch company that provides payment options and simply deposits the various payments into your account without the need for contracts with your bank.

Extension 7: Multiple Shipping Addresses

Shipping multiple addresses

By default, you can only enter one shipping address during checkout. But what if you make multiple purchases at once and want them sent to different addresses? This extension allows that.

Extension 8: Product Image Watermark

Product image watermark

Prevent others from copying and using your product images by automatically placing your logo on the image with each new upload.

Extension 9: Multilingual Webshop

WPML

This is not an official extension of WooCommerce itself but a plugin that works with the webshop to make it multilingual. WPML has a Multilingual E-Commerce module specifically designed for this purpose.

Extension 10: Security

WordPress antivirus

An antivirus for WordPress is not a luxury but a necessity, especially if you use WooCommerce. You want to protect your customers and their data as much as possible, and you can achieve this with this antivirus plugin for WordPress.

Paid Extensions vs. Free Extensions

For the above extensions, you pay a small amount. However, it is recommended to make this investment over free alternatives. These paid extensions can be downloaded from the WooCommerce site, ensuring that there are no hacks or backdoors.

The Sky is the Limit?

Don’t clutter your webshop with too many extensions/plugins. Each plugin loads code, which can slow down your website. Additionally, hackers frequently test plugins for vulnerabilities, and they often find them. In short, every additional plugin is a potential vulnerability.

Try to have your WooCommerce webshop work with a maximum of 5-8 targeted plugins. Less is more when it comes to security.