
At the beginning of a new year it’s only natural to reflect on your key takeaways and set new goals: maybe you’re thinking about launching a new product, or it’s time to finally think through your marketing strategy?
If you have too many ideas or, on the contrary, don’t know where to start from, Ecwid is here to help you plan your New Year’s resolutions so that you can track your progress all year long.
Launch a New Product
Start 2018 with a new product, and not only because of the nice symbolic meaning. If you haven’t added to your product line in a while, doing so can sparkle customer interest. Consider the trends and your buyers’ feedback, or analyze your bestsellers — what can you do to repeat their success?

Eco-friendly products like CeeCee & Bee were a huge trend in 2017, and it seems like it’s going to last
To help you fulfill this goal, the Ecwid blog has prepared some useful tips:
- How to Find Trending Products to Sell Online
- How to Price Your Products? A Science-Backed Answer
- How to Find a Manufacturer for Your Product Idea
Learn to Work Remotely
It is high time you stopped giving envious looks to the Instagram profiles of your favorite travel bloggers and started to use your business to fulfill your dreams. No matter what you’re up to — traveling, spending more time with your loved ones, or managing more tasks at a time, remote work can help you do that. And Ecwid Mobile lets you manage your business even when you’re on the move.
These posts will help you embrace this new lifestyle:
- The Enhanced Ecwid Mobile App: Take Your Online Store With You
- Sell on the Go: Create Orders on Mobile
- Elon Musk’s 8 Time Management Principles to Work Like a Machine
Work on Your Photography Skills
Having beautiful product pictures is essential for steady sales. Customers can’t touch the things you sell, so all they are left to deal with is photos. Start with the pictures in your store and don’t forget about photos on your social media, especially Instagram. Don’t be afraid to try something new, for example, working with models if you own a fashion brand.

Irresistible product photography from Julián Ángel
With these tips you’ll create such pictures that your online store will be able to beat even a physical shop:
- The Beginner’s Guide to 360º Product Photography
- How to Create Cinemagraphs for Product Pictures With Your Smartphone
- Simple Product Photography Tips to Beautifully Showcase on Your Store
Redesign Your Store
If you haven’t updated your store design since the day you’ve started it, you might be thinking about making some changes, but why not act bigger? A new look is a nice way to attract new customers and make the current ones enjoy shopping at your store more. Moreover, you can not only work on the style, but also make your website more user-friendly. The latter might be even more important.
Big companies like YouTube understand the need for a new look to match new capabilities: "Our new look applies material design to YouTube and delivers a fresh, simple and intuitive user experience that lets content shine."
Check out some of these articles to take the most out of redesigning:
- Emerging Trends in Branding for 2018: Transparency, Authenticity, and the "80s
- A Comprehensive Guide to Customizing Your Ecwid Store Design
- Is Your E-Commerce Business Making One of These 10 Design Mistakes?
Improve your Customer Service
Customer service can never be too good, so consider improving yours. It is that simple: a pleased buyer is a steady buyer. Master your answers to the feedback, and learn how to deal with complaints and how to prevent them.
It’s fine for customer service to have fun too
These tips will guide you through the secrets of customer service so that you will forget about negative feedback in the coming year:
- The Art of Positive Communication in Customer Service
- How to Provide Excellent Customer Service: Advice From 5-Star Ecwid Ninjas
- How to Gain Your Customers" Lifetime Loyalty and Value
Hire People to Work for You
Your e-commerce store is growing, hurray! To keep on track with a bigger business you might need a helping hand. Have you thought about hiring employees? Delegating some of your responsibilities will improve your working process and boost profits. If the size of your business lets you manage it alone, don’t give up on this idea: you can still hire people like models or influencers.
Here is some advice for sellers who are ready to expand their team:
- How to Hire and Manage Staff for Your Growing Online Store
- Staff Accounts: Give Your Team Administrator Access to Your Store
- How to Find the Right Models for Your Fashion Brand
Strive for Perfect Shipping Process
The final stage of selling influences your customers’ impression a lot. If shipping takes too much time, is too expensive, or messes up the order, it will scare away even the most hardcore fans of your high-quality and beautifully wrapped product. The shipping process involves more people than just the seller, so chances are it has some weak points, which you don’t have to tolerate in 2018.
Ecwid’s got you covered! Check out these articles for a perfect shipping experience:
- 6 Free Shipping Strategies and Their Alternatives
- How to Set Up Shipping Rates in Your Store Using Ecwid
- An Entrepreneur’s Guide to Understanding Shipping Labels for E-Commerce Stores
Go International
Though it may sound a bit challenging, global selling is a big step for your business. If you’ve been thinking about it already, don’t hesitate. When planned well, it can lead to huge success. It is essential to analyze your product and how it will stand out in the new environment, and to research the foreign marketplace itself.

Statista shows how the number of digital buyers worldwide is growing
We have described the whole process in our articles and are happy to guide you through this new stage of your business:
- International Business Online: How to Start Selling Globally
- How to Optimize Your Store for a Global Audience
- International Shipping: Picking a Provider & Shipping Around the Globe
Clear Up Your Finance
Business finance is one of the crucial parts of your work, so take it seriously and get ready to puzzle out sales tax, accounting, and all the legal matters. Improving your financial literacy will serve you the good turn in all the years to come. If you feel taxes are still odd to you, or you’re going to take out loans for your business, make sure you have learned everything you need first.
Here are some articles that can help you make finance matters a piece of cake:
- How to Pay Yourself When You Own a Business
- Accounting, Finance & Legal E-commerce Blueprint
- How to Make Your New Business Attractive to Lenders
Pay More Attention to Promotion
This is the land of unlimited work, opportunities, mistakes, and results. There can never be too many sales, so this goal is good for your business no matter what stage you’re in. Think about where and how you want to promote your store, and analyze your experience so far: what needs to be changed and which moves have been the most profitable.
There are a lot of ways to promote your business, and these are just some of the examples you might be interested in:
- How to Promote Your Online Store With Content Marketing
- 15 Practical Ideas for Promoting a Small Business Locally
- How to Promote Your Brand Outside of Social Media

Nice touch on promotion from sephora.com
Add a discount wheel to your store →
Improve Your Copy
Even if you don’t have a blog, the art of writing should on your "to master" list. Customers do read your product descriptions, your bio, or "about us" page. In the golden age of social media everyone expects to see well-written content, so make your customers happy by presenting them with an informative and understandable copy.
Start creating your best texts with this advice and see how much impact words can have:
- How to Write an "About Us" Page if You’re Not a Copywriter
- Sell the Story: How to Get Started With Storytelling for Your Brand
- How to Write Awesome Product Descriptions That Sell
Try Videos for Your Store
Even if you’re not planning to become a YouTube star, you need some basic video skills anyway. People love video content, and they love to see products in real life. You can start with short Instagram videos, or if that’s too simple for you, try making some video ads.
Check out our tips for creating video content that sells:
- How to Use Video in E-Commerce Marketing
- How to Create a Professional-Looking Promotional Video With Your Smartphone
- Facebook Video on a Budget: Create and Run Ads in No Time
Work on Email Marketing
Email marketing helps to communicate with your existing or potential customers, and it is one of the most effective tools for your e-commerce business. When done right, it can boost profits no worse than sales season, so pay closer attention to your mailing list and newsletters.

Salesforce illustrates The DMA’s data
If you want to master your email marketing, some of our articles might be handy, for example:
- How to Build the Best Mailing List Possible
- 22 Things That Make Your Newsletter Look Like Spam
- 10 Smart Ways to Increase Email Signups for Your Store
Make Sense of SEO
SEO is still important for any e-commerce business. Making your stores indexed better in Google will eventually get more organic traffic to your site, and that means more sales. Good reason to spend some time on SEO, isn’t it?
Look through some of our SEO articles and find the one that suits your goal the most:
- New Clean URLs for Every Ecwid Store: A Simple Way to Better SEO
- How to Get Your Local Online Store to Rank Higher in Search Engines
- The Power of SEO and SEM for E-Commerce
Protect Your Business
No one wants to be the victim of cyber attacks or piracy, and the good news is that Ecwid conforms to the highest international safety standards. However, it won’t hurt to take some precautions anyway, especially if you have embedded Ecwid on a third-party website.
Learn more about web safety and improve your security with some of these tips:
Online Store Security: 8 Must-Complete Steps Against Web Threats
How to Protect Your Digital Goods From Piracy
HTTPS: How to Increase Search Engines’ and People’s Trust
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Set your big goals, divide them into smaller tasks, and track your success. Hopefully, by the end of the year, all your resolutions will transform into an even more prosperous business.
Happy selling in the year 2018!