Back in February, we conducted an e-commerce survey in the Ecwid blog newsletter.
Over 250 business owners shared how they were doing business, what was going well, what difficulties they were facing, and what plans they had for 2018.
It revealed lots of insights, which are summed up in the infographic below. If you are a fellow small business owner or are going to become one, these insights will help you get an idea of what it’s like to run a small business in 2018.
Survey Findings
Team. The majority of small business owners (70%) are solopreneurs. However, 30% have a team and 13% claimed they were planning to hire staff in 2018. In addition, not hiring enough employees was a common regret among the participants.
Feeling like there’s not enough hours in a day too? It might be time to get help. If you can never get to the end of your routine list, or you tend to implement fewer new ideas, you are less likely to build a healthy business. Employees or freelancers can help you find the time that’s necessary for strategic planning.
Related: Staff Accounts: Give Your Team Administrator Access to Your Store
Education. Every second small business entrepreneur has graduated from college. The education process never stops for them, though. Running an e-commerce business is impossible without keeping up with the demand, technology, and trends.
If you are thirsty for knowledge and inspiration, take note of these articles:
- 10 TED Talks That Will Change the Way You Do Business
- 8 Great Blogs for Improving Your Financial Literacy
Gender. Male entrepreneurs still prevail over female entrepreneurs, but the percentage of female business owners has increased by 2% since 2015.
The Ecwid community counts many remarkable female entrepreneurs. Get inspired by their stories:
- How One Passionate Home Decorator Got Her Entire Family Into a Prosperous Business
- Why Being Strange Is Good for Sales: Lessons From a Bikini Brand
- Days for Girls: Improving Girls’ Access to Education, One DfG Kit at a Time
- Cooking With Tenina: A Recipe for E-Commerce Success
Niches. According to our e-commerce survey, handmade soap is the top popular product to sell in 2018. Jewelry comes second. Do you want to take one of these routes too? Read these articles:
- Think Local: Corktown Soap’s Journey From the Beginning to 70+ Pop-Ups in a Year
- How to Sell Jewelry Online: Tips from Jewelry Store Owners of the Ecwid Team
Promotion. 56% of the recipients shared that they didn’t do anything in particular to promote their products, which was quite surprising! If you are one of them, we are curious to learn why in the comments to this post.
At the same time, social media marketing is the most popular channel (65%) for the small business owners who responded to our e-commerce survey. Little wonder that Ecwid’ new social selling tools were very well received.
Explore more marketing channels with these articles:
- How to Write a Welcome Email That Sells
- How to Promote Your Online Store With Content Marketing
- The E-Commerce Guide to SEO
- Checklist: Is Your E-Commerce Store Ready for Paid Ads?
- Publicity on a Budget
Skills. Networking is the hardest part of doing business for many entrepreneurs. Only 26% of the recipients consider themselves good at forming business relationships. If visiting a networking event ends up in nothing but a bunch of random business cards, CakeSafe’s story can shed the light on networking for you.
Struggles. The top three difficulties in the lives of small business entrepreneurs turned out to be lack of time (32%), lack of money (31%), and marketing and promotion (23%).
Lack of time can be cured by hiring more people to work for you; sometimes it’s not an option, so you might want to increase your own productivity instead.
As for lack of finances, you can save some money by testing free or cheap ways to promote your store. Finding the time-money balance can still be tough.
As for the marketing and promotion, it is only a matter of learning and trying. The Ecwid blog is always here to help.
Plans. This was the most curious question of the survey. What are fellow entrepreneurs going to do this year to make more money? Turns out, the majority (68%) are going to try new ways to market their products (which is kind of comforting after learning about today’s 56% of word-of-mouth marketers).
Second, many (53%) are going to launch new products. Need help figuring out what to sell online? Our collection of trending products to sell this summer can give you a head start.
If you are going to redesign your online store like 37% of the recipients of this e-commerce survey, read how to clean up your website without a huge redesign.
Finally, if you are among the 12% who are going to start a business, isn’t it a beautiful day to create your online store? It’s free and only takes five minutes.
Happy selling!