eCommerce consulting companies analyze eCommerce businesses to identify bottlenecks and opportunities and create innovative and effective strategies that lead to growth.

They provide businesses with guidance, monitoring and actionable tips to make sure their marketing plan of action brings optimal results.

Thus, some of the things they will focus on include:

• Finding the right selling channel
• Avoid international payment issues
• Discover selling untapped opportunities
• Detect potential security problems
• And more

eCommerce consulting companies focus on creating marketing and brand marketing strategies to help brands reach their goals. This includes reaching a wider audience, closing more deals and boosting their profit.

Most of them also offer development services and build cutting-edge apps and websites that are fully functional and eye-catching.

Here’s a list of what they do:

• Research and analytics
• A roadmap and strategy development
• Monitoring reviews and customer service
• Marketing and advertising strategy
• Online store code audits
• Custom app and web development
• User experience development
• Conversion optimization
• Advising on product/niche selection
• Quality assurance and testing
• And more

There are several types of eCommerce consulting agencies and we can classify them based on:

• The businesses they work with: Some of these companies deliberately focus on a specific type of clientele, like small businesses for instance, while others have a diverse client base.
• Their industry expertise: Some eCommerce consultants deliberately focus on a particular type of industries, while others have varied industry experience.
• The services they offer: Some of these agencies offer only consulting services while others also provide full-service eCommerce development.
• Their location: These companies’ location tends to inform their level of expertise (due to competition), their rates and the industries they specialize in.

There are several aspects to consider when it comes to the cost of eCommerce consulting services.

On the one hand, it will depend on the company’s expertise. The more skilled and experienced an eCommerce business consultant is, the higher the fee will be.

On the other hand, the location also affects the project cost. For instance, an NYC-based agency is likely to charge more than a company located in Boston.

Finally, the scope and the timeframe of the project will also influence the final cost.

Most of the top eCommerce consulting agencies charge per hour and the price varies between $50 and $150.

While ecommerce opens the doors to much bigger markets, it also comes hand-in-hand with fierce competition. eCommerce consulting agencies help businesses develop every aspect of their digital strategy to increase competitiveness and profits.

They are experts in analyzing your business needs, your target market and competition and creating strategies that will lead to business growth.

Here are the top five reasons why you should invest in a certified eCommerce consultant:

1. Reaching The Right Audience

There are more than 2 billion online shoppers in the world. [Statista]

However, not all of these consumers are your audience.

To make every penny invested in your digital business count, you need to focus on the right market.

An eCommerce consultant can help you achieve that by:

• Researching the buyer persona: They will describe your ideal clients, discover their likes and dislikes, the buying decisions they make as well as the challenges they face.
• Analyzing customer lifecycles: They identify the steps your leads go through before and after they convert or complete a purchase. Thus, by studying each of these phases they will come up with strategies for customer retention and revenue increase.
• Retargeting: They will also run retargeting ads and target people who are already familiar with what you offer to make them reengage with your brand.

Your partners’ strategy will help you speak your audience language and put your products in front of the right people who are more likely to make purchases.

2. Improving Customer Service

93% of consumers would make a repeated purchase with brands that offer excellent customer service. [HubSpot]

Building loyalty is the best tool eCommerce businesses can use for improving customer retention and increasing the number of returning clients.

However, trust is not given, rather it is something that should be earned.

Great customer service can help you establish long term relationships. And eCommerce consulting agencies will provide you with actionable tips on how to create memorable customer experiences.

Or, they can implement the following strategies:

• Send personalized messages and replies
• Provide fast customer support
• Experiment with discounts and trial offers
• Analyzing customer feedback
• And more

3. Enhancing Your Brand Image

Brands have as little as 7 seconds to make a first impression. [Forbes]

Before potential clients click the “buy now” button, they will certainly research your brand. So, depending on where you sell, they will either visit your website or social media profiles to see how credible you are.

And when they do that they will form their opinion about your business within seconds.

Your brand identity is of key importance for getting a winning impression.

A few factors to be considered here are:

• A strong logo
• Clearly defined values
• Unique and high-quality content
• Social proof and positive reviews
• And more

eCommerce consulting companies will provide you with analysis and solutions on what branding elements you should focus on so that you complete more purchases successfully.

4. Increasing Sales

The average cart abandonment rate is 79.17%. [OptinMonster]

A huge number of shoppers never complete their purchases. They abandon their shopping carts for different reasons including:

• Extra costs (shipping, tax fee, etc.)
• Requests for account creation
• Requirements of credit card info
• Long checkout process
• And more

eCommerce consulting firms can help you deal with uncompleted purchases by:

• Getting inside the heads of your clients and analyzing their behavior to understand what drags them from completing their purchases
• Putting together cart recovery strategies including sending personalized emails and remarketing
• Making the shopping process easier and smoother

Here are several factors that can help you find the right partner for your business needs.

To shorten the list of potential eCommerce consulting agencies down, make sure that you:

• Look at their services: Define your goals and think about what part of your online store you want to improve. Then, see what type of consulting services eCommerce consulting companies offer to understand which of them can meet your requirements.
• Go through their work: Take a look into the portfolios of every certified eCommerce consultant to see what projects they have worked on, what businesses they have worked with, what results they have delivered and in which industries they have experience.
• Read their reviews and testimonials: View the reviews and testimonials that previous clients left to understand their experience with the best eCommerce consulting agencies. Industry recognition a great indicator of the company’s reliability and whether it can be the right fit.
• Check out the companies’ values: Pick a partner that shares the same values as your business and focuses on quality over quantity to establish long term relationships and achieve better results.

1. Do you have experience in working on similar projects?
2. What eCommerce consulting services do you offer?
3. What is your plan for adjusting your services to meet our business needs?
4. What is your process for creating a roadmap?
5. What do you think about our brand?
6. Based on what you see, what improvements do you think can be made?
7. What results can you promise to deliver and how will you measure them?
8. Who will work on our project and who will be the main point of contact?
9. How will we be involved?
10. How does your pricing work? Are there extra charges to the original quote?