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There are essential features that every successful ecommerce web site must have. Make sure your website has them when you are setting it up. Do this now and you will save yourself a lot of pain and expense further down the line.

Unlimited products and unlimited categories

You want to be able to easily add your own products and menu categories to your website without having to call your Web designer every the time you need something changed. Check there aren't any restrictions on the number of products you can add too, as there may be hidden costs if you go over the maximum number - or worse, the system may not be able to handle it and you may need an expensive upgrade. Content management

Ideally you want to be able to change text on your website -- such as information about shipping charges, terms of business etc -- without having to rely on your Web designer to do it, who will probably charge you each time.

For this, you need a built-in content management system to change the text based pages yourself.

Easy-to-use admin area

An easy-to-use control panel is essential as you will be use it constantly. You need to easily check new orders, customer details, add items etc. If this is difficult to do you will find yourself wasting a lot of valuable time.

Comprehensive reporting

You need to see reports on visitor information such as what products have been viewed etc so that you can make informed decisions on new product to stock, what products you should drop etc. Comprehensive reporting gives you valuable market intelligence that you can use to really grow your business.

Newsletter and e-mail functions

With e-commerce it is absolutely vital that you can keep in touch with existing customers in order to encourage them to purchase from you again in the future, by sending out special offers, product updates, newsletters etc. Look for an e-commerce system that has email list functions built in to it.

Link manager

You need to be able to add links to other sites without relying on your web designer every time you need a link added. Establishing link partnerships is vital ingredientl in obtaining good search engine rankings so ensure this feature is provided.

Search engine optimisation

Having mentioned search engines, another valuable feature is the ability to specify Meta tags for each product page you create. Meta tags are the "hidden code" that search engines use to determine what your page is about, so by making sure you can put the relevant keywords in for each product, you will give your site a huge advantage.

Other features

There are many other features that you can get in an e-commerce website, such as specials, bestsellers section, recommended items etc, so think ahead as to what you may need in the future and ask any web designer to include it now as it will be a lot cheaper than to get it put in at a later date.