E-commerce: A Comprehensive Guide to Selling Online in 2025
Whether you're updating your existing e-commerce offerings or launching a new online store, your business needs a comprehensive plan to achieve outstanding success.
From generating demand to improving conversion rates, this guide covers everything you need to know to start planning your e-commerce strategy for 2025. Use these tips, tricks, case studies, and lessons learned to develop a plan for your online store to attract, engage, and delight more customers.
What is e-commerce?
E-commerce refers to all activities involving the buying or selling of goods and services online. This includes everything from products such as appliances and sporting equipment to software solutions and other digital services.
Unlike traditional stores, all e-commerce transactions and interactions take place online. This has revolutionized the retail world by meeting the changing needs of modern consumers and facilitating shopping.
Three Types of E-Commerce Businesses
Business-to-Consumer (B2C)
Sales occur between a business and a consumer. For example, if a customer purchases a laptop through Amazon, they are making a business-to-consumer (B2C) online purchase.
Business-to-Business (B2B) E-commerce
Goods and services are sold from one business to another. For example, Contentsquare offers software for businesses that need to understand their users.
Consumer-to-Consumer (C2C)
An individual sells a product or service to another person online. Platforms and marketplaces like eBay, Etsy, and Craigslist are examples of consumer-to-consumer e-commerce.
Benefits of E-commerce for Businesses and Consumers
Global e-retail sales are expected to grow significantly over the next few years, reaching $8 trillion by 2027. But if you're still hesitant about e-commerce, there are benefits that suggest this way of doing business is not only rapidly growing, but here to stay.
Here are some of the most important benefits of e-commerce for customers:
- A wider range of products to choose from
- A simpler and more convenient shopping experience
- Faster and easier transactions
- More informed purchasing decisions
- Easier price and product comparisons
From low financial investment to global sales capabilities, e-commerce is crucial to the business world. Here are the top benefits of online retailing for business owners and their companies:
- Lower operating costs
- Greater access to customer data insights
- Ability to sell products globally and 24/7
- Greater control over sales and tracking
- Greater visibility to potential customers through search engine optimization
3 E-commerce Trends for Retail Companies in 2025
With technological advancements and changes in consumer behavior, you need to keep up with the latest trends in this field. Improve your online store by taking advantage of these trends:
1. Growth in the Volume and Value of Online Shopping
In the coming year, consumers will increasingly turn to online shopping. E-commerce sales are on the rise, with forecasts of 7.8% annual growth. This growth in online shopping is attributed to several factors, including:
- The rise of voice search: More people are relying on smart speakers and voice assistants for their purchases. As more homes adopt this technology, more consumers will use voice search to shop online, order food, and organize their lives. Voice commerce sales are expected to exceed $164 billion by 2025. This presents significant opportunities for e-commerce companies in terms of keywords and content.
- The acceleration of mobile shopping: Global e-commerce revenues across websites and apps are expected to reach $2.74 trillion, representing nearly 60% of global e-commerce sales by 2026. These staggering figures demonstrate that improving the e-commerce experience for mobile customers represents a tremendous opportunity for companies to capitalize on.
2. Personalization: Using Insights to Create Customized Experiences
Personalization is the future of e-commerce. Both B2C and B2B shoppers are looking for personalized online shopping experiences, with 57% of consumers reporting they would spend more on a brand that personalized their shopping experience.
Whether you use it in your marketing or develop and integrate it into your e-commerce website, personalized shopping experiences help you increase sales. Here are some examples of how to offer personalization and foster customer loyalty:
- Use personalized customer messages for email marketing, chatbots, and other types of messaging.
- Leverage user feedback to deliver personalized offers based on your customers' preferences.
- Create targeted content to share with your customers via video.
3. The Rise of Artificial Intelligence in E-commerce
The application of artificial intelligence (AI) in e-commerce businesses is becoming an essential part of effective conversion rate optimization (CRO) strategies. From inventory management to customer service, there are many ways AI can serve e-commerce stores in 2025:
- AI helps businesses understand consumers: By collecting data on how users shop, when they buy, and what they are looking for in a product or service, AI and machine learning help e-commerce brands provide automated and personalized shopping experiences for existing and potential customers.
- Chatbots provide better customer service: These virtual bots help fill the service gap by providing 24/7 support to your customer base. The more you use this type of e-commerce software, the more efficient the bot will be at answering questions and helping users complete a successful purchase.
- Targeted Marketing and Advertising to the Ideal Customer: Using the right customer data, AI can create content and ads tailored to the needs of users and their target audience. It can also predict shopping behavior based on user activity online, helping to optimize future e-marketing campaigns.
- Adapting websites to customer behavior in real time: Beyond operations, AI is revolutionizing the user experience by enabling e-commerce companies to dynamically adjust their user interfaces and website design to deliver an interactive and intuitive experience tailored to each customer.
How to Build an E-Commerce Business: A Step-by-Step Guide
Choose the Right E-commerce Platform for Your Business
Compare the various e-commerce platforms available—Shopify, Bigcommerce, WooCommerce, Wix, Squarespace, and others—to choose the best one for your online store.
Design a great e-commerce website
E-commerce website design aims to delight customers every time they interact with your website. The goal is to build a website that customers enjoy and benefit from, reducing bounce rates and boosting your brand's reputation and revenue.
Create the best user experience for your customers
The essential features your e-commerce website should have. Learn the most important elements, principles, and best practices for e-commerce user experience design that will help you create a great shopping experience for your customers.
Strategies for E-commerce Businesses to Boost Conversion Rates
An effective conversion rate optimization (CRO) strategy is the best way to meet your customers' needs, deliver an effective user experience, and boost your sales in the long run.
Apply the JTBD framework to your e-commerce business
Increase your online sales with the JTBD framework: Discover ideas and opportunities, validate ideas and prioritize changes, gain support and coordination with your team, identify problems and prioritize solutions.
Use Contentsquare tools to boost your e-commerce sales
Contentsquare's products, tools, and features are designed for e-commerce businesses to analyze your website from a customer perspective. Learn how to use Contentsquare to better serve your customers and exceed their expectations.
Use the right tools to successfully manage your online business
If you're serious about scaling your business and transforming it into a brand, you'll need the right e-commerce analytics tools to assess your customers' behavior. This section of our e-commerce guide covers essential analytics tools that enable data-driven decisions and sustainable growth, as well as how to get started and choose the best options for your business.