Sometimes life gives you lockdowns. But this is Malta. We endure, we make the most out of a tough situation, and we turn anything into a business. This is the nation that beat the Ottoman empire, that turned corsairs into a thriving business, and that survived siege after siege. We’ve got this.
If you don’t have a lot of time, just read these 5 points. We’ll go into more detail about them below, but it’s all you really need to know:
- Online shops are much easier to set up than you think
- Local delivery services like eCabs Delivers give your clients same-day delivery, or really affordable next-day delivery
- Your online store will be here to stay, even after Covid you will have a new shop without paying expensive rent or utility bills
- Act now while Amazon and other online shops are expensive and have slow delivery services
- You can launch an online store with Switch, very quickly (weeks) and with little-to-no upfront costs.
We’ve been building eCommerce sites for years, however since the beginning of the pandemic we’ve been running online stores that have been generating tens of thousands of €s of sales.
You could be launching a store in a few weeks, and this could be the opportunity for you to add 5-figure sales to your existing business, even in the middle of a pandemic.
We’ll help you out by setting you up some of Malta’s top:
- Payment gateways
- Delivery services
We can also help you out with getting all your inventory online in record time, and we can put our award-winning performance marketing team behind the marketing of your online shop, virtually guaranteeing that you’ll get the brightest minds on the island working to improve your return on investment.
Let’s consider what has been going on from the point of view of a local business. In the year BC (Before Covid), you had to hope that the market came to your place of business. Your retail in Malta competed with the eCommerce of Amazon in the UK and Germany with their phenomenal inventory and very, very cheap shipping. You hoped that those who weren’t comfortable with online shopping would remain fearful. In short, life was tough.
Fast forward to today. Brexit made Amazon’s UK site very unattractive. And the drastic reduction in air traffic made Amazon DE, IT, ES etc dial up their shipping rates to a point where they are almost unaffordable – not to mention extreme delays in delivery from anywhere in Europe.
At the same time companies like eCabs launched their super-affordable point-to-point courier services. Suddenly, online shopping and eCommerce in Malta seems like a very attractive option, with eCabs offering next day deliveries for under €4, you know that you can definitely compete with Amazon who’s charging €10 for an item that will be delivered in 2 weeks.
We were lucky to work with some of our clients during the first half of 2020 to launch their eCommerce sites. In a short time, their sales equaled those of some of their regular stores. Once their shops were open, in every case, the eCommerce sites we launched in the lockdown of 2020 simply added sales to the ones they got in-store when they opened back up – they added a shop without the expense of a shop.
With shops closed and inventory inside them, this is the best time ever to consider eCommerce. The infrastructure is super easy, your customers are now all used to buying online, the delivery systems are in place, and the overseas competition is crippled by ridiculous shipping costs.
The great thing about eCommerce is that it is here to stay. Even when overseas shops have access to reasonable shipping again, your customers in Malta will be used to shopping from your online store, together with the very quick and very affordable delivery that goes with it.
Think of your online shop as a new shop without paying the rent or electricity bills and with a whole lot of new customers from all around the country. What’s not to love?
If you have any questions we’re here to answer them. Get in touch and see how we can get your business up and running within a few weeks and at a cost that is more reasonable than you think. We even have options where you can get your site with little-to-no upfront costs.
