Are you ready for foreign expansion? Everything an e-commerce solution should meet

In cross-border sales, it is especially true that fortune favours the diligent and prepared. At the same time, however, it should not be forgotten that a great help to future success is also a good foundation in the form of a quality platform that allows you to expand fully and without unnecessary restrictions. What should such a solution meet?

Multilingualism as a key advantage

Multilingualism, i.e. the ability to manage your e-shop in different languages, is touted by many systems. However, only a few of them offer truly full-fledged multilingualism that allows you to sell professionally internationally.

Quality multilingualism must allow you to sufficiently localize all important parameters essential for successful sales. It is far from being just about product translation, as it might seem at first glance. You also have to adapt a number of other circumstances for each country , such as transport and payment options, billing information or terms and conditions, as well as multi-currency support. This is an absolute necessity to make the sale at all possible and legal. But it doesn't stop there.

The e-shop must also look like it would attract foreign buyers. Therefore, your e-commerce expansion platform must also allow you to customize the look and feel of your e-shop. In particular, banners and other distinctive graphic elements that aim to capture the customer's attention must be well localised. The blog should also get its own foreign version.

Selling on separate domains

Foreign versions of the e-shop should be operated on separate domains. It always looks more trustworthy. Ideally, the customer should get the impression that they are buying from a local retailer, or at the very least, they should gain confidence that they will get maximum support from you. And this impression, in addition to quality localization and good customer support, will help you promote sales on separate domains.

Let's explain this with a simple example. A lot of e-shops run their language versions under one domain, which is only distinguished at the end by the brand of the mutation. It must be clear to the customer at first glance that he has come to a clone of a foreign e-shop.

It will look something like this: mujeshop.cz/de

Selling on a separate domain, on the other hand, means that the customer gets to an e-shop located directly on their national domain. Thus, there is no reason to doubt that they are in a foreign e-shop.

So customers can find your e-shop at: www.mujeshop.de

⚠️ Attention! It should not just be about creating one false impression based on sales on a separate domain. You will only be a trustworthy seller if you handle the localization completely from A to Z. A separate domain is just the icing on the cake.

Now you may be afraid that you will have to set up two e-shops to manage two separate domains. Not at all. In fact, a good multilingual solution can separate the sales for each language into separate domains and manage them from one administration.

Connecting to location tools

A well-executed foreign expansion doesn't mean spending tens or hundreds of hours working on translations and localization of the e-shop. On the contrary, today's intelligent tools make it possible to embark on localization fully, but with minimal effort. And it's thanks to tools like LOCO that you can handle foreign expansion smartly, automatically and with minimal cost. This way, you can be sure that your e-shop will not only be translated, but also localized. That is, adapted to the habits and expectations of local customers.

E-shop solution fully prepared for expansion

We've already covered what you should expect from a truly multilingual platform. Now we'd like a specific tip. This is the Upgates e-commerce platform, which will offer you everything you need for a complete international expansion. Whether it's true multilingualism, support for separate domains, and connections to useful expansion tools like LOCO.

You can try Upgates for free for 30 days and explore its other benefits. These include the ability to create your own e-shop design, the freedom to connect to third party systems including an open API, or transparent pricing. With Upgates there is no extra charge for features, all are always included in the basic tariff.