Launching an Online Store in India: A Step-by-Step Plan

You've got 60 products in a godown, an Instagram page with decent followers, and a WhatsApp inbox full of "price?" messages. Time for a proper online store. But where do you actually begin: the website, the payment gateway, or the photos?

Start with none of those. The order matters, and getting it wrong is how people end up with a beautiful store that can't take an order. Here's the sequence we suggest to clients.

Step 1: Count your products honestly

Open a spreadsheet and list every product you'll actually sell online, with name, price, weight, and a photo status. This number decides your package more than anything else.

• Up to 20 products: our Store Starter, ₹35,000, 10 days
• Up to 100 products: Store Pro, ₹60,000, 14 days
• Unlimited products: Store Elite, ₹95,000, 21 days

If you're at 70 products now but plan to reach 120 soon, don't pay for the top tier yet. Our add-on of 50 extra products costs ₹10,000 and takes 3 days, so you can grow into it.

Step 2: Decide how customers will pay

Many first-time sellers assume they need every payment method on day one. You don't. Our Store Starter runs on cash on delivery plus one payment gateway, and that's a perfectly workable start for many local sellers.

A word of honesty here. The Store Pro package lists Stripe and JazzCash as its gateways. If you're selling within India and want UPI or an Indian card gateway, tell us before you order so we can confirm what we can connect for your case. We'd rather settle that in a conversation than surprise you at launch.

Step 3: Work out shipping and returns

This is where small stores quietly lose money. Before design starts, decide:

1. Which courier you'll use and how you'll compare their rates.
2. Whether shipping is free, flat or by weight.
3. Your return policy, in two plain sentences.
4. Whether you'll deliver only to certain pincodes at first.

COD is popular in India but comes with returns when buyers refuse parcels. Some sellers charge a small COD fee or only allow COD on lower-value orders. That's your call; the store should simply be built to match it.

Step 4: Photos and descriptions come before design

A custom theme can't rescue dark, cropped, inconsistent photos. Shoot against a plain background in daylight, same angle for every product, at least three images each for the best sellers. Write descriptions that answer the questions you get on WhatsApp: size, material, care, delivery time.

If you only have time to improve one thing, improve the first photo of each product. It's the image that shows on listing pages.

Step 5: Pick the package by the features you'll use

Two features are worth understanding. Inventory tracking stops you selling something that's out of stock, which matters the moment you also sell offline. Abandoned-cart reminders recover some lost orders, but only once you have steady traffic. Under 20 orders a month, it's a nice-to-have.

Step 6: Test like an angry customer

Before launch, place at least five test orders: one with COD, one with each gateway, one with a wrong pincode, one on a phone, and one where you try to pay and then close the page. Check that the confirmation email arrives and the stock count drops. Also check what the customer sees when something fails. Vague error messages cost sales.

Mistakes we see most often

• Launching without a returns and privacy page, which many payment providers expect.
• Uploading 40 products with no weights, so shipping can't be calculated.
• Choosing a heavy theme that takes ages to load on mobile data.
• Forgetting to put GST details on invoices if you're registered.

Who an online store is NOT for

If you sell five products and handle orders on WhatsApp comfortably, a simple business website with an enquiry form costs less and may do the job. A store makes sense when you get repeat orders, stock changes often, or you want payments handled without a chat for every sale.

One last thought on timing. Plan your launch away from your busiest week. Festival season is tempting, but it's also when couriers are stretched and customers are least forgiving about late parcels. Launching a month earlier gives you time to fix small problems while the stakes are low.

How we handle this at DegitalService

We build the three store packages above, with the prices and delivery days listed. You send the product spreadsheet and photos; we set up the catalogue, checkout and theme, test the order flow and hand it over. If you want to look at options first, the E-commerce Store page has the details, and you can start an order when you're ready. Not sure about gateways or how many products to start with? Talk to us first, and we'll tell you if a smaller package will do.