With more (typically younger) consumers leading a shift towards using environmentally-friendly products, many business owners are becoming eco-conscious too - especially when it comes to packaging. One of the star performers in the eco-friendly material stakes is jute.

When it comes to establishing a successful e-commerce company, you’ll know that having a valued and worthy brand is half the battle. And in this tricky, over-saturated market, the most important way to build your brand is to be consistent, especially with your packaging.

We are proud to say that Sufio is one of the most popular invoicing apps for online stores and is used by merchants in more than 75 countries. When we started four years ago, we wanted to make an app that’s compliant with different invoicing legislations and is available to customers around the world.

Have you ever had a request for an invoice from a customer? For online merchants who sell internationally, this could be pretty common.

Design is to business what evolution is to nature: it allows brands to change and survive. When operating an online store, the virtual look and feel of your business are the only things that potential customers have to go on to make up their mind about whether to spend their money with you or not.

Consumers like to feel as though they are making their own informed decisions when it comes to what they choose to spend their money on.

Creating an online store is pretty straightforward but turning that into a successful e-commerce brand is certainly no easy feat. With over 28 million registered small businesses offering competing products, consumers have many options to choose from.

With billions of tons of waste filling landfills globally every year, society is becoming increasingly environment - conscious - from eating more sustainably to reusing grocery bags.

Online shopping. It’s easy, convenient and usually pretty speedy. But many of us will have experienced that moment of returning home to find one of those annoying ‘We’re sorry we missed you!’ cards on the doormat.

Click to enter any online shop. Intrigued?

An ancient web template with messy menus and illegible fonts probably won’t make you leap for your wallet. A gorgeous, shiny intro page with beautiful imagery and a captivating aesthetic? That’s a whole another story.

Why is a brand’s visual identity important?

We know it’s not always easy to make your way through the taxes, especially for online businesses that sell both locally and across borders.

Charging the correct tax rates is vital for your own accounting, as well as that of your customers. And you don’t want to get yourself or them into trouble with tax authorities.

Despite the dominance of content and social media marketing, email is not dead and is not likely to die anytime soon.

As an ecommerce seller, it’s easy to be complacent about choosing to only ship domestically. Indeed, shipping internationally can be a pain — there’s all this paperwork, it’s expensive, and logistics can be very complex. For small businesses, this can be very overwhelming and not worth the effort in exploring.

Every merchant spends a fair amount of money on marketing tools with only one goal: to bring visitors to his site.

But what happens next? 

Having a good, recognizable logo is key when getting your brand out there. But what if you’re just starting up and can’t afford to hire a pro designer? Well, there are online logo makers.

If you’re selling stuff online, your potential customer may find your products from anywhere. E-commerce is still growing, the market is huge, and there are practically no limits as to where your business can expand. The only question is: Are you ready to go global?