Quickly does it

By C. S.-W.

FOR many shop owners, e-commerce remains a riddle. Each step, from creating an online shopfront that lures in customers to taking payment for goods, can flummox retailers selling their wares online. In many cases, intimate knowledge of such technical wizardry as Perl, PHP and MySQL databases is needed.

Enter Tictail, a ten-month-old Swedish start-up, which aims to radically simplify the process for businesses to go online. It takes no more than a few minutes before a new virtual store is ready to accept orders. Owners only need to follow a few simple steps, link their shop to a PayPal account, and set a price for their items.

The idea of automating the set-up of an online store came to Carl Waldekranz, the firm’s 26-year-old founder, when he was involved in marketing Spotify, the popular music-streaming start-up. He likens Tictail to the clean, intuitive interface used by Tumblr, a blogging platform popular with teens. Retailers, Mr Waldekranz argues, are more concerned with the products they sell than learning about technical trifles such as search engine optimisation (SEO).

His hunch seems to be correct. During its short life, Tictail has already attracted 10,000 users (and 75% of them have recommended the service to friends). So far, Sweden is its biggest base and America number two. Seed funding of €1.2m, secured in late 2012, is allowing the firm to try to boost growth in Western Europe.

All this is admirable, but not in itself extraordinary. Other products and websites also let users set up simple online shops. Etsy, a community-driven marketplace, for instance, is popular among makers of twee knick-knacks such as crocheted tea cosies. Where Tictail differentiates itself, is its continuing support for shop owners.

Tictail has a “feed”—a stream of messages—that acts as an automated adviser. Among other things, it coaxes and cajoles shop owners to tweet about their latest lines. And it reminds them to follow up with customers to ensure their packages arrived in good order—important in any customer-facing industry, but often overlooked in the rush to keep a young business afloat.

The service also aims to build loyalty and repeat custom through social-media features. Customers can “subscribe” to a store, meaning they will get messages informing them of any new products put on sale. Later this year, owners will also be able to add extensions, such as the ability to hand out discount codes to their store—which will be a way for Tictail to make money: it will charge a fee for the use of such extensions.

Like every ambitious entrepreneur, Mr Waldekranz has big plans for his product: he wants Tictail not only to become the world’s most used, but its most loved e-commerce platform, with millions of users worldwide. Whether he will get there remains to be seen, but lowering the barrier to entry for online retailing will certainly push many bricks-and-mortar businesses to move into the virtual world.