Business eCommerce

Running an eCommerce Store

A practical, end-to-end course on building, operating, and improving a profitable online shop

Running an eCommerce Store logo
Quick Course Facts
18
Self-paced, Online, Lessons
18
Videos and/or Narrated Presentations
6.0
Approximate Hours of Course Media
About the Running an eCommerce Store Course

Running an eCommerce Store is a Business-focused course designed to help you build, operate, and improve a profitable online shop from the ground up. You will learn how to choose the right products, set up a trustworthy storefront, manage day-to-day operations, and create practical marketing systems that support sustainable growth.

Build And Grow A Profitable eCommerce Business

  • Learn the foundations of the eCommerce Business model, including niche selection, customer definition, product sourcing, and margins.
  • Create a store setup that builds trust through the right platform, strong product pages, effective media, and clear merchandising.
  • Manage core operations with confidence, including payments, taxes, policies, fulfilment, returns, inventory, and customer service.
  • Develop a practical growth plan using SEO, email marketing, paid advertising, promotions, analytics, and conversion metrics.

A practical, end-to-end course on building, operating, and improving a profitable online shop.

Running an eCommerce Store gives you a clear path through the major decisions and systems involved in creating an online retail Business. You will start with the fundamentals: how eCommerce makes money, how to choose a niche, how to define your target customer, and how to evaluate products based on sourcing, pricing, profitability, and unit economics.

From there, the course guides you through store setup and customer experience. You will compare platforms and sales channels, design a storefront that builds credibility, write product pages that convert, and use product photography, media, and merchandising to make your offer easier to understand and buy.

You will also learn the operational side of Running an eCommerce Store, including payments, taxes, legal pages, store policies, shipping, fulfilment, returns, inventory control, customer service systems, and the post-purchase experience. These lessons help you avoid common mistakes and create a smoother Business for both you and your customers.

The marketing and growth sections cover eCommerce SEO, email automations, customer retention, social content, influencers, community building, paid advertising, promotions, bundles, seasonal campaigns, store analytics, and conversion metrics. By the end of the course, you will be able to move from scattered ideas to a structured 90-day eCommerce growth plan, with the skills to run your online shop more strategically, profitably, and confidently.

Course Lessons

Full lesson breakdown

Lessons are organized by topic area and each includes descriptive copy for search visibility and student clarity.

Foundations

3 lessons

This lesson defines the eCommerce business model in practical operating terms: how an online store creates value, attracts buyers, converts demand into orders, fulfills those orders, and keeps enough …

Lesson 2: Choosing a Niche and Defining Your Customer

20 min
In this lesson, Professor Christina Ross explains how to choose an eCommerce niche with enough customer demand, realistic competition, and workable economics. The goal is not to find a magical product…

Lesson 3: Product Selection, Sourcing, and Margin Basics

22 min
This lesson teaches a practical method for choosing products that can sell profitably, not just products that look interesting. Students learn how to evaluate demand, competition, sourcing options, un…

Commercial Planning

1 lesson

Lesson 4: Pricing, Profitability, and Unit Economics

21 min
This lesson teaches the financial logic behind a healthy eCommerce store: how to set prices, calculate true contribution margin, and understand whether each order is creating value or quietly losing m…

Store Setup

4 lessons

Lesson 5: Choosing the Right Store Platform and Sales Channels

18 min
In this lesson, students learn how to choose an eCommerce platform and sales channel mix based on business model, product type, budget, operational needs, and growth plans. The focus is not on chasing…

Lesson 6: Designing a Storefront That Builds Trust

20 min
This lesson explains how to design an eCommerce storefront that feels credible before a shopper ever reaches checkout. It focuses on practical trust signals: clear branding, professional visual design…

Lesson 7: Writing Product Pages That Convert

19 min
In this lesson, students learn how to write product pages that help shoppers understand, trust, and buy a product without feeling pushed. The focus is on product titles, benefit-led descriptions, scan…

Lesson 8: Product Photography, Media, and Merchandising

18 min
This lesson shows how product photography, video, and merchandising choices affect trust, perceived value, and conversion in an online store. Students learn how to plan a practical media set for each …

Operations

3 lessons

Lesson 9: Payments, Taxes, Legal Pages, and Store Policies

21 min
This lesson turns the operational “fine print” of an eCommerce store into a practical setup checklist: payment methods, fraud controls, sales tax readiness, required legal pages, and customer-facing s…

Lesson 10: Shipping, Fulfilment, Returns, and Inventory Control

23 min
This lesson explains the operational backbone of an eCommerce store: how products move from supplier or warehouse to customer, how returns are handled without destroying margins, and how inventory is …

Lesson 11: Customer Service Systems and Post-Purchase Experience

18 min
This lesson covers the customer service systems that keep an eCommerce store reliable after the sale: support channels, help desk workflows, order status communication, return handling, response stand…

Marketing

4 lessons

Lesson 12: Building an eCommerce SEO Foundation

22 min
This lesson builds the search engine optimization foundation for an eCommerce store: how search fits into customer acquisition, how to structure the site so products can be found, and how to create pa…

Lesson 13: Email Marketing, Automations, and Customer Retention

21 min
This lesson explains how email marketing supports retention in an eCommerce store: capturing permission-based subscribers, segmenting customers by behavior, building core automations, and measuring re…

Lesson 14: Social Content, Influencers, and Community Building

18 min
Social content, influencer partnerships, and community building help an eCommerce store earn attention without relying only on paid ads or discounts. This lesson explains how to choose the right chann…

Lesson 15: Paid Advertising Fundamentals for Online Stores

23 min
This lesson introduces the practical fundamentals of paid advertising for online stores: when to use ads, how to set goals, which channels fit different products, and how to measure whether campaigns …

Growth

3 lessons

Lesson 16: Promotions, Bundles, and Seasonal Campaigns

19 min
This lesson shows how to use promotions, bundles, and seasonal campaigns to grow an eCommerce store without training customers to wait for discounts. You will learn how to choose the right promotion t…

Lesson 17: Reading Store Analytics and Conversion Metrics

22 min
This lesson teaches students how to read eCommerce analytics as an operating tool, not just a reporting dashboard. Students learn the core metrics that explain store performance, including traffic qua…

Lesson 18: Creating a 90-Day eCommerce Growth Plan

20 min
In this lesson, students build a practical 90-day growth plan for an eCommerce store. The focus is on turning broad revenue goals into a sequenced plan with measurable targets, realistic initiatives, …
About Your Instructor
Professor Christina Ross

Professor Christina Ross

Professor Christina Ross guides this AI-built Virversity course with a clear, practical teaching style.