Knowing the target audience you are selling is vital. Your own ecommerce store’s layout and presentation is the flagship way of presenting your product.
Questions you should answer before embarking on a design phase.
What percentage of your customers are engaged on social media ?
Is the colors and shapes on the site compatible with the product. ?
If your product is for example baby related then a layout with sharp corners and dangerous colours like red is not a great idea. Likewise pastel colors are not suiteable on a workwear site. Current trends are leaning towards white layouts. It the safe option.
If you are not the manufactorer of the product , visit the manufactorers online presences to get an idea of their targeting.
Is accessibility an issue ?
If you are selling to the elderly consider accessibility issues. Are you going to make older people reach for their reading glasses when on your site because you have tiny or super thin fonts that are very designerish but pretty frustrating for older customers.
Consider the age profile, the male female percentages of customers.
Consider the multichannel option to get your product into everyones favourite store such as ebay, amazon or alibaba etc. Some channels are more suited to some products than others.
There are many online research areas to look at when finding out who your target market is for your product.