Every eCommerce business is looking for ways to increase the number of sales they’re making, because you can’t grow an eCommerce business without generating more sales. Rather than leave you floundering around trying to work out how to improve your sales we thought we’d show you what you need to do to generate more sales via your digital marketing strategy.
It’s tempting to buy into the notion that the success of your online store is based only around offering your products at the cheapest price and providing the best deals. The truth though is that whilst this is very important, there are a range of other factors that can be leveraged to improve your digital marketing performance that will help deliver more sales over the short, medium, and long term.
To help you out we’ve pulled together a quick overview of what we think you need to focus on for your digital marketing to grow your ecommerce business.
Demonstrate Knowledge of Your Products
If you’re focused solely on reaching people right at the point of purchase, you’re missing out a huge portion of your potential customer base. An awful lot of your customers will be doing research and looking for information on their purchases before they’re ready to purchase, so if you can reach them when they’re in the research phase you’ll be able to convert them to a sale easier later.
To reach people whilst they’re researching though you need to offer them content that’s relevant to their searches and needs. That means creating high quality content based around key terms that users are searching for, and a tonne of supplementary content that will demonstrate your expertise so that users will trust you.
Not only does this matter for grabbing the attention of users whilst they’re researching their purchases, but it also plays a massive part in Search Engine Optimisation. Expertise, Authority and Trust, are three areas that you need to optimise to rank well and having what Google terms “Supplementary Content” that demonstrates your expertise is a major part of that. So by having content that demonstrates knowledge you can not only reach people earlier in their buyer’s journey, but also improve your organic rankings as well. Improved rankings lead to high volumes of relevant traffic and increased sales!
Set Up Re-marketing Campaigns
Once you’ve got the attention of your audience through content that shows your expertise, you’ll need a way to reach them once they’ve left your site. Ideally, you’ve got them to sign up for some special offer or deal, but the reality is that the bulk of them will not convert in anyway on their first visit, so you need to find a way to bring them back to your site. That’s where re-marketing comes in.
By using re-marketing campaigns, set up properly and with considered strategy behind them, you’ll be able to ensure that as your site visitors continue to surf the web, your brand & store will be front of mind time and time again. By offering them deals and offers based on the content and pages they were engaging with on your site you can bring them back when they’re ready to purchase.
There are multiple platforms that can be used for re-marketing and the ones that you should use are determined by the audience you’re after. Identifying where your audience is should determine which platforms you use. Google’s Display network is useful for almost all eCommerce stores, but social media re-marketing should be based on if your audience uses a specific platform.
Social Proof Your Products and Site
Once you’ve got to your site, regardless of what stage of their buyers journey they’re in, you’ll need to demonstrate that you’re a trustworthy place to make their purchase. The best way to do that is through social proofing.
Social Proofing as defined by Robert Cialdini in his 1984 book “Influence” as “people [copying] the actions of others in an attempt to undertake behaviour in a given situation”. In essence it means that by demonstrating that others are taking an action, your audience will want to take the action as well.
In a basic way, social proofing in E-Commerce can be seen in the way stores rely on reviews. Whether they’re specifically searching for the products or for the store itself, by having reviews you’ll be able to demonstrate that others are purchasing the products and influence people to buy from you. In fact the power of reviews is so strong that studies show that up that people are willing to spend as much as 31% more from a site with good reviews, and that by having even only small number of reviews, you can increase the likelihood making a sale by up to 270%
On top of this you can use social proof through more subtle means such as encouraging people to share your content online. Retweets, shares, and likes all act as ways to demonstrate that others approve of your website and content and can influence people to engage with your store.
Don’t Rely on AI
For channels like your Google Search ads, and Google Shopping Campaigns, it can be very tempting to just rely on the AI that google has developed to just rely on the AI that underpins the campaigns and trust that it will deliver for you. The truth though is that whilst this will work, relying solely on Performance Max and Manufacturing Centre will result in you underperforming.
AI led campaign types will optimise for the effectiveness of the campaigns to generate sales, but they won’t optimise for your overall business objectives. For instance, sometimes you can make more profit by achieving fewer sales by focusing your advertising budget on high profit margin items. Identifying these sorts of issues is where PPC experts can come in, as they can help you
PPC is perhaps the most important channel for E-commerce and as google launches more and more campaign options like Google Manufacturing Centre and Performance Max, it can be tempting to just rely on the AI that underpins the campaigns and trust that it will deliver for you. The truth though is that whilst this will work to a degree, you can increase performance if you combine the AI with the expertise of PPC specialists (whether in-house or via an agency) you’ll be able to take your PPC campaigns to a new level that will help you deliver on the specific business objectives and targets you’re aiming for.
Invest in High Quality Photography
The imagery ad photography on your website can have a massive impact on your conversion rates. That’s why it’s important to make sure that your images are of top quality. Whilst you can source some images from stock image hubs like Shutterstock you’ll end up lacking the uniqueness and style that working with a commercial photographer can bring.
Cultivate Your Existing Customers
Often businesses spend all their time looking to bring in new customers whilst failing to leverage their existing loyal customers. The basic facts are that if someone has already purchased from you, they’re more likely to make another purchase from you in future. That means you can grow your business by selling more to your existing customer base.
Whilst this can be difficult, it’s worth the expenditure of time and energy. Through email marketing, re-marketing and social media you can keep your customers engaged after the point of purchase and bring them back to the site the next time they need to make a purchase.
Where Should You Start With Optimising Your Site
All these ideas are just the starting point though! Each website is unique and what works for your competition might not work for you. As such it’s important to make sure that you get a proper review of your digital marketing to assess what you need to improve to grow your ecommerce business.
