Marketing for eCommerce requires specific strategies outside of your usual digital marketing efforts. To achieve true, long-term success, your eCommerce marketing plan must be laser-focused on customers’ shopping experience and the strategies for elevating it.
The key performance indicators (KPIs) that your business will zero in on include organic revenue, targeted web traffic, click-through rates (CTRs) and shopping conversion rates. These are some of the focus points when you’re marketing for eCommerce.
The strategies you employ will be a mix of time-tested methods and emerging and trending practices influenced by shifting search behaviors. There is no one-size-fits-all approach; each company and eCommerce marketer will need their own methodology on how to go about making an impact on their target market. For example, even the eCommerce content marketing tactics you apply won’t just focus on getting traffic to your website.
Old-school strategies like eCommerce email marketing still prove to be extremely effective. You also need search engine optimization (SEO) if you want customers to find your products. Every company needs to execute an individualized eCommerce SEO strategy based on personal metrics and other data.
In no specific order, these are five proven strategies on how to increase your sales as an eCommerce marketing company.
1. Responsive Web Design
Your eCommerce strategy must incorporate a mobile-friendly design. The rise of mobile shopping is showing no signs of slowing down. Statistics show 53.9 percent of users purchase online on their phones. Imagine their frustration when your site is too big for their screen size.
Making site elements mobile-friendly is integral to your eCommerce marketing plan. Google improves the rank of highly responsive websites and penalizes those that aren’t. Think of mobile-friendliness as a central element of your overall eCommerce SEO strategy.
The objective behind this part of your eCommerce sales strategy is to make things effortless for your visitors. It should be easy for each user to find products, view product photos and scroll through product details. Experts from any eCommerce marketing company will tell you that site visitors won’t always convert during the first encounter. But, if you’re successful in making that first contact as seamless an experience as possible, odds are they’ll come back. And this time to make a purchase.
There is no way to manually set up your site or store for every screen size. Seeking out an eCommerce digital marketing agency that has the experience and industry know-how is the first step in designing your responsive, mobile-first website.
2. Search Engine Optimization
Creating a website for your business is just half the battle. An eCommerce SEO strategy is needed to supplement your web development efforts so your target audience can find you in a highly saturated market. After all, there’s little point, if any, in having an eCommerce store if it’s not visible to your prospects.
Studies reveal 87 percent of consumers today will search for products online before placing an order, underlining the importance of eCommerce optimization.
Ask any eCommerce digital marketing agency; they’ll recommend doing a site audit first. Your site’s content and server-side details need close inspection. This is part of technical SEO, which shouldn’t be taken for granted.
Employing SEO for eCommerce website best practices will require you to do the following:
• Do keyword research relevant to your brand
• Use different keyword strategies for each product
• Leverage conversion rate optimization (CRO) to analyze campaign performance
• Optimize content on your site and your product descriptions
Related to the technical side of SEO is improving the customer checkout experience. This is an important part of any eCommerce marketing strategy. Statistics show 68 percent of shopping carts end up abandoned because of poor checkout experience.
The three biggest things to avoid are:
1. Few payment options (provide at least four)
2. Missing progress bar (should show customers how many steps are left)
3. Making customers create accounts (always allow direct purchases)
This is true for any platform. Working with the best Shopify web designers or for any platform for that matter will go a long way. Remember that 70 to 80 percent of Google users focus on organic search results. The best eCommerce marketing company can fine-tune your current strategy to produce a one-of-a-kind, optimized strategy avoiding the usual pitfalls.
3. eCommerce Email Marketing
Using personalized eCommerce email marketing should be part of any digital marketing plan. Consider it a time-tested strategy providing a direct means to reach your ideal customers. Is it an intrusive way to market? Not really. Forty-nine percent of people actually prefer to receive emails from brands they like.
There are several types of emails that you can send:
• Birthday emails: help you keep in touch with current customers
• Welcome emails: for new and returning customers
• Shopping cart abandonment: BI Intelligence reports 63 percent are recoverable
• Newsletters: touch base with clients and increase website traffic
• Thank you emails: nurture customer relationships and product promotion
• Promotional emails: inform customers about discounts and increase sales volume
There are other types of email campaigns that you can use, and data provided by eCommerce marketing services can help you generate new campaigns. The tools provided by digital marketing service providers help you gather insight about your customers, competitors and industry segment.
4. Paid Campaigns
In addition to using SEO for eCommerce website traffic, turn to pay-per-click (PPC) advertising to see fast, cost-effective results and bolster your overall eCommerce marketing strategy.
Do you remember seeing ads that appear at the top of the search engine results page (SERP)? That’s PPC in action. And it’s a targeted way to expand your reach. Incorporating them into your eCommerce strategy lets you optimize for specific keywords to reach a specific audience, specifically those who are ready to make a purchase.
The thing to remember about PPC is that you will only pay when someone clicks on your ad, hence why the platform is called “pay-per-click”. When you work on your eCommerce marketing strategy, be sure to budget for these ads. There are three types of ads that you’ll use most often: paid search ads, product listing ads and display ads.
1. Paid Search Ads: These appear at the top of the SERPs. They don’t contain images and will appear like one of the organic search results. This text-only ad is based on the user’s search terms. Using them in your eCommerce content marketing efforts lets you reach out to audiences who are ready to buy and allows high chances of conversion.
2. Product Listing Ads: Experts from any eCommerce digital marketing agency will usually recommend these ads for shopping campaigns. Product listing ads display your products in relevant search results. This works for Google Shopping, Amazon marketing and Walmart Marketplace.
3. Display Ads: Also known as banner ads, these are the ads you see on apps, websites and even on mobile games. Display ads are based on the user’s browser history, topics they read online and the type of content they consume. They can be used to retarget customers. Incorporate them in your eCommerce strategy as an effective tool for increasing brand awareness.
5. eCommerce Content Marketing
Content marketing for eCommerce is a blanket term for everything related to producing content for eCommerce businesses. Since plenty of customers are spending time surfing social networks, your time is well spent developing social content, as well. This is a whole other dimension from producing content for your website and eCommerce store.
The good news is that Instagram and other social media channels are now incorporating shopping features. It’s another element you need to introduce to your eCommerce marketing plan. Think of it as another net you can cast to get more sales.
An interesting feature you might want to consider is product tagging on social media posts. Look for ways to add that to your eCommerce sales strategy. It’s an organic search tactic that allows you to nominate your products without looking too salesy.
Other than social media content, some of the other areas of focus may include:
• Blog posts
• FAQ sections
• Infographics
• Video
• Lead magnets
Another area of focus is reaching out to micro- and macro-influencers. Micro-influencers are those with 10,000 to 30,000 followers, while macro-influencers have significantly more. Professional eCommerce marketing services will come into play when reaching out to influencers and leveraging their clout to get your product in front of more eyes.
Formulating a Unique Strategy Mix
Apart from content marketing for eCommerce and other strategies outlined above, there are other factors to consider as you formulate a strategy that works for your business. Depending on the stage of your campaign, you need to create an eCommerce sales funnel and perform web audits and A/B testing, among others.
This is where an experienced eCommerce marketing services company will come in handy. Thrive is an eCommerce marketing agency that has a proven track record spanning more than 15 years.
Working with our eCommerce marketing agency is a collaborative effort that includes a unique growth formula for your enterprise. Contact Thrive today by calling 866-434-4748 or by filling out this form to get a free quote.
