By Kunjal Panchal
Do you find your eCommerce sales to be disappointing? Simply setting up an eCommerce store is not enough anymore. If you are really looking to sell more products, promotion is key. Even the best products in the world will not sell if consumers don’t know about them. You need to spread awareness if you want people to buy from your store. With that being said, never underestimate the power of marketing.
How can you become a marketing master? In this post, you will discover clever, proven ways to boost your eCommerce sales. By implementing these tactics your business is sure to take off!
1. Live Chat
According to research conducted, Consumers prefer Live Chat (73%) in comparison to the all other forms of Customer Service.
Live Chat offers better engagement, in addition to better business insight. This insight is beneficial, as it will lead to a reduction in expenses. Since Live chat provides customers with instant responses to their questions, it’s the perfect choice for someone is looking to increase their sales in the eCommerce industry.
A report from Forrester states that almost 44% of online Customers consider Live Chat as one of the most important features of any eCommerce site! It’s the best customer support you can offer, and it will help you to build trust with your target audience. Using it will lead to a better brand image.
Live Chat ensures the top level of customer service and complete guidance from the beginning all the way to checkout. Crocs, for example, allows their visitors to talk to their team in real-time.
2. Make Your Checkout Process Simple
Hassle-free buying will lead to happy customers. Reports suggest businesses should consider removing some features, such as the mandatory ‘sign up,’ that impede the consumer. This will allow the entire act of buying to become easier, since it only requires the shopping cart. The simpler the checkout process, the higher the visitor conversion rate.
You should provide people the option to buy as a ‘guest.’ This will make the buying process quicker, and therefore motivate several one-time buyers to use your website for their needs. For example, one company made the simple change of removing the mandatory ‘sign up’ and saw a $3 billion dollar rise in profit.
You should also shorten the checkout form and minimize compulsory field requirements if possible. In the above image from MindMeister, customers are allowed to pay with credit cards or PayPal. It also only asks for essential information. People are attracted to expediency, and making small incremental changes will boost sales greatly.
3. Invest in email marketing
Email marketing is one of the best methods to boost your eCommerce store sales. 85% of US retailers consider email marketing one of the most effective customer acquisition tactics. 89% of marketers also say that email is their primary channel for lead generation. Email has an ROI of around 4300%. Email is 40 times more effective at acquiring new customers than Facebook or Twitter. In fact, email converts 3x better than social media in general.
That being said, you should take email seriously for marketing purposes. First, focus on creating a quality email list. The most effective way to build an email list is to offer free incentives, such as a giveaway. For example, Birchbox provides a welcome gift of 15% off on their sign-up form when you join their email list.
Now you need to build a strong and trusted relationship with your subscribers and customers. Consistently send them interesting, personalized, and valuable emails. Don’t irritate them with junk. Craft interesting subject lines and content. Allow customers the option to adjust content preference and email frequency. It will help you to reduce your unsubscribe rate.
Don’t forget the holiday season. It’s a great opportunity to drive sales and boost your conversion rate. Send free gifts, special discounts, free shipping, or some other incentives just before holidays like Valentine’s Day, Thanksgiving, Cyber Monday, Black Friday, and Christmas.
4. Turn Your Followers into Leads with Social Contests
According to Reputation.com, Millennials turn to social media and online reviews for information. This is because most of them don’t trust advertising. Social Contests are just one of the most attractive ways to ensure your followers get converted into leads.
Running a social contest on Instagram, Facebook or any other social media channel will ensure positive brand gain. In addition to earning you new followers, current followers also have a better chance of turning into leads.
Social contests allow your brand to create market buzz, which will increase awareness among people related to your services/products. Online contests and giveaways also act as enticing, interactive content that will drive more traffic to your website and improve online conversion. If you are on a social media, use social contests to generate curiosity among your followers and generate online sales.
As indicated by the ActivPhy example below, your contest participants will become qualified leads.
5. Paid ads
Paid Ads are another proven marketing strategy to generate sales for your eCommerce Business. While paid ads may seem like an expensive investment at first, there are several hidden benefits to ordering them. A small initial payment is all it takes to take your business to the next level.
Paid ads create an audience base for your business and also increase the chance to gain word-of-mouth publicity. You can obviously test the waters by running a cheap ad first. Utilize a small portion of your budget and check the response. I’m sure you will not regret the decision.
Create multiple campaigns later on a consistent duration and you will surely see the difference in your branding and sales. Ad platforms you should consider are Facebook, Twitter Instagram, and Google Adwords.
See this example:
Image Source
I hope you find these tactics helpful. Do you want to share your favorite way to boost eCommerce sales? Please share with us in the comments below!
Kunjal Panchal is a Digital Strategist and a social media geek. She is passionate about content marketing and strongly believes in the power of storytelling for marketing. A perfect day for her consists of reading her favorite author with a hot cuppa coffee. Find her on Twitter and LinkedIn.
