From artificial intelligence conversational bots to mobile payments and digital customer loyalty programs, the e-commerce landscape is exploding with activity. Consumers have myriad online shopping options at their disposal; everything from voice-enabled shopping bots (can you say Alexa?) to subscription-based payment models are being used to entice customers to purchase from online vendors.
If you’re an e-commerce brand attempting to build a profitable online business, it is absolutely critical you set your business up for success. A half-hearted attempt to grow a revenue-positive business just won’t do. You need to go all-in on conversion optimization or you shouldn’t even bother with your entrepreneurial endeavor. To ensure your company has the best chance at sustainable growth, bear the following eight essential conversion tips in mind. The future of your company is at stake.
1. Prioritize Your Homepage
Your best selling products should always be front-and-center on your website. Prime digital real estate isn’t meant for introducing new products or flogging last year’s slow sellers. Promote your new products in a sidebar advertisement or scrolling banner, but save your homepage for your top sellers.
Do a little competitive research to see which products are hot sellers for others in your niche. Dive into their Twitter @ replies and view their Facebook comments too. The better informed you are about hot sellers within your sector, the better you can optimize your e-commerce homepage for increased sales.
2. Integrate Search Data
Understand how consumers are finding your online store and how they are searching for your products. Pay attention your most visited pages and use analytics investigation to determine tags and categories for your products. You want to make product discovery as easy as possible; using the category tags that came with your website template does nothing for your sales. Customize your site based upon the search habits of shoppers. Not only will this help on-site shoppers discover more products, it will improve your search engine optimization too. When you know how consumers are hunting for your products, you can use that information to your business’ benefit. (Don’t forget to consider voice-search queries too!).
3. Integrate Social Data
Speaking of search engine optimization, integrate social media data into your e-commerce SEO strategy. Numerous social media platforms offer an advanced search function, as does Google. Make your queries network specific, i.e. Twitter or Facebook, and dig into social media conversations regarding your type of products. Once you understand the comments and questions happening on social media, you can incorporate this newfound information into your SEO strategy.
Pay attention to product trends, complaints, and queries for new products. Use a search identifier like “anyone know” to find questions consumers are asking on social media regarding your market sector. (This is also an awesome way to discover social media engagement opportunities for your business).
4. Positive Reviews Matter
Review marketing is an integral part of building a successful e-commerce business. Not only do reviews help you discover problems current customers are having with your products, positive reviews can become a powerful tool for your social media marketing team. Positive reviews can be shared on social platforms like Twitter and Facebook (make sure customers consent to social sharing) and can also be used to create visual marketing assets for your company. Create infographics out of your top reviews, build SlideShare presentations, or embed a positive review in a company blog post and create written content based upon the review. You can even incorporate review marketing into your email newsletters.
5. Bet On Buyer Personas
Buyer personas are another crucial component of building a successful e-commerce business. Once you discover the power of persona marketing, you will wonder why you waited so long to dig into the details behind your customer motivations. Understanding who your customers are, the emotional triggers that make them buy, and the tactics that are likely to make them purchase more can have a huge impact on your revenue. Using the power of buyer persona intelligence can increase your average sales total and encourage return visits from loyal customers. Buyer data intelligence can be incorporated into everything from your inventory selection to your marketing strategies.
6. Optimize Your Website Copy
Copy optimization is essential for increased conversions. A/B test the copy on your landing pages, your homepage, product descriptions, and social media posts. If you don’t know how to test your copy, hire an experienced copywriter who can assist you with your conversion strategy. Even the copy you use on your business’ blog (you do have an e-commerce blog, right?) should be tested to ensure maximum ROI. Words matter; the sooner you realize the potential of stellar copywriting, the sooner you can start reaping the rewards.
7. Understand User Flows
User flow is a vital component of e-commerce optimization. Far too few online entrepreneurs monitor how consumers use their site and its structure to enable higher conversions. Understanding which user flows lead to the most sales can help you tweak your site’s design accordingly. Is your shipping data page the first thing new visitors look for on your site? Are your landing pages causing bottlenecks on your site? The more you track how consumers move about your website, the more informed you’ll be to adjust your site’s structure to suit their needs.
8. Color Choices Influence Conversion Rates
Color optimization is another essential factor in supercharged conversions. Something as simple as using the wrong background color on your website can send potential buyers running to your competitors. Your background color and fonts need to be optimized for all levels of sight (consider those with slight sight impairments) as well as all lighting conditions. If you’ve ever tried to read grey font on a white background, you’ll be familiar with the importance of color testing. A/B test everything from the color of your banners and sidebars to the color of your call-to-action buttons. An incorrectly colored CTA button can have a drastic impact on your sales rate.
Position Your Business Now
The e-commerce industry is expected to experience super-sized growth over the coming decade as consumers in developing nations flock to online shops. Combined with innovations in mobile payments and mobile banking security, the future does indeed look bright for entrepreneurs wise enough to capitalize on the incoming flood of traffic. If you put the above-listed conversion tips to work for your online business, there is no reason why you can’t be one of the entrepreneurs profiting from the global push towards e-commerce shopping. Are you ready to optimize your online business for success?
