So, you’ve successfully set up your online shop for your business, but are you looking to take it to the next level? Below are a few considerations you can look at, to help you grow your online business.
Turn passive browsing into active buying!
You’re sat down, browsing through your favourite online retailer, when all of a sudden you see a banner telling you that they have a selection of items at 10% off, but only until next week! Sound familiar? Creating a sense of urgency is a commonly used tactic by online shops. The idea is that the perceived time sensitivity gives a sale a more immediate appeal to a customer who may have otherwise abandoned the item in their online shopping cart.
Visual Website Optimizer estimated in 2014 that 54% of customers will return to their shopping basket and complete a transaction if some form of discount was offered. Acting on this, you could consider using a prompt email for those users whose information you hold, offering them a discount or free shipping if they complete a purchase.
Removing obstacles
Getting people to buy from your online shop, is greatly helped by making the whole process as easy and as frictionless as possible. Try to remove any unnecessary barriers that may interrupt a customer’s journey and make it more difficult for them to buy from you. These can include difficulty in navigation, your site looking untrustworthy, and forcing a user to sign up in order to complete a purchase.
This also extends to considering your user traffic flow and looking at how your site could be tailored to cover devices of all sizes.
Smartphones are increasingly popular in the UK, indeed OFCOM estimates that the Smartphone is the most popular internet connected device, with 78% of UK adults owning one. As a result, a large amount of internet traffic comes from smartphones meaning that sites need to be prepared for the different screen sizes. You can do this by making your site responsive, meaning that it changes size based on the device it’s loaded on. So, why is it important? Well, back in 2012 Google released a survey suggesting that 61% of people would quickly leave a site if they couldn’t immediately find what they were looking for on the site. 67% said that they were more likely to buy from a mobile-friendly site.
Streamlining your process, making your site easily accessible with clear navigation is a great way to help increase sales for your online shop.
Using marketing effectively
Drawing people to your site in the first instance is an important way to help you increase sales, and for this you need to look at your advertising and marketing campaigns beyond your website itself.
Items on your website should be well presented, which can be significantly helped by clear and high-quality photography.
Be consistent with your marketing communications across all channels you use. An offer seen across multiple channels will encourage potential customers that the offer actually exists.
Encourage existing customers back.
Once someone has bought from you, it’s no reason to close the door on them. In 2012, Adobe concluded that 16% of revenue for UK online retailers came from repeat customers.
One way in to encourage customers to return to your site is to personalise content for each user. Beyond the normal ‘one size fits all’ approach that a lot of retailers have taken for their websites, the conversion statistics associated with personalised content is encouraging; Econsultancy found that 93% of companies saw an increase in conversion rates from personalisation.
Providing post-purchase offers can also help to encourage users to shop with you again. Bundling a voucher for a small discount with either the product you send out, or the purchase confirmation.
With your online shop set up, implementing a few of these techniques this year could help to increase your sales and develop your strategy going forward.
