It’s an ecommerce store owner’s dream to see their online sales skyrocket.
However, as much as we wish it were an instant occurrence, it’s not. It takes time, authentic customer relationships, and the best marketing and other strategies. You can find out more information about eCommerce, including mobile eCommerce, online, if you are interested in learning more about the statistics to potentially leverage these for your own eCommerce business.
If your profits have been distressingly low for some time now, check out six essential ways for your ecommerce sales to (steadily) go through the roof.
1. Show off your product’s value.
Failing to showcase your products’ value can be one of the reasons your brand isn’t generating sales online.
You can’t let shoppers perceive your product’s usefulness on their own. You have to proactively demonstrate how it can help improve their lives and alleviate their stress.
To do that, understand first your customers’ pain points. Then address them by explaining how some tips and your product can solve their problems.
Elaborate on your product’s relevant features and benefits. Concretely present how shoppers can use the item for specific purposes.
Next, produce compelling content materials in various formats to showcase this information. Publish tutorial videos, blog posts, user guides, digital brochures, product photos with captions, and more.
In this way, your customers will see that your products are worth their hard-earned money and say “yes” to your sales offers.
2. Offer several payment methods.
Customers can now send (and receive) money through various innovative financial services, such as digital wallets and bank transfers. This gives them more options to complete their monetary transactions besides cash and credit and debit cards.
To accommodate many customers and their preferences, allow them to pay through several modes. Indicate this on your homepage, product pages, and checkout. You can also publish logos of your accepted payment gateways.
When customers see that you accept various payment methods, they can confidently push through with their purchases — increasing your sales.
Integrate different payment modes and gateways on your online store by using even the simplest ecommerce platforms at the onset.
These site builders have native functionalities that streamline your store’s ability to process and receive customer payments.
Leveraging them also dismisses the need for heavy coding to integrate financial transaction features.
You only need to install the required plugins, and you can readily accept customer payments straight from your website.
3. Leverage scarcity techniques.
Urge customers to buy your products lightning-fast through scarcity tactics. These techniques trigger panic, a sense of urgency, and a fear of missing out (FOMO) — prompting shoppers to take your offers immediately.
Here are some scarcity techniques to implement:
- Host flash sales. Announce huge discounts and low prices for a short period, e.g., an hour. This prompts customers to take advantage of the promo without thinking twice.
- Add a countdown timer. Showing customers how much time they have left to grab your offer urges them to respond fast or prepare accordingly.
- Indicate the X remaining items left. Do this when you have worryingly few stocks left for a specific product. Display the figure in red or other noticeable means (but not too flashy). Integrate your ecommerce platform with warehouse management or enterprise resource planning software to automate the update.
- Add limited edition items and one-time offers. Showcase exclusive promos and products with this tactic. The rarity of these offers will entice customers to grab them while they still can.
- Exhibit scarcity for item sizes. Apply the same tactic in displaying the “X” remaining items left — only this one is specifically for sizes.
Then, ease your implementation of these tactics using various ecommerce tools, e.g., inventory and warehouse management platforms.
These tools have automation features and powerful integrations that can handle the manual, tedious, and repetitive work of updating stock information, among others.
That way, you can better focus on your brainstorming, executing, and monitoring the performance of your scarcity techniques and sales.
4. Host virtual events.
Organizing virtual events is an excellent way to get tons of sales. It’s more convenient, cost-efficient, and even more enticing for customers since attendance is only through the internet. That means they don’t have to deal with traffic, crowds, extra travel hassle and expenses, etc. (You won’t have to either).
Begin hosting your virtual event by deciding first on your activity type.
Let’s say you’re thinking of organizing an online conference. Then you have to know that a conference is different from a summit, convention, forum, and other similar activities.
Conferences gather like-minded stakeholders from generic sectors (e.g., engineers, ethical hackers) to learn new information and exchange opinions. Summits gather high-caliber industry leaders to resolve top-level problems. Conventions lean more toward fandoms, and so on.
Knowing these things beforehand helps you invite the right audience and prepare accordingly.
To attract numerous attendees, plan and announce your event at least three months ahead. This allows your speakers and attendees sufficient time to organize their schedules, expenses, and other internet needs. It also gives you more chances to widen your promotions. You could also enlist the help of award-winning services like digital marketing companies to expand your virtual and hybrid event production and easily achieve your goals.
Your event’s topic should be relevant to your niche and customer’s interests. It must also be educational and unique, or something they don’t get to hear about every day.
Invite and announce that you have influential, renowned, or expert presenters. Encourage your resource speakers to share the event with their online networks to get more potential attendees.
Additionally, announce in advance the opportunity for participants to win branded or exclusive freebies, giveaways, and prizes. This can further entice them to join your virtual event.
Also, on your side, try to use the benefits of social media marketing strategies to increase even more visibility.
You can also offer early bird registration fees at much lower prices than the original one, plus other benefits. This will prompt more attendees to take your offer, increasing your sales within a shorter period.
5. Engage customers in compelling sales conversations.
Convince visitors to buy your products by engaging them upon arriving at your website. Proactively “approach” them rather than passively letting them explore and waiting for them to inquire. Doing the latter only increases the risk of their leaving without any profitable activity.
Let potential buyers know you’re there to assist should they have inquiries or requests. Then engage them in conversations that lead to sign-ups, purchases, and other profitable activities.
You can do that through AI customer service chatbots. Installing one on your site lets you automate talking to any visitor anytime (yes, even beyond your working hours).
Using AI sales and customer service chatbots offers several advantages. They can:
- Detect first-time and returning visitors and engage accordingly
- Converse with human-like speech and thought processes
- Gather necessary historical information for continuous dialogues
- Personalize interactions
- Study customers’ messages to recognize and give the appropriate response
- Optimize strategies to increase sales and contribute to your other goals, etc.
Then integrate your chatbots with customer service software and sales tracking platforms to centralize monitoring and managing shopper interactions. These tools can also provide insightful analytics and reports about your bots’ performance.
By leveraging AI for sales engagements, you can turn window shoppers and new visitors into impressed, happily paying customers.
Your ecommerce sales can fly through the roof in no time.
Skyrocketing your online sales is no overnight thing, but it can still happen within a shorter period with the right strategies.
When applying these and other tactics, monitor your performance and improve according to the insights you get.
Genuinely understand your customers, don’t treat them like cash cows, and always value excellence.
Doing all these tactics enhances your customer relationships — which is crucial in persuading them to buy (tons of) products from your ecommerce store.
