How to Increase Online Sales for Your Business
For years, online shopping has become a global trend for business owners and customers and has positively expanded brands. While the potential to shop online has existed for more than two decades, it became more popular during the pandemic. With the COVID-19 pandemic accelerating the growth of online shopping, many are wondering how to increase online sales.
Statistics show that retail e-commerce sales reached about $5.2 trillion worldwide. The figure is predicted to grow by 56% over the coming years. The global online shopping market size as of 2019 was valued at 9.09 trillion dollars, and it is expected to grow from 2020 to 2027 at a compound growth rate of 14.7%.
There are many opportunities for e-commerce businesses, but taking the right step is crucial. If sales numbers differ from where they should be, you need to take action and look at what you need to improve in your process, pricing, and more. Today's consumers expect more from their online shopping experience. Taking the right marketing approach can help increase your online business sales.
Common Mistakes E-commerce Businesses Make
Online business is fast becoming the norm in the era of retail and commerce businesses. The demand for online shopping has increased in record numbers. In fact, people now seek convenience over the experience of exploring a brick-and-mortar store.
Establishing a new e-commerce business can be daunting. As the digital marketplace gets congested, there's pressure on retailers to improve every aspect of their marketing approaches. A frustrating or complex shopping experience can make you lose customers.
In a competitive market, a little mistake can affect your online business sales. Thus, avoiding these errors is crucial to enable your business to grow. Here are common mistakes e-commerce businesses make:
Poor Customer Service
Friction can resurface at any moment in the sales cycle. Thus, having a dependable customer service funnel to get leads back on track if something goes awry is crucial. Although you won't meet your customers face to face, you can offer excellent customer service.
Automated chatbots can help resolve customers' complaints on time without needing a physical agent.
Customers who are satisfied with your services will likely become dedicated ambassadors and brand advocates.
Insecure Website
Due to the high rate of scams and fraudulent actions on the internet, security now becomes essential in e-commerce. Once customers notice their details are not secure on a particular platform, they will likely leave. Ensure your website is secure otherwise, you risk losing potential sales.
Lack of Shipping Options
Your online business sales will likely increase when you present customers with choices on shipping. Try to offer a broad range of accessible shipping methods, and don't forget to include delivery time and price.
Poor Search Function and Product Description
You may lose out in the market when the general website interface is poor, coupled with the search option. Always try to make sure customers can search and find products they want easily. Your product description should also be well-written and come with good, clear, and compelling images.
Complex Checkout Process
If the payment method becomes complex, customers will be frustrated and abandon the product. Since the market is highly competitive, they will move to the next competitor with a more straightforward checkout process.
Avoiding the above mistakes will help you dominate the trending e-commerce business world.
Tips on How to Increase Online Sales
As an entrepreneur, after setting up an e-commerce business, you need to implement sound e-commerce business strategies. A solid and well-executed customer engagement approach can help businesses overcome specific challenges, boosting online business sales.
Learn from the following tips below and become an e-commerce business guru.
Use Paid Traffic to Promote Sales
Paid ads on Facebook, Twitter, as well as Instagram can help you boost sales. When you share posts on your platforms, only your existing followers can see them. With paid ads, you can reach a new audience. Consistent paid ads will also enable you to reach out to a large audience based on location, age, gender, and buying interest.
Introduce Chatbots and Live Chat
Introducing a chatbot, an intelligent system, can help build good customer relationships. A chatbot is a unique e-commerce tool suitable for customer support and conventional marketing.
AI chatbot is perfectly suitable for answering repeated customer queries and facilitating sales. Here is how the tool can help your increase online business:
- Schedule appointments
- Book orders
- Auto-qualified sales leads
- Automate sales support
Live chat is an effective communication channel. In fact, 79% of end-users prefer real-time chat since they won't need to wait long before a customer representative responds. This can lead to a boost in conversion rate and revenue.
Live chat can increase your online business sales in the following ways:
- Reduces sales cycle
- Lowers bounce rate
- Converts website visitors into leads
- Routes sales chat to the right person
With the ability to answer customers' queries, the machine reduces the load on the entrepreneurs and allows them to focus on other aspects of the business.
Add Reviews to Your Site
Reviews are always important in increasing online sales because customers look for what others say before purchasing a product. So ensure that your customers' positive remarks and feedback about your brand and product are posted on all brand platforms. With this, sales will likely increase because customers now trust your brand and product based on other people's experiences.
Incorporate Flash Sales
Flash sales are a marketing technique that has become popular of late. They are sales or promotions added to the prices of some products or the entire online store for only a short period.
Offering flash sales on your online shop provides the following benefits:
- Promotes your store or brand to new customers
- It enables you to eliminate outdated stock and unpopular products
- Creates a large impact on social platforms
- Provides a high volume of sales within a short period
Flash sales also ignite interest among online buyers, generate more clicks, and greatly impact social networks.
Offer Sales Kits
Custom sales kits are also becoming crucial for e-commerce businesses in helping them reach their sales target. What's more, it would help if you used uniquely designed packaging to showcase your product and make them stand out from the crowd.
Sales kit helps online businesses:
- Build brand loyalty
- Create a memorable experience for shoppers
- Showcase products
Using a custom sales kit, you can show your dedication and expertise to your industry.
Create a Promotional Campaign Using Different Social Media Networks
Social omnipresence is vital in boosting online sales. You can target different classes of an audience through social media platforms. Understanding your target audience will also help you choose the right platform for your business. Today, you can involve celebrities on TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, as well as Twitter to influence your brand and boost online business sales.
Use Good Product Photography
Good product photography that resonates with prospective customers can also help increase online business sales. So ensure that all your online product photos are of high quality.
You can use product videos or images in the following ways to increase online business sales:
- Embed product videos
- Show the real use of the product
- Use excellent quality images
- Provide context
The quality of your product pictures also determines if they're worth buying.
Conclusion
Implementing a digital marketing approach is an effective way to increase e-commerce sales. Build a secure and user-friendly website and promote sales through social media platforms. In addition, always try to provide the necessary information to your customers through constant communication.
E-commerce has become a competition with the increasing demand for optimization solutions. The tips in this blog post will help your e-commerce sales funnel work more efficiently.For more information on managing your e-commerce business, get in touch with us today!
At Viral Solutions we are committed to seeing YOU succeed. It is our goal to grow your business with proven digital marketing strategies that will help your business for the long haul.
Stay Up To Speed in the Ever Changing World of Marketing!
Sign-up today for FREE, monthly marketing tips, loopholes, and news to EXPLODE your Return on Investment!
Share your knowledge and gain exposure by becoming a guest author on our blog! Learn how to write for us.