E-commerce Business

In the light of present-day realities, every business should have a website and online community in order to survive and increase its profits. Everything is on the Internet these days because being out there is the way to find customers from all over the world and expand your business. However, it is not the easiest thing to do – you need to make an effort to stand out of the online crowd.

As the owner of an e-commerce website, you should fight on two fronts: with your competitors and Google updates.

Your chances of being found on the Web by potential customers can increase if you apply specific SEO, user experience and data-mining strategies. Let’s explore in depth the techniques that can make your e-commerce business wildly successful:

Data Mining

To keep track of your business and develop it, you need to use data that you have at the moment. These days, data is a gold mine that can help you get to know your customers, increase their loyalty and own profits. Also, it allows you to make better strategic decisions, improve control of operational processes and target advertising.

To determine the preferences of your customers, keep track of products they buy, their shopping timing, geolocation, and age. This information will help you to offer your customers other products according to their preferences. A woman who buys diapers online will most probably buy an infant formula or a teddy bear as well, but she will not do this unless you use data analytics tools to understand her behavior.

To personalize your customers’ experience and provide excellent customer service, conduct surveys and analyze responses. You can offer your customers discounts in order to motivate them to take part in surveys.

Besides your customers, you need to track your competitors’ pricing and offers. Consider big data tools like e-crawl in order to get real-time data. It will help you to predict trends, turn visitors into buyers and leave your competitors behind.

User experience

There are plenty of fish in the sea, so if something doesn’t work on your website or isn’t transparent enough, your potential customers will find another company. People don’t have time on figuring out how to complete the payment on your website or finding what they want. That’s why you need to test every page and optimize user experience (UX).

Hire a professional UX developer who can guide users with personalized product recommendations (that’s where you can apply in practice your collected data), improve page speed, and create calls to actions on your website.

SEO

Search engine optimization (SEO) helps to survive in today’s competitive market. It is a long-term investment that is aimed at increasing your website’s search traffic and monthly revenue. SEO experts can help to make your website visible so that every time people google certain products your site will show up on the first page. Let’s be honest, your potential customers will not be looking for your company on the third page of Google.

Also, SEO experts will be able to help you in case you have a steady or sharp drop in search traffic or if your website has been penalized by Google.

To get started with SEO on your own, you can use tools like Google Adwords Keyword Planner. However, applying search engine optimization strategies without professional feedback can be a waste of time, so consider hiring a professional team.

Customer Engagement 

If you want your customers to recommend your company to their friends and family members, build trust and become their friend. To do so, you can offer something for free (e.g. newsletter, a book) from time to time, ask for their opinion, keep up and maintain good customer service. Also, learn how to speak your customer’s language by using big data. Determine where your customers are from, what is their age and favourite social media platforms.

If your customers are millennials in the majority, it would be weird to write very formal cold posts. If your customers are seniors, you might want to avoid using a lot of slang. Consider hiring a social media manager who will speak with your customers on a daily basis and answer all their questions.

Branding

How can people recognize you among thousands if not millions online stores? You need to invest in branding since it is your company’s face and identity. Before launching an e-commerce store, create a catchy name and a logo, choose the colours of your brand, and apply marketing strategies. It is crucial to identify your brand’s target audience and outline the key benefits of your online shop.

Transparency

To improve your sales, you need to be upfront about the products you are selling, payment methods and additional fees (e.g. shipping).

There are still a lot of people who don’t trust online stores because they can’t see the product. To give your customers a better understanding of your products, make sure to have a detailed description. Also, consider adding videos that would show the product and create a section where your customers can describe their experience.

Your customers should be able to get in touch with you to ask their questions. Encourage them to contact you via email, phone, Skype, or an online chat. Not hiding from your customers will help you gain their trust.

Conclusion 

In order to stay on the market, you need to increase your customer’s loyalty and establish a good relationship with Google since your business is at his mercy at this point. Work on every detail and test your website weekly. Don’t hide from your customers if they don’t like your products or website navigation. Be thankful when people leave comments since every feedback can help you improve your online store. You can contact Shopify Design agency for more help. Find experts who will help you with branding, SEO, user experience development, and data mining. Every improvement brings you closer to success.