Setting up an online store is fairly easy these days, by using accessible software such as Zoho Commerce or Shopify etc. anyone can start an e-commerce business within hours. However, in order to be successful, you need to create and implement a well-developed e-commerce strategy. This should attract potential customers and make them feel welcomed on your online store, from the first contact to after-sales support.
There are hundreds if not thousands of online articles and guides on how to increase ecommerce sales in 2022. In this post, we are looking to make your job easier and present you the main steps you need to take in order to skyrocket ecommerce sales 2022.
Consolidate your shopping experience
Customer experience should be the main focus of any type of business, whether you are a lemonade stand on the side of the road or a B2B online store selling specialised products.
Even if you have the best products in the world, people will not buy it if they are having a hard time navigating your website or getting in touch with you. There are several aspects to look at when it comes to having a seamless online shop:
Fast loading speed
Approximately half of all shoppers expect e-commerce websites to load in two seconds or less. If your website takes more to load, potential customers will most likely turn to your competitors, causing you to lose sales opportunities.
Smooth shopping cart and checkout functionality
A large number of people abandon their shopping cart during the checkout process for reasons such as hesitating to provide their financial information, insufficient payment options or shipping prices turning out to be higher than expected. What you can do in exchange is to add a progress bar to give shoppers a visual indicator of where they are in the checkout process or to provide a limited-time offer to incentivise shoppers to complete the transaction immediately.
Secure payment options
Offer multiple online payment methods to your customers to avoid high shopping cart abandonment rates. Aside from debit and credit card options, consider online payment processors like Stripe or PayPal and even buy now, pay later functionalities. There are multiple factors that you can control for the checkout process, so be careful to never give people a reason not to buy and start searching somewhere else.
Mobile-friendly
A large majority of consumers are researching products and placing orders from their mobile phones. Including mobile optimisation with your e-commerce website is vital for the success of your business.
Extensive product information
Consumers can feel hesitant to make online purchases, especially from brands they are not familiar with. Since people cannot see or try the product before buying it, you need to offer as much product information as possible – colour, size, materials, ingredients, care instructions, place of origin, specifications etc.
We recommend you to constantly A/B test the various elements of your website, from button colour and placement to product photography, and check analytics to see which versions lead to a higher level of conversions.
Generate more leads
Before nurturing your leads and converting them to paying customers, you need to add more of the right people to your subscribers/followers list. Your latest content and promotions are useless without having an audience available.
Never hesitate to ask people to join your list of subscribers – if they are interested in your product or industry, they will subscribe. Next, segment those leads to create personalised marketing campaigns to each target audience.
Of course, you don’t just ask people to follow your social media page or receive your email without being prepared in advance with an optimised social presence, how-to blog content, interacting with engaged communities, building strategic partnerships, surveying prospects, and tapping into new audiences with guest blogging.
As a final word on generating and cultivating those leads, always focus on email and lists of subscribers. Social networks come and go out of fashion, while email marketing still delivers the highest return on investment, and your list of email contacts stays there all the time (except for people who unsubscribe but are replaced by new subscribers). Email allows you to interact directly with your prospects, without being affected by changes in policies that social networks make quite often.
Upgrade your SEO strategy
Search engine optimisation is a must-have in your digital marketing strategies portfolio when you are looking to skyrocket ecommerce sales 2022. This is because many potential customers land on your website after making a search on Google or another major search engine. In order to increase your chances of being found by new people on your site every day, you need to boost your ranking by including prominent keywords from your industry in your web pages.
Google offers a keyword planning tool that provides information on both the search volume and competition for various keywords. In order to be displayed on the first page of search engine results, it is recommended to include in your website keywords that have a medium or high search volume but a low to medium competition rating.
SEO also includes improving your voice search visibility, creating content that answers specific questions, and adding videos and optimising them for search. Regularly test your e-commerce website to see what works and what is killing your SEO rank and conversions.
Gain the trust of potential customers
Would you buy something from an online store you know absolutely nothing about, especially when the value of the purchase is high?
One of the natural laws of the business world is that people do business with those whom they know, like, and trust. Learning how to increase online sales through social media means that you will need to be active on social networks and have a presence that reassures shoppers who research your business before placing an order online.
Social proof is an excellent strategy for showing new visitors that you are already trusted by other customers and it usually takes the form of online reviews.
You can encourage more customers to leave reviews by sending them reminders a week or two after their purchase. You can even offer them a special discount for leaving honest feedback on your site, although someone who is really happy with the products and the service you’re provided will want to let other people know about it without needing an incentive.
Another method that can increase conversion rates significantly is using trust badges from reputable companies on your checkout form. This works because being recommended by a trustworthy, large enterprise is also a form of social proof.
Diversify customer support options
Nobody places an order thinking they will have an issue with the purchase, but you have to be prepared for all kinds of situations, some of them not even being your fault. A well-trained customer service team can turn a dissatisfied customer into a loyal supporter of your company.
In order to be able to handle effectively and professionally all customer interactions, we recommend using a mix of chatbots and live chat. Chatbots will manage the simplest requests and filter customers, thus saving time and costs.
For interactions managed by human agents, consider offering as many channels as possible, such as phone, email, live chat, and social media messaging. Throughout all your customer service interactions, be customer-centric (and not by just saying you are so) and have meaningful conversations with customers about your products and their experience. Don’t be afraid to ask people what it would take to get them to buy your product – some customers will be honest and tell you exactly what they think!
To recap this post, there are five major directions you need to complete in order to skyrocket ecommerce sales 2022: making sure customers enjoy the time spent on your website and deal with no frictions, communicating to a large number of prospects, optimising your website for search engines, getting people to trust you, and offering multiple customer support options. Once you get all of the above firing on all cylinders, consider adding paid ads (like Google Ads or Social ads) to the mix to drive even more traffic to your website.
Don’t forget to monitor your results and make required changes to get the best from this framework for increasing your e-commerce sales in 2022!
