Drive more traffic to your online shop
The online retail landscape is busier than ever, with e-commerce businesses fighting for consumers’ attention. Fortunately, there are steps you can take to keep people coming through your virtual doors – here are some to try.
Paid search advertising
If you’re after a quick traffic boost – perhaps as part of a promotion or new product launch – consider buying some search engine advertisements.
The intuitive tools offered by the likes of Google and Bing make it easy for anyone to make a start in this kind of advertising, but if you’re using it regularly and investing more than just a few pounds, you’ll need expert assistance.
“Paid search at a certain level should, wherever possible, be outsourced,” advises e-commerce marketer Adam Bastock. “The level of complexity means that in-house individuals often get pulled away from their usual management tasks, and that can make the whole thing counterproductive.”
If you are going alone, though, consider the following:
- Ad types – Google Shopping (more on that below) is an obvious choice for retailers looking to finalise sales, but YouTube’s video ads are better for introducing people to your brand and its website.
- Keywords – Use your website data and social media channels to learn more about your audience and what they’re likely to search for.
- Landing pages – Targeted ads need links to targeted content: make sure when the user clicks through to your site, they land on a page that’s relevant.
- A/B testing – Not sure what will work for your business? Set up more than one ad and test effectiveness over a short period of time; you’ll soon learn what works best.
Google Shopping
Even more relevant to an online retailer are Google Shopping adverts, product-specific listings shown right at the top of Google’s search engine results pages (SERPs).
“As we are still new, we’re finding that we still aren't ranking particularly high in organic search results, even though we are climbing steadily,” says Matthew Andrews, founder of eco-friendly goods store Enviroli. “But by using Google Shopping ads we can ensure that we are shown above organic results, getting exposure that we otherwise wouldn't get.”
Paid social advertising
These work similarly to paid search ads, but the user data held by social media platforms can make it easier to reach your target audience.
“Paid social advertising involves paying to display adverts to relevant social media users,” explains Dan Shapiro, marketing manager of fashion brand Manière De Voir. “With daily budgets as low as £1 and a pay-per-click (PPC) model – where you only pay if the user takes the desired action –- it’s suitable for any budget.
“One particularly popular platform among retail businesses is Facebook Ads, which offers intelligent audience targeting, but alternative platforms like Snapchat and Pinterest can offer cheaper CPMs (cost-per-1,000 impressions) for more cost-effective advertising.”
Given its billion-strong global user base, Instagram is another powerful platform for advertising. A little investment here will open up prime ad space on targeted users’ feeds, with photo, video and story posts all possible.
External blog-writing
If you’ve got the knowledge, flaunt it. Posting your useful content on other people’s sites will build brand awareness and draw more shoppers to your site, especially if you can get a direct link back to your store included. Be sure to pitch blog ideas to places where your target market visits: review sites and industry-specific media, for example.
Strategic social content
Many of your followers are likely to be customers, or at least aware of your brand, but their shares and likes on social channels will push your content and help you grow your audience.
“I launched an online shop in the midst of lockdown and used regular Facebook and Instagram activity to drive traffic to my website,” says April Bowden, founder of Home Luxe Co. “I used a mixture of quality content, follower engagement and influencer outreach to ensure a constant flow of traffic to my website.”
Your social channels are good places to run promotions too: whether it’s an offer exclusive to your followers or a competition, it’s a great way to get new eyes on your product pages.
Engage with influencers and brand ambassadors
“We are really active with brand ambassadors and spend a lot of time and energy sending products to celebrity chefs who might publicly cook with our ingredients,” says Ann Lowe, marketing manager at Spice Kitchen UK. “Whenever one of these influential people mentions Spice Kitchen on their YouTube channel, on one of their other social media pages or even in their cookbooks, we see enormous spikes in both web traffic and sales.
“Influencer outreach can be done in different ways, but we’ll just pop one of our spice tins in the post and see if the chef wants to cook with it. If they do, fantastic – but if not, no problem: the sales growth we see when it works out definitely outweighs the cost of losing a few products every now and then.”
Explore dynamic cross-platform re-marketing
This, according to team lead at Broadplace Advertising Oliver Cox, is a traffic-driving tactic every e-commerce business should use.
“Dynamic re-marketing allows you to put specific products in front of shoppers who’ve visited your site in the past, and it’s something you can set up across Google, Bing and Facebook,” he says. “Whichever social or search channel your past visitor uses, you always want to keep your business and products at the front of their mind – especially seeing as they’ve already shown interest in your offers and are likely to be closer to converting.”
Email and SMS marketing
By reaching out to potential buyers through more direct channels like email and SMS, you can tell them what’s new and why they should be looking through your store. Seeing as you’ll need their contact details and consent, this is one for bringing existing followers or customers back to your site.
“Don’t be afraid to remind people that you’re fully operational online,” says Luke Tobin, managing director at marketing agency Digital Ethos. “You could even offer an exclusive discount code to get them started. There should be zero, or at least minimal cost, in doing this if they are already engaged with the brand. So what have you got to lose?”
Shout about your website, offline
Maximise any chance to advertise your web address in the real world. That could be on business cards, flyers, vouchers and other promotional items, or even on your physical shopfront.
Another place many retailers forget is packaging: put your URL here and it’ll be seen not only by the eventual recipient but by their family, friends and any delivery staff too.
Article courtesy of NatWest
Original article
