If you're running an e-commerce business, you're probably always on the lookout for new ways to increase traffic and sales. Inbound marketing has proved to be one of the best strategies to be adopted for e-commerce businesses.
If you want to attract potential customers to your brand then we must take all efforts to create valuable content and experiences. This is what we mean by inbound marketing. You should never try to push your products on your customers. In this blog, which can be considered to be an ultimate guide to inbound marketing strategy for your e-commerce business, let us cover some of the key elements of an effective inbound marketing strategy.
If you push up your business growth, the best option is to switch to e-commerce inbound marketing. It is very much essential that you have to adopt the right marketing approach to attract potential customers to your business. Two factors that would play a crucial role in scaling your business are customer acquisition and retention.
According to Forrester Research (Influential research and advisory firm in the world), on average, 80% of marketing budgets are focused on new customer acquisition. However, acquiring a new customer can cost five to 25 times more than retaining an existing one. But with the increasing cost of customer acquisition, businesses are realizing the value of retaining customers because increasing customer retention rates by as little as 5% can increase profits by 25% to 95%.
Source: makewebbetter
Define Your Target Audience
The first step that you should follow to create an effective inbound marketing strategy is to clearly define your target audience. You should also find out who your ideal customers are, and identify their pain points and desires. After identifying your target audience, you have to create content and experience that they would appreciate by in sync with them. Only then, they will be attracted towards your brand.
When you work towards this objective, the first step to be taken up is the creation of buyer personas. This step will be a very interesting one for it gives a detailed account of your ideal customer. We tend to find out their demographics, personal interests, buying behaviours and even hobbies, at times. One easy way to create buyer personas is to begin surveying your existing customers. You should not fail to analyse your website, take your social media analytics seriously and start examining your industry and competitors.
Strategy for Content
Strive to create valuable content and this should be the focus of your content strategy. Only this will help lure potential customers to your website and social media channels. Here are some different types of content that will build your e-commerce businesses:
Blog posts: It is easy to write a blog but when you do so have your target audience’s pain points and desires in mind. You have to find out ways to give them useful advice and tips.
First, you have to take an effort to find out what the pain points are. This can be done only if you identify the problems of your target audience. Once you have identified their specific challenges, you should try to help them out with solutions or even use bits of advice. Once you have crossed this step, a part of your job is done. Address all the frustration, and difficulties of your audience in your blog. It will reach your audience with ease and they will also understand your authority or experience in the concerned field or industry.
All these are easier said than done. If you have to effectively give your audience advice or explain it in detail in your blog, understand their problems deeply. For this is essential to analyse the market and research it as much as possible. Get good customer feedback, and analyse that too. Keep monitoring social media conversations. Only then you can consistently observe and understand the pain your audience is undergoing. Obviously, the content of your blog will naturally address these concerns and give clarifications that will enable your audience or readers to get over them.
Read on to how you can target and elaborate on some of the pain points in your blog:
- Pain points identification: Begin with specific points that are causing pain to your target audience. See if they point to budgets or time or knowledge or even expertise.
- Address them: When you begin the blog, start with the problem that has been identified. Do not use bombastic language because only then your audience can identify themselves with it. The blog is never written to show off your prowess in language.
- Offer solutions: The blog should also contain solutions. These must be practical ones that will enable your audience to address their pain points. You can give them a checklist or shortcuts to gain control of the situation.
- Real-life examples: Always the blog should contain some real-life examples to help your audience to overcome their pain points. It should easily point to solutions that can be applied in their life. The content can also be about people who have undergone similar experiences. This will draw more people to your business as you are trying to emphasize and sympathize with them.
- Product reviews: If you have created a product, post reviews. It should contain all the benefits that your product can give. Feature its ingredients and its benefits too. Nothing like a fair and truthful review as it is sure to draw genuine customers to your website and business.
- Social media content: The social media content that you create should talk high and tell the story of your brand effectively.
- Video content: The videos that you create should portray your products in action. If possible give tutorials and dos and don’ts. Including behind-the-scenes glimpses of your business is also an effective strategy.
Role of Website Optimization
When you are doing e-commerce business, it is very important to maintain your website well. You should consider it as an asset because it is the point of contact between you and your customer. It will automatically help your audience to learn more about you and your products, services, authenticity of your brand. If all this information makes them happy, they will definitely decide to make a purchase. Now, you will understand how important your website is for your e-commerce business or for better conversions.
Guidelines for optimizing your website for conversions:
- Every page of your website should definitely have clear, compelling calls to action (CTAs)
- The website should present your products in an organized way by way of categories. This will enable your customers to navigate through your website easily
- If you want to showcase your products in an attractive manner, then the website must have high-quality images and descriptions should be very clear. That’s it, customers can now make informed purchasing decisions
- Posting truthful customer reviews and ratings will help build trust in customers
- Payment options should be easy and clear. If possible give customers multiple payment options
Leverage Email Marketing
There can never be e-commerce businesses without email marketing. It is one way of keeping in touch with customers and good prospects with ease. Alluring personalized offers and recommendations can be made then and there.
Let us see how we can use email marketing effectively:
- Start by building an email list. One way to attract the audience is by offering a free gift or discount if they sign-up
- Keep in mind that personalized welcome emails are a must for new subscribers. Thank them profusely for signing up. Keep sending them information about your brand and products
- Regular newsletters will keep your subscribers informed about new products, promotions, and company news
- Use automation to send targeted emails based on customer behaviour, such as abandoned cart reminders and post-purchase follow-ups
Measure and Optimize Your Results
Optimising and measuring your results is an effective inbound marketing strategy. We have to regularly track incidents like website traffic, how customers are engaging themselves with the website and the rate of conversions. Certain tools like Google Analytics and social media can help you to measure your results and optimize them, the right way. Only then we can find or identify the appropriate strategy to make things work the right way.
Use A/B Testing to Test Different Variations of your Content and Calls to Action, and See which Ones Perform Better. What is A/B Testing?
A/B testing is a kind of marketing technique where we try to compare two different versions of a piece of content _ a webpage or email. We now have to determine which performs better. This testing will help marketers to make decisions regarding which part of the content is effective and in sync with their goals (engagements or conversions).
The A/B testing Process:
Definition of the goal: First of all find out what you want to want to infer from the results of the A/B testing. It is important for us to improve the conversion rates, increase engagement and also the click-through rates.
Two variations of content: Decide the content you want to test. Make two identical versions of it. The change should be subtle or there can be just a single variable such as a colour button or the words in the headline.
Test the variations: Concentrate on the audience next. Divide them into two groups. Show one version to one group and the other to the second. Check on how they react and interact with each.
Analyses of the results: Now is the time to analyze the data and find out which version performed well. You can use statistical analysis or simply compare the results of each variation
Winning variation: Monitor the performance of the winning variation by implementing it immediately and continuing the surveillance for some time.
A/B testing is a very effective way of testing different kinds of elements (headline, layout, design, images) in content. It is also a fine way to spruce up your marketing campaigns. It is easy to achieve your goals this way. But, one important aspect of A/B testing, is that it is a continuous process. You should not just stop with just one test. As it is on, your content should also undergo continuous change. Only this way, your e-commerce business can pick up and get you good profits.
Here are some salient points on how you can optimize and measure your efforts of inbound marketing strategy:
- Begin by setting precise goals for your marketing strategy. You have to increase your website traffic, improve the rate of conversion and also try to enhance the amount of engagement of your audience on social media
- Social media channels should be checked the time and again for any kind of feedback from the customer. Never fail to respond to queries or any concerns about your business
- Watch out for the scope of improvement from the customer feedback and review of your products and customer service
- Optimization of the website should be a continuous one and must be done after careful analysis. Initiate SEO for better visibility
You can stay ahead of the curve and lure more customers or audiences to your business only if you optimize your inbound marketing strategy holistically. This cannot be done overnight and it is a long-drawn process. But, by following all the above-stated measures to the best of your ability, you can create a successful inbound marketing strategy for your e-commerce business.
