Let’s face it. Nowadays, online shopping is a thing. Consider the statistics. According to Build This, in 2019, eCommerce comprised more than 13% of all retail revenue. Oberlo predicts global e-retail sales will reach $4.8 trillion by 2021, as e-commerce continues to get an increase in the share of global retail sales:
In short, the future looks bright for online businesses. But online businesses still need to seal the deal, so to speak. No one in the world, after all, has succeeded just by riding on forecasts, and not doing the hard work.
That being said, here are six ways to increase online sales this 2020:
1. Create a Good Landing Page
In sales, the expression “Don’t judge a book by its cover” does not apply at all. The truth is, people will really judge your brand by how it looks. In short, everything about your product should look good at first glance. If one person sees perhaps even the tiniest flaw, you may as well say goodbye to him or her as a customer.
The “looking good” requirement applies to your landing page as well. The landing page, after all, is the first thing a potential customer will see if he or she clicks on a link to your site. If your landing page has grammatical errors, that can be a break for some people. If it’s too confusing, people won’t even bother navigating. A good site is one of the ways to improve customer trust.
Envatotuts lists five important characteristics of a great landing page:
- A clear call-to-action.
- A clear separation of content sections
- Clean and concise text
- Visuals
- Appealing color schemes
All you need is a good landing page builder, and you’re good to go.
2. Use Online Surveys
You might ask, what do online surveys have to do with increasing online sales? Well, a lot actually. Surveys, after all, can help you do two things: Make adjustments to your product, and retain people (and potential customers) in your website.
Let’s take a look at the first one. The rationale behind this is quite simple: If you ask people for feedback about your products, you can make the necessary adjustments to those products. You want to make those adjustments because, simply put, sales depend on how pleased people are with what you’re offering.
With surveys, you can also help retain people on your website.
Let’s say a person finds nothing that interests them on the first page of your online bakery and decides to leave. If an online survey on the type of personality they have based on their preferred cakes, for example, suddenly pops up on the screen, they can be enticed to answer it. This is good because the longer they stay in your online store, the higher the chances they will purchase something.
And it’s not even that difficult to include an online survey in your website anymore. There are available tools you can use. You can check out ProProfs Survey Maker, for instance.
3. Learn Facebook Ad Hacks
Facebook does not only help online store owners get their products in front of a bigger audience. More importantly, the social media platform can help online store owners get their products to the right people. How? Through Facebook ads.
The thing is, Facebook has put in place rules just to make sure the ads will indeed be seen by people. For instance, if your picture or video thumbnail contains too much text overlay, Facebook limits the reach of the ad. And then there are times the ad doesn’t perform as consistently as you’d expected. In the beginning it performs well, but as time passes by, interest in it seems to wane.
Fortunately for you, there are ways to address these issues. All you need to do is take the time to read up on these Facebook ad hacks. If you manage to execute these properly, you will literally squeeze even more value from your paid Facebook ad, and get the best bang for your buck.
4. Track Competitors
Anyone who wants to increase online sales should learn from the best, and sometimes the best includes your competitors.
This is why tracking your opponents should already be something of a habit. Let’s face it, there may be areas where he or she is a step ahead of you, and the only way to cope is to know what these are. If you know what your opponents’ strengths and weaknesses are, you can make the necessary adjustments.
And I’m not just talking about monitoring how your products fare against your opponents’. I’m also talking about other things that have an effect on sales. For instance, your marketing strategy. It pays well to know how to track competitors when it comes to reaching people on social media so you can improve your own strategy to increase online sales.
5. Retarget Shoppers With Push Notifications
Your aim as a business owner is to retain and acquire as many customers as possible. To do this, you have to be persistent (but not too much). So for instance, if someone goes to your site but decides he or she won’t buy anything and ends up leaving, you can’t just “let that pass.” You have to find a way to reach him or her again. How do you do this? Through push notifications.
There are many reasons you should retarget shoppers with push notifications. According to Connecto, web push notifications have 30 times higher conversion when compared with mail. Push notifications also have higher opt-ins since as compared to emails, users don’t need to give their email address or other contact details.
Push notifications also have lower unsubscribe rates which studies have pegged at less than 10 percent. And one of the best things of them all? Push notifications can reach users even when they’re not on your website.
6. Be Organized
You might ask what being organized has to do with increasing online sales. Well, I would have to say everything.
It is you or your team if you have one, after all, who is behind all the strategies that are crucial to increasing sales. If you or your team did not make those marketing collaterals on time because you didn’t know it was the deadline, then the entire marketing process is delayed. And when that gets delayed, then you lose those people you could have reached with your products if you had sent the collaterals on time.
Bottomline is, productivity is key to increasing sales as well. You can use a time clock app to organize your schedule or that of the members of your team.
Wrapping Up
Although the odds are in your favor, resting on your laurels is not an option. It is, after all, a brutal and competitive e-commerce world out there. Whether you’re marketing your brand under private-label products or using the dropshipping model, there are no shortcuts to success.
If you want to get ahead, you have to do the work. So I suggest you follow these six ways to increase online sales and get your hands dirty. If you do these, there’s no reason you can’t reach your goals.