eCommerce stores have taken over the world in the past few years. Especially since 2020, people are relying on online stores now more than ever. And thus standing apart from your competitors has also become difficult and requires constant effort. The online marketing industry is constantly changing and evolving and thus every online business needs to implement a comprehensive marketing strategy and update it every once in a while to stay with the current trends. Nowadays, being present on social media, using influencers, and posting regular content is key for getting noticed.
Why do we mention current eCommerce trends? Because what once was considered effective is now a disaster. And we see many businesses falling victim to decreased conversion rates and sales just because they are not aware of marketing techniques that are actually harming their business.
In this article, we have listed the major don’ts of eCommerce marketing and why you need to avoid them at all costs.
eCommerce Marketing Trends To Avoid
1. Insufficient Use Of CRM Tools
CRM refers to the operation of managing customer relationships by utilizing the information provided by them. This information refers to preferred items, purchase history, browsing history, and much more. By utilizing this information, you can create an amazing shopping experience for your visitors and convert them into loyal customers. Many businesses do not avail of this data and lose potential customers.
With the help of CRM tools, you can convert customer data into deep insights which can help you identify your target market, your best-selling product, your supply and demand, your areas of improvement, and much more to better customer service. It saves you tons of time as you know whom and how to market your product to. This can also help you create a personalized shopping experience for your customers, which leads to increased customer engagement and sales.
For example, if your target market is teenage kids, then being active on Instagram and posting relatable content will gain you the attention you need.
2. Inadequate Images And Video
Content is king. Your planned marketing strategy will be useless if it doesn’t involve what type of content to create, how to display it, and what’s the best time to do so. Content marketing has reached new heights due to the variety of platforms available such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Pinterest, Youtube, and much more. All of these platforms require different types of content and depending on where your market is most active, you need to style your content according to it.
We divide our content into three parts; text, images, and videos. Usually, we mix these up together. Nowadays, video content has the most impact in gaining attention and increasing sales. Why so? Because not only its relatively new, it also shows you the product in real-time and thus increases customer trust and loyalty.
If you don’t focus on content marketing, you will lose sales, customer engagement, and your business altogether. So stay consistent and relevant.
3. Difficult Website Navigation
Suppose you are a consumer on your first visit to a website. Upon entering, you find multiple links, popups, colourful images, and different types of text adorning the landing page. As you move along, you find it difficult to search for your preferred items. Moreover, it’s taking time to go back and forth between pages. And before you know it, you are out in 5 seconds.
First impressions are important. No matter how good your products are, customers won’t continue if the website is not navigation friendly. It is important to keep the user journey in mind when designing a site. The better your customer can navigate, the higher the chances of them making a purchase.
Moreover, it is also important to make your site mobile-optimised, as 80% of the population use mobile devices to place an order online.
4. Lack Of Social Proof
Social proof is one of the most effective marketing strategies for online/retail stores. It is based on the psychology the people follow the masses. And it’s true. People have been using this technique for many years to gain customer attention and loyalty and with eCommerce stores, enabling social proof on your site has become easier than ever.
Through social proof, you can display customer reviews, testimonials, trust seals, real-time stats, and much more to show your visitors that your product is trusted by many. This helps in removing the decision-making time and confusion of whether to trust a business or not.
Through social proof, you can also create urgency and a sense of FOMO in your customers by displaying remaining items, hot sales, and much more. With social proof, you can build trust, credibility, and increase the conversion rate. By not using this technique, you miss out on huge sales.
5. Poor Customer Service
Even if you correct all your above mistakes, but still lack good customer service, it’s going to cost you. Customer service is the crux of any eCommerce business and with your customers being able to shop 24 hours a day, the job becomes much more difficult. Good customer service can add a lasting impression on your customers, resulting in positive reviews, increased sales, and revenue. But a single bad experience could lead to you losing potential customers.
Final Thoughts On eCommerce Trends
Creating a good marketing strategy for your eCommerce store is imperative for its success. Realising the major do’s and don’ts of eCommerce marketing is a good step to get started. The above-mentioned techniques are some of the common errors made by businesses that result in decreased sales and revenue. Although these changes might seem small, they have a huge impact on your user experience. Similarly, every business is different, so do A/B testing and see what works best for you.
If you want to learn more about eCommerce, check out these Marketing.com.au articles:
- Using Social Media For Ecommerce
- How to Plan a Content Strategy for Your eCommerce Business
- Seven Key eCommerce SEO Tactics and Tools You Should Be Using
- 6 Simple Truths For Ecommerce Success
- 5 Must Have Strategies for eCommerce Businesses in the Digital Age
- 6 Simple Truths For Ecommerce Success
- Turn Mentions Of Your Brand Into Juice Passing Links