There are three key things matter for an e-Commerce business. First is building your brand, because customers need to recognise and trust you. Second is lead generation, because without new customers, you don’t get very far. Third, and perhaps most importantly is conversion. Leads are great, but if you’re not converting them into sales, what’s the point?
These three crucial elements also line up with the customer journey. Customers need to find you easily, find what they want on your website, and have a clear checkout process. Technology supports these key steps in the customer journey, and here’s how.
Building your brand
Brand building is something that takes time, but with the right strategy you can get there pretty easily. Some ways you can do this with little expense are:
- Clearly establish what your company stands for
- Maintain an active presence on social media
- Use consistent messaging
- Explore multiple advertising channels
Once people are familiar with your brand, and they feel connected to it, they’re more likely to purchase from you.
Start the customer journey by ranking well on search engines
No matter how strong your brand is, customers need to find you easily. Generally, that happens in two places. Social media, which we mentioned above, and search engines. There are two ways you can be more accessible on search engines. Firstly, by ranking well organically. This often means putting time and effort into your website’s SEO. You can also use structured data and schema throughout your website to make your search results more visually appealing. This also helps you appear in shopping carousels on mobile searches, for example.
Secondly, you can use pay-per-click (PPC) advertising on search engines to get your business name right in front of customers. It may sound simple, but you need a solid marketing strategy to ensure you target the right customers with paid advertising.
Customised landing pages
Once you’re generating more leads, you need to think about what those customers are seeing. This is where landing pages are crucial, especially for PPC ads. If you’re advertising a monthly special, or particular products, your landing page should include all the relevant information for that deal or product. If customers click on your ad and just go to your homepage, they lose interest because they have to digging for what they want. Make your landing pages clear, concise and include a strong call-to-action, nurturing customers towards a sale.
Complete the customer journey with API integration
The next step in the customer journey is the sale. If you thought getting them to add items to their basket was the final step, you were wrong! Abandoned shopping carts are the bane of an e-Commerce business’s existence.
You need to make it easy for customers to buy. So, using API integration on your website, you can provide more payment options, accurate delivery fees and times, and even item tracking. When it’s easy for customers to buy, you’ll get more sales.
But remember, the customer journey still continues after the sale. You may have complaints, customer support issues, or hopefully even repeat business. So, make sure you have a great CRM to help manage long-term relationships with your customers.
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