GUEST POST BY ROBERT RAND, SVP RAND MARKETING

Whether you’re targeting B2C or B2B sales, there are a wide range of digital marketing campaigns that you can leverage to attract the right shoppers to your ecommerce store. Regardless of seasons and holidays, it’s always a good time to step back and evaluate your options for driving targeted traffic to your ecommerce store, as well as staying engaged with people even after they leave your store. With that in mind, we’ve put together recommendations on some of the best options for both driving buyers to your ecommerce store, and staying engaged with them to keep them coming back.

Pay Per Click Marketing (PPC)

Platforms like Google AdWords allow you to create highly trackable ad campaigns, which can be continually optimized around the metrics that are indeed driving sales. This includes campaigns like Google Shopping product listing ads (PLA’s). With a PLA, shoppers can see a photo of the product that you’re selling, the price, and the name of your business to in essence pre-qualify them before they click your ad. You’re only charged when someone clicks on your ad (hence the term “pay per click”). These campaigns can therefore have really strong conversion rates.

Another great pay per click opportunity for ecommerce is ReMarketing, which can include showing advertising banners to shoppers that came to your ecommerce store, but didn’t checkout. These ads follow shoppers at intervals as they visit sites that show such ads, such as news sites and blogs. This reinforces your brand, and keeps you top-of-mind with the shopper. They already know your website, and you’re still only charged if and when they click on an ad banner. This can lead to a healthy sales boost through cost-effective advertising.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

If you’re looking for a good long-term marketing investment, SEO is often one of the best opportunities that you’ll find. By creating and properly tagging valuable content, and following best-practices such as keeping your website loading speed optimized, you can earn higher organic rankings for keyword phrases in search engines like Google. Search Engine Optimization campaigns also involve backlinks. These are links from other websites to yours, which search engines can take into consideration. If you have healthy backlinks from valuable and relevant webpages, it can increase your rankings. These can even include backlinks from articles, press releases, social media sites, and major online directories.

Email Marketing

With an order management system like SalesWarp, retailers can capture customer data, providing a clear, holistic view of each customer, no matter what channel they chose to interact with your brand. As you collect this customer data, in the form of e-mail addresses from newsletter signups and through your ecommerce checkout, you’re presented with a natural opportunity to stay in contact and increase the lifetime value of your shoppers. Sending well branded e-mail blasts about sales and new products can be valuable, so can sharing updates about your brand, such as what you’re doing in the community. For retailers with established lists that are ready to upgrade to more powerful E-mail Marketing campaigns, there are opportunities to this ecommerce data, as well as data on what your e-mail recipients are responding to. This can lead to segmented lists that receive different offers and messages based upon their shopping history and other key information. It can also lead to automated campaigns that message shoppers when they’re likely to be ready to re-order, capturing them before they purchase elsewhere.

Social Media Marketing

Social networks like Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Twitter can help you in a variety of ways. Like e-mail marketing, social media platforms give you a medium to stay in touch with fans and followers, and to earn exposure to new consumers. They also provide you with opportunities to run social media marketing campaigns. Much like traditional pay per click marketing, these can often focus on showing ads to your target audience, and charge you a fee if they click on your ad. Which platforms you focus on will depend on your audience. For instance, B2B businesses may find better targeting options with LinkedIn, or even Facebook, than with other platforms.

SMS Messages & Push Notifications

If you have a mobile app for your ecommerce store, push notifications can be a great way to notify shoppers of new sales and other high-value messages. There are also ways of sending push notifications to a user’s web browser, like Google Chrome. You can also have shoppers opt in for notifications by text message, which can have higher open rates than e-mails. There are now platforms like Emarsys and Listrak that agencies can use to help you manage campaigns across these marketing channels.

Still not sure which solution is right for you, or if you’re getting the most out of the campaigns that you’re running? Rand Marketing can provide you with a free consultation on your digital marketing efforts, and can offer insights and recommendations to help your ecommerce sales and conversion rates to grow. Reach out and mention “SalesWarp” to request your free consult. Once your ecommerce store and marketplaces are generating significant traffic, you may find you need help automating key order, inventory, and fulfillment processes. Contact SalesWarp to see how their all-in-one ecommerce solution can increase customer reach and sales by integrating and synchronizing your marketplaces and ecommerce store.