The downward revenue spiral of brick and mortar means your ecommerce strategy takes on an added urgency. Now is the time to optimize and maximize your ecommerce presence. It is more important than ever to create a healthy symbiosis between your in-store and online businesses. We are amid an unprecedented growth surge for ecommerce retail: The industry is expected to more than double, from $2.3 trillion in 2017 to $4.88 trillion in 2021.
To capitalize on this significant forward momentum for your business and enhance revenue, you need to start thinking of your brand as what’s been called a “click-and-mortar” or “click-and-brick” enterprise, where both online and in-store operations work synergistically to generate greater profits. It’s vital to stay up-to-date on crucial ecommerce trends that can strengthen your online presence as well as your overall brand.
While nothing can exactly replicate the experience of going into a store and trying on clothes, feeling the fabric, and getting an accurate representation of color and fit, essential innovations bring this IRL shopping experience closer than ever to computers and mobile phones. What’s most important to keep in mind is that the following ecommerce trends are all aimed at delivering the optimal customer experience—and that’s a worthy goal to have in all facets of your business.
Brands must leverage the right ecommerce business platform to ensure they can deliver a superior online experience to their visitors. They may use EDI software integration or a headless ecommerce platform for a better user experience for their visitors. Many businesses critically evaluate their ecommerce KPIs and try to engineer a conversion funnel to not only bring people to their site but get them to complete a transaction.
Many brands in the luxury ecommerce space leverage celebrity collaborations to associate their brand with a popular figure to increase sales. This is a common beauty retail trend and can help create a positive customer experience.
However, the most important thing is to deliver a superior experience and constantly work to create a site that satisfies your audience. Check out some of our helpful guides to reduce your ecommerce return rates and increase sales:
- Product Listing Strategies
- Retail Pricing Strategies
- 3PL Ecommerce Fulfillment Guide
- Retail Markdown Strategy
- Traditional Marketing Strategy
- Customer Retention Strategy
- Product Page Optimization Strategy
- DTC CPG Ecommerce Strategy
Now, back to our article. Here are our 4 essential tips to increase ecommerce revenue:
1. Make It Personal
Giving customers what they want in your online store is easier than ever with the right ecommerce tools. This can include using a shopper’s purchasing history to create specific product recommendations, targeted emails, and meaningful coupons and discounts custom curated to the individual. You can do this using data-generating tools that deliver consumer information on a granular scale to reach customers better. Personalizing the ecommerce experience can provide accurate results.
Gartner’s research and advisory firm estimate that this kind of “tailored help” can increase purchases by 20%. Plus, the less tangible but no less critical is the benefit of developing a trusted relationship between your brand and your customers. When you give shoppers more of what they are looking for, they will come back and make purchases again and again. Enhancing the personalized shopping experience can lead to better customer satisfaction and loyalty, ultimately boosting your sales and conversion rates.
2. Deliver the Goods—Quickly
Instant gratification used to be the domain of brick-and-mortar stores, where you could buy something and take it home with you. Now we live in a world where two-day, next-day, and even same-day shipping are commonplace. If your delivery service hasn’t gotten up to speed yet, it could be time to review how you can improve performance in this area. Many third-party options can help you avoid falling behind the curve in this key aspect of customer service. If drop-ship fulfillment and logistics aren’t in your wheelhouse, finding a partner that excels in the field is vital.
Please don’t wait on this one: By the end of 2019, it is estimated that same-day delivery service will be offered by 65% of online retailers. They know that providing the shortest possible delivery time is one of the surest ways — if not an outright requirement — to build a competitive advantage and meet the customer’s demands for convenience. Speedy delivery boosts revenue through driving repeat business, reaching key demographics, and providing a pricing opportunity: 56% of online consumers between ages 18 to 34 expect access to same-day delivery, and 61% of consumers are willing to pay more for it.
3. Get Interactive With Customers
It’s one thing to look at a photo of a product. But it’s another thing entirely to see how a shade of lipstick or a pair of glasses looks on you. Augmented reality delivers the technology to make this possible—for instance, snap a photo of your room and use it to see how a new couch or paint color would look there. And consumers are responding: One study found that augmented reality was more than twice as engaging to people than a plain photo. And since engagement drives conversion, the increased activation of AR in ecommerce is bound to drive sales.
A 2016 survey found that 53% of responding adults said they would be more likely to buy from a brand that uses virtual reality (VR) than from a brand that does not. Global retail leaders are climbing on board with VR/AR: early adopters include IKEA (virtual showrooms), Zara (virtual fashion show), CoverGirl (virtual makeovers), and Coca-Cola (virtual merchandising). The trend is taking off in B2B as well: by 2022, “the number of VR experiences in B2B will account for 40% of all experiences.”
4. Find Your Voice Online
We’re all on a first-name basis with Siri, Cortana, and Alexa. That dynamic is changing the way content is optimized for searches. The focus is now shifting towards writing content that answers questions posed by search users (“Siri, where is the closest shoe store?”) and more closely reflects the way people talk.
Some companies find that keywords are also changing shape, focusing more on long-tail terms that incorporate words often used as part of a question, such as “where” and “how.” Providing value in your digital content by answering questions, telling stories, and addressing issues in your brand’s unique voice creates a personalized connection that moves buyers through their purchase journey and thus generates more revenue.
