30 actionable ecommerce tricks and tips

starting a business is an awesome experience you learn a lot you grow a lot and hopefully you sell a lot but what are the most important steps to building launching and growing your store hey guys I'm Jessica guzik with Ober Lo and today we're going to look at 10 steps you can take right now to optimize your store for immediate sales and long-term growth did you miss part one click the link to check that out already seen part one then let's get to it number 11 be specific with your product categories as your store grows and you offer more and more products you'll want to be super specific with your product categories this will let your customers easily find what they're looking for product categories like women and children don't really help your shoppers quickly find what they're looking for look at how Amazon organizes their product categories it's uber precise the easier you make it for a customer to find exactly what they're looking for the more likely they'll buy from your store number 12 create a loyalty program new customers are awesome don't get me wrong but it costs up to 10 times more to acquire a new customer than to make a repeat buyer out of an existing customer in addition returning customers spend about 67% more than new customers that means it's more affordable and rewarding to keep the customers you already have there are several great ways to reward loyal customers consider sending them a discount on their birthday or offering them a small gift with their third purchase or perhaps running a special contest just for that all of these perks reward repeat customers and over the long term the more customers you can keep the more money your business will save and make number 13 create unique content if you're a drop shipping entrepreneur odds are you need to find a way to stand out among your competitors the easiest way to do this is by creating unique content pumping out blog posts each week is a great way to build an audience and educate visitors while keeping your website looking fresh and up-to-date you can always find topics for your content if you're in the yoga niche for example you could post about your 10 favorite yoga poses on YouTube if you're in the pet I review some of the best pet apps out there bottom line unique content can go a long way to increasing your store's visibility a key factor in boosting sales number 14 offer free shipping it's important to test free versus paid shipping yes but when you have a new store it's a good idea to go ahead and offer free shipping to incentivize sales especially if people don't know your store yet free shipping as a little nudge in the right direction if you dropship with over low supply most suppliers offer free shipping and a packet delivery which is a low-cost express shipping service number 15 create product videos product videos can help boost conversions and increase sales for your store you can add product videos to your product page to show different angles or demonstrate how to use a product you can also use product videos as a marketing tool on Facebook or Instagram creating video content can be time-consuming but it will give your brand a competitive advantage number 16 create ads from day one ads on Instagram and Facebook bring in traffic that converts into customers now for the first couple of weeks you're going to be an experimentation mode use ads to figure out which products your audience likes the most by switching the products in the ads and seeing which gets the most clicks as well test multiple price points and make sure your product price is sustainable given the cost of advertising keep adjusting the dials until you find your winning formula and then turn your ads on full force number 17 learn to recover abandoned carts talk about different abandoned car apps and email formats the abandoned cart rate on average falls somewhere between 60 and 80 percent so it's normal for customers to abandon their cards but you should do everything you can to get those customers back if you have the customers email address send a follow-up and nudge them to complete the purchase but don't stop there consider sending at least two more follow-up emails and in each of those emails offer an additional discount to sweeten the sale and convert the customer number 18 talk to your customers and get to know their needs building relationships with customers is a time-consuming but super important part of being an e-commerce entrepreneur a simple thing you can do to get better insights is email your customers individually ask them however enjoying the product they purchased if there are any other products they wish your store had or if there's any type of blog content they'd like to read you might even throw in a VIP discount code as a thank you for their feedback now of course not everyone will reply but the feedback you do get will be huge for understanding your customers number 19 start building links to reduce ad spend while increasing revenue it's important to build external backlink backlinks are links on other websites that take people to your online store you build backlinks by promoting your products on relevant and popular blogs or websites you can also reach out and offer to write guest posts on these same blogs the more sources you have driving traffic to your website the less you'll spend on ads and once we've gotten clicks to your website you can retarget visitors with your best selling product number 20 think of ways to put your customer on a pedestal if you treat your customers right they'll keep coming back so stay in touch with them show them that you appreciate them you can try for example to host a customer appreciation event where you give them first access to new products or an additional discount sending thank-you notes and letting them know how much you appreciate their business will also go a long way brainstorm things you can do for your customers that'll make them happy and your customers will likely return the favor by buying from your store again so that's it for today what do you think where these steps new to you were they helpful let us know what you think by dropping a comment below and in addition let us know what tip we might have left out that you would give to other e-commerce entrepreneurs I personally read every comment so I'm really eager for your feedback and when you're ready for even more ecommerce tips and tricks look for part three of our e-commerce series thanks so much for watching I'll see you next week and in the meantime learn often market better and sell more