The world of e-commerce is growing and changing so much, it can feel impossible to keep up with the pace. Ever-shifting viral trends, faster and faster delivery standards, and constantly evolving tech mean you’re always adapting to something new.
That’s true regardless of whether you’re selling homemade beauty products out of a garage or running a multi-million dollar DTC. Fortunately, many of these changes are worth the investment since they make it so much easier to scale your business.
You can outsource, optimize, and automate everything from your customer care to your logistics, often letting AI do much of the work. Here are just some of the ways you can take advantage of all this change to increase your e-commerce revenue in 2024.
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1. Update Your Website
User experience has been the name of the game for a while, with more and more customers abandoning websites out of frustration. If your site takes too long to load or is too confusing to navigate, you’ll lose customers left and right. On the other hand, offer them something both unique and intuitive, and you have a much better shot at the sale.
It’s no longer enough just to make a webpage and list your products. According to Hawke, turning prospects into conversions starts with creating an online journey. That means building a site that’s both beautiful and functional, offering the user an engaging, immersive experience. Delight your users with a simple, playful interface, and they’ll keep coming back to buy more.
2. Add A New Sales Channel
If you’re selling on your own site, it might be time to try your luck with selling on Amazon. Or if you have a successful marketplace store, it might be time to consider getting your own site off the ground.
Platforms like Shopify and BigCommerce can handle most of the heavy lifting. But with your own site, you’ll need to spend some time and money on marketing. If you already have your own site and Amazon store, you could try expanding to other mainstream marketplaces, like Walmart.
For artsier products, you can try niche marketplaces like Etsy and MakerPlace by Michaels. And no matter what you sell, adding a social media channel like TikTok Shop — or even an international channel — could be a great move for your revenue.
3. Optimize Your Inventory
When a customer can’t get your product as fast as they want to, they might turn to a competitor. That’s why it’s crucial to make sure you’re never out of stock, and avoid putting products on backorder.
Always having the right amount of inventory on hand ensures a better brand experience for your customer. It can also save you a ton in tied up capital and storage fees. Inventory optimization software, often powered by advanced AI, can take the work out of managing inventory levels.
Advanced algorithms can tell you exactly when to reorder each SKU, and keep your sites updated with current inventory levels. As you add new channels to your business, they can make sure your stock is always in the right location. That means faster delivery times, happier customers, and even more potential profit.
4. Try Influencer Marketing And UGC
Survey results are in, and it turns out customers absolutely love influencer marketing. They trust influencers to determine what products to buy as much as their friends and families. And they definitely trust them more than they trust information coming directly from brands.
Influencer marketing is also more accessible to smaller brands than it used to be even a few years ago. To grow your revenue, instead of spending big on a celebrity influencer, work with a few growing nano or micro influencers.
These influencers have more targeted audiences, and are often perceived as more credible. Matching platforms can help you find the right influencers to work with your brand. You can also experiment with user-generated content campaigns, where you create a hashtag and re-share content created by brand fans and followers.
5. Be More Convenient
Another surefire way to increase your revenue is to make everything easier for your customers. That means eliminating every possible trace of friction between your products and a user’s doorstep. One way to do this is to offer a variety of payment options, including Buy Now, Pay Later, and one-click and autofill payment options.
Make it less burdensome for customers to pay for your products, and they’ll be less likely to abandon their carts. Offering faster deliveries, more delivery visibility, and a range of shipping and pickup options also helps.
Customers are more likely to choose your brand when they know they can get your product in hours or days, not weeks. If you’re not able to speed up shipping, offering tracking options can also help. Speed and transparency can both work well to drive e-commerce sales.
6. Personalize Experiences
Today’s customer wants to feel like their favorite brands really know what they want and need. That includes everything from offering personalized product recommendations on your site to making sure customer service agents know their transaction histories.
If you have the budget, you can use special software to customize various aspects of their online experience. Even without a significant tech investment, you can still offer your customers personalized treatment.
Consider conducting surveys to learn what kinds of promotions customers would like to see or what new products they’d consider buying. Segment email addresses into groups and send tailored messages to different sets of customers — or even reach out individually. The more your customers feel valued, the more they’ll spend.
In E-Commerce The Customer Is Always Centered
The old saying “the customer is always right” still applies, but in today’s e-commerce world, the customer is more than that. To win the sale, every interaction with your brand needs to make them feel like the center of the online universe.
That means always giving them exactly what they want, when they want it, every time. Putting the customer first, in every aspect of your business, is the best way to boost your revenue in 2024.
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