Finding ways to boost ecommerce sales is always a priority for online business owners.
It can be tempting to spend on paid ads, but this may not necessarily be the best way to optimize your sales funnel. In fact, some of the most successful ecommerce sale strategies come from leveraging the power of your audience, UX, and customer services.
If you’re trying to learn how to boost ecommerce sales on a budget, your search ends here.This article will explore 15 proven ways to grow ecommerce sales with either free or low-cost solutions.
Table of Contents
How to boost ecommerce sales
Summary
How to boost ecommerce sales
Now let’s take a look at these 15 tried and tested tactics you can start implementing right away to boost your sales:
- Build an email list onsite
- Set up automatic email marketing campaigns
- Display customer reviews in prominent places
- Recover abandoned carts with emails
- Use video product demonstrations
- Give more product recommendations
- Optimize the checkout process
- Add a live chat to your store
- Use urgency and scarcity tactics
- Improve your store’s SEO
- Allow split payments for customers
- Use SMS marketing campaigns
- Inspire visitors with an Instagram feed
- Run paid marketing campaigns
- Give away an expensive product
1. Build an email list onsite
You might think that social media is enough to connect with your customers and would-be’s but that’s simply not the case. Regardless of your niche, an email list will be the best way to ensure long-term growth goals Some campaign ideas include
- Exit intent popup — Offer free shipping to collect your visitor’s email address before they leave.
- Welcome popup — You can welcome new visitors with an exclusive 10% discount.
- Content upgrade form — Create a valuable ebook and encourage visitors to share their email addresses for access.
- Abandoned cart recovery — When a customer adds items to their cart but fails to complete the purchase, you can offer a discount as an incentive.
- Gamified signup forms — Create a spin-to-win wheel where customers enter their email addresses for a chance to win a discount or a free gift.
The good news is, such popups and signups can be created with Omnisend. Check out our video tutorial at the end of this section to understand how to optimize them for your business.
This popup from To’ak Chocolate is an excellent example, generating an 18% conversion rate. Over time, the company was able to increase email-generated revenue by a whopping 460%, 39% of which was through automated emails.
Watch our step-by-step tutorial on creating signup forms:
2. Set up automatic email marketing campaigns
If you want your email list to help you boost ecommerce sales, you’ll need to have an email marketing strategy firmly in place.
Start with a simple sequence consisting of a welcome email and a weekly newsletter containing news, promos or offers.
There are various types of automated campaigns, for example:
- Welcome email series
- Birthday email series
- Transactional and post-purchase email series
- Cart or browse abandonment email series
This welcome email, part of an overall email campaign by B-Wear, is one email-done-right success story Omnisend is proud of.
Using pre-designed templates, you can quickly create automation in just minutes, making tasks easier and saving time.
With Omnisend’s best-in-class email automation features, you can supercharge your email marketing campaigns in no time. Do you want to know how to master email automation like a pro? This instructional video is for you:
3. Display customer reviews in prominent places
In a competitive online world, reviews act as a type of social proof. In fact, 87% of customers read reviews before choosing to buy from a local business, up from 67% in 2010. Plus, product pages with embedded customer reviews have a 3.5 times higher conversion rate than those without.
Displaying reviews in prominent places such as product pages, menus, and checkout areas can significantly increase customer confidence.
This example from Kerrits shows the average user rating directly under the product, plus a quick method of reading user reviews. This is a quick, extremely low cost tactic to increase ecommerce sales.
Don’t have any customer reviews yet?
No problem. Emails are a great way to ask for reviews, and these tips to create a product review email will have you collecting them regularly.
4. Recover abandoned carts with emails
Abandoned carts are a serious challenge for ecommerce businesses. The average abandonment rate is just under 70%, meaning only three in ten shoppers will actually purchase your product. But not all is lost. A cart abandonment email campaign can help you to bring those visitors back to your site and boost ecommerce sales.
Abandonment emails have the potential to teach you how to grow ecommerce businesses the right way. Here are some tips that will help you get started:
- Send the first email an hour after abandonment, the second message 12 hours later, and the third 24 hours after that.
- Use high conversion keywords in your subject line.
- Feature the abandoned product in your email.
- Add ways to contact customer support in case the shopper had questions or issues while ordering.
Abandoned cart recovery emails have contributed to the success of Amundsen Sports. Emails like this one have up to a 57% conversion rate:
5. Use video product demonstrations
In modern ecommerce, high-quality product images are a gold standard across the board. Videos, however, are not. This provides the perfect chance to stand out without spending exorbitant amounts of money. If you’re looking for how to grow your ecommerce store on a budget, video product demos are an excellent choice.
Unlike still images, high-quality videos can be used for product exploration, or to demonstrate products being used in their idealized environment.
Allbirds is one example of a business that engages visitors using product videos. By showcasing dynamic videos alongside their photos, they capture the shopper’s attention by showing the products in use.
6. Give more product recommendations
Showing similar items underneath your product page will encourage visitors to browse more and often put additional items in their cart. If you’re looking for an easy way to learn how to boost ecommerce sales, showcasing product choices is key.
Adding product choices to your pages doesn’t need to be complicated. For example, Kerrits uses unique sections to both upsell and cross sell, packaging items together to entice customers into additional sales.
Pro tip: Popups can be used to share product recommendations. If you’re not sure how to create them, check out this guide on creating product recommendations. Be sure to use our template to get up to speed.
7. Add a live chat to your store
Emails and phone calls have their place, but customers will always gravitate to the speed and simplicity of live chat. Live chat is a customer support method that offers the highest customer satisfaction rate at 73%. People are more likely to use live chat than any other communication method, making it ideal for your ecommerce platform.
Adding a live chat function to your website will allow you to communicate with customers more effectively without breaking the bank.
The live chat widget at Pooch Bandana combines humor with simplicity, instantly catching the shopper’s attention. It’s also an excellent example of how to increase website sales.
8. Optimize the checkout process
In 2022, about 17% of customers left their carts because of a complicated checkout process. The longer and more complicated your pipeline is, the greater your risks are for cart abandonment.
You can optimize your ecommerce checkout by:
- Dropping unnecessary registration requirements, like asking for ‘profession’
- Allowing visitors to checkout with a guest account
- Including trust signals
- Offering multiple methods of payment
- Adding an upsell form
The image below illustrates how to optimize trust signals like a “why choose us” section and upsell using a “Top it Off” section.
9. Use urgency and scarcity tactics
Urgency and scarcity are two tactics of behavioral science that induce FOMO (fear of missing out) and encourage customers to buy your product. In some studies, a sense of urgency has helped to increase sales by up to 332%.
However, proceed with caution. Scarcity tactics could also be overused to the point of dilution, reducing their effectiveness.
Still, they can be highly effective and are worth trying for any business that wants to learn how to increase ecommerce sales. Notable ways to implement them are:
- Free trials
- Limited time offers
- Discounts or coupons
- VIP lists
Consider this example from Kerrits, which clearly demonstrates their knowledge of how to grow ecommerce sales using urgency and scarcity tactics. This popup offers a free shipping code that works only for a single day. Since free shipping is a top reason why people buy, Kerrits’ strategy is leveraging both psychology and great marketing tactics all in the same popup.
10. Improve your store’s SEO
Performing regular search engine optimization (SEO) for your store is essential for picking up more sales.
- Use relevant high-volume, low-competition keywords throughout your site. Tools like Ahrefs and Google Keywords Planner help you find them.
- Add alt text to every image. This helps Google understand what your images are about.
- Optimize your site’s URL structure. Generally, shorter and keyword-rich URLs make for a better user experience and are favored by Google.
- Write product descriptions that are optimized for search engines. Include keywords naturally while writing.
11. Allow split payments for customers
Installment payments for ecommerce are a game-changer. They let customers buy now and pay later in smaller, manageable chunks instead of paying the full amount upfront. It’s super convenient and makes purchases more affordable. The best part? You’ll see a boost in conversion rates as more people complete their purchases.
So, which apps can make it happen easily? Two popular options are Klarna and Afterpay. Klarna offers smooth and flexible installment plans, while Afterpay lets customers split payments into four equal parts.
These apps seamlessly integrate with various ecommerce platforms, making it a breeze to offer installment payments and provide a fantastic shopping experience for your customers.
12. Use SMS marketing campaigns
SMS marketing can shoot your sales off the charts. Imagine sending personalized texts with exclusive discounts or limited-time offers directly to customers’ phones. You can also automate campaigns for order confirmations, shipping updates, and abandoned cart reminders. It’s like having a direct line to their wallets, driving them to complete purchases.
Divatress is an example of a business using SMS marketing to grow its sales. Divatress collects phone numbers using the popup below, and generated $123,000 in sales—in one year!
Even if you do the bare minimum with setting up automation, it’s a super-easy win. But really, there’s no reason not to bring SMS to work alongside email campaigns.
Rob Lin, Divatress owner
13. Inspire visitors with an Instagram feed
Instagram is an ecommerce marketers’ dream when done right. According to SocialPilot, 87% of Instagram users reported taking action after seeing a product on the platform.
Because social media sites like Instagram are a familiar place for customer inspiration, they can also be the perfect opportunity to organically showcase your wares.
Begin this process by adding an Instagram feed to your website that will be a source of inspiration for shoppers. An app like Instafeed can help you do this in Shopify.
With more than one billion active users on Instagram every month, your ecommerce sales potential could be virtually limitless.
This outstanding example from Naked and Famous Jeans serves as a great starting point. Take note of the bright colors, great composition, and constant product showcase.
14. Run paid marketing campaigns
If you’ve got your site converting well and want more ways to boost ecommerce sales, it could be time to try paid ads. Done effectively, paid ads can be one of the most lucrative tactics, with recent estimates suggesting an 800% ROI for Google Ads.
When creating your first campaign on Google Ads, target relevant keywords that combine search intent with your product offerings.
For example, searching for “travel bags” on Google brings up paid product listings from a number of stores including Amazon, Macy’s, and Herschel. The more you optimize your store, the higher your chances are of sealing the deal. Additionally, the use of clear, straightforward text helps to quickly tell shoppers what you’re offering.
Ecommerce advertising has its nuances. For more tailored tips on SEO and paid search, check out this SEO Best Practices for Ecommerce Sites resource from Google.
15. Give away an expensive product
Product giveaways are one of the best ways to increase ecommerce sales.
Offer a cool, valuable prize, and watch people drop their emails with you in hopes of winning. It’s a win-win situation. You get more emails, and they get a chance to score something awesome.
Having a big email list is important because it means more potential leads for your business. Those email addresses are like gold, representing people who are already interested in what you have to offer. And that’s where targeted email campaigns come in. With a bigger list, you can send personalized content directly to people who are more likely to engage with your brand and become customers.
How to run a product giveaway:
- Choose an item. It must be expensive and relevant to customers
- Announce and promote the giveaway where possible. You can promote on your social media pages and create popups on your website. You can even partner with an influencer to increase reach.
- Keep entry requirements simple. Just an email address will do.
Running a giveaway is simple. If you’re using Omnisend, you can connect to the Giveaway Ninja app and use the two apps to run and manage giveaways with ease.
An example of how to improve ecommerce sales with giveaways is the modern bridesmaid and event dress brand, Revelry. They run a $200-worth giveaway every month to grow their subscriber list and boost revenue.
Summary
In this article, you’ve learned how to boost ecommerce sales using a variety of tried and trusted tactics.
We’ve covered building an email list onsite, optimizing your checkout process, abandoned cart recovery, SEO, running paid marketing campaigns, and more.
Applying a mix of different tactics can help to drastically boost your ecommerce revenue.
For example, automated email campaigns nurture leads obtained from SEO or paid ads. And a simplified checkout process will translate those leads into paying customers in a fraction of the time.
Source from Omnisend
Disclaimer: The information set forth above is provided by Omnisend independently of Alibaba.com. Alibaba.com makes no representation and warranties as to the quality and reliability of the seller and products.
