Whether you’re finding it hard to continue your marketing campaign or are eager to attempt fresh approaches to boost your company’s growth, the most apparent option is to switch to eCommerce inbound marketing!
Inbound marketing is an effective technique for expanding your business. It increases brand awareness, lead generation, and revenue. Also, it contributes to the development of long-term customer connections. It brings customers to the business through content marketing, SEO, video marketing, affiliate marketing, and social media.
Continue reading to discover eCommerce inbound marketing and the best strategies for your business.
Table of Contents
- What Is E-commerce Inbound Marketing?
- Why Ecommerce Inbound Marketing?
- Ecommerce Inbound Marketing Strategies
- FAQs About Ecommerce Inbound Marketing
- Start Growing With Metricks
What Is E-commerce Inbound Marketing?
E-commerce inbound marketing entails enticing people to your online store with interesting and valuable content. By providing relevant content to customers, the eCommerce inbound marketing approach attracts and retains them. Businesses that regularly deliver high-quality content will have increased customer engagement and sales.
On the other hand, outbound marketing is a conventional advertising technique that aims to distract potential clients. The term “outbound marketing” refers to practices like cold phoning, trade exhibitions, and lecture series. Compared to inbound marketing, it is expensive and has a far lower ROI.
Also Read: Differences between inbound marketing and outbound marketing.
The key lesson here is that eCommerce inbound marketing strongly emphasizes customer experience. Through a strategy that encompasses the four stages of the sales cycle—Attract, Engage, Close, and Delight—inbound eCommerce marketing has the power to convert random leads to your website into actual, paying clients. These steps are necessary to develop effective inbound marketing for eCommerce strategy.
1. Attract
The first step is generating valuable and top-notch content. Also, ensure that it efficiently reaches your target audience. Bringing new traffic to websites and addressing their problems and purchase difficulties are the first steps in eCommerce inbound marketing. Here, your company is raising awareness.
It is just impossible to start eCommerce inbound marketing without drawing in customers. This is because it’s the critical process that helps your brand reach a wider audience. You already know that increased traffic in the first stage will result in more sales. Hence, the three key strategies used in attracting customers are;
- Content creation.
- SEO.
- Social media.
- Paid media.
- Blogging.
2. Engage
This phase provides your business with a chance to convert site visitors into qualified leads. A lead is a website visitor who gives you his contact details. Furthermore, it includes everyone who registers on your website or subscribes to your newsletter.
At this point, eCommerce inbound marketing aims to communicate with prospects and offer them inbound options over time. However, the good news is – because leads consciously choose to engage with you and provide you with their contact, they are open to being sold to. Engagement strategies in eCommerce inbound marketing are;
- CTAs.
- Opt-in forms.
3. Close
Leads turn into paying clients at this point in the eCommerce inbound marketing funnel. It entails connecting with leads and persuading them to patronize your brand. You’ll effectively nurture leads when you contact them regularly.
To nurture leads, you must interact with them through numerous channels. Also, demonstrate to them how your goods or services might benefit them. A clear-cut method to do this is by;
- Email marketing.
- Segmentation.
- Abandoned shopping cart recovery.
4. Delight
Converting leads into paying customers is only one aspect of eCommerce inbound marketing. There’s more!
Pleasing your customers will encourage them to recommend your brand to others. Note that your existing customers are your most ardent supporters. So, the more you make them happy, the more they will give you excellent reviews and spread the word about your store. Ecommerce inbound marketing will delight customers when there are;
- Excellent customer service.
- Reviews.
- Loyalty program.
Why Ecommerce Inbound Marketing?
The success of your eCommerce store depends on its level of customer interaction. And eCommerce inbound marketing is the secret to achieving this. It is a series of ongoing actions that help increase sales and foster better relationships with current, past, and future clients. But, it is not a one-time fix.
Now that you understand the importance of inbound marketing for eCommerce, it’s time to discover how to create the right strategies that precisely represent your business.
Ecommerce Inbound Marketing Strategies
While there isn’t one ultimate method for eCommerce inbound marketing, here are effective strategies.
1. Define Buyer Personas
A superb way to grasp the buyer persona is to create the ideal profile for customers who purchase your goods or service. Their profiles should include;
- Age
- Interests
- Gender
- Demography
- Education
- Industry
- Technical ability
This will provide preciseness and clarity. Once you’ve identified your target consumer, answer RFM (recency, frequency, and monetary). Consider if they’re new customers, how frequently they buy, and how much they’re willing to spend.
2. Blogging
A long-term content strategy should include blogging. Successful blogs provide potential consumers with helpful knowledge and experience. As a result, it increases customer loyalty, trust, and revenues.
Although blogging takes time, setting aside a few hours a week may provide a massive return on your effort. Always include a direct gateway to purchase whenever you expressly write on your site. In addition, use product photos and links that lead to relevant product pages.
Where it’s seasonal content, consider writing shopping recommendations with headings like “What to buy for your spouse, or bestie.” These kinds of guides will significantly improve your organic SEO. Not only that, it’ll assist your clients in the buying process.
3. Search Engine Optimization
Any eCommerce business must prioritize search engine optimization (SEO). Several SEO methods are crucial for you to gain more visibility naturally.
- Each product page’s URL and the main page’s URL should be distinct. Then, improve the URL and include the name of the goods with relevant keywords.
- In addition, the page should include a title tag that corresponds to the URL. And this is typically 50–60 words long. It comprises product description, category, and website name.
- Add a meta description. This will serve as the page’s description. And it’ll contain your target keywords. Make sure the description is no longer than 300 characters. Else, some words will be omitted.
4. User-Generated Content
If you’ve ever conducted an online product search, you probably read reviews before buying a product. Hence, two significant advantages come from adding feedback to your website:
- It enhances your rank on organic search engines.
- It draws people to your website and gives them more reason to buy your stuff.
With this in mind, start presenting client testimonials on your website. It’s a tiny adjustment that can greatly boost client happiness and your e-commerce conversion rate.
5. Social Media
The use of social media is now essential to eCommerce inbound marketing. No strategy is complete without using social media platforms — Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest. Maintaining your e-commerce brand on these platforms aids in raising brand visibility and exposure.
Therefore, encourage your social media fans to share your content. It’s an excellent method to increase your social media following. The first step is strategically positioning worldwide social sharing icons on your website in the header, footer, and other content areas. Another strategy is to promote “affiliate marketing.” This implies paying affiliates to recommend your items to their friends.
See also affiliate marketing for small businesses.
6. Enhance Product Pages
The process of improving your website for conversions and more significant revenue is conversion rate optimization (CRO). CRO optimization enables you to spot issues with your website.
Where do you lose money on sales? Who is leaving, and why? What can you do to seize those lost chances?
This strategy uses qualitative and quantitative research to provide a comprehensive and fair picture of your site’s conversion-oriented.
7. Paid Media
Paid media is also one of the strategies for eCommerce inbound marketing. It comprises social media ads, paid search ads, and display. Paid search advertising has a direct benefit on your revenue goals. Thus, it attracts clients who are highly motivated to buy.
Paid search is a wonderful tactic for achieving your conversion and financial goals. While boosting your brand’s exposure and awareness among potential buyers is the primary goal of social media and display advertising.
8. Email Marketing
The eCommerce inbound marketing tactic most often associated with aiding the sales funnel is undoubtedly email marketing. Don’t forget to plan emails to promote sales in conjunction with marketing automation. Email continues to be the channel with the best conversion rate for many eCommerce business owners.
In addition, it provides a steady stream of income. However, remember to do A/B testing on email templates before sending. This testing will eventually enable you to determine which emails generate the most revenue. Not only that, it’ll suggest how to modify your subsequent strategy.
8. Abandoned Shopping Cart Recovery
eCommerce shops are frequently confronted with abandoned shopping carts. Hence, they find it challenging to keep abandoned shopping cart rates at the nearest minimum. This occurs when visitors add an item(s) to their shopping cart but do not finish the purchase. Though, the reason for this might vary significantly.
Also Read: Marketing Inbound vs. Outbound Marketing: The Difference, Pros & Cons
One of the reasons could be because they were distracted by something which changed their mind. Whatever their motive, reducing your abandoned cart rate is a critical strategy for eCommerce inbound marketing. Hence, set up an abandoned shopping cart email to notify if a customer has a transaction pending.
9. Influencer Marketing
Influencer marketing is an intelligent eCommerce inbound marketing strategy. It helps grow your online retail business. Also, it enables you to access new audiences and raise brand recognition. This strategy will help you collaborate with influencers who will generate your revenue.
Influencers are online celebrities who act as brand advocates. You can compensate them through free items, cash, or discounts to advertise your business.
According to a recent Mediakix research, 80% of marketers believe influencer marketing is essential. Also, 67% of businesses use Instagram – the most popular medium. Other marketing channels are as follows:
Influencer marketing is great for locating relevant customers. Several times, you’ve watched an influencer’s Instagram post, liked it, and wanted to buy it. Hiring influencers to promote items reduces the selling process. Besides, as social commerce technologies expand, shoppers may buy directly from Instagram and TikTok.
FAQs About Ecommerce Inbound Marketing
Yes. Customer discovery is the goal of eCommerce inbound marketing, and Inbound marketing, as opposed to outbound marketing, drives clients to your website. Optimize your site content and post it in places where your target audience will likely come across it to guarantee it is visible to them.
Content marketing not only outperforms traditional marketing strategies by a wide margin. Also, it attracts more website traffic and leads. Consistent content creation improves website traffic, and as traffic grows, so do conversions. A successful conversion strategy will generate high-quality leads, which is the primary goal of developing inbound marketing campaigns, i.e., to generate focused, high-intent leads.
Start Growing With Metricks
Having learned more about eCommerce inbound marketing and its strategies now is the time to use the eCommerce solution to help you grow your business. You can significantly increase your eCommerce sales with Metricks.
Ecommerce businesses have many marketing options at their fingertips. However, Metricks outperform others in user-friendliness, driving customers to your store, earning more significant ROI, increasing sales, and much more.
Why?
Metricks lets you launch an affiliate program within five minutes. You can also seamlessly track and manage your affiliate program with no coding experience.
Godsfavour is a passionate content strategist with an excellent flair for writing on various niches. With a bachelor’s degree in Accounting. Her natural knack for details, coupled with her love for the English language, helps her weave and spin words together to create a masterpiece. She’s passionate about business growth and development.
