Ecommerce Hacks That Can Boost Your Sales and Conversions

There are anywhere between 12 to 24 million online stores in the world. What are your odds of success in this competitive space?

Depending on the products you sell and the geography you target, your online store would be competing with dozens or hundreds of stores. Launching an online store and offering the best products doesn’t guarantee success anymore. Your store needs to battle for traffic, conversion, and sales.

This is easier said than done as competitors are unlikely to yield space. While top-rate SEO, PPC, and Social Media Marketing can drive traffic to your store, it isn't enough. To put things into perspective, only 2.17% of visits to a store convert into sales. You must focus on conversion optimization and ensure maximum users visiting the store carry out transactions. Here, we look at eCommerce hacks that can boost your sales and conversion.

1. Reward Loyalty

Ecommerce is a game of attrition. The majority of customers aren’t likely to shop from you for the second time! The success of your online store and increase in conversion rate is proportional to customer loyalty. Stores that convert one-time customers into loyal customers leave their competition behind. Customer loyalty can reduce customer acquisition costs and help stores gain through “word of mouth” marketing.

A Customer Loyalty Program should be up on the pecking order in your conversion optimization strategy. Offer exclusive discounts, free shipping, shopping points, gift wraps, etc. to your loyal customers. Reward their acts every time they recommend a new customer to your store. Customer loyalty helps generate regular orders for your store and keeps you going even in the hard times such as we have seen in the ongoing Covid-19 crisis.

2. Leverage Reviews Aggressively

Reviews are perhaps one of the most underrated hacks in eCommerce. While most stores undertake aggressive digital marketing campaigns, they tend to ignore the power of reviews. Your brand needs to follow up with satisfied customers and encourage them to write reviews on your store and social platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and Yelp. Did you know 90% of customers read reviews before buying products online?

Reading reviews is an integral part of the buying cycle for all online shoppers. Customers tend to assign more weightage to reviews than they do to product descriptions when shopping from a new store. 79% of shoppers trust reviews as much as personal recommendations. Leverage this aggressively by showcasing positive reviews to increase conversion.

3. Enable Guest Checkout

Some online shoppers take privacy too seriously. They don’t like their mailbox flooded with offers or like to spend the extra few minutes registering on your store. While you’d always want to have loyal and repeat customers, you shouldn’t discourage the one-time shopper at the same time. Add a Guest Checkout option to your store with the assurance of respecting their privacy. This adds to your order volumes and in due course of time may turn such shoppers into loyal customers.

4. Focus on Images & Videos

Retail shopping involves several senses–sight, touch, and hearing primarily and the sense of smell occasionally. When it comes to online shopping, shoppers rely on sight alone. Is your store positively triggering that sense? Lack of images, poor quality images, or misleading images can hurt your brand. 75% of online shoppers rely on images when deciding on a product to buy.

Add the maximum number of images for every product listed on your store to offer customers the best perspective and let them make an informed choice. Focus on the quality of the images and ensure different colored products have different sets of images. Including a demo video of the product, unboxing guide, etc. can take this experience a step further and boost your sales.

Read More: 13 Holiday Marketing Campaign Ideas for Ecommerce Businesses

5. Build Sense of Urgency in Customers’ Mind

You have heard about the FOMO factor. But did you know more than 50% of the millennial population experience this emotion? “Fear of Missing Out” is a part of consumer psychology and more so in the digital space. Playing with FOMO psychology can boost your conversion rate. As a part of your strategy, focus on building a sense of urgency in the minds of your customers. There are several ways in which you can trigger FOMO among your users. These include:

• Run viral campaigns on social media highlighting the number of people who have bought targeted products and why it is the coolest thing to own.
• Show the demand for these products on the page messages like “Hurry only 5 items remaining”, “Grab this product at the lowest price”, “Free shipping for a limited time” etc.
• Highlight the difference between the regular price and the sale price during the sale to show the incentives of placing an order
• Run limited-time deals on popular products like Amazon does. It can result in tons of fresh orders.
• Run a countdown timer during every sale to ensure users visiting your store know when the deal is running out.

6. Make use of Gamification

Gamification is being widely adopted in digital marketing. Gaming is engaging and it is helping eCommerce sites increase their sales and conversion. A simple spin wheel on your store that rewards the user with discounts, free shipping, or free products can increase your conversion rate substantially.

With gamification, you will be able to play with the minds of your visitors. Everyone wants to be a ‘winner’ in life and when you let them win something in the form of a game it immediately triggers a positive buying behavior in their minds. As soon as they spin the wheel there is a sense of anticipation in their minds. Most users aren’t likely to let go of this opportunity to win a deal on your store that makes them feel good.

7. Tap on the Undecided Buyer

Not every visitor to your store has a clear idea of what they want or have made their final buying decisions. It is the undecided customers that your store needs to tap into, and this strategy can increase your conversion rate substantially. Undecided customers need a bit of coaxing and the final push to turn their visits into sales.

By offering them exclusive incentives such as limited-time additional discounts, assistance over the phone, or free shipping for low-value orders, you can turn them into your customers. Offer such deals to returning users on your site or people who are continuously visiting a certain product page. It is like wearing a star salesman’s hat and turning the casual store visitor into a customer.

8. Let Customers Decide Payment

Imagine a customer having to abandon a cart due to the lack of payment options. There can be nothing as annoying as this for the customer as well as the store. The more payment options you have, the higher is your conversion rate. Payment methods vary based on demography, geography, and the kind of market you are targeting.

For instance, Gen Z is known for preferring digital wallets, while Gen Y prefers cards. If you are planning to target customers from different countries, you must accept payments in different currencies for ease of transaction. Don’t let a customer walk away from the store for the want of payment options. Don’t force your choice, let them decide.

Final Words

These are some of the hacks that can boost sales and conversion for your eCommerce store. There is one thing common in most of the strategies we have listed above–you must get inside the mind of the customer and make use of their emotions to convert visits into transactions. As we have stated above a little more than 2% of visits to a store result in transactions on average.

By employing these strategies, you can increase your sales and conversions and in the process grow your brand organically. Ecommerce conversion optimization is a long-haul game.

If you are looking for a team of passionate marketers who can increase your sales and conversions, we at Growth Natives would be proud to partner in your endeavor. We have been helping brands scale up their market share and edge past their competitors. Our team specializes in eCommerce marketing and brand building. Write to us at info@growthnatives.com or visit our website to know the difference we can make.