E-commerce sites, unlike some other web properties have been slow to change. I hate to use the cliche Web2.0 but if its the blanket term that we are all forced to use to describe the social change and shift in the web then so be it.
Marketing has changed too, the old fashioned advertise with a large call to action, is dead, and dying. Word of mouth, viral media and blogging has replaced the old and tired “Buy me! Buy me!”. Generation Y consumers are more banner blind, and spam aware than ever before.
So then, why are we not seeing that change reflected in e-commerce?
The answer, is probably due to the fact that once people find a recipe for what works, they tend to stick to it until it dies off, then the kneejerking / panic starts to set in. Business Myopia at it’s worst.
The early adopters have a headstart, the ones keeping their fingers on the pulse, will be the market leaders of tommorow. I’ve written before on ideas to generate traffic for e-commerce. So how can small independant retailers utilise social media to maintain their existing growth, against the larger high street brands and build upon the marketing they have already done? WITHOUT spending a fortune.
Build Community
Sites which have an existing customer base need to build loyalty and repeat visitors. If an indie’s strength lies in the personal service that they provide, then this needs to be reflected on their website. You have to work at making a site a home, a place that they can trust, and above all personal.
Introduce your staff on your site, along with their strengths, including the products that they are better at selling. You’ll be surprised at how many phone call conversations and conversions will happen as a result of an e-commerce site. Don’t hide behind an 0800 number – that’s a weakness of the high street stores that you need to move away from.
There are also a few ways that you can bring a social aspect to your website, quickly and cheaply.
1) Twitter.
This gives your customers an instant way to contact you whilst browsing your site. A live support so to speak. It also allows you to build up a following of people, and drive traffic back to your site. Win win for retailers. Instant contact, and a way of driving traffic. The question should be why AREN’T you on there? Depending on your product, you may also be able to utilise Twitter search to find new leads, and people who are looking for the products you sell. Connecting directly with prospects at their time of need makes for an easy sale.
2) Forums
A forum is hard work, but if you do manage to get it off the ground it can become somewhere that visitors return to talk amongst each other, and with you.
I’m in the process of doing the same myself. The great thing about a forum is that it is user generated content. The single biggest way of growing website traffic is content. And lots of it.
Learn from what Amazon have done. User generated, honest reviews of products. Reviews that people trust, good and bad unedited and unhinged. REAL.
You will be a lucky retailer to be surviving without search engines, and they love fresh content, which leads me onto blogging.
Blogging
Blogs as we used to know them are no more. “Blogs” to me represents the 1990′s verbal splurging of thoughts and feelings and outpouring of diary entries on sites like LiveJournal. The web has moved on since then, and businesses and individuals have started to see the rewards of quality content.
The web, such as it is, is filled with ALOT of rubbish, so rising to the top, isn’t as hard as you might imagine. As long as you attract links from the right place, and write inside the scope of both your knowledge and your site theme, you will be rewarded. Creating truly great content, that outshines the rest, and isn’t available elsewhere, is where the major rewards are to be won. This is the content that takes you days and sometimes weeks to compile. You won’t be able to create it all the time, so supplement your existing content with it.
There are a few reasons that blogs have become important.
Firstly they facilitate regular content posting. It take far too long (even for web savvy users) to create a copy of an HTML page and upload. Blog posts can be done quickly, and WordPress allows the poster to write content no matter whether they are out of the country or using their iPhone.
Secondly, they facilitate collaboration, a combination of comments, and people posting responses (trackbacks) on their own blogs. Further creating a sense of community around your site. If you think about the flow of visitors, it is cyclical, and this results in increased exposure for both the sites.
Get Real. Get Useful.
Get real. Stop pretending. You aren’t as great as you say you are. At least not in your advertising anyway. Consumers are not as stupid as you think, we can smell fake a mile off. I think about the brands that I’m prepared to “let in” to my life, and they are the ones that connect with me on a very personal level. The more personal the better in fact. It shows a deeper understanding of my needs as a consumer, and a genuine interest in my needs. Once you become too product driven, you fail. I have to find the products myself, not be spoon fed them.
Social media enables this. It gives you a perfect way of profiling your audience, and connecting with them. It enables you to reach out, and offer added value. It’s transparent, its relevant, its honest.
If I were a retailer.
Here’s what I’d do to drive traffic.
1). Setup multiple REAL twitter accounts. One for each member of staff that deals with web orders. Not the fake ones that feed products everytime you post create a new product line. Post thoughts, feelings and offer a human face. Make your twitter profile human. Give them free reign, within reason to let their personality through. Offer links to those Twitter profiles on your help pages.
2). Offer consumption of your products via a third party – nothing new here really. Offer it in multiple formats, and encourage it’s usage in mashups. RSS is the key here.
3). Create a sense of community around your site. Forums, product comments, and easily facilitating sharing of products. Integration of the social bookmarking sites, and “send to a friend” via email.
4). Participation on Social Networks. Facebook, Bebo etc. Create a mashup Facebook application. Better still, uses your existing traffic to transform a white label social network into one of your own.
5). Posting new and fresh opinion on fashion, trends and next season’s stock. What’s hot, what’s not. Let your visitors give you feedback on what you plan on selling. Social media offers you the cheapest and most cost effective form of market research there is.
6). Build links. I’m amazed at how many retailers have no idea how to do this for themselves. Content creation is one part of building links, but manual link building strategies can work wonders at growing presence on Google.
linky
posted:March 4, 2009 10:38 pm
Great article Paul.
Been doing some research on E-Commerce for a client, and your posts are a great help.
Keep up the quality work,
Thanks.
Greg Wallace
linky
posted:March 5, 2009 1:24 pm
Nice post! Very interesting read.
kelvinwins