Powerful eCommerce Holiday Marketing Strategies for 2014

Online shopping and online selling has become more efficient and fun these days. With new technologies been introduced round the year, eCommerce stores are making haste by harnessing new techniques that sets them on the path of spectacular growth.  

Last year, it was all about guest blogging, website optimization, higher CTR & conversion rates, and responsive design. This year, it's all about mobile, social networking, big data, analytics and personalization. All these changes has led to new trends in the world of eCommerce.

The long and short of it is that there are significant changes happening in the eCommerce space and some of the important ones have been listed below:

1. Mobile Optimized Websites:

Last year, the chant was all about building responsive web design that were mobile-friendly. This year, however, the eCommerce owners are completely focusing on building sites that blossom beautifully on smartphones and tablets.

2. Mobile Advertising:

Mobile Advertising is catching fire. It's the latest fad to enter the eCommerce arena, and the big, branded eCommece stores are going to the first big spenders on mobile ads. Though, small store owners may be not be prepared for the big leap, larger store owners will try to reach as many mobile users as possible. Even video mobile ads will be in great demand.

3. Advertising On Wearable Devices:

Google glasses, smart watches and other wearable devices are set to enter the market in 2014. If demand of these devices pick up, eCommerce stores are sure to bombard it with promotions, offers, and updates to their customers through these wearable devices.

4. Re-emergence Of Long Content:

Bid adieu to short content. Long-form content is the order of the day. We will see the rise of long-form content for all the products and services offered by the stores. Plus, all the articles and blog posts will have to be long enough going forward. Moreover, the easy availability of analytics and data will lead to the creation of more data-based content.

5. Increase In Social and Search Ads:

With more and more content marketers turning toward social media and search ads for revenue, PPC and CPC ads experiments in small and large eCommerce companies will increase manifold.

6. Brand and Author Identity Assumes More Importance:

The death of large-scale guest blogging has inspired the rise of digital brand both for authors and businesses. Going forward, a brand blog plus a team of well-known bloggers will be  for eCommerce businesses.

7. Personalized Product Displays:

With users becoming more comfortable sharing personal information with brands and trusted online stores, it would lead to rise in personalized product displays and suggestions for registered users.

8. Instant Delivery:

Amazon is stepping up its delivery services manifold with drone delivery. Online stores are not meant for instant gratification. For this offline stores are better as you get your goods instantly. However, in case of online stores you have to wait for 2 days to 2 weeks. But this won't be the case in 2014. Next-day delivery options and same-day delivery options are on the top of the agenda for many eCommerce stores.

9. Local SEO:

While larger eCommerce stores try out new ways to attract customers, smaller eCommerce store owners will focus on traditional SEO to target customers in a limited geographic area.

10. Marketing Automation:

Online shoppers are known for their notorious trait of browsing the store for endless hours and leaving it without buying anything. Targeted marketing can solve this issue to a greater extent. For instance, lead nurturing, emails and analytics should be automated to help small online store owners gain better insights and convert visitors into buyers.

These are some of the most important eCommerce trends that can be used in upcoming holiday season and increase sales.

Read more »

9 Ways to Empower your Sales Reps via B2B Platform

Believe it or not, sales reps view online platforms as a threat. They think that online platforms not only eat into their commissions but block sales opportunities as well.  But there's a sunnier side to it well. The online platform acts as a bridge between the customers and the sales reps, as they stay connected 24/7. And what with manufacturers and distributors adding more tools and functionalities to their B2B platform to support sales reps on a day-to-day basis. The arrangement enables the manufacturer to offer customers exact information on pricing, inventory availability, and product information to the sales reps.

Some of the important B2B eCommerce platform features that empower sales staff are as follows:

• Include a dashboard with key performance indicators such as sales by customer, sales by product, trending products, customer order history, commissions, order status etc.  
• Include alerts that keeps the rep updated on the order status, whether it's placed or not placed etc.  
• Include price, and quote capabilities. It helps reps easily generate a proposal from their mobile or laptop device.
• Include reporting and analytics capabilities. This help reps view abandoned carts and customer behavior on the website so they can get insight about the areas of interest and lost sales.
• Include subscriptions for recurring orders so reps can easily set them up for customers.
• Include instant chat capabilities to connect reps to customers who are shopping online.

Also, the reps should learn to use the already rich product content available in your online store as they make sales calls in the field. This will equip them with all the necessary ammunition with regard to pricing, availability, comparisons, data sheets, and videos, which will be useful to them while meeting customers. Plus, they should have instant access to up-sells, cross-sells and substitute products at their fingertips, which will help them sell more while holding conversation with the buyers.

Further, allow your reps to preconfigure shopping lists, which can be used by buyers to quickly place reorders. Once you have these tools in place, train your reps to use your online store and sales application to be more productive in the field.

Read more »

How To Be A Retail Giant In The World Like Amazon

Believe it or not, Amazon is the largest online retailer in the world. In 2013, Amazon's online retail sales recorded a whopping $67.9 billion, more than the next 9 largest e-retailers combined.

Through this post, we make sure our clients know how an Amazon Webstore, the eCommerce platform of Amazon can reap huge benefits by giving an amazing online shopping experience to their customers.

What makes Amazon Webstore a success, while others are forced to bite the bullet. 

1. Personalized Services:

As per a research from Infosys, one-third of the consumers expect personalized shopping experience. And Amazon rocks at the personalization front. Their on-site recommendations are not only colossal but they are interesting enough. 

2. Easy Checkout:

While slow shopping carts kill conversions, on the other hand, speedy carts attract buyers. Speed is where Amazon scores. An ideal shopping cart completes the purchase in 2 or 3 clicks. And Amazon does it well.

Plus, it saves your previous carts, in case you want to come back to it later. It also gives notification about price changes at checkout. Also, credit card purchases with Amazon is easy than other sites.      

3. Product ratings and reviews:

Research shows that two-thirds of shoppers are interested in your product only if you have product ratings and reviews. Since Amazon has both, making it world's first choice for online shopping.

In fact, most of the products have hundreds of reviews, for instance Kindle Paper white has no less than thousand reviews.  If more and more customers are rating a product highly, then it simply means the product is worth consideration. Amazon displays both favorable and critical reviews, thereby building trust among buyers.

4. Product Images, Videos and Descriptions:

Large product images boost conversions. It fires buyers’ imagination. Though Amazon so far hasn't succeeded in doing this every time, but whenever it does the results are outstanding. One can even add video about the product, enabling buyers to get a 360 degree view of products.

The other remarkable thing about Amazon is you will find all the information on a particular product on a single page – be it colors, variations, new, used etc. 

5. Up-selling and Cross-selling:

Up-selling and cross-selling is Amazon's strength. It encourages customers to buy more of similar products by informing them about the customers who looked at the same products, as you are doing right now, but eventually bought something different.   

6. Easy Filtering, Navigation and Search:

Navigation and search are the two important pillars of  eCommerce Optimization, and no one knows it better than Amazon. Given the number of products available for sale on Amazon, anyone should feel overwhelmed, but one doesn't given its excellent filters.

Plus, if you are searching for a certain product, it guides not just by price and star rating but by operating system, brand and more. It’s gives you a sense of satisfaction that you are finding the right product that meets your needs.

Besides these, Amazon has eCommerce conversion optimization funnel.  It helps visitor track interesting products they want to buy. This is why eCommerce is there for, after all.  Follow this implacable strategies to be a retail giant like Amazon going forward. 

Read more »

How to Make Non-shoppers Shop With eCommerce

Nowadays businesses have classified shoppers into four different categories : the bargain hunter, the researcher, the impulse shopper and the loyal shopper. But then, there's one more important category that businesses tend to ignore. Yes, the non-shopper. These shoppers are said to be low on patience and they tend to dislike shopping anywhere and anytime. They hate digging through the sales rack to find that perfect shirt or pair of pants. 

 

Shop With eCommerce

For such shoppers, there are online subscription retailers like Fancy, Trunk Club and Mantry. These retailers attract the non-shoppers through their monthly subscription programmes. This is how they work: A non-shopper pays a certain amount every month to an online subscription retailer. The retailer on receiving the subscription amount chooses an assortment of products based on customer's profile, and sends it directly to his or her office or house. The non-shopper picks and chooses what's best for him within the given budget. 

 

Such innovative services not only saves customer time but the best part is that non-shoppers get what they want. But to achieve this level of efficiency, the online companies require a robust and capable eCommerce platform that's able to capture and leverage customer records to offer the best tailored shopping experience. 

 

Here’s how they do it.

Solid Customer Profile: 

 

This is a prerequisite that every online subscription retailer should consider. There's a huge responsibility on retailer's shoulder to built trust with customers and gather data about their likes and dislikes. 

 

Order Management:

 

Match customer profiles with supplier inventory levels, lead times, inventory position and financial considerations. Once this is done, come up with a monthly box that's sure to tempt your customers every month and ensure that they stick with their plan of paying the monthly fee. 

 

Packaging and Order Fulfillment

Packaging and Order Fulfillment: 

 

Smart retailers pay extra attention to packaging. It should not look like any plain eCommerce delivery. The box should be printed and branded with an inviting message on it. 

 

Iteration:

Making the customer fill the survey form or profile questionnaire only once in a while is not sufficient. Best of the subscription service companies continually request feedback and additional profile attributes to refine customer profile and use it to stock products that shoppers are counting on.

 

Systems:

Successful on line subscription retailers focus on building scalable and automated systems so as to offer subscribers personalized shopping experience.

To cut the chase, today online retailer can be style experts for their customers by offering customized products. But to carry out this practice efficiently, they should be able to capture the data, store it and act on the information quickly and easily. Non-stoppers are not God, they too can be tempted simply by going the online subscription way.

Read more »

Benefits of Using Inventory Management Software

Are you managing the inventory of your store manually and wondering if you should opt for one of those inventory management software that's available widely in the market? Yes, you definitely should because it offers loads of benefits. Just have a look at some of those benefits.

Empowered workforce

An effective inventory management system will arm you with a barcode scanner and an in-depth knowledge about how much inventory you have and where it's located. Once you receive an order, it becomes very easy for the employees to find the right product and pack them. Also, each and every aspect of the inventory management system will be streamlined and simplified.

Affordable

As the processes will be streamlined and employees will be empowered to perform well, inventory management software will help you save on storage costs, carrying costs, overstocks and other unnecessary costs. Moreover, you will also stop loosing money by avoiding overselling of the products.

Quick shipping

When you have an inventory management software and you receive multiple purchase orders, you still can ship them quickly because the system will tell you where exactly the inventory is and how much of it needs to be shipping. Again, quick shipping translates into quick delivery and better customer service. All this is not possible if you aren't using the software.

Effective planning

With the help of inventory management software, you can predict the right level of inventory that you will require – eliminating the chances of facing out-of-the-stock situation or oversold situation. The software will offer you important insights into hot-selling items and upcoming trends through graphs, charts and spreadsheets.

Warehouse management

Whenever you receive an order, you won't have to hunt through the website to look for the ordered products. The software will offer you detailed information, including where the product is and on which shelf. Based on this information, you can put low-selling items farther while hot-selling items closer to aid in the shipment process. You can even put two products together if they generally get sold together.

Higher ROI

Through inventory management software, you are eliminating the scope of human error while streamlining the entire process. This in turn will reduce the wastage of resources, leading to higher ROI and business performance.

Although all inventory management software offer you several benefits, it doesn't mean that all of them will work for you. Keeping your business requirements in focus, you should look at each and every feature offered by the various software.

Read more »

How to Track Inventory in Multiple Locations

As the size of inventory increases, management becomes complex and convoluted. The problem becomes more severe when you have to expand the warehouse facility and manage multiple warehouses. If you don't have a proper inventory management system in place, you will never know how much of inventory is stored in each of the warehouse locations. So in this kind of situations, an highly advanced inventory system that helps you in warehouse management is a must. Ideally, a flexible inventory management system will help you:

• Check inventory levels of each products at each location with a click
• Integrate shipping options such as UPS, FedEx and USPS
• Transfer bulk of items from one warehouse to another in case of shortage or excess
• Monitor short-term as well as long-term trends, leading to optimum inventory decisions
• Streamline shipping and ordering processes for both customer orders and supplier orders
• Utilize wireless barcode scanners to order, receive and cycle count inventory for each location
• Update information about inventory, orders and shipment real time across the board
• Update relevant information in all other locations, including Quickbooks and Microsoft Dynamics

If you scour the market, you will find several inventory management software but not all can offer the above mentioned features. Kaushalam's inventory and order management system will offer the most advanced features over and above the functionalities mentioned above. Our software will offer convenience, reliability, efficiency and sophistication.

If you wish to know what else our inventory and order management software can offer you, contact us. Pronto.

Read more »

Basics of Setting Up An eCommerce Stores

If you are selling through a brick-and-mortar store, it's about time that you set up an online store and expand your horizons. The reason for doing so is simple: daily more customers are shifting to online buying due to packed work schedules and advanced technology. And there will come a day when a customer will rarely go to a brick-and-mortar store to buy anything. Consequently, if you want to keep pace with the changing times, you have to have an eCommerce store. If you are wondering from where to start, no worries. Here are the basic steps that you need to follow to set up the store.            

Setting Up An eCommerce Stores

Domain name

Like your brick-and-mortar store, your eCommerce store too will need a name. Catchier the name, better the business. Make sure that the name you are selecting reflects the business you are in, and it's appealing to your target audience. Also, if the name is already taken by any other business, you won't be able to get a domain name for that. So, the name needs to be unique too. If you aren't able to make a concrete decision regarding the name, do some research – as in how your competitors have named their business. But do not copy them by making minor tweaks to it or you might end up with a weak branding strategy.  

Platform
 
The next step is to decide the platform of the store. When you are building a store, you should select the language which is flexible for creating user-friendly websites. Unless you are a technical person, you won't be able to do it on your own. It's better to hire professionals for this task. If you don't want do so much of work, you have an option to choose existing eCommerce platforms such as Amazon, Yahoo, Collusion and Shopify.  

Design

There are several eCommerce stores out in the market, selling the exact product or service that you are selling. Consequently, if you want to attract customers in hordes, you have to set yourself apart from the crowd. You have to differentiate yourself from your peers, and you can do so by customizing the design, layout and shopping cart. While customizing, make sure that the overall look and feel of the store reflects your business.  

Search engine optimization
 
Once you have set up the store, the last step is to make sure that your target audience is able to find you. To let them find you easily, you have to make your website readable and searchable for search engine bots. Optimizing the website from SEO point of view requires lot of effort and unless you are an SEO expert, it's better to hire professionals for them. If you are on shoe-string budget, you have the alternative to read up loads of material available over the internet and learn. However, do remember, this alternative will take up lot of time because mostly you'd be doing trial and error for the website.

If you are new to setting up a business and require some guidance, do not hesitate to contact us. We specialize in offering a range of products and services that simplifies eCommerce business while offering maximum output.

Read more »