When you think of fast-fashion retail and brands like H&M (Hennes & Mauritz) and Zara (Zara Home) what comes to mind?
Familiarity breeds contempt and resistance, so it’s no wonder that people are often hesitant to shop at these stores. But just because something is popular doesn’t mean it’s good for everyone. In fact, with many fast-fashion retail brands popping up online, it’s easier than ever to seek something more unique.
If you’re looking to gain more traction with your online store, try one of these digital marketing hacks from an agency that specializes in e-commerce.
Hire A Market Research Company
If you’ve never really done any market research before, the idea of hiring someone to help you may seem daunting. Sure, you need to know what works best for your website, social media, and email marketing campaigns. But who should you trust? What questions should you ask?
Oberlo, a market research company that specializes in online retail, had 23 million monthly active users and 65 million annual mobile transactions when they were acquired by TikTok in May 2021. If you’ve ever shopped on either of these platforms, you’ll know exactly what kind of data they have available. You may not realize, however, that these are not your typical marketing research companies. Not only do they have extensive experience collecting data on digital shoppers, but they also specialize in digital marketing and social media for retailers.
By using specialized software or tools like Quora VAS, you can gain deeper insights into how people interact with your website, social media, and emails. For instance, you can see detailed analytics for your top performing pages and posts, as well as get feedback on whether or not your customers find your content valuable.
Launch A Facebook Group
While it’s not always easy to get people to visit your website, your Facebook group is a place that you can always depend on to pull in new members. Launching a Facebook group for your brand or business provides many benefits, such as allowing you to engage with customers on a private platform and grow your audience.
You can also use a tool like HubSpot to create different groups for various purposes, such as marketing, sales, and customer support. Having different groups for different purposes helps keep track of conversation and helps provide more value for your customers.
Build A Loyalty Program
One way to attract customers to your brand is by building a loyalty program. Nowadays, customers expect to be able to earn perks and discounts for doing certain things, such as buying certain products or visiting a certain store. You can use your loyalty program to reward your customers for doing business with you, or just because they’re a valued customer. You can also use a tool like Shopify to create a loyalty program for your store.
Creating a loyalty program is simple and can definitely be fun. Depending on the size of your business, you may want to consider creating a rewards tier for your top customers. For example, you could give your best customers gold labels or a special discount code that they can use to get certain products or services.
Use Personal Stigma
Depending on the type of business you’re running, you may have different types of customers. If you’re running a luxury goods retail store, for example, you may want to consider using a tactic similar to luxury brand stores that put a stigma on buying cheap products. You can tell your customers that although this product may seem good enough, it doesn’t quite have that “special feeling” that you’re looking for. This type of thinking can help draw in more luxury-brand shoppers who are looking for that “special feeling.”
Try Something New
TikTok user Sean Wroe said it best: “If you don’t try new things, you’ll never improve.” The key to expanding your business is by continuously trying new things and improving your current practices. Just because a certain tactic or strategy worked for one of your competitors doesn’t mean that it will work for you.
This is especially true for retail businesses. If you’re looking to grow your brand, you’ll want to consider what makes you different from your competitors and what would make your customers value your brand over theirs. You can use this knowledge to develop a unique selling proposition (USP), which is basically your product’s or service’s distinct selling point. You can use a tool like Canva to help you develop a unique logo and template for your business.
Make Regular Content Consistent
When you’re first starting out, it’s easy to be tempted to make every post or article unique. After all, you haven’t yet found an area of interest that you can develop into a theme or regular schedule for posts. But if you do this, you’re risking your brand’s consistency and trustworthiness. Regular content, whether it’s an updated blog post, podcast, or vlog, is better than singular content because it keeps the interest of your audience and encourages them to come back for more.
You can also use a tool like Hootsuite to create a schedule for your regular social media posts and track the performance of your content. Having content that’s both consistent and unique can help establish credibility with the audiences that you’re trying to reach.
Monitor The Competition
Your competitors are watching you and your every move. This is a fact that you should never forget. Nowadays, there are many ways that your competitors can track your activities, from the types of content that you create, to the marketing methods that you use, and even the customers that you gain or lose. You should definitely be keeping an eye on what your competitors are up to, but you should also be thinking about how to prevent them from seeing your tricks and tactics.
Avoid Free Blogging Platforms
Blogging platforms like Blogger and WordPress are great for getting your thoughts out there and connecting with audiences. But you shouldn’t be using these platforms if your goal is to make money online. The reason being, most blogging platforms require you to pay a fee to promote your blog.
These fees can range from $10 to $50 or more per month. Instead of paying up front to promote your blog, try out a free blogging platform, like Medium. With Medium, you can connect with other bloggers, businesses, and influencers to grow your audience and make money online.
Link To Other Websites
While creating quality content is an essential part of attracting a digital audience, beyond that, you can take advantage of the fact that people are constantly researching online to gain more knowledge and explore various topics. If you create helpful content that connects to other websites, you can potentially gain a lot of traffic from organic searches and across platforms.
For example, if you’re writing a blog post on the benefits of vitamin C for skin health, you could potentially link to reputable websites or medical journals that provide reputable sources of information on the subject.
Use Social Media To The Max
If you’ve been holding off on using social media for your business, you’re definitely missing out on a major opportunity to grow your audience. If you’re not using social media to promote your brand, you’re losing out on the potential to connect with millions of people all over the world and grow your business.
To make the most of social media, you’ll need to create accounts on various platforms, like Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram. Once you have your accounts, start utilizing Twitter to post regularly and engage with people. With Instagram, you can use stories to post regularly and highlight interesting content, whether it’s from your own website or elsewhere on the internet. Once you get started, you’ll realize how much value these platforms provide.
Back To You
Now that you’re equipped with some marketing strategies, it’s time to put them into action. With each new generation coming online and traditional marketing tactics evolving, it can be hard to know what will work and what won’t. But with a little bit of research, testing, and then some trial and error, you can find a method that suits you perfectly.