Mastering the Online Marketing E-Commerce Game

It is no secret that traditional retail sales are declining, and with them, the number of retail stores. With e-commerce gaining popularity, many companies are looking for ways to gain a competitive advantage through digital marketing and sales strategies. One popular approach is to take advantage of the growing trend of consumers using their mobile phones to research and compare different products and brands before purchasing something. The industry response has been heavily embracing the online world and using online channels to promote and sell physical products. This approach is often called online marketing e-commerce. Simply put, online marketing e-commerce is using digital marketing and internet marketing to attract, convert, and retain customers in the online world.

Forrester’s Consumer Retail Marketing Hub analysis of retail store engagement and conversion best practices found that retailers that utilize multichannel marketing, using both online and offline strategies, enjoy a 6.2% higher conversion rate.

Now is the time to figure out how to play in this new world. To do this, you need to understand the basics of e-commerce and how to apply them to your business.

What Is E-commerce?

Electronic commerce, also known as e-commerce or online shopping, is the sale of goods or services via computer networks such as the Internet. When a business decides to implement an e-commerce strategy, they are essentially deciding to conduct all of their business transactions online. Thanks to the recent explosion of mobile phones and the growing popularity of online shopping, a business can now be successful and reach a large audience without having a storefront.

E-commerce can be further subdivided into online marketing e-commerce and online retailing e-commerce. Online marketing e-commerce is using digital marketing and internet marketing to attract, convert, and retain customers in the online world. Online retailing e-commerce is using e-commerce platforms (like Shopify, for example) to actively sell products to consumers. You don’t need to have your own e-commerce store to participate in online marketing e-commerce—you can use third-party platforms like Shopify or Bonjoro to easily launch an online store in under a minute.

Why Should You Get Into E-commerce?

The global e-commerce market reached $16.9 trillion in size in 2021 and is expected to grow to $26.9 trillion by 2027.

This is a huge market, made up of consumers who are increasingly taking the internet as their primary source of research, comparison, and purchase rather than going to brick-and-mortar stores. Thanks to the ease of online shopping, more and more people are choosing to shop online rather than in retail stores. This trend is called click-and-collect, where consumers click purchases and collect them later at home or another location.

Retail stores face numerous challenges, and with the rise of e-commerce, they now have an online source of competition that cuts into their sales. This is why it’s so important to find ways to stand out from the crowd and ensure that your customers know exactly who you are and what you offer.

Building A Brand

Your customers can’t help but compare your product or service to others, so it is important that you establish a brand identity that is rich in uniqueness and consistent across all touchpoints. One of the best ways to do this is through product packaging. If your product is expensive or difficult to transport (or both), then you should consider investing in a good quality box or packing material. When designing the box or covering the product in promotional material (e.g., catalogs, mailers, etc.), it is important to keep in mind that not all expensive looking packaging is created equal. Invest in a high-quality box or covering that compliments your product while still maintaining a professional image.

E-commerce & Digital Marketing

E-commerce and digital marketing aren’t exact opposites, but they are closely related. When someone performs digital marketing, they are usually taking an online or marketing-driven approach to marketing. As I stated above, e-commerce is using digital marketing and the internet to attract, convert, and retain customers. Thus, to do digital marketing, you don’t need to sell products online—you can use digital tools like Google Ads or Facebook Ads to attract potential customers and then convert them into paying customers. (And yes, you can use social media to gain brand awareness and establish credibility before pursuing sales.)

How Does E-commerce Fit Into Your Marketing Plan?

E-commerce and digital marketing aren’t exact opposites, but they are closely related. When someone performs digital marketing, they are usually taking an online or marketing-driven approach to marketing. As I stated above, e-commerce is using digital marketing and the internet to attract, convert, and retain customers. Thus, to do digital marketing, you don’t need to sell products online—you can use digital tools like Google Ads or Facebook Ads to attract potential customers and then convert them into paying customers. (And yes, you can use social media to gain brand awareness and establish credibility before pursuing sales.)

A business can use digital marketing to gain brand loyalty and trust from customers. The key is to find ways to generate interest in your brand while sticking to the ethics and principals of digital marketing. You can use online reviews and forums to establish credibility, but you should only post when you have new and valuable content to share. Always remember that customers can leave a review at any time, so you must weigh the benefits of engaging with potential customers against the risk of tarnishing your brand’s image.

Generating Traffic

Now that you have a better understanding of e-commerce and how it fits into your marketing plan, let’s take a look at how you can generate traffic and leads to your store. To get started, you need to measure the effectiveness of your current campaigns and decide what changes you need to make. To determine this, you need to track the results of your current campaign and analyze the performance of each major piece of copy in your ads.

For example, did your Facebook Ads generate any action or clicks or did your SEO campaign lead to a spike in website traffic? If you found that your SEO campaign didn’t generate any interested leads, it might be a good idea to switch to a different approach like PPC or social media ads. (You can also try combining methods to see what works best for your business.)

Once you have your answers, you can decide what changes you need to make to reach your goals. For example, if you found that your PPC campaign was the most effective method of generating leads, you might want to try running more PPC ads or create more compelling copy for your organic posts.

Creating A More Stable Flow Of Income

While retail stores and brick-and-mortar locations aren’t going to disappear, the shift to online marketing and e-commerce is changing the way we will purchase goods and services. Thanks to online stores and comparison shopping engines, more and more people are discovering the joys of online shopping and finding it quite convenient and comfortable. This convenience is resulting in increased sales and a more stable flow of income for online stores and marketers. (If you’re interested, you can gain a better understanding of this by reading The Future of Retail.)

Thanks to the Internet and digital marketing, more and more people are discovering the joys of online shopping and finding it quite convenient and comfortable. This convenience is resulting in increased sales and a more stable flow of income for online stores and marketers. (If you’re interested, you can gain a better understanding of this by reading The Future of Retail.)

Conversion

Once you have traffic, you need to convert it into paying customers. To do this, you need to develop marketing strategies and analyze the performance of each campaign to determine which one is the most effective. (If you’re looking for quick wins, you can always try A/B testing to see what works best for your business.)

For example, did the text in your Instagram caption prove to be more effective for converting traffic into paying customers than your headline or the content of your blog post? This type of analysis will help you determine what conversion tactics and strategies work best for your business.

Retention

This is a broad term used for determining the amount of time and money you’re spending on marketing and the effectiveness of your efforts. When talking about retention, you’re usually referring to the amount of time and money you’re spending on efforts to make new customers vs. the amount of time and money you’re spending on retaining current customers.

As you gain experience, you will be able to tailor your retention efforts to be more effective. For example, if you’re discovering that users aren’t staying engaged with your content, you might want to try experimenting with different types of content or trying a different marketing channel.