Do you want more sales on your online store? Do you sometimes feel stuck in a loop trying to choose marketing strategies that can increase visitors, conversions, and sales on your store?

Salla, the future of e-commerce, is an easy platform to start your business

In fact, marketing is one of the very first tasks we all keep in mind when launching an online store. Once you determine the products you want to sell, you start wondering how to attract more traffic to the website and convert it into sales.

But, as many seasoned online store owners can testify, figuring that out is a major challenge.

Today, hundreds of different strategies are at your disposal, which can bring more people to your site, but if the strategy is not the most suitable for your store and audience, all your efforts will be in vain.

So, how do you choose? How do you decide which marketing strategies will work best for your store? And what are the best e-commerce marketing strategies that you can start experimenting with to find the right strategy for your store? This is what we will present to you in this article.

Are you ready to start?

8 of the best marketing strategies for online stores that have proven successful

1- Best-selling products strategy 

Best-selling products are a great trick that can never fail to drive more and more sales, so you should apply the best ideas to increase sales, as they are a treasure trove for online store owners, and you must benefit from them in every possible way.

Everyone tends to love acquiring products they know other people are buying. This is an incredibly powerful tool in encouraging people to buy your products.

Here is how to apply it:

Step 1: Identify your best-selling products

This product probably doesn't need much explanation, but if you're not sure what your current best-selling products are, here is the step-by-step method I use to find them.

But first, remember that identifying your best-selling products requires you to consider a variety of factors, not just overall sales numbers; you want to make sure you are choosing the best product for your business. "Best seller" might include products with strong profit margins, products that are easy to produce, in-stock, easy to ship, and more.

If you have set up Google Analytics on your online store, your site's pages can be quickly sorted by traffic via Behavior >> Site Content >> All Pages.

To take things a step further, sort by Page Value to identify which product pages are generating the most revenue for your business; traffic doesn't always equal sales:

If you don't have values associated with specific actions taken on your site, I highly recommend setting them up. You can do this by setting up specific Goals in Google Analytics to track sales, landing pages, clicks, sign-ups, and more.

Once you've identified your best-selling products, it's time to create the landing page.

Step Two: Create a landing page for your product

A landing page for a "best-selling" product doesn't need to be perfect (it practically sells itself). It just needs to do the job of turning people from visitors to customers. Here are the 8 most important stages of the customer journey for your online store.

Here is a great example: Brent Black Panama Hats. A "Best Of The Best" hat costs around $25,000, and imagine how many they sell?!  

This is a long sales page to sell the product:

Observe the landing page:

• Attractive ad.

• Interactive copy content.

• Product photos with multiple options. 

Pages like this are great for running ads on networks like the Google Display Network, where search intent is lower and people need to be sold on the product with a great story.

A valuable landing page communicates value, answers customer questions upfront, and has clear calls to action (CTAs) throughout.

Step 3: Advertise the landing page 

Once your "best-selling" product landing page is up and running, it's time to advertise.

In the world of e-commerce marketing, I recommend two time-tested methods for getting the word out about your new landing page: email and Facebook ads.

Start with a natural, highly effective email marketing method by targeting a segment of customers who haven't purchased the product.

Whichever way you go, market your new product's landing page and watch the sales flow in.

2- Content marketing strategies

Because people are used to using content to rank in search engines, increase traffic, and sell products, SaaS has dominated the internet, and only blog sites use content to grow their businesses. But content marketing works wonders for e-commerce too!

In a study conducted by SUMO on 6,868 e-commerce content marketing articles, it was found that online stores that focus on publishing content generate more profits.

Many e-commerce companies have succeeded in content marketing, look at Ikea:

Ikea has a blog called "Ideas" that targets lovers of furniture and minimalist products, as well as home styling and organization. Through their blog, they cover these topics related to furniture and elegant, luxurious home arrangement ideas:

There is an important aspect you should know about users, which is user intent. User intent is simply the reason why someone requests specific information from Google.

Users usually display one of four intents: they either want to learn something, navigate to a specific website, research a potential purchase, or buy something.

Why is it important to understand the intent behind user searches? Simply because Google wants to deliver the most relevant results to its users, which means it will choose the content that most closely matches the intent (because it is more likely to meet user expectations).

Therefore, your pages—whether they are product pages, informational content, or blog posts—must match the specific user intent of your target queries.

Generally, stores struggle with ranking blog content for phrases that a product page would fit better. Mapping content and keywords to the right intent ensures that your site's informational content will not compete with commercial pages, and vice versa.

The good news is that identifying intent isn't that hard. On a basic level, you can just type your target keywords into Google and see what type of information pages are listed in the search results.

For example, a search for "running shoes" leads mostly to commercial results. Moreover, the top of the SERP contains a local pack with stores offering such products. Based on this simple fact, I can assume that anyone typing a similar phrase into Google wants to buy running shoes and do so at their local store.

On the other hand, a search for "winter running" lists information and tips for running in the winter, indicating a completely different intent for this phrase.

3- Referral Marketing

One of the most powerful e-commerce marketing strategies, also known as word-of-mouth marketing.

The reason is simply that we are all social creatures, and we love sharing our experiences with our family and friends. It is useful for us too; we help each other avoid bad experiences and encourage each other to support places that provide an excellent experience.

This also means, whether you like it or not, people will share about you with their friends. Wouldn't you prefer that sharing to be something positive about your brand and product?

Referral marketing is when you intentionally influence the word-of-mouth process, whether it's encouraging more sharing or making that sharing positive.

It is the secret weapon in the marketing strategies arsenal of many e-commerce companies, for example, Acton Global:

Acton Global is the company behind RocketSkates, the first-ever smart electric skates. Since then, it has become one of the leading companies in the smart personal transportation industry and its deployment (such as electric skateboards).

How to apply referral marketing to your business

The fastest and easiest way to start referral marketing is to set up a referral program. If you have the resources like Uber or Dropbox, you can hire a developer to design a custom referral program for your store. This gives you complete control over the program, but it can be tedious and resource-intensive.

The alternative is to install a referral program app like ReferralCandy, which allows you to start quickly, as almost everything is ready for you.

Whichever solution you choose, there are several referral program components you must get right to ensure that these e-commerce marketing strategies will work for you.

First: Offer incentives

This is important because it is the main reason why your customers share. After all, a referral program helps you influence the referral process by providing incentives, so giving the right incentive is almost the winning element of the entire battle.

The "right incentive" depends entirely on the context of your store, what your store is, the industry, the products you sell, their prices, and what your competitors have done.

There are a few general rules you can follow while applying marketing and referral marketing strategies:

• If you sell something people need frequently, give a discount coupon. 

• If you sell a product most people buy only once, give a cash incentive (get 20% off your next purchase).

After you successfully decide on the incentive, the next task you must get right is promotion.

Pay attention! If you don't promote your referral program, no one will know about it, and if no one knows, no one will join; and your program will fail. So promote it as much as you can, treat it as you would a new product launch. Share it on social

media, send it to your email list, and also invite all your past customers to join it.

4- E-commerce email marketing strategies

Email marketing is probably the most obvious marketing strategy for e-commerce to increase revenue, and you are probably already using it in some way.

But do you earn $4,425 or more every time you spend $100?

If you're not achieving that, you'd better start improving your email game.

That is the amount you will earn if you spend—on average—just $100 on email marketing for an e-commerce business.

It makes sense too, considering that 91% of consumers use email at least once a day; email is the only medium we all share.

Statistics on email marketing in e-commerce:

GetResponse is a great source for email marketing statistics, and their 2019 email marketing benchmarks include some useful data on open and click rates:

• The average overall open rate for email marketing is 22.86%.

• The average click-through rate is 3.71%.

• The click-to-open rate is 16.23%.

• The average unsubscribe rate is 0.21%.

For years, email marketing has driven over 25% of Black Friday sales globally. Other marketing channels, such as social media, direct traffic, and even ads, have a lower return in comparison. And those were direct sales from email. Imagine the massive proportion of sales that came indirectly from email, so you should use sales-boosting strategies that have an impact on increasing your sales.

Statistics indicate that the ROI from email marketing is 3,800% on average, which is three times higher than social media.

Therefore, email marketing is not just for professional bloggers, info-product businesses, and service companies.

Email marketing is crucial for every e-commerce entrepreneur too. Email marketing allows you to:

• Increase your sales.

• Learn about your target market.

• Reduce shopping cart abandonment.

• Reach your customers whenever you want.

From now on, you need to start implementing email marketing strategies and pay more attention to them than before.

How to apply email marketing to your business

There are two main parts to email marketing:

• Building your email list.

• Sending the right emails.

Of course, before you start sending emails, you will have to create your email list, because without that list you won't have anyone to send emails to.

How to build your email list?

To start, you must have an attractive offer, as you need to help your potential customers answer "What's in it for me?".

Everyone hates spam. To get them to subscribe, you must entice them by offering something of value. The specific offer depends on your store, but there are several things you can try to see if they work.

The first thing you can try is offering a discount to encourage them to sign up for your list. The second type of offer you can test is providing some specific value in exchange for leaving their email address. This value could be in the form of an e-book or a guide.

Steps you must follow after building your email list: 

• Welcome email: This is the email subscribers receive when they first join your list.

• Nurture sequence: A series of emails you send to educate your customers about your product, brand, or niche.

• Abandoned cart email: This is the email you send when visitors fill their shopping cart and then leave your store without checking out.

• Email receipts: These are the emails you send to confirm a customer's purchase. It is also a great time to send them more promotional offers.

Once you're done setting up these emails, you can then play around with the different types of emails.

5- Marketing strategies via Instagram 

65% of Instagram users use their feed to look for online shopping inspiration, while they also look to discover new brands. These are the users who are looking for stores like yours to buy from!

Instagram shopping stats you need to know in 2020

This also means that if you don't have a strong presence on Instagram, you are missing out on a lot of sales. This is especially true if you sell highly visual products. Here are the best-selling products in Saudi Arabia on Salla stores.

How to apply Instagram marketing to your business?

Contrary to what many people think, Instagram is not just a passive marketing channel that can be forgotten. You will need to nurture your followers and keep them engaged while also encouraging them to buy.

To achieve good results on Instagram, you must focus on three pillars:

• Creating high-quality content.

• Getting more followers.

• Interacting with your audience.

We don't need to emphasize that high-quality images are the foundation of your Instagram account. You will have to create high-quality photos or images, displaying your products in a natural way.

Don't skimp on this aspect! If you have a budget, do not hesitate to hire a professional photographer. The content will be one of the biggest reasons you have followers and why they stay, so research your target audience and find out what kind of images they interact with. 

6- Facebook ads strategy

Facebook ads work very well; they always have solutions to reach your target customers. How well do they work?

Did you know that ad spend on social media has surpassed print? And that in 2020, advertisers are spending nearly $38 billion on social ads? 

Why does advertising on Facebook pay off?

Obviously, you don't want to produce useless content, and even the most amazing content can fade away without the right marketing strategies.

Organic social media is very effective, but relying on it alone will likely result in your content not being seen accurately. To ensure that all your production efforts are not wasted, you need to allocate some spend behind it.

Before diving into ad campaigns, metrics, and placements, let's analyze some numbers for more context:

By 2023, ad revenues are expected to achieve an annual growth rate of 24.5%.

With traditional ads becoming more expensive and less flexible every day, it's no wonder that 72% of marketers still choose Facebook ads to display their content to their audience.

A variety of ad formats, targeting options, and rich placement choices, not to mention having Instagram and WhatsApp in the mix, make Facebook a marketing platform that is hard to beat. Although the ad space has become a bit saturated recently, 74% of users claim that there are many marketing ads, such as Facebook ads, that get clicks.

7- Video marketing strategies 

Video has taken over in the past few years and its trend is still on the rise, but how do you use it?

Try behind-the-scenes footage of your product manufacturing process, daily vlog videos, or tutorial videos showing visitors how to do something related to your products or niche.

Here is one example of that: Innovative Journaling designs beautifully handcrafted leather journals. Making each one takes an hour or more.

The owner created this video showing the entire process in just 60 seconds:

What I love about this video is that it is very similar to a "How It's Made" video that you would watch on the Discovery Channel. Very nice!

Are you ready to start using video to attract more customers? 

8- Captivating words strategy 

I have one last marketing trick for you, it is absolutely amazing and worth paying attention to, and it might blow your mind with excitement.

Using power words is one of my favorite marketing strategies; because words have the power to evoke emotions and spark curiosity, they can make you click, share, or buy, they can annoy you or make you laugh.

Factors that help you choose suitable marketing strategies for your online store?

• Identify whom you want to attract first and foremost [Buyer Persona]

Every marketing strategy must start with strong and deep marketing research about the people you wish to engage with, i.e., your target audience.

You must also know what ideal customers think about your products, such as introducing them to your products, how they talk about them, or even how they might refer to them.

You also need to know how they search for product-relevant information, their lifestyle, the motives behind their decisions, and more of such information.

Why? Because having a clear image of the target audience is what drives most marketing processes.

• Determine the value you want to communicate to your customers

E-commerce is a competitive market, so it is likely that many other stores are targeting the same audience you are.

How do you make sure that customers notice your company and consider buying from you?

The answer is by standing out, so you must define the value through which you would like to showcase your uniqueness.

• Evaluate the competitor situation

Where are you and where are they in the market?

• Conduct in-depth keyword research related to your products based on audience preferences

Write a phrase you think best describes the information we are looking for on Google, and explore the first page of search results.

All of this is so you know what topics your audience is searching for, and what intent they have when conducting the search.

To summarize the above:

You will always find unconventional ways to increase your sales and find new customers, whether through social media, email, and many others. The important thing is to find the most suitable strategy among the marketing strategies for the nature of the market and the audience you are targeting. You can start by trying one of the eight strategies that we discussed with you in detail in this guide:

1- Best-selling product marketing strategies.

2- Content strategy.

3- Referral Marketing.

4- E-commerce email marketing strategies.

5- Instagram marketing strategies. 

6- Facebook ads strategy.

7- Video marketing strategies.

8- Captivating words strategy.

And do not forget also to rely on the factors we discussed afterwards to evaluate each of the marketing strategies, and predict how effective they will be with your online store.

I hope you found at least one piece of information that will help your business grow today. If you need more details about any of the previous marketing strategies, you can search for detailed topics on them in the Salla blog.