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 consider when launching an online store. Once you determine the products you want to sell, you start wondering how to attract more traffic to the site 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 go to waste.

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 you can start trying to find the right one 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- The best-selling products strategy 

Best-selling products are a great trick that can never fail to bring in more and more sales, so you should apply the best ideas to increase sales. They are like a treasure trove for online store owners, and you must make use of them in every possible way.

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

Here is how to apply it:

Step 1: Identify the best-selling products

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

But first, remember that identifying your best-selling products requires taking into account a variety of factors, not just total sales numbers. You want to make sure you are choosing the best product for your business. A "best seller" might include products with a strong profit margin, products that are easy to produce, products that are in stock, easy to ship, and more.

If you set up Google Analytics on your online store, your site pages are quickly sorted by traffic: Behavior >> Site Content >> All Pages

To take things a step further, sort by Page Value to identify which product pages generate the most revenue for your business; traffic does not 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 specific Goals within Google Analytics to track sales, landing pages, clicks, subscriptions, and more.

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

Step 2: 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 converting people from visitors into customers. And here are the 8 most important stages of the customer journey for your online store.

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

This is a long-form sales page to sell the product:

Observe the landing page:

• An attractive ad.

• Interactive copywriting.

• Product images with multiple options. 

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

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

Step 3: Advertise the landing page 

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

In the world of e-commerce marketing, I recommend two time-tested ways to spread the word 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.

No matter which path you take, market your new product's landing page and watch the sales roll in.

2- Content marketing strategies

Since 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 pay attention to publishing content generate more profits.

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

Ikea has a blog named "Idea" targeting lovers of furniture, simple products, and home organization. Through their blog, they cover these topics related to furniture and elegant, luxurious home arranging ideas:

There is an important aspect you need to 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: either they 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, meaning it will choose content that matches the intent closely (since 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 for their target queries.

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

The good news is that identifying intent is not that difficult. On a basic level, you can just put your target keywords into Google and see what kind of information pages are listed in its results.

For example, searching for "running shoes" yielding mostly commercial results. Furthermore, the top of the SERP contains a local pack with stores offering such a product. 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 advice for running in 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 to share our experiences with our family and friends. It is also beneficial for us; 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 that means encouraging more sharing or making that sharing positive.

It is the secret weapon among the marketing strategy weapons for 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 industry of smart personal transportation and its dissemination (like 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 full 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.

Regardless of the solution you choose, there are several components of a referral program that you must get right to ensure that this e-commerce marketing strategy will work for you.

First: Provide incentives

This is important because it is the main reason 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 have successfully decided on the incentive, the next task you must get right is promotion.

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

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

4- Email marketing strategies for e-commerce

Email marketing is probably the most obvious marketing strategy for e-commerce marketing to increase revenue; you might already be using it in some way.

But are you earning $4,425 or more every time you spend $100?

If you aren't achieving this, you had better start improving your email game.

This is the amount you will earn if you spend $100—on average—only on email marketing for your e-commerce business.

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

Statistics about 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 drove more than 25% of Black Friday sales globally. Other marketing channels, such as social media, direct traffic, and also advertising, have lower returns in comparison. And those were direct sales from email. Imagine the huge percentage of sales that came indirectly from email, so you should use strategies to increase sales which have an impact on boosting your sales.

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

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

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

• Increase your sales.

• Understand your target market.

• Reduce shopping cart abandonment.

• Reach your customers whenever you want.

You need to start activating email marketing strategies from now on, paying 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 do you build your email list?

To start, you must have an attractive offer; 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 join your list. The second type of offer you can test is delivering 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.

• Cart abandonment email: This is the email you send when visitors fill up 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've finished setting up these emails, you can then experiment with different types of emails.

5- Marketing strategies via Instagram 

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

Instagram shopping statistics you need to know in 2020

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

How to apply Instagram marketing to your business?

Unlike what many people think, Instagram is not just a set-and-forget marketing channel. You will need to nurture your followers, keeping them engaged while also encouraging them to make a purchase.

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

• Creating high-quality content.

• Getting more followers.

• Engaging 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 screenshots or photos, displaying your products in a natural way.

Do not skimp on this aspect! If you have a budget, do not hesitate to hire a professional photographer. Content will be one of the biggest reasons you get and keep followers, 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 clearly. To ensure all your production efforts aren't 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 revenue is 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 get their content in front of their audience.

A variety of ad formats, targeting options, and rich placement choices—not to mention having Instagram and WhatsApp in the mix—makes Facebook a hard-to-beat marketing platform. And although the advertising space has become slightly saturated recently, 74% of users claim there are plenty of marketing ads, like Facebook ads, that get clicks.

7- Video marketing strategies 

Video has taken over during the last few years, and its share is still constantly rising, but how do you use it?

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

Here is one example of that: Innovative Journaling creates beautifully hand-crafted leather journals. It takes an hour or more to make each one.

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

What I love about this video is that it looks a lot like a "How It’s Made" type of video that you would watch on the Discovery channel. Very nice!

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

8- Catchy words strategy 

I have one final marketing trick for you. It's truly amazing, worthy of attention, and might dazzle and thrill you with excitement.

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

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

• Identify whom you want to attract in the first place [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 of products, like introducing your products to them, how they talk about them, or even how they might refer to them?

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

Why? Because having a clear picture of the target audience is the driving force behind most marketing processes.

• Identify the value you want to communicate to your customers

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

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

The answer is by standing out, so you have to identify the value through which you want to display your distinction.

•  Assess the competitors' position

Where are you and where are they in the market?

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

Type a phrase you believe best describes the information we are looking for in Google, and explore the first search results page.

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

To summarize:

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 that you find the most suitable strategy among marketing strategies for the nature of the market and the audience you target. You can start by trying one of the eight strategies we covered with you in detail in this guide:

1- Best-selling products marketing strategies.

2- Content strategy.

3- Referral Marketing.

4- Email marketing strategies for e-commerce.

5- Marketing strategies via Instagram. 

6- Facebook ads strategy.

7- Video marketing strategies.

8- Catchy words strategy.

And do not forget also to rely on the factors we addressed afterward to evaluate each of the marketing strategies and predict its effectiveness for 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 for them in the Salla blog.