Ecommerce in 2011 How to Dominate Your Competition in the New Year onlinebusiness.volusion.com Matt Winn Online Communications Specialist
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Today’s Agenda • Trends that shaped ecommerce in 2010 • Predictions that will transform 2011 • Helpful strategies to start now for long-term success
• Pending legislation that could impact how you do business • Special discounts to boost your new year • Live Q&A to answer your burning questions
Flashback to 2010 Recession? What recession?
Consumers were increasingly more confident in spending
Overall spending was much higher, particularly during the holidays
Flashback to 2010 Price, discounts dominate Online shoppers increasingly depended on discounts: • 57% of consumers who used a coupon code during their last online purchase said that if they hadn’t received the discount, they wouldn’t have bought the item(s). (Compete) • 35% of online shoppers say they use comparison shopping engines when looking for products online. (Compete)
But was this a good thing? • Average order value was $216 for shoppers who used a coupon, compared to only $122 for those who didn’t use a coupon. (Compete) • 91% of customers who used a coupon said they would make another purchase from that online store, as opposed to 86% of shoppers without a coupon. (Compete)
Flashback to 2010 Social commerce takes off • High product ratings will increase likelihood of purchase for 55% of consumers. (eConsultancy, July 2010)
• Nearly half of all Americans are now members of at least one social network, double the proportion of just two years ago. (MediaPost) • 51% of active Twitter users follow companies, brands or products on social networks. (Social Media Today)
• For businesses of all sizes, companies that have blogs have 79% more Twitter followers than those that don’t. (HubSpot) • Social media adoption by small business doubled from 2009 to 2010. (Social Media Today)
Flashback to 2010 Ecommerce hits its stride
Online sales averaged about $4B more each quarter in 2010
Ecommerce continued to grow faster than retail, stealing revenue share
Today’s Agenda • Trends that shaped ecommerce in 2010 • Predictions that will transform 2011 • Helpful strategies to start now for long-term success
• Pending legislation that could impact how you do business • Special discounts to boost your new year • Live Q&A to answer your burning questions
Trends for 2011 Predictions to keep you ahead of the curve 1. Ecommerce goes global, turns to developing countries 2. Social media begins to stabilize and define its purpose 3. Efforts switch from customer acquisition to retention 4. Mobile continues to rise and mature
5. Content finally takes its throne as king
Today’s Agenda • Trends that shaped ecommerce in 2010 • Predictions that will transform 2011 • Helpful strategies to start now for long-term success
• Pending legislation that could impact how you do business • Special discounts to boost your new year • Live Q&A to answer your burning questions
Objectively Assess Your Site Give yourself a starting point Start by looking at your site design: •
Perform full site audit for branding consistency
•
Review the content across all pages and products
•
Identify key areas for improvement
•
Put your budget and timeline on paper
Objectively Assess Your Site Give yourself a starting point Then take a good, hard look at site interaction: • • • •
Study your most popular products and categories Utilize your CRM for new content ideas Refer to your most frequent internal search terms for insight Review abandoned cart reports
Get a second, third and fourth opinion with user testing: • • • •
Pull in friends and family members of various ages, personalities Turn to a paid, third-party service Recruit a professional consultant for a quick overview Turn your findings into results and test, test, test!
Get started with SEO, now Preparation and patience are virtues Analyze the current state of your SEO health: • • • •
Refer to analytics to discover your most popular keywords Don’t ignore the long tail – leverage it in 2011 See if you’re cannibalizing yourself across your website Compare your progress with your rivals
Turn your findings into action: • • • •
Optimize your pages and link build for popular keywords Create content geared toward the long tail Focus your SEO efforts in specific parts of your site Benchmark your progress as you proceed
Work to Increase Customer Retention Customer service is the new marketing Customer retention is a matter of economics: • Acquiring a new customer can cost 6 to 7 times more than retaining an existing customer (Frederick Reichheld, Bain & Company) • 85% of customers are willing to pay more than the standard price, if a great customer experience is involved (RightNow) • Businesses which boosted customer retention rates by just 5% saw increases in profits ranging from 5% to 95% (Frederick Reichheld, Bain & Company) • 61% of Americans report that quality customer service is more important to them in today’s economic environment, and will spend an average 9% more when they believe a company provides excellent service (American Express)
Work to Increase Customer Retention Customer service is the new marketing 61% of Americans report that quality customer service is more important to them in today’s economic environment, and will spend an average 9% more when they believe a company provides excellent service (American Express)
Work to Increase Customer Retention Customer service is the new marketing Some ideas to help you get started: •
Remember that customer service is unique to your business
•
Find problem areas via customer surveys and CRM analysis
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Segment your customers, give each a specific carrot
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Under promise, over deliver
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Provide special deals to keep customers coming back for more
Bow to the Content King Think like a publisher and churn out content Why invest time into content marketing? • Spending levels on branded content was 100% higher in 2010 than 2008 • 73% of companies with a social media strategy used unique branded content in their social media campaigns • 68% of marketers are shifting from traditional forms of marketing to branded content
“To compete in the social media space, companies will have to constantly create content to push out to their social networks in all its many forms – blog postings, tweets, Facebook updates, customer-service interactions, etc.” – Sean Carton, Clickz
Bow to the Content King Think like a publisher and churn out content Six steps to build an effective content marketing strategy:
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
Set your objectives Perform a content inventory Identify your audience and their information needs Decide how you’ll promote your content Create a content calendar Establish your metrics for success
Today’s Agenda • Trends that shaped ecommerce in 2010 • Predictions that will transform 2011 • Helpful strategies to start now for long-term success
• Pending legislation that could impact how you do business • Special discounts to boost your new year • Live Q&A to answer your burning questions
Internet Sales Tax Proposed legislation to watch in 2011 Background: •
Majority of states facing deficits
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Introduction of Main Street Fairness Act
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Individual states begin to take action
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Amazon and eBay are at front of the fight
Internet Sales Tax Proposed legislation to watch in 2011 How passage will impact your business: 1.
Need for new software or integrations
2.
Big push in paperwork
3.
Inability to position on price
4.
Smaller margins
5.
Shift toward local marketing
Today’s Agenda • Trends that shaped ecommerce in 2010 • Predictions that will transform 2011 • Helpful strategies to start now for long-term success
• Pending legislation that could impact how you do business • Special discounts to boost your new year • Live Q&A to answer your burning questions
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