Holiday marketing planning for retailers
Marketers, we know the struggle. We know that taking into account the holiday seasons are vital to your retail strategy and it's not just having an idea of what you will do, it's having a plan, a system and a course of action. Without these things, you’ll be left in the marketing dust. Timing is everything.
At Fathomdelivers.com, we have created this infographic and content, to give you a framework that you could work to for the year. If you are looking for management buy-in, it can help to have a visual calendar to show your plans - whether it's for a quarter, a six month period of the year ahead and also a great way to show your results if you don't have an analytics dashboard.
Here are some ideas of how we have used it to plan from October - January, for a retailerr.
October - SEO…
Recommended design patterns and best practices for online retail Product category pages
This is the second in the series of posts from me in which I hope to give you ideas to consider for testing improvements to page elements on retail and other ecommerce sites following emerging best practices. In my first post, we covered best practices for ecommerce homepage designs.
If you work in an ecommerce team at a retailer, or are involved in design for your client’s accounts, then I hope these templates and tips will help generate ideas for testing page enhancements.
Key Ecommerce category page wireframe requirements
In retail, 'product category page' is the general term referring to pages listing the range of individual products. But you may know Category pages as Hub, Department or Division pages. Then there will often be sub-category pages too depending on the information architecture for the catalogue.
The key core elements of…
5 examples of retail home page good practice
Great ecommerce websites are likely to be based on personal preference. But many would agree there are common practices for persuasive design that should be tested, if you're not using them already.
In this post, I take a look at a range of less well-known small to medium business ecommerce websites where I have deconstructed the practices to suggest a shortlist of 'must have features' for the homepage. It's part one of a series of posts, next I'll be looking at category pages. Of course, in a blog article there is a limit on what can be sensibly covered. See the relevant Smart Insights guide for more details.
Recommended Guide: Ecommerce Design Patterns
Use our wireframes and examples to test and create more persuasive Ecommerce designs to boost retail sales.
Download our Ecommerce Design Bible.
Home page feature…
Examples from big brand Ecommerce sites which smaller businesses can test
The web has transformed the way people compare and buy everything from fruit to flat-screen TVs. The demand to be able to shop online has fuelled a race to join the likes of Amazon, with small independent e-commerce retailers springing up on a daily basis. But it’s important to remember that increasing sales doesn’t necessarily have to cost hundreds of thousands of pounds; small improvements can make a big difference, and even the biggest organisations may be losing revenue unnecessarily.
This post features eight of my top tips for maximising e-commerce sales and includes good practice examples from some of the most successful e-commerce sites.
Tip 1: Remove dead ends
Your site should have no dead ends. Full stop. This should be the first rule of thumb. Every page should be designed to channel visitors to the right product, service or sales representative, even…
How to use personalised product recommendations to increase Ecommerce sales
The importance of effective product recommendations cannot be ignored. When done correctly they can heavily contribute to the success of a website, both by increasing the quantity and the size of orders being placed.
Studies of personalisation have revealed that, when recommendations are made intelligently, those products being recommended can enjoy conversion rates over 900% higher than sitewide averages. Amazon have famously leveraged this technique to attract a huge customer base and vast revenues - a look at their homepage will reveal a site committed to personalising its shopping experience around the needs of each and every individual customer.
Today, the importance of website personalisation as a method for boosting conversion rates is recognised by most digital professionals. An Econsultancy report recently named website personalisation as 2014's top digital priority by…
How online retail brands can benefit from video commerce
Consumers today want a visually engaging online shopping experience that is personalized at the same time. According to a recent study, 52% of consumers said that watching videos makes them more confident about their purchase decisions.
As one of the most shareable forms of media, videos not only boost your brand’s voice, but also help you build an emotional connection with your customer.
Thus, including it as a part of your marketing strategy will not only help you drive conversion, but also increase average order value, differentiate marketing campaigns, increase margins and reduce return and development costs.
6 ways for video engagement
Here are six ways suggested by MobStac on how to make videos work for your e-commerce store:
1. Feature engaging product videos
Not only does engaging video content improve the look and feel of your e-commerce website, but also has a huge…
Lessons on using the right e-retail incentives at the right time
'Should we use discount codes in a our abandonment emails?' is a question we’re often asked by retailers at Triggered Messaging. On the surface, incentives look like a great idea because you can recover more carts and gain more sales you wouldn't have otherwise. Most of our data supports that point.
HOWEVER, when considering profitability, cart abandonment programs can be dangerous. You can give discounts when you didn’t need to.
In this article we share this case study of one retailer we worked with who discovered that they were needlessly giving away discounts costing over $3,000 a month.
What’s more, we’ll show how it appeared to be a success, even though it damaged profitability. Then we’ll tell you how you can make your abandonment incentive programs more intelligent and strategic to increase customer acquisition and lifetime value.
Here is the analysis we…
A summary of 'add to basket' techniques from 50 retailers
The checkout process is crucial for e-commerce sites and a holistic approach is best to improve retail website conversion rates, for example using abandonment campaigns and analytics to review the online buying journey.
At an earlier stage in the customer journey, reviewing design and messaging practices around the 'add to shopping cart' or 'add to basket button' can help move shoppers further down the funnel. We thought this was a useful infographic from Volusion based on reviewing the "Add to Cart" practices of US 50 shopping sites considering its shape, colour, size and design.
The infographic is not providing a 'one size fit's all solution' and shows commonalities and tips on what is important to support conversion; it's tailored to the shopper, layout and branding of your website. It's interesting to look at examples…
10 last minute Christmas retail conversion hacks
Christmas is days away, but there may still be options to drive your your conversions and revenue per visit higher. Despite development lock-downs and short timescales, there’s still time for these types last-minute conversion hacks to give the gift of a higher conversion rate to your marketing team. Here are 10 I've seen used.
1. Promote any gift wrapping or customisation options
Customers who are buying gifts will appreciate options like gift wrapping or personalised messages since it saves them time and money. Promoting these options on product pages and at the checkout can give a quick revenue boost – plus it gives customers an extra reason to buy from you.
Selfridges offer a beautiful gift-wrapping option at checkout which includes their signature box:
However,…
What consumers want and how to give it to them?
This infographic isn't a compilation of different unreferenced sources, rather it's based on a single piece of research by Sociomantic Labs who polled over 1000 US consumers via ResearchNow, specifically to assess their attitudes toward online shopping and digital advertising.
'It found that personalized ads lead to a dramatic improvement in a marketing channel’s perceived influence, as well as a channel’s ability to encourage consumers to take action'.
Their findings delved into shopper behaviour by understanding:
why and how consumers shop - interestingly, 41% visit a site with a 'product in their mind' to buy or research.
how consumers use online shopping carts - 19% add to their cart to create a reminder/wish list.
how consumers embrace targeted ads - 70% happy to receive ads and
how receptive consumers are to ad targeting - targeted content converts browsers to buyers.
The infographic provides more key highlights and…
