9 Ecommerce Optimization Tactics to Boost Sales

Your ecommerce store is set up, and it is time to make sales. You may have started out a little slower than you wanted to, but there is plenty of time to make 2018 a strong year for your ecommerce store. This article will show you 9 ways to optimize ecommerce to boost sales.

The #1 Rule of Ecommerce: Never Stop Testing

You’ve started getting sales, but there is always room for improvement. Doing A/B tests to see what product descriptions are working the best for you or changing the primary photo for the product page could mean an increase or decrease in conversions. You will not know until you test it. This is why it is important to continue testing.

If you are unsure what to split-test, you can look at the guide from BigCommerce. If you don’t know what you should be testing, this is a great place to find out.

#1. Only the Best Images

When you want to make ecommerce sales, you need to use top-of-the-line photos of your products. You can’t use pictures with poor lighting and bad angles and hope someone will pity you and buy from your store. Your images need to have great light, be crisp and clear, and especially show off any features that the product you are selling has.

If you are taking your own images, you should set the products where the lighting is complementary, and you can see the product without any shadows. Take photos from different angles and only use the best ones.

#2. Offer Free Shipping

If you are charging for shipping, you are behind the times.

The most successful online stores do not charge for shipping. However, not every eCommerce store can afford free shipping for all customers without increasing the product or service price.

While increasing your prices to cover shipping may seem counter-productive, understand that customers do not like to pay for shipping. They see no value in shipping (even though that gets them their product). They would rather pay more for the product than have to pay for shipping.

#3. Coupon Codes

Who doesn’t love a good coupon code? You can make as many as you want and offer them throughout the site occasionally, for a limited time, or any other combination you want. If your ecommerce store is a Shopify store, you can get different apps like Big Coupon Box and set up your coupon experience and tracking to make your life easier.

#4. Adjust Pricing

Having the right price point for your audience is essential. If you are selling something everyone else is selling, you might be in a price war, causing your profit margins to shrink.

On the other hand, if you are selling something that has messaging that speaks to your ideal client, they are likely to pay the same or more for your product instead of going for another brand, so before you slash your prices, remember that your marketing and branding have a lot to do with what people are willing to pay for your product.

#5. How Is Your Checkout Process?

If your checkout process is too long, you will lose people. Amazon kept working on their checkout process until they could offer people the one-click purchase. The team kept coming back with 3 clicks and finally 2 clicks, but the process was not accepted until it was a one-click purchase.

Why? Because people cannot be bothered with complicated. Time is precious, and people do not want to spend time on complex order processes.

You aren’t going to know precisely what your audience wants out of a checkout page until you do some A/B split testing. Yes, we are back to the divided testing again. This is one of the essential things you must get used to.

#6 Always Show Cart Contents

When you put something in your shopping cart at the store, you can see what you put in the cart. The same should be true with your online shopping cart. Ensure customers can see the shopping cart and that there is something in it so they can check out when they are ready.

#7 Do Not Require Account Creations

While you want to capture as much visitor information as possible, you do not want to drive your customers away. Requiring that they create an account to purchase will decrease your conversions. People don’t want to marry your website on the first purchase. Let them check out as a guest.

#8 Give Detailed Product Descriptions

Your product descriptions shouldn’t be dry and dull. All of your product descriptions should feel conversational so that people can take in the details and technical parts of the product, but you also want them to be able to see themselves using the product.

#9 Don’t Go Overboard on the CTAs

If you go overboard on the CTAs, your consumers won’t know which way to look or where to put their attention. Calls to action are powerful, but only when they are used strategically. Put the main activity that you want people to perform on the page.