A three-step approach for your retail strategy: stand out and win more retail sales in 2024

It’s no secret that the last few years have caused chaos for retailers globally. To survive you need a robust retail strategy that focuses on long-term and short-term profit for your business.

According to the Centre for Retail Research forecast in July 2021, total retail sales in 2020 will fall overall by -4.6% compared to 2019 (or a reduction of £17,281m). The level of retail sales will not regain last year’s level (2019) until 2022.

With reduced consumer spending, competition for retail marketers converting customers is tougher than ever. Marketers need the right tools, and skills, to optimize a winning digital marketing strategy and cut through the noise to convert even more customers online. [si_learning_path_module_shortcode_block id=154071]

Of course, the rise of online is another major factor that has influenced the…

Website personalization, product, offer, and content recommendation services to help retailers and other businesses personalize their proposition to nurture prospects toward conversions

The website personalization tools we recommend in this article enable you to segment visitors and then deliver personalized messages of the 'next best product' or 'next best content' within containers on your website as with the classic Amazon personalized recommendations (read their published methodology from this fascinating whitepaper from back in 2003). I originally wrote this post in 2010 when there were fewer personalization options. I have updated it annually since with recommendations provided via social media - do get in touch if you have a suggestion. The latest update includes the new Google AI Recommendations framework that was introduced in January 2021. A serious new competitor has entered the market to disrupt competition and perhaps reduce fees for retailers. This is the latest update where…

E-commerce 2023: The latest data and forecasts for all things online retail growth

It's interesting to look back at e-commerce growth over the last few years and think forward to the future of this industry. As demonstrated by these charts from Statistica, the annual revenues of the US e-commerce industry shot up in 2020 and 2021. What's more, despite recent growth slowing slightly, Statistica Market Insights estimates strong continued growth in this area in 2023 and beyond. The reasons for this are two-fold - the rise of revenue from total retail sales, both in the US and worldwide, and also stark growth in the % of the total retail sales being e-commerce. This constitutes a much larger share than previously to the pandemic, showing that some of the rapid changes to…

Create a co-ordinated 'always-on' digital marketing strategy for the whole customer lifecycle to boost conversions and retention

It's no secret that engaging your customers is crucial to achieving continued sales, and it's also well known that it is usually far easier and costs less to get repeat business from existing customers than it is to acquire new ones from scratch. Customer relationship management (CRM) is well established as a process to try to achieve this, but this customer lifecycle 'relationship' begins with the first contact with the customer (when they are still a contact or prospect). We believe that the best way for a company or brand to build relationships is through a planned always-on marketing approach of integrated communications across multiple digital channels. To enable this, we're fortunate today to have many martech options for marketing automation, so we can create a co-ordinated contact strategy to engage audiences through: …

Real-world data shows the most crucial sources of traffic for e-commerce websites

E-commerce/online retail is a booming sector. But because the latest marketing techniques change so rapidly, it can be tricky to keep up with the latest trends whilst also keeping your feet on the ground. Datareportal's 2023 global overview shows that search engines and social networks are the 2 biggest sources for self-reported online brand research. But how are users navigating to e-commerce websites?

B2C top traffic sources

Hubspot's 2022 user survey, compiled by 400+ users, primarily of B2C audiences, demonstrates a mixed bag in terms of traffic attribution. The biggest question mark is a sizable chunk of 22% direct traffic, which could include: 'Dark' social (untrackable social shares) Bookmarked traffic Direct links from pdfs, shared documents, or other non-trackable sources But interestingly, after direct, we see…

Social commerce trends to create seamless e-commerce experiences directly in social channels your customers love

One of the things that has always fascinated me about social media is the way it continues to adapt and evolve to changing consumer trends. Over the last 20 years we’ve seen a progressive shift from simple, text-based updates, to increasingly visual and ephemeral content, championed by app-based platforms like Instagram and Snapchat, and at the same time, social commerce has flourished. Whilst newer entrants such as TikTok have taken this trend even further, there have also been innovations in one-to-one communication seen in the development of messenger apps such as WeChat, WhatsApp and Messenger (the latter both owned by Facebook):  It’s been interesting to see how some of these trends have converged to drive innovation in social media…

E-commerce conversion rate and lead generation landing page stats for desktop and mobile devices for benchmarking averages across different industries

As you will know, conversion rates are often used as a KPI to review the effectiveness of e-commerce sites. Naturally, all site managers and owners want to know the benchmarks - "how do our conversion rates compare?". As consumer and business confidence falls, it's more important than ever to audit and optimize your marketing success metrics. In this post, I have compiled different free industry sources focusing on retail e-commerce conversion. At the end of this article, we also feature an analysis of landing page lead generation conversion rates by industry sector towards the end of the post. We keep this compilation updated as new conversion data is published in 2023.

E-commerce conversion funnel

This funnel-based view of the conversion process is a useful starting point since as well as the typical average basket…

Introducing P.R.I.C.E. - a tool to review differentiation and integration of E-commerce omnichannel marketing

There is an enormous, and potentially bewildering, range of possibilities and options available to retailers to differentiate themselves from their competitors in a multichannel world.

Why a multichannel marketing framework is needed

Selection and prioritization of investment in online retail can be a huge challenge, and so to help, when reviewing multichannel strategy with clients I have developed a framework to help based around five key factors: Price Range Information Convenience Experience Those five key factors, in varying priorities, define what is important for your customers in a multichannel retail experience. Together they describe your differentiation from your competitors in a multichannel world. [si_blog_banner_cta] In brief, the elements of P.R.I.C.E are Price - As everyone knows, prices online are transparent prices, and having a competitive price position is an essential part of your positioning, that said, it's not the only…

Discover our framework to plan, manage, and optimize your brand positioning strategy in the era of omnichannel consumer branded goods

In its best form, a brand positioning strategy for a company unifies all customer-facing comms and marketing activities. It highlights who the target audience is, and why they need your product (and how you're going to make sure they know that). More importantly, in today's age of digitalization, with Debenhams and Arcadia Group being bought by online giants Asos and Boohoo, and now GAP planning to close stores in UK, France, and Italy as part of their European review, positioning your brand online is more important than ever. That's where RACE comes in - a dedicated marketing structure your brand can use to integrate your customers' experiences of your brand,…

A case study focusing on eBay marketing strategy: The facts, figures, and strategy behind their highest quarterly revenue yet

This case study summarizes the strategic approach used by eBay to take advantage of increased consumer adoption of the Internet. In this article I'll be summarizing eBay's objectives, strategy and proposition and key risks. Ebay marketing strategy updates will be added at the top of the case study.

2021 eBay marketing strategy update: E-commerce giant records highest quarterly revenue Q1 2021

Ebay has had a fascinating year. The quarterly revenue chart below depicts both highs and lows for this company in the last 12 months. Plunging to a low revenue of US $2,129 million in quarter 1 of 2020, the company then rocketed to it's highest recorded quarterly revenue of US $3,023 in quarter 1 of 2021.…