For businesses small and large, the birth of eCommerce comes as a breathe of fresh air, seeping with a surplus of money-saving opportunities that’s only existed within the past few decades.
From reducing the cost of promotion to eliminating the time barrier of selling goods, eCommerce gives consumers the shopping-flexibility they’ve always desired while helping businesses significantly lower labor costs. It’s a win-win situation where companies can maximize work efficiency and customers can relish in purchasing convenience.
But in a struggling economy, driving traffic to your eCommerce site still takes a hefty toll on your finances. Amazon, the modern-day mogul of eCommerce websites, only intensifies the need for additional cash to maximize marketing efforts and drive consumers to your personal site. And for companies operating within a small budget, how do you balance the pressure of competition with big profit goals? –Thru a savvy marketing structure, that’s how.
While maintaining a frugal marketing approach may seem like a dubious strategy, several options do in fact exist that can maximize your efforts without breaking the bank.
Here are three money-saving marketing ideas that are geared towards driving traffic to your eCommerce platform:
Spotlight Your Efforts
The Internet universe is an overwhelming virtual world. And when you’re operating a small business, sometimes the most difficult part of online marketing is to know where to start. Thus, begin by prioritizing which initiatives require the most immediate attention, and from there, methodically arrange your investments so that you’re able to evaluate each campaign, one at a time. Many small businesses make the financial mistake of attacking too many marketing projects at the same time, however, by spotlighting a specific endeavor, you will have a better understanding of whether or not a strategy is or isn’t working. Sure, this approach may be the more time-consuming alternative, yet when you consider the risk of unloading all your investments concurrently, you risk existence within your market.
In the spirit of frugality, the first priority is making sure the quality of your eCommerce site looks and functions properly. Is the site easy to navigate? Are items properly stocked and accounted for? Do you offer secure credit card processing? If the quality of your website isn’t up to par, it’s an immediate deal-breaker as you lose the trust of the consumer. After all, what’s the point of attracting consumers to your website when they’re immediately turned off from its design and features?
Take Advantage of Social Media…
As I’m sure you’re well aware, social media is free.
Sure, it does take a fair amount of labor to actively engage with consumers on each of its various platform, but the reward of building authenticity through the streams of social media is priceless. Social media is a wonderful, and if done correctly, simple way of driving loads of traffic right to your site. But simply having a LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter account is not enough; in order to efficiency utilize the financial opportunity that is social media, you need to actively engage with people.
A great platform to start your social media efforts is on Twitter. That’s because Twitter is arguably the most powerful medium in terms of finding influencers that directly relate to your product and industry. Start by simply researching key words and phrases, which will lead you to a plethora of related influencers. From there, try to establish a two-way relationship, where you share their content and vice versa.
Like when you go fishing, patience is your greatest virtue—so don’t give in to the time-consuming nature of this strategy, just keep fishing and the bites will come.
Focus on Current Customers
As a growing business, it’s only natural to want to seek out more customers; however, in the issue of a conservative budget, it’s crucial that you don’t invest all of your marketing on building your consumer base. Instead, focus on your current customers and strengthen the relationship that you’ve already established with them.
Utilize the domino effect of word-to-mouth and authenticate your loyalty to your invested clientele. Send monthly newsletters and press releases about company information, offer promotional opportunities, promptly respond to emails, invest in great customer service and have them sing your praises. Before you know it, your consumer base will have significantly grown, and the idea of spending more money on building new customers will have seemed irrelevant.