Marketing Your Ecommerce Store (Lessons Learned From a Brick-and-Mortar Store)

You’ve started on the journey of having your own ecommerce website.

You’ve opened your store to the public, and you’re excited about the possibilities of successful sales ahead.

But now… a month or so after opening your doors, you’re not getting the traffic or the sales you had hoped for.

What do you do?

Continue reading… I think this article will help.

Your Own Storefront!

Imagine this scenario…

You’ve been given the opportunity to run your own specialty / niche business for at least one year.

Costs

Your cost will be $348.00 for that year.

This cost includes rent for your storefront – including utilities and everything else you need to function in that storefront.

You will, of course, be accepting debit or credit card payments for the things you sell – and like any business, credit card processing charges will apply. These credit card processing charges will be 2.9% of each sale, plus $0.30 of each sale.

Your Storefront

You’ve been given the building to use for the year.

This building is tucked back a few blocks off the main street through a major town. While it isn’t right next to all the other busy stores, it’s still in a major town with easy-to-navigate roads to get to the building.

You can do anything you want to the building to help support your business.

For example, you can paint the walls to match the branding of your business, hang signs, divide the building into departments or sections for the types of things you sell. The cost of this basic decor and features are included in your fee for the year.

You do have the option of adding specialty features and decor to your building if you choose, but since these things are not required to run your business, you will need to pay extra for them. Remember, these things are purely optional.

Your Inventory

Since this is your business, you can sell anything you want to sell (assuming it’s legal to sell) – and you provide your own inventory.

You can source your inventory from wherever you choose, and you can set whatever prices you want for your inventory.

You can display your inventory throughout your storefront however you’d like it displayed – this is completely up to you and what you think best serves your business.

You’re Ready!

At this point, you have everything you need to begin selling your items immediately.

You have a fully functional, branded storefront that has everything you need to start selling.

You know what your rent payment is for the year.

You have the inventory you want to sell.

You’re ready to start selling! So…

You Open!

You’re excited for opening day!

You fling open the doors to the public and immediately people start visiting your store and you can’t keep up with sales.

Oh wait…

Is that really what happens?

Since your storefront isn’t on the main street through town, it’s not at all obvious to anyone in town that you are even there, ready to do business.

What’s Next?

You’ve gone to work each day for a week. You’ve opened the doors to your store. And yet… there are no customers. There are no sales.

What do you do about this?

Seriously. Give this some thought. This is important.

Take some time to thoroughly imagine this scenario and make a list of what you need to do next.

You know you have a great product that will sell.

You know your store is attractive and the window displays are compelling, ready to entice shoppers to enter.

You know you’ve made it easy for customers to find products within your store, and your displays are very appealing.

The part that’s missing are the customers. They don’t even know your store is there!

Get the Word Out!

The old saying “if you build it, they will come” does NOT apply in this scenario. Customers can’t visit a store they don’t even know exists!

You need to market and promote your store to get the word out!

You need to tell the world “I am here!”

How Does This Scenario Relate to a Ecommerce Store?

Starting a new ecommerce store on Shopify is very similar to the scenario above.

Your Shopify website has everything you need to start selling.

You know the cost for a year is $348.

You have your inventory and know it will sell.

But unless you promote your store – no one is going to know about it.

In order to have sales, you need customers.

Your ecommerce store is similar to the storefront above – it’s tucked a couple of blocks off the main street in town. You need to make some noise and let people know “I am here!” You need signs that direct traffic straight to your doors!

Ecommerce Misconceptions

I think a lot of merchants have a misconception when it comes to ecommerce. They think if they open a website, people will start to find it through internet searches and sales will start to happen immediately.

While this certainly can happen, it isn’t the only way to do business – or the most effective.

Sure, if you have rock-solid, keyword rich descriptions and titles for your products, chances are customers will eventually find your products. But the likelihood of your shop showing up on the first page (or even the first three pages) of an internet search when you first open your store is very unlikely. It takes time for search engines to find your website, index it and rank it.

Don’t get me wrong, organic traffic is some of the best traffic you can attract to your store. These are potential customers who have searched specifically for what you’re selling, and are therefore, quality traffic looking to buy.

But… you can’t just rely on organic traffic.

You need to promote your ecommerce store, just like you would need to promote the storefront in the above scenario.

Without marketing your store, the sales are only going to trickle in from people who have stumbled upon your store, if you get any sales at all.

A Marketing Plan

As with any business, you need a well thought out marketing plan for your ecommerce store.

Think about this:  How are you going to tell the world “I am here!”?

Signs

If you had a brick-and-mortar store, you would probably first start by posting signs or billboards in popular places throughout town that direct customers to your doors.

For an ecommerce store, those signs are what you post on social media platforms.

Ads

A brick-and-mortar store might take out ads in the local newspapers, or post ads in the local Chamber of Commerce.

An ecommerce store can place ads on social media platforms, on Google and Bing, and in places where your target customer hangs out, such as forums, Reddit, or Quora.

A brick-and-mortar store might take out ads on the radio to reach beyond local customers, and advertise to a larger audience.

An ecommerce store could be featured on a podcast related to your niche. The backlinks and awareness of your store would be great exposure!

Mailings

A brick-and-mortar store might send out postcards to everyone within their town to let people know about their store, and to give them an offer that compels them to stop in.

If you have an existing customer email list, you could send an email blast to your existing customers to let them know you have a new website. Give them an offer they can’t refuse, to encourage them to visit.

Provide Help

A brick-and-mortar store could attract more customers by writing helpful articles for their local newspaper. Articles that involve the products you sell and how they solve a problem, or how they could be used.

An ecommerce store could write these same kinds of helpful articles and post them in their store blog. Customers searching for answers to a problem or need, would find your articles in internet searches – a good source of organic traffic. The blog articles could also be shared on social media platforms to help spread the word.

Summary

We are all so familiar with shopping at actual brick-and-mortar stores throughout our lives. Thinking about your ecommerce store like a brick-and-mortar store gives you more ideas on how to promote your store. Use those tried-and-true methods of marketing and promotion that brick-and-mortar stores have used for years, and adapt those ideas for ecommerce.

There’s a lot of competition out there – especially for ecommerce stores! I’ll be honest and tell you that having a store is hard work – just like with any business. You need plans in place in order to grow your business and make it successful. You need to constantly be marketing and promoting your store.

For ecommerce, you need at least one year of being in business to know if you’re going to succeed or not. Once you start to grow your customer base, your customers will help you market your business by word-of-mouth, and your business will continue to grow. But it all starts with you, and how you plan to promote and market your business.

Next Steps

So… what do you do from here?

Grab a piece of paper and a pen and start writing down your marketing ideas.

Think outside the box. Think of clever ways you can shout out to the world “I am here!”.

 

Have questions or comments about this article? Post them below. I’ll be happy to help!