Why doesn’t my product sell online Tom? I’ve done everything by the book! I created a nice shop; I’ve added a lot of fancy pictures and good descriptions. People can pay online via Paypal and credit card and shipping is done in a jiffy. Amount sold last month: zero, nada, nothing, not even a pennie. Please Tom, what am I doing wrong?
Stuck in the box?
That’s what is happening to you, you’re stuck in the box, the box being your comfort zone, the box representing the boundaries of your company. You are asking the wrong question. Instead of asking ‘why doesn’t my product sell’, ask ‘why isn’t my customer buying it’. Stop thinking from your perspective and start thinking as your customer. Come out of the box, take two steps back and look at it.
So, how does my customer buy stuff?
Your customer goes through four stages before buying your product: Awareness, Consideration, Intent & Decision. This is your customer’s journey for buying your product. You have been focusing on the last step, the decision, which is good. Good descriptions, nice pictures, easy checkout and fast delivery are very good ways of convincing your customer to buy. What you shouldn’t neglect however are the other three steps in his journey: getting the customer to the point of decision.
Use your marketing tools wisely
Where, when and how should you invest your time and money in things like bannering, Facebook & e-mail marketing? Well, let Google help us on this. On Think With Google our friends have created a Customer Journey Channel tool where they analyzed when to use which channel.
Source: Think With Google – Customer Journey to Online Purchase
Creating Awareness
One of the best ways of creating more brand awareness is to invest in display clicks, or bannering. For instance you could place some banners on an online newspaper site that your customer segments frequently visit, it's a lot cheaper that an advertisement in the printed versions...
Getting Consideration
Let's get social... Social media offer the most advantage when it comes to getting some brand consideration from your target customers.
As they already have seen your banner on the site they love, being present on social media can trigger more trust and comfort with your organization. Time to create a Facebook page or a LinkedIn Company Profile? Off course it is wise only to invest time in social media that are relevant for your customer segment...
Building Intent
This is an important piece of the puzzle, building your customers intent to make the decision. It is time to start triggering him to buy your product, as he knows it exists and he is considering it as a viable alternative. In this step of the buying process, a combination of e-mail marketing and paid search (read: Google Adwords), are interesting tools to use.
Send regular e-mails with powerful 'call-to-actions', but be sure not to spam your target audience. Investing in paid search results via Google Adwords will assist further in stimulating the customer to go the extra mile and take a leap of faith.
Get out of your box and start thinking outside-in.
So what’s the most important thing to remember? Starting from today you will get out of your company box, start thinking as your customer. This might give you inspiration for improving your digital strategy to embrace your customer’s end-to-end buying process and ultimately boosting your sales!
Did you know that we can help you building your digital strategy? Invite us! You bring coffee, we bring digital inspiration!
