Throughout the pandemic, many local businesses pivoted from in-store to online sales. Of course, this requires an e-commerce website, set up to allow customers to purchase directly from the website with little to no interaction with the business.
This year, the e-commerce industry is expected to generate $4.5 trillion in sales by the end of the year. Any local business owner with an online store will obviously want a piece of the pie, But, in order to get that, your e-commerce site needs to first attract the right kind of traffic. If your e-commerce website isn’t bringing in the revenue you’d like it to, your traffic is the first thing to consider.
Here are five reasons you might be having trouble attracting traffic:
You haven’t set up an SEO Strategy
If you’re selling products and/or services that people want or need, then the safe assumption is that people are logging into Google to search for companies like yours every day. You want to make sure your e-commerce site is one of the ones they see first.
One of the best ways to do this is by investing in an SEO strategy, which involves optimizing your site to make it easier to find – including by using the same keywords in your content that your audience is searching for.
If your e-commerce website is easy to find, you’ll generate more traffic than if it’s hidden back on page two or three of the search results.
You’re not running ads
Combined with a smart SEO strategy, running ads through Google, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, or elsewhere can help drive both new and returning visitors to your website. Most platforms have an advertising component, so it’s just a matter of choosing the network where your audience is.
And if you do have a good understanding of who your target audience is, you (or an ads specialist) can create highly targeted ads. And these ads will be put in front of exactly the kind of person who is more likely to buy from you. This not only generates more traffic but generates the right kind of traffic for your e-commerce site to be successful.
Your site isn’t optimized for mobile
Many, if not most, of your potential website visitors, will scroll from their cell phones. If your site isn’t optimized for mobile traffic, you will automatically lose those visitors. So make sure that you have a responsive site, which means that it will load properly on a phone or tablet.
Optimizing for mobile also means thinking about your e-commerce website’s speed. In fact, 41% of users will leave if your site takes more than 5 seconds to load.
You don’t have enough reviews
Whether on your Facebook page, your Google My Business listing or in your Instagram Highlights, customer reviews are incredibly important for generating website traffic. In fact, we’ve shared before that:
- 88 percent of consumers trust online reviews just as much as personal recommendations, and
- 90 percent of consumers read online reviews before visiting a business
- 10% of all website traffic is a result of online reviews
How do you generate reviews? Send a thank-you email to all customers post-purchase. Your email should include a link to leave a review in the body and in your signature. And don’t forget to respond to all the reviews left by your customers – both good and bad!
You’re not on Social Media
Instagram launched in 2016, and by 2018 almost a third of all referral traffic was coming from social media. Who wouldn’t want to secure that extra traffic? You don’t have to be everywhere, but choose one or two platforms to show up on and share value with your audience, and then guide them off of social media and to your website.
Creating a successful e-commerce website isn’t as easy as “if you build it they will come.” It’s important to take the right steps to generate traffic to your site, so you can then focus on converting those visits to sales.
If you have questions about setting up or promoting your e-commerce site, book a free consultation and let’s chat about how we can help you generate more traffic.