e commerce

Success in Ecommerce

Chris Middleton

Notes and Ebook

Copy of the presentation

Slideshare.net Search “eskimosoup ecommerce”

Free internet marketing ebook

www.eskimosoup.co.uk/ecommerce

Success in ecommerce

• Introduction: facts and figures• Choosing the right product or service• Options to enter the market• Creating your own ecommerce website• How to market your ecommerce website• Analytics• Introduction to mobile• Review the internet marketing system

“Ecommerce is the process of buying and selling products and

services online”

Size of the market

• In April 2000, estimated online expenditure in the UK was £87 million. By December of 2005, the figure had increased significantly to some £2.26 billion.

•  UK online shoppers spent £68bn in 2011, 16% more than the year before

• The UK has the biggest e-commerce market in the world when measured by the amount spent per capita

http://www.imrg.org/IMRGWebSite/user/pages/homepage.aspx

http://www.bcg.com/media/PressReleaseDetails.aspx?id=tcm:12-64183

Size of the market

• Over three quarters of businesses have a website in 2010 (78.7 per cent).

• While the majority of businesses have a website, a relatively small proportion of businesses use the website for selling (15.3 per cent).

http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/dcp171778_245829.pdf

Choose Your Product: Research the Market

• Gap in the market?– Locally– Nationally– Internationally

• Reinvent the wheel?– Can you improve on an existing product or

service?

• Support offline businesses• Are you passionate about it?

Be Remarkable

What is a Purple Cow?Seth’s definition of being a Purple Cow is that

‘products, services and techniques so useful, interesting, outrageous, and noteworthy that the market will want to listen to what you have to say’.

Being a Purple Cow is not about being loud or quirky, but about being more outstanding and remarkable than your black and white spotted competitors.

Do this with BrandIt’s everything you say and everything you do, but includes:

– Visuals• Logo• Photos• Videos

– Brand language• Anywhere you speak• Anywhere you display words

– Branded materials• Stationery• Brochures• Website

– Operational activities• How you send out invoices• How do you answer phones• Customer service• Smell of the office / shop / marketing material http://sensorydecisions.com/

Above the Aircon it says “not that kulula planes need it… they’re already cool”.

overhead cabins – “VIP seating for you hand luggage”.

“Black box which is actually orange”

Fuel tanks – “the go-go juice”.

"Ladies and gentlemen, we've reached cruising altitude and will be turning down the cabin lights. This is for your comfort and to enhance the appearance of your flight attendants."

"Your seat cushions can be used for flotation; and in the event of an emergency water landing, please paddle to shore and take them with our compliments."

"Ladies and gentlemen, we have landed in Cape Town . Please take all your possessions. Anything left behind will be shared equally between staff. Please note we do not accept unwanted mothers-in-law or children."

"Welcome to Johannesburg, if this is not where you were intending to go then you have a bit of a problem."

"Me Tarzan, You on hold“ - when phoning Kulula and being put on hold.

“Have you heard the latest Cabin Crew lingo? BOB (Best-On-Board)if you are a BOB – you are the best looking man/woman onboard” – facebook comment

http://www.facebook.com/iflykulula?sk=app_227728410594266

http://www.thefuntheory.com/piano-staircase

Entering the market

• Established market place– Ebay– Amazon– Not on the highstreet.com

• Off the shelf ecommerce system

• Bespoke ecommerce system

Existing Market Place

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-eBay-Business-Handbook-3rd/dp/1906659974/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1339145800&sr=8-1

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Amazon-Top-Seller-Secrets-Successful/dp/0814410340/ref=sr_1_sc_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1339146017&sr=1-1-spell

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Build-Business-Your-Kitchen-Table/dp/1471102114/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1339156679&sr=8-1

http://socialcommercetoday.com/top-50-facebook-stores-top-20-facebook-store-solutions/

Your own online store

Off the Shelf Vs Bespoke

Off the Shelf

http://www.actinic.co.uk/

Considerations

• Still requires design• Integration of brand

– Images– Video – Blogs– Social media

• Programming to fit your business• Complicated back-end management

system

Bespoke

Considerations

• Can be considered the more expensive option

• Requires providing a brief for agencies to tender for

• Requires a leap of faith and trust

How Do I choose?

Think about:

• Your audience– Where do they “hang out”?– What experience would they expect?

• Your market place– Do you want to always compete on price?– Will your business thrive with what Amazon

etc can provide?

How Do I Choose?

Be honest with yourself:• Do you have the skills to;

– Design, build and manage an ecommerce website. There are a lot of skills required?

• Consider the true cost of building an ecommerce website. – Will you save money buying an off the shelf solution? – Is there a lost opportunity cost? – Will you outgrow it / become frustrated with having

work within the constraints of a one size fits all solution?

Must Have Functions

Information is being searched for in different ways:•We expect honest and transparent information (no spin)

•We expect to comment and add to content

•We expect to read comments, reviews and ratings

•We expect to subscribe to information

We Expect to Use the Internet Differently Now

Social Reviews

Search Marketing

Push Marketing

Pull Marketing

PPCPPC

SEOSEO

Search Engine Results Page

Supply

DemandRelevancy

Three Pillars of SEM Success

Supply

DemandRelevancy

Three Pillars of SEM Success

Supply

DemandRelevancy

Hot Tip – Search Google for ‘adwords keyword tool’

Three Pillars of SEM Success

Supply

DemandRelevancy

Three Pillars of SEM Success

1. High demand

2. Relatively low supply

3. High relevancy

What Are We Looking For?

Campaign

Ad Group

Keyword Keyword Keyword

URL URL URL

Adverts

Geography

Languages

Search Engines

Devices

Budget

Time of Day

Share of BudgetMax Click Cost

Text Message

Trigger Words

Landing Pages

How PPC Works

“men’s work shoes”

Campaign

Ad Group

Keyword Keyword Keyword

URL URL URL

Advert

Walk Through

Campaign

Ad Group

Keyword Keyword Keyword

URL URL URL

Advert

Walk Through

Campaign

Ad Group

Keyword Keyword Keyword

URL URL URL

Advert

Walk Through

Campaign

Ad Group

Keyword Keyword Keyword

URL URL URL

Advert

Walk Through

Landing Pages

Improving Your Adwords Campaign: Ad Extensions

Review extensions:The review line stands out to the eye compared to competitors and increases click through rate.

Improving Your Adwords Campaign: Ad Extensions

Local Extensions: Help nearby consumers find or call your nearest location

Improving Your Adwords Campaign: Ad Extensions

Call extensions:Connect users to your business directly by phone

Improving Your Adwords Campaign: Ad Extensions

Ad Sitelinks:

Promote more pages within your site beyond your main ad landing page

• It’s Fast– Typically brings traffic within an hour– Quickly get in and out of a market– Manipulate keywords that convert– Quickly change bid prices

• It’s flexible– Turn on and off instantly– Can be run seasonally– Test new products in the market– Schedule campaigns if time sensitive– Change the ad messages instantly

• Control– Over everything– Infinitely customisable

• Rewards Well Managed Campaigns

How PPC Works: Benefits

• Not as Easy as It Sounds

• Paying for Every Visitor

• Getting More Expensive

• Only Attracts 10% of All Available Clicks

How PPC Works: Drawbacks

How Google Works Out What a Website Does?

What the Website Says About Itself: Onsite Optimisation

• The text on the page

• How it's formatted

• How non-text elements are described

• How readable the pages are, both for humans and Search Engines

Onsite Optimisation: What a Website Says About Itself

The text on the page

Onsite Optimisation

How non-text elements are described

Images, headings, animations, videos etc

Onsite Optimisation

How readable the page is, both for humans and Search Engines

<h1>Handmade Soy Candles

</h1>

<u><b><font size=“5”>Handmade Soy Candles</font></b></u>

Vs.

http://www.google.com/webmasters/

Hot Tip – Get the search engines inside information

www.bing.com/webmaster

Onsite Navigation

Recent Google Updates

OffSite Optimisation: What Other Web Pages Say About A Website

The main reason Google became the monopoly

Your Web Page

Your Web Page

Another Web PageAnother

Web Page

Another Web PageAnother

Web Page

Another Web PageAnother

Web PageAnother

Web PageAnother

Web Page

Hot Tip – Book ‘The Search by John Battelle’

Offsite Navigation

3 Key Elements for Quality Links

1. Link source

2. Anchor text

3. Landing page

Quality and theme matter far more than quantity

Offsite Optimisation Navigation

Google+

• Black Hat SEO

• URL Penalties

• Content Spamming

• Link Spamming

• Misleading Web Users

• Don’t Optimise only for Search Engines

• Lazy SEO and PPC

Hot Tip – Search Google for ‘Google Guidelines’

Avoiding SEO Disaster

When to Use PPC• New Domains• Need Fast ROI• Need Flexible Volume• Testing• Targeting• Precision Control

When to use SEO• Need Max ROI• When Competition is

High• When Demand is

High• When Sales Goals

are High• Punch Above Your

Weight

Horses for Courses

Your GoalsYour Goals

Existing Customers

Existing Customers

Suppliers / CompetitorsSuppliers /

Competitors Analytics Reports

Analytics Reports

Social MediaSocial Media

SoftwareTools

SoftwareTools

Choosing keywords

• Google AdWords Editor• Google Analytics• Google Trends• Google Webmaster Central• Google Places• Google Webmaster Guidelines• Google Merchant Centre• Web CEO*• Web Position*• Alexa.com• Dmoz.org

Tools

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Art-SEO-Eric-Enge/dp/1449304214/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1339356069&sr=1-3

Email Marketing

• A 1st Class tool for – Nurturing relationships– Generating repeat business– Retaining customers

What Email Marketing Is…

What Email Marketing Is Not...

– A Customer acquisition tool– A replacement for direct mail campaigns– A cheap alternative– A tool for the lazy– As easy as it looks

3 Pillars of Email Marketing Success

Permission

PersonalisationPersuasion

3 Pillars of Email Success

Permission

PersonalisationPersuasion

3 Pillars of Email Success

Permission

PersonalisationPersuasion

3 Pillars of Email Success

Permission

PersonalisationPersuasion

Timing for Success: Choosing the Right Time to Send

Businesses Consumers

Wednesday Friday

3 PM

Your Audience is Varied: Segmentation

Celebrity News Subscribers

New Products Subscribers

Special Offers Subscribers

Case Study: Fashion Hire Company

Celebrity News New Product Announcements

Seasonal / Exclusive Offers

News Page on Website / Blog

New Products Landing Page Offer Page

List

Message

Target

Permission

PersonalisationPersuasion

Permission

PersonalisationPersuasion

Permission

PersonalisationPersuasion

Once a Month, a Week or every Day? How Often to Send

• Depends on the situation / audience

• Probably more often than you think

• Once a month is likely too long

Test and Measure

http://bit.ly/bdWAP7 - See average industry rates

Top Tips: Best Practice

• Don’t use Outlook

• Don’t use Word

• Used an Approved Broadcasting Service– AWeber– MailChimp– Constant Contact

• Only Send Messages of Value

Online Social Media

Shift Happens

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFZ0z5Fm-Ng

Dialogue between consumer and brand

Hot Tip – Search amazon for Seth Godin and Brian Halligan

Uses of Social Media

•Customer acquisition• Customer retention (rewarding loyal customers)• Customer care• Research – listening and learning

•Clients researching you•Customer research

• Networking – building relationships of trust• Mass communication• Digital personality

Creating loyal communities of customers

More and more customers are blocking traditional marketing, psychologically and with the help of

technology

We hang out in different places

SOCIAL MEDIA IS AN UMBRELLA TERM THAT DEFINES THE VARIOUS ACTIVITIES THAT INTEGRATE

TECHNOLOGY, SOCIAL INTERACTION, AND THE

CONSTRUCTION OF WORDS,

PICTURES, VIDEOS AND AUDIO

“Social mediais people having

conversations online.”

Use the tools that help you communicate to your audience better

Share slides and documents

100m Videos 2nd largest search engine

79% have watched

video content online

Universal McCann: Power to the People Social Media Tracker, Wave 4http://www.slideshare.net/Olivier.mermet/universal-mc-cann-wave4

70% have uploaded photos

Universal McCann: Power to the People Social Media Tracker, Wave 4http://www.slideshare.net/Olivier.mermet/universal-mc-cann-wave4

200,000,000 blogs

Online Social Networks

64% of us in the UK have joined

Micro-blogging

We don’t always find information using Google

Social Reviews

25% of search results for the worlds top 20 largest brands

are links from user generated content

June 8, 2009 article from Marketing Vox and Nielsen BuzzMetrics SES Magazine entitled:Turning Blogs and user-Generated Content Into Search Engine Results, Chris Aarons, Andru Edwards and Xavier Lanier 

Who influences whom?

Will the brand site continue to be the first visit after they search Google or Bing?

The attraction of social media

People trust “a person like me” more than authority figures or marketing messages from business and media

Seeking ongoing dialogue, not a one way advertisement

Trust, Transparency, openness, honesty

We are seeing a communication shift

The shift is from one way communication

Dialogue between consumer and brand

Dialogue between consumer and consumer

With or without you

Conversations will happen online with or without you

Choose to be a part of it

Engage and embrace

Blogs

The product is right

The price is right

But who am I buying from?

70% trusts bloggers’ opinions on products and services

People think more positivelyabout a company that has a blog

Universal McCann: Power to the People Social Media Tracker, Wave 3

http://www.slideshare.net/Tomuniversal/wave-3-social-media-tracker-presentation

The stage before committing to buy

The customers perspective

Understanding your customerChoosing the right Social Network

(Hang out where your customers hang out)

Profiles

A Reason to Socialise: The Social Object

Pages

Hot Tip – to create a page visit http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php?

Engaging - Listening and learning

Engaging – Customer service

Hot Tip – use Tweetdeck and Google Alerts to monitor conversations

Engaging – Create a social object*

•http://www.kyle.mathews2000.com/node/60

Engaging – Create a social object

Hot Tip – http://storefrontsocial.com/

How do I promote my social media outlets?

Email Campaigns

Business card

Email Signature

Website

On Other Blogs

Direct Engagement

increase your exposure using highly targeted advertising.

Target users by age, gender, location, interests, etc.

Advertise an external website or a facebook page.

facebook advertising

“Move your loyal customers

from an expensive offline advertisement campaign to a cheaper, more efficient and engaging online campaign…

Use the tools of social media”

Web Analytics

Google Analytics

Purpose

“To enable us to take action based on the actual behaviour of

website visitors”from ‘Actionable Web Analytics’

Analytics

Traffic Sources

Search Referred Direct

Google Yahoo Bing

Keyword 1

Keyword 2

Keyword 3

Keyword 4

Keyword 5

Keyword 6

Keyword 7

Keyword 8

Keyword 9

Keyword10

Keyword11

Keyword12

Facebook Yell Times Bookmarks Typed History

DealLocal.co.uk

3 Gems

1. Holding advertisers accountable

2. Monitoring local awareness

3. Monitoring website persuasiveness

Holding Advertisers Accountable

Holding Advertisers Accountable

Monitoring Local Awareness

Monitoring Local Awareness

Monitoring Website Persuasiveness

Monitoring Website Persuasiveness

Mobile

7 out of 10 searchers expect a website to be as easy to navigate on a mobile device as it is on a desktop computer…

Only 21% of Google’s top advertisers have a mobile website

Having a website that does not perform well on a mobile device is like being closed on Thursday

The three biggest challenges faced by business are...

• Finding more prospects• Closing more sales• Increasing repeat custom

Step By Step

1. Research your market

2. Choose a product / service that is in demand. Be passionate about it.

3. Be remarkable

4. Enter the market. Choose an ecommerce solution based on your customer expectations, your resources and aspirations

5. Market yourself to new customers

6. Market yourself to existing customers. Keep existing customers and use persuasion to promote positive word of mouth

7. Install and understand Google Analytics. Make improvements based on results.

8. Consider mobile.