How to Profit from the Benefits of Mobile Marketing

Posted on August 26, 2017 by

The benefits of mobile marketing offer huge opportunities to your bottom line

The benefits of mobile marketing are huge.

From a closer connection to your customers to creative marketing campaigns, you can do so much more through a personal device than a desktop.

Before we get into the benefits, take a look at these mobile marketing statistics to understand the big money in m-commerce:

Statista, one of the leading statistics companies on the internet, released a report titled “Mobile retail e-commerce sales in the United States from 2013 to 2020” stating that, in 2018, U.S. mobile retail revenues are expected to amount to 206.53 billion U.S. dollars, up from 80.94 billion U.S. dollars in 2015.

That’s over a 150{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} increase in revenue in only 3 years.

But it get’s better…

A report from Business Insider titled “The Mobile Checkout Report” states that In 2014, mobile comprised 11.6{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of the US’ $303 billion in ecommerce sales. By 2020, mobile will account for 45{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of the $632 billion in total e-commerce sales.

That means almost half of all ecommerce sales will be conducted from your customer’s phone.

If you want a piece of this growing pie and reap the benefits of mobile marketing, we’ll give you a few general strategies and go over some specific ways you can execute a better mobile marketing campaign today.

But first, let’s define mobile marketing.

What is Mobile Marketing?

Mobile marketing is the use of mobile devices to market your business.

The goal is to make your business as appealing, user-friendly, and helpful as possible to drive the most engagement and sales possible.

It can provide your customers personalized, location-specific, time-specific information and advertising that gives them what they need and want when they need or want it, wherever they are.

Benefits of Mobile Marketing

You and your customers will benefit from mobile marketing in a variety of ways.

But you might be confused about the specific benefits mobile marketing offers, and may not want to invest any more of your budget into marketing campaigns you don’t understand.

To help you see this opportunity clearly, here’s why mobile marketing could be so profitable for your business:

Constant Contact With Your Prospects

According to “The Mobile Fact Sheet” from Pew Research, 95{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of Americans own a cellphone of one kind or another, while 77{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of Americans own a smartphone.

Additionally, this report revealed that broadband services are diminishing and “smartphone-only” internet users are increasing. 1 in 10 Americans do not have broadband service and only use their smartphones to access the internet.

So not only do most people have a cellphone they carry with them wherever they go, some of them use it exclusively for all of their computing needs.

Increased Social Media Engagement

A report from Statista titled “Mobile internet usage in the United States” states that In 2015, the number of smartphone social network users in the United States was 149.5 million. By 2020, this number is set to reach 186.3 million monthly smartphone social users.

Online consumers who access social media through their mobile device are more likely to read, comment, like, or share content posted by a company than those who accessed social media from their PC, according to a study from Forrester.

For example, 46{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of smartphone users liked something a company posted weekly, while only 37{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of PC users liked something a company posted weekly.

This type of engagement could lead to a massive increase in your social media sales.

Opportunity for SMS Mobile Marketing

Since almost all of your customers have a mobile device on them wherever they go – whether it’s a smartphone or not – you have the opportunity to send them a text message about a special deal, a coupon, a sale, or any other promotion.

Your text messages could be about an impromptu deal, or it could get them ready for a big sale in the future.

You could even send out questionnaires, surveys, or polls to gain valuable insight into your customers thinking.

Advanced Location-Based Mobile Marketing

Since over 3 quarters of mobile device owners have smartphones, you have the ability to cash in on location-based marketing.

You could develop a Geofence that “pushes” a notification to their device, alerting them they’re in the perimeter of your location.

Similarly, you could use an iBeacon to push notifications, send a daily deal, or inform your customer that they’re nearby your store.

More Payment Options Through Mobile Wallet Marketing

By 2018, Forrester Research Inc. predicts mobile wallets will reach critical mass with consumers and become a high-value new marketing channel, according to their report “The Future Of Mobile Wallets Lies Beyond Payments.”

That same report identified the 2 features most customers want from their mobile wallets:

57{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of customers want loyalty programs
56{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of customers want coupons/offers

By 2019, Forrester predicts U.S. mobile payments to grow to $142 billion, according to their report, “US Mobile Payments Forecast, 2014 To 2019.”

From Apple Pay to Android Pay to Samsung Pay, your ability to deliver deals, inspire loyalty, and give your customers more payment flexibility has never been easier or more exciting.

Of course, the benefits of mobile marketing mean nothing if you can’t put them into action.

To help you grow your business through mobile marketing, we put together some proven strategies you can implement today.

Mobile Marketing Strategies for Increased Sales in Mobile Commerce

This is where the rubber meets the road (or, the marketing meets the phone to be exact).

You know you can increase your sales through mobile marketing, but you may not know the specific, data-driven strategies that make this possible.

Below are 5 proven mobile marketing strategies that will increase engagement, optimize conversions, and boost your bottom line.

Design a Mobile-Friendly Website

The purpose of your website is to provide easy navigation for your customers, especially if they’re visiting your site on their mobile device.

Cluttered icons, confusing menus, and distorted images will cause your customers to quickly close your website and visit someone else’s.

Here are a few surefire guidelines for creating a mobile-friendly website:

Use simplified drop-down menus instead of a full menu bar
Use high-quality images for everything from your About page to your product pages
Write detailed, in-depth product descriptions
Make your website mobile-responsive so that it automatically adjusts for a mobile user

For additional tips, check out this guide from Moz on optimizing your site for mobile devices.

Optimize Checkout

Once potential customers have filled up their carts and are on the checkout page, it’s critical to do everything you can to prevent shopping cart abandonment.

For instance, don’t force customers to create an account just to buy your products.

A case study from User Interface Engineering found that by removing the “register” button from their client’s checkout page (a major ecommerce retailer), they increased conversions by 45{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3}, resulting in a $300 million boost in the retailer’s sales.

You could also display the shopping cart at all times. This ensures quick access to the checkout page.

Try to auto-detect their city and state immediately after they input their ZIP code to make it easier and faster for them to enter their information.

Offer free shipping if you can, or, at the very least, calculate shipping immediately after your customer selects a product so that the costs are transparent.

58{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of online shoppers abandoned their cart because the cost of shipping was higher than expected according to Business Insider.

Create and Optimize a Mobile App for Your Business

A mobile app is a must-have if you want to take advantage of all the benefits of mobile marketing.

Here are a few phenomenal reasons why mobile apps are one of the best tools for mobile marketing courtesy of Criteo’s “State of Mobile Commerce 2016”:

Apps convert 3.5x more consumers than mobile web-browsing
Apps deliver up to 54{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of all mobile transactions
Advanced capabilities like home screen presence, instant loading, offline content, push notifications, personalization, and access to native functionality could create a 15{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} increase in transactions year-over-year
Apps convert 3x more product viewers than mobile web
App users continue to browse more products and purchase more than on the mobile web and desktop at every stage in the funnel
Apps deliver 2x the new user retention power
New app users are twice as likely to return within 30 days vs. mobile web users

Apps also allow you to take advantage of iBeacons and Geofences since you’ll need an app to push a notification to your customer when they’re in range of your store.

Use Video Marketing

According to “Cisco Visual Networking Index: Forecast and Methodology, 2016–2021,” global IP video traffic will be 82 percent of all consumer Internet traffic by 2021, up from 73 percent in 2016.

So, over 3 quarters of internet browsers will be mostly watching videos on the internet in just 4 years.

Plus, it turns out that 4x as many consumers would rather watch a video about a product than read about it. This comes from a study conducted by Animoto. Here are 3 more stats from the same study:

1 in 4 consumers lose interest in a company if it doesn’t have video
Customers are nearly 50{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} more likely to read email newsletters that include links to video
4 in 5 consumers say a video showing how a product or service works is important

Create an SMS Mobile Marketing Campaign

SMS mobile marketing offers an exciting opportunity to smart businesses ready to profit from this low-tech strategy.

To give you an idea of the benefits of SMS mobile marketing, check out these stats from the 2nd edition of the “Mobile Intelligence Review”:

90{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of text messages are read within 3 seconds
29{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of those targeted with an SMS advertising campaign responded to the message
47{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of those who responded to the message went on to make a purchase

Follow these tips for a successful SMS mobile marketing campaign:

Always get consent from your customers to send them text messages, otherwise, they will be angry, and you may lose a customer for life.
Start the text ad with a compelling offer such as “Buy 4 pots get 1 FREE vase!”
Make the deal seem exclusive by telling the customer they belong to a seemingly elite group named “Platinum Text Club Members” or something similar.
Make the text time-specific and give it a deadline to add urgency to your message by telling them “this offer expires on October 15th at midnight,” for example.
Tell them the location of your store where they can redeem the offer.
Give them a call-to-action they can execute immediately, like “Stop in today and show this text at checkout to redeem this exclusive deal!”
Don’t send deals more often than once or twice a month to avoid being spammy and annoying.
Always include an unsubscribe option so that your customers can opt-out anytime.

Time to Reap the Benefits of Mobile Marketing

You know what mobile marketing can offer your business.

You know the strategies you can use to create a killer mobile marketing campaign.

Now, you just to need to go out and apply this information.

Just remember, mobile marketing should be one part of your entire omnichannel ecommerce strategy.

Test everything, use what works, discard what doesn’t.

By using what you’ve learned today, you’ll be well on your way to profiting from the benefits of mobile marketing.

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How Consignment Inventory Works and How to Make It Work for You

Posted on July 15, 2017 by dearsyst

Do you ever wish you could try out a new product in your retail store and not have to buy it unless you sell it?

Or, wouldn’t it be nice to easily get your new product onto a retailer’s shelves without much hassle or haggling?

There is a unique business model that makes these 2 scenarios possible…

It’s called consignment inventory, and it’s an underutilized way to create a win-win partnership between suppliers and retailers as long as they’re both willing to share the risks – and rewards.

To help you learn how to make consignment inventory work for you, we’ll go over what it is, what are its pros and cons, and how to implement it wisely.

What is Consignment Inventory?

Consignment inventory is a business arrangement where the consignor (a vendor or wholesaler) agrees to give their goods to a consignee (usually a retailer) without the consignee paying for the goods up front – the consignor still owns the goods, and the consignee pays for the goods only when they actually sell.

For example, a women’s watch vendor might want to break into a new market, but they’re relatively unknown and have had a hard time selling their goods to retailers.

If the vendor offers their watches on consignment, the retailer agrees to stock the watches in their store and only pay for the ones they sell.

This arrangement can be hugely beneficial for both parties, but it also carries with it some major risks.

To get a balanced view of consignment inventory, let’s look at some of its pros and cons for both vendors and retailers.

Pros and Cons of Consignment Inventory for Vendors

Pros for Vendors

1. New Markets

As we pointed out in our women’s watch example, selling on consignment allows vendors to enter new markets at minimal cost to the retailers, which makes retailers more likely to carry the vendors’ inventory.

2. Low Inventory Carrying Costs

Inventory is expensive to warehouse. By giving a portion of it to a retailer, vendors lower the cost of carrying inventory.

3. Direct-to-Retailer Shipping

Instead of having inventory shipped to a warehouse and then to a retailer, vendors can have their manufacturers deliver the inventory directly to the retailer.

This streamlines the supply chain, saves labor costs, and gets goods on retailers shelves faster.

Cons for Vendors

1. Increased Cost for Unsold Inventory

Since the inventory is still owned by the vendor, they still have to count it as part of their assessment of their costs.

The vendor may profit less the longer the inventory is held without being used or sold.

2. Uncertain Cashflow

Vendors won’t receive payment until after some or all of the goods are sold by the retailer. Goods that aren’t sold are usually returned to the vendor.

This makes cashflow uncertain and volatile since they don’t know when or how much of the goods will be sold.

Pros and Cons of Consignment Inventory for Retailers

Pros for Retailers

1. Lower Cost of Ownership

Retailers are able to draw upon consignment inventory to use it without owning it, which lowers their total cost of ownership and holding costs.

2. Minimal Risk

Retailers don’t have to pay for the inventory upfront, which allows them to use their capital to purchase and sell more established products while taking on minimal risk when carrying a new supplier’s brand.

3. Improved Cashflow

The retailer pays nothing to hold the goods and only pay their vendor once they sell the products. The retailer doesn’t have to worry about excess holding costs since the vendor still owns the stock until it’s sold.

This means the retailer can hold more consignment inventory at lower cost and not have to worry about stockouts or buying goods that won’t sell in their store.

Cons for Retailers

1. Increased Risk of Damaging Inventory

The longer the retailer holds the inventory, the higher the chances of it getting damaged during normal business operations (which usually means they’re obligated to buy it).

2. Increased Chance of Stock Count Errors

Consignment inventory should be “invisible” to most employees. Meaning, it should be handled like all the other inventory.

If it has to be managed separately from the other types of inventory and the retailer isn’t using an inventory management system designed for consignment inventory, they may experience costly inventory errors such as double counting and shipping delays.

How do you Make Selling on Consignment Profitable for Both Parties?

Cultivate Mutually Beneficial Relationships

Vendors and retailers can reap the biggest rewards from consignment inventory if they develop an honest partnership and work together to improve their processes and strengthen their supply chain management.

Vendors should assist retailers in any capacity possible, and retailers should work to sell their consignment inventory as efficiently as possible.

Create a Mutually Beneficial Contract

Carefully outline the responsibilities and expectations of each party, the length of time the retailer will hold the inventory, the prices of the goods being sold, who is liable in the event of damage on the retailer’s property, etc.

The more detailed and thorough your contract is the more transparent your business partnership will be, which will help mitigate possible disputes and disagreements in the future.

Use an Inventory Management Software Designed for Consignment Inventory

Not any inventory management system will work with consignment inventory.

An Excel or paper-based inventory management system will make collaboration between vendor and retailer slow and difficult.

Most inventory management software only handles on-site inventory and doesn’t account for consignment arrangements.

And a lot of businesses don’t work on consignment very often, which makes the process confusing, dissuading businesses from trying it out.

An optimal solution to these problems would be making an investment in an inventory management software that is designed to handle consignment inventory.

Ideally, the software should:

– Track the inventory sent to the consignee

– Track what inventory needs to be replenished at the consignee’s site

– Track what inventory needs to be ordered to replenish the consignor’s stock

– And make consignment inventory management as easy as possible

Fortunately, there’s a solution that can do all of this for you…

Start your free 14-day trial today

Amazon Seller Central vs Vendor Central: How to Choose

Posted on June 10, 2017 by

Amazon Seller Central vs Vendor Central: Which way should you go?

While the ecommerce landscape ebbs and flows there remains one constant we can’t escape (for now):

Amazon is the single most important platform you can be selling through if you want to stay competitive and profitable.

A 2016 study conducted by Bloomreach Inc., an internet marketing firm, revealed that 55{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of consumers use Amazon to search for products as their initial step on the buyer’s journey.

Those figures are up from 44{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} the previous year and the trend doesn’t seem to be slowing down.

Most wholesalers and retailers begin with Amazon’s Seller Central since it’s the most accessible platform when starting out, but at some point, you’re probably going to consider becoming an Amazon Vendor.

We want to help you make the best decision between the two, so we’ll share with you exactly what these platforms offer, the benefits and drawbacks of each, and how they can help or hinder your ecommerce business.

But first, let’s start by defining their differences.

What’s the Difference Between Amazon Seller Central vs Vendor Central?

The 2 primary ways to make money on Amazon: as a 3rd party seller (Seller Central) or a 1st party seller (Vendor Central).

Let’s take a look at exactly how these interfaces work and what they offer to you.

Seller Central

Seller Central is the interface that allows wholesalers and retailers to list their products for direct purchase from consumers. Amazon considers you a “marketplace” or “3rd party” seller and gives you nearly full control over your brand messaging and marketing.

If you’re selling 40 items or less, you can sign up for an Individual plan without a subscription fee, and you’ll simply be charged $0.99 per item sold plus other selling fees, which vary by category.

If you’re a fairly high volume seller, then you can sign up for the Professional plan which costs $39.99 monthly plus per-item selling fees, which vary by category.

Vendor Central

Vendor Central is the interface used by manufacturers and distributors to sell directly to Amazon. Instead of setting up a consumer facing list of your products, Amazon buys your stock in bulk and sells it for you.

You negotiate a price for your products with Amazon, then Amazon will send you purchase orders which you can fulfill by shipping your stock to Amazon directly. They handle the marketing and you pay a set co-op fee.

Vendor Central is currently invite-only, and Amazon usually reserves their invites for popular brands or big companies who have strong sales and a strong reputation in the market.

However, you can sign up for Vendor Express to begin selling wholesale to Amazon right away and you’ll get most of the same benefits. If you’re selling enough on either Vendor Express or Seller Central, Amazon may ask you to participate in Vendor Central.

Even though Vendor Central and Vendor Express are similar, there are some key differences that we’ll touch on a little later in this article.

For now, let’s look at the benefits of being a Seller vs. being a Vendor if you’re offered that choice.

What Are the Benefits of Seller Central vs Vendor Central?

When choosing which interface to use, or when trying to switch from one interface to the other, it’s critical to know exactly what you’re getting out of the deal.

Let’s take a look at some of the main benefits of Seller Central and Vendor Central, then afterward, we’ll take a look at the drawbacks of both.

Benefits of Seller Central

Price Control

You set your own prices and have full control on when and why you raise or lower them – allowing you to maximize your profits.

Customer Analytics

Seller Central provides a clean and robust analytics dashboard to help you forecast demand and understand your customer’s interactions with your products on Amazon.

Creative Marketing Control

Since you’ll have full control over your listing, you’ll have full creative control over marketing aspects such as what keywords are used, what videos are added, what pictures are displayed, and what strategies are implemented through Amazon’s premium advertising features.

Quick Payouts

Seller Central offers payments every 2 weeks which can be critical to your business if you suffer from lack of cash flow or your profit margins are very slim starting out.

Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA)

If you sell high volume and become a “pro merchant,” Amazon will give you access to their Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) program whereby they handle your shipping, customer service, and returns.

Benefits of Vendor Central

Amazon Vine Program

Amazon’s Vine program is mainly used for pre-released or new products and allows the top reviewers on Amazon to (hopefully) write great things about your products and give your listings a huge boost in credibility.

More Sales Right Away

Since Amazon buys your products in bulk, you’ll see a larger volume of sales faster than when you sell them one at a time as an Amazon Seller.

A+ Content

A+ Content is essentially an enhanced product listing that expands the basic description field and product images, displays a detailed video explaining your product’s features, provides a comparison chart and generally enhances the look and feel of your product for increased conversions.

Additional Marketing Tools

A+ Content isn’t the only marketing perk offered by Vendor Central, you also get access to Amazon Marketing Services, Amazon Display Advertising, and Amazon’s Subscribe & Save program that consumers use to receive your items on a monthly basis.

“Sold by Amazon” Seal of Approval

Established brands that sell on Amazon as a 3rd party retailer already have high credibility in the eyes of their consumers. But, if you’re relatively unknown, having Amazon put their stamp of approval on your products by displaying them as being “Sold by Amazon” will boost consumer confidence and make it more likely they will buy your product.

What Are the Drawbacks of Seller Central vs Vendor Central?

As many benefits as Seller Central and Vendor Central offer, they each have their own set of drawbacks that you should be aware of.

By contrasting the positives with some of these negatives, you’ll have a more balanced view on which interface best fits your business needs.

Seller Central Drawbacks

High Overhead

With complete control over your product listings comes complete responsibility for your stock maintenance, customer support, shipping, etc. While you can enroll in the FBA program if you’re not selling enough, you may be paying way more in overhead than the service is worth to handle everything until sales pick up.

Basic Product Pages

Unfortunately, if you’re not a Vendor you can only create basic product pages with basic descriptions and you miss out on longer, narrative descriptions, detailed product videos, and comparison charts.

Fierce Competition

Amazon sells well over 300 million products on their platform which creates a fiercely competitive environment for a new seller as much as an established one. You might even start competing with Amazon directly – if they observe a high-performing retailer, they’ll go directly to their manufacturer or distributor and buy wholesale and sell it themselves through Vendor Central if they can.

Vendor Central Drawbacks

Long Wait Times for Payments

Vendor Central pays its sellers after at least 60 days, but they could hold payment all the way up to 90 days, which can obviously hurt if you’re suffering from low cash flow.

Violations of MAP Pricing

Amazon has made it very clear that they don’t adhere to Minimum Advertised Prices and allow retailers, including themselves, to sell products below the manufacturer’s MAP requirements, which can cut into your profit margins if they decide to sell lower than yours.

Poor Seller Support

While 3rd party sellers have access to quick and easy support—since they’re required to manage their own listings—a 1st party seller has very little oversight or input into their product listings. Everything needs to be approved by your account manager, and if you’re not paying for Vendor Central’s extra services, you probably won’t receive preferential support treatment.

What’s The Difference Between Vendor Central vs Vendor Express?

Amazon’s Vendor Express program allows anyone to become a Vendor without being asked to join Vendor Central. It’s very similar to Vendor Central with a few key differences.

Since you may or may not be invited to Vendor Central, but still want to benefit from selling wholesale to Amazon, here are a few key benefits and drawbacks you should know about Vendor Express.

Benefits of Vendor Express

Pay nothing for your products to be warehoused by Amazon.
No wait to get started since it’s open to all sellers.
High turnover rates – so if you have a hot-selling product it could sell even faster through Vendor Express.

Drawbacks to Vendor Express

Net 90 payment terms.
You can only sell 85 items, while Vendor Central offers unlimited product listings.
Amazon is in complete control of how much they sell your products for.

So… How Do You Choose Between Seller Central vs Vendor Central?

If you’re a smaller brand that needs absolute control over your pricing and shipping to maximize growth, then Seller Central is right for you.

If you’re a bigger/quickly growing brand that wants to move a lot of product while letting Amazon manage just about everything for you – go with Vendor Central.

Regardless of which interface you choose, though, you’re going to need an effective system for managing your stock and inventory levels in order to be successful….

Ready to Optimize Your Amazon Business?

With seamless integration of your product listings with Amazon’s marketplace, automatic tracking of your sales, stock levels, and revenue, the right cloud-based inventory management software is an essential tool for the retailer or wholesaler who wants to have complete control over maximizing ROI and growth on Amazon.

Start your free 14-day trial of DEAR Inventory today!

Try DEAR for Free

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5 Proven Ways to Stop Shopping Cart Abandonment

Posted on May 27, 2017 by

Another casualty of shopping cart abandonment…

Did you know 69{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of online shoppers completely abandon their shopping carts before making a purchase?

That’s what the research says according to usability firm Baymard Institute.

Think about it like this:

Say 10 people walk into a grocery store, shop around for things on their list (and maybe a few things that aren’t – the bakery section is always calling!).

When all’s said and done in their shopping experience, 3 of them take their full carts to the checkout, smile as the cashier rings up their items, and pay the bill before heading home.

But for 7 of them, something happens between entering the grocery, starting to fill their carts, and the actual purchase.

Four of them were just taking a look around, they had some time to kill and thought they might like a snack; maybe they grabbed a couple things to think about them a bit, but ultimately they decided they weren’t that hungry and they needed to get a move on.

One of them put one or two items in their cart before checking Facebook, seeing their friends are meeting for drinks nearby right now, and deciding they don’t really need their items now – so they’ll come back later.

Another got all the way to the checkout line, but after waiting for 10 minutes in the crowded store with only 3 items to buy, they decide they’d rather just leave and come back later too.

And the last got all the way to checking out, but because the cashier gave them an unsavory look, they decided they didn’t quite trust handing over their money to them and just walked out.

Top Reasons for Shopping Cart Abandonment

In their study, Baymard makes it clear that 58.6{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of US online shoppers abandoned their carts within the last 3 months because they were “just browsing” or “not ready to buy”.

But these aren’t the shoppers you should be worried about – “browsing” is a millennia old part of the process, rooted all the way back in the hunter/gatherer days.

What you really need to know is why people who were ready to buy suddenly changed their minds.

Once you account for the “just browsing” segment, that last 10.4{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of abandoned carts is where you can actually make a difference in your sales.

And with research from BI Intelligence revealing approximately $4 trillion worth of merchandise is abandoned on a yearly basis – there’s a huge opportunity, as they also found that smart companies could recover 63{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of that lost revenue by streamlining their checkout process.

Top Reasons for Shopping Cart Abandonment or How to Grow Your Profits!

Based on testing of checkout processes from leading e-commerce sites – such as Walmart, Amazon, and Wayfair – Baymard found that 35{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of site owners can fight shopping cart abandonment by simply redesigning their checkout page.

Though you might not realize it, there are certain things you’re doing that might be scaring off potential buyers, and certain things you’re NOT doing that are psychologically proven to make buyers feel more comfortable with and confident about their purchases.

So, if you want to make more sales and keep more customers, then read on to discover our top 5 ways to reduce shopping cart abandonment in order of least to most effective!

5. Include Images of Products Throughout Checkout Process

This is a powerful way to keep the value of your products front and center in your customer’s mind (so powerful we added it to our list even though it wasn’t covered in Baymard’s research – free bonus!).

Think about the process of buying physical goods from a bricks and mortar store.

Throughout the entire shopping process, you’re subconsciously reassuring yourself every item in your physical shopping cart is a worthwhile by literally looking at it throughout your entire shopping journey.

Even if you don’t do it consciously (or that juicy pack of steaks is buried under all the other stuff you’re going to buy), you’re carrying each and every item with you the entire time, a subtle reminder that you’ve already committed to buying it.

And when you finally get to the checkout counter, you have to physically take all of your items out of your cart and watch them get scanned.

So how do you apply the psychology of these subtle commitments and reminders online?

The moment a customer clicks “add to cart,” you should reassure them it was successfully added in one of a few ways:

By displaying a number of total items in their cart (+ however many they just added)
By taking them to a “successfully added” page (like Amazon).
Or maybe even a small popup that confirms their item has been added and what else is already in their cart (like Amazon would do if changing its website didn’t cost billions of dollars).

Then, once they get to the checkout page, you should display a thumbnail version of the product picture.

Even if you have multiple checkout pages, keep the thumbnails of all their in-cart items listed on one side of the screen to act as a visual reminder of what they’ll get when they complete their purchase – so they’ll be less likely to allow a distraction keep them from getting the products they want from you!

4. Use Trust Badges on Your Checkout Page

18{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of shopping cart abandonment occurs because users don’t trust the website their shopping on with their credit card information.

Baymard found that many people believed certain pages were more or less secure than other pages; even if this isn’t technically true – for example, if your entire site is secured with HTTPS – most people don’t have the technical insight to understand exactly how your website security works.

So especially when it comes time to enter their credit card info, people will look for any signs that your checkout page is tightly secured with a recognizable trust badge.

As we just mentioned, a common way to signal a secure checkout is with HTTPs, an SSL certificate, and some sort of badge that signals your website is secured this way.

But while it’s most common, HTTPS/SSL isn’t the only way to tell your visitors you care about their security and privacy.

You can also install other security software such as Symantec, Comodo, or TRUSTe.

These go a long way in protecting your customer’s data and making your business look (and actually become) more legitimate.

While security should be a top concern for ecommerce companies, there are other forms of trust badge.

Visual Website Optimizer ran a test for one of their clients and found that by adding a simple trust badge that read “100{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} money back guarantee” they increased their conversion by 32.57{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3}.

While not website security related, money back guarantees still offer the peace of mind that comes with knowing if for any reason they don’t like the products they’ve bought, they can return them at little to no cost.

Ultimately buyers need their fears dispelled in order to feel comfortable enough to make buying decisions. So help them realize they’re making a good choice by using trust badges on your checkout page!

3. Reduce Checkout Form Elements

Baymard also found that 27{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of shopping cart abandonment occurs for a relatively simple reason:

The Checkout process is “too long/complicated.”

Their usability tests showed that the ideal checkout flow should be restricted to 12-14 form elements, yet the average amount of form elements used by US ecommerce sites was 23.

That means that by cutting their form elements in half, most site owners can see significant reductions shopping cart abandonment.

And, if you can, stop using multi-page checkouts; just like too many form elements can be overwhelming, so too is trudging through page after page just to get to the “order now” button.

Instead, try to condense your entire checkout process to just one or two pages, and if you must have multiple pages for checkout, use a progress bar that displays how far along your shopper is in their checkout journey.

Recent research from Statistic Brain suggests that humans now have lower attention spans than a goldfish – so each and every task you ask someone to complete is another second they’re losing interest and becoming more distracted.

Fewer fields to complete and “you’re almost there” progress bars can help keep them engaged while gently guiding them closer to the sale. And remember: by making your checkout process shorter, you’re making 27{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of online shoppers more likely to actually buy from you.

2. Ask Users to Register for an Account After the Sale, Not Before

35{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of shopping cart abandonment occurs because ecommerce sites make customers create an account in order to make a purchase.

Requiring a customer to create an account on your site before being able to make a purchase is sort of like a tax on their time – you’re making it more difficult for them to make a purchase without really adding value to their order (sure, next time it might be easier to purchase by logging in, but there won’t be a next time if there’s not a this time!).

Why lawmakers raise taxes on tobacco products (besides revenue)? To deter people from buying them.

Do you really want to deter potential customers from buying through from you?

We’d guess not.

So instead, offer a “guest account” option that streamlines the checkout process and makes it easy for the customer to buy first. Then, on the “thank you” screen, offer to create an account for them in order to make checkout even faster next time.

This is a win-win for 2 reasons:

You’ve made it easy to purchase from you at all.
You’re offering to make the checkout process even easier to purchase from you next time.

In a time and attention strapped world, easy sells.

And as an added bonus, by creating accounts and capturing emails from actual customers, you’ll be able to build an email list that you can turn into a valuable resource going forward.

1. Reduce Your Shipping Cost (aka Make It Free)

Well, you’ve finally made it to the last thing any business wants to do, even if they know it will increase customer conversion – lower their prices.

It’s a hard fact to swallow, but the biggest reason for cart abandonment is high hidden costs like shipping fees and taxes. 61{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of potential buyers will abandon their cart if you try to slyly tack on additional costs at checkout.

But as a smart,web-savvy business, you’re not going to do that (at least, not anymore).

The most important step to take here is to be completely honest about extra costs.

The moment your customer adds something to their cart, you should calculate tax and display it with their total. Being transparent beats being sneaky in the long run because you build trust before the sale – which makes that sale more likely – instead of breaking what trust you’ve built up right before someone is ready to buy, which results in losing both the sale and a customer.

The second step is to try and offer free shipping (even if it costs you).

The big ecommerce retailers have been doing it for so long it’s no wonder most consumers expect everyone, including small businesses, to follow suit; a 2011 Comscore study suggested that 61{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3} of consumers are likely to cancel their entire purchase if free shipping is not offered.

If you absolutely can’t afford free shipping for each and every one of your items, then create different bundles of products or have “free shipping on orders over $x” to make enough money to cover shipping on all products while still making a profit.

At the very least, offer free shipping for special holidays.

Either a 1-day or 1-week free shipping offer can easily spike sales during peak buying months.

Now as an added bonus, we have 1 more step you can take to reduce shopping cart abandonment:

Always have enough stock to meet customer demand.

Make Sure Shoppers can Fill Their Carts… Even if They’re Going to Abandon Them

One of the quickest ways to damage your reputation and bottom line is greeting would-be customers with the dreaded “out of stock” sign.

Are you able to easily and automatically track your products from raw good to sale in order to always have just the right amount of stock?

If not, you need a better way to manage your inventory: one that offers better metrics on your customer’s buying decisions while helping you keep a close eye on your inventory levels across your warehouses and sales channels.

Automate tracking, integrate product info with major ecommerce platforms, and keep track of your sales throughout the year with cloud-based inventory management software.

Ready To Take Back Control of Your Inventory?

Experience the automation and real-time reporting benefits modern cloud-based inventory management software offers by starting your free 14-day trial of DEAR Inventory today!

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Use Product Bundling to Grow Your Profits

Posted on May 6, 2017 by

Grow your customer base and increase average order size with product bundling!

Growing a business means growing sales, which can be done a few ways. A couple of go-to strategies include finding more customers and increasing your average order size.

Wouldn’t it be nice if you could do both at the same time, all while making your offerings more attractive than the competition’s?

Luckily, there’s 1 simple strategy that does exactly this:

It’s called product bundling.

Product bundling is the process of offering several products for sale as one combined product.

But is it actually an effective way to grow a business?

To test this, researchers in the Netherlands conducted a study to understand the effects of bundles on purchasing decisions.

Their study revealed that product bundling does, in fact, create an incentive for consumers to not only choose to buy from a particular brand (hard enough in and of itself), but even go so far as to switch from one brand to another (even harder).

So if the shop across the street offers a single slice of pizza, but you offer a slice paired with chips and a soda, customers are more likely to choose you over them.

But it’s not as easy as just throwing 2 or 3 products together and putting them on your digital or physical shelves… there a few things you need to know to make product bundling successful.

Read on to check out our 5 tips to start profiting from the power of product bundling quickly and easily.

1. Offer “Mixed Bundling” not “Pure Bundling”

When it comes to marketing, there are two types of bundles:

“Pure bundling” is when you ONLY offer a bundle, without offering those same products as standalone items.
“Mixed bundling” is when you offer standalone products AND a bundle of those products. It’s also the best type of bundle if you want more cash and customers.

2 researchers, Vineet Kumar and Timothy Derdenger, studied the sales of Nintendo’s Game Boy Advance and Game Boy Advance SP consoles, along with the games for both devices, between 2001 and 2005.

Essentially, they found that even though consumers may perceive the value a bundle (the Game Boy + a game) less than the individual components, they still bought MORE units of the bundle than of the individual products.

A driving factor behind this, though, was that consumers had a choice – they could either buy the bundle or buy the game and system separately; a “mixed bundle.”

When Nintendo offered a “pure bundle,” revenues decreased by 20{cb377218d5687e54e8ee9149518f87201a393a7c1db5e8076e9d750029ec0dc3}, meaning hardware sales fell by millions, and software sales fell by over 10. Ouch!

If you want to maximize your ROI from product bundling, make sure you clearly present both standalone and bundle options to your customers.

2. Offer Bundles That Make Sense

The key to great bundles is pairing related items together.

For example, a Christmas tree cookie cutter + box of cookie mix + frosting is a festive baking bundle. These products logically belong together and complement each other.

Some producers accidentally find themselves offering a “multi-pack” instead of a bundle.

In this example, a multi-pack would be a star cookie cutter + a tree cookie cutter + an ornament cookie cutter sold together. Since they’re variations on the same product, this isn’t the kind of “bundle” we’re talking about.

You also want to be careful not to offer totally unrelated items, like a 6-plate set + a mop.

Sure, they’re both “household items,” and you might use both in the kitchen, but they don’t match the “buyer’s intent.” When someone is thinking of buying plates, they’re thinking about how they’ll look when they serve dinner guests and if they’ll match their silverware, not how they’re going to clean their floors after everyone’s left.

If you want a quick way to find bundle ideas, search for products related to yours on Amazon, then look at the “frequently purchased together” section under a particular product’s listing.

With all the data Amazon has at its disposal, it’s a safe bet that they’re offering the items that are most likely to sell together, signaling to you which products you’ll be able to successfully sell in a bundle.

Learn more about crafting unique bundles to sell on Amazon here.

3. Create a “Bundle Brand”

An often overlooked value of product bundling is that it allows you to create a totally unique product, with a unique SKU, that your competition will find much harder to replicate.

Think about it this way:

There could be 20 sellers of selling plates that look like some you’re offering.

But fewer sellers could offer a bundle pack of plates and silverware that both look similar to those you could offer.

And if you create a special brand, a trademarked “collection” of dinnerware, copying you will be near impossible.

The more products you have in a category, the more possibilities you have to mix and match to create totally unique listings.

And the more likely your bundles will help you stand out from the crowd.

4. Sell on Bundle-Friendly Platforms

Recognizing the value of product bundling, the major internet retailers are very friendly toward product bundling and will gladly help you set up new bundles. But any well-established marketplace is great for testing different bundles to find a winning package.

So if you’re business’s ecommerce site is already generating a good amount of sales, the right plugins will help you test out new ideas quickly.

Here’s a bit more information on bundling using top ecommerce platforms:

Amazon

Amazon has a straightforward list of rules and recommendations for product bundling. Learn more about their policies and recommendations here.

Shopify

The Shopify app store includes an app that makes it easy to offer bundles just like Amazon’s “frequently purchased together” section, as well as discounts when customers buy them. Check out the app here.

Woocommerce

The Woocommerce Extension Store also features product bundling app similar to the one offered for Shopify, check it out here.

5. Track Bundle Sales and Adjust Accordingly

Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to read your customers’ minds and create product bundles you know they’ll buy?

Then be sure to collect data on their buying patterns!

To create effective bundles, you’ll want to collect customer data around:

What they buy separately
What they buy together
How often they’re buying
How much they’re willing to spend

Once you know all this, you can create bundles tailored specifically for your existing customers to grow your repeat business, as well as grow your average order size for new and existing business.

And don’t stop collecting that data!

Continue to track the success and failures of your product bundles and adjust them accordingly.

But how do you effectively track your sales and customer data?

With inventory management software that centralizes all your stock management and tracking under one hub, seamlessly integrates with multiple ecommerce platforms (including the ones we listed above), and gives you up-to-the-minute reports about your customers’ buying habits.

Ready To Profit from Product Bundling?

Experience the stress-free automation and integration that cloud-based inventory management software can provide your ecommerce business.
Start your free 14-day trial of DEAR Inventory today!!

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