6 Biggest Marketing Lessons From the Largest Online Retailers

Big league online retailer websites have spent millions on testing to improve conversion rates. During these experiments, it can be considered that some minor tweaking could result in an improvement in the order process. It can also be safe to assume that they are redesigning their e-commerce websites based on how visitors are expected to use the website.

Whatever the case, you should try to consider and even implement these ecommerce lessons to your own online store so you can also reap the same benefits, free of charge.

Here are the six biggest marketing lessons you need to know from the world’s largest online retailers:

Lesson 1 – Protect Your Customer’s Data

The privacy policy is not only for compliance obligations but, most importantly, to establish trust with your customers.

Identify what kind of information you need to collect from your visitors when they browse your site and from customers when they buy from you:

• Personally identifiable information like name, email, shipping address
• Payments and financial data
• Usernames and passwords
• Site analytics and behavioral tracking, using cookies

Then plan where you will store your customer data, how long it is kept, and how the data is used or shared with third parties.

Finally, alert your visitors to your privacy policy. Put your privacy policy in the footer of your homepage. Regularly reinforce it by providing privacy policy links in each email you send to your customers.

Lesson 2 – Minimize the Number of Checkout Pages

Make shopping easy for your consumers by eliminating unnecessary checkout pages. Removing redundancies can help improve your conversion rates.

Lesson 3 – Provide Free or Flat Rate Shipping

Offering free shipping is as good as providing a discount so make sure you have the information boldly displayed on your website, notably on the home, product, and checkout pages.

Results of studies have discovered an increase in average order value when e-commerce businesses placed “FREE SHIPPING” in the header of their websites.

Lesson 4 – Display Progress Through the Checkout Process

This is one of the biggest marketing lessons from the world’s largest online retailers that are proven effective.

Having multiple steps in your checkout process helps your customers in identifying where they are in the process. This should be implemented not only in your online shop’s checkout process but also on your lead generation pages.

Lesson 5 – Fees Should be Highly Visible to Consumers

Be transparent. Present all fees on product pages and not during the checkout process.

Lesson 6 – Offer a Multitude of Payment Options

If you cater to the international market, use geo-targeting to ensure you are showing the payment options suitable to a particular region.

Always think of your customers and their preferred payment method and offer those options in your e-commerce store.