By Rodney Laws.
While lockdowns and quarantine restrictions drove online shopping to an all-time high, as the world starts to open up again it’s important that ecommerce businesses prepare and adapt. These are five of the most important things for online stores to focus on post- COVID.
Establishing a clear brand identity
As more and more online stores have opened up during COVID and ecommerce continues to grow, it’s crucial that your shop can stand out from the competition. Establishing a clear brand identity is going to help you differentiate yourself and build up awareness of your online store.
With so much choice when your target customers are shopping online you want your store to be instantly recognizable so that it sticks in people’s minds.
To effectively establish your brand you need to do some research into your target market and your competition, identify your values and mission and also incorporate your business’s personality. You then need to outline your brand and put together brand guidelines that cover everything from your logo and brand colours to the messages and tone of voice you want to use.
Brand guidelines will help you to be consistent across all aspects of your business such as your content marketing and social media posts so that everything has a clear brand identity that your target customers and existing customers will be able to recognize.
Streamlining operations
People’s expectations when it comes to online shopping are continually increasing — they expect websites to be easy to use, a simple checkout, speedy delivery, and convenient returns. With so many online stores out there now, if any part of the ordering or delivery process is too difficult or takes too long, then your shoppers are likely to go to one of your competitors instead.
Post-COVID you need to look at ways in which you can streamline your operations and make sure that they can scale as your business grows and orders increase.
One of the key aspects is to make sure you’re using the right ecommerce platform to run your store. It needs to have all the right tools and features so that you can effectively manage your website, process and track orders, and monitor inventory levels.
If you need to upgrade your ecommerce platform then two good options are Shopify and Squarespace. They offer all the essential tools, the ability to customize your site, as well as additional plugins and features that can help you with things like customer service and marketing.
Omnichannel strategy
Focusing on omnichannel marketing is another key way to ensure you give your customers the best possible experience with your brand and stand out from the competition. Shopping needs to be a seamless experience across every channel and device and it needs to be as convenient and simple as possible for people to make a purchase.
This means that if someone comes across your brand when they’re scrolling through social media on their phone, they can easily click through to buy your products. If they don’t buy straight away, the next time they’re on their computer they’ll see a targeted ad for the product so they can pick up where they left off.
As people’s buying journey becomes more fragmented, it’s important that you’re focusing on catching people on whatever platform, channel, or device they’re using.
Building strong relationships with customers
Once someone has made a purchase from your online store it’s important that you build up loyalty so that they’ll keep coming back. They have so much choice when shopping online that providing a great shopping experience isn’t enough, and many people will just look for the best price for an item if they have no connection with a particular brand. You need to follow up with your customers, stay connected, and provide them with more value that ensures the next time they buy from you again.
Post-COVID you can focus on customer retention by encouraging shoppers to create an account with your store, improving customer support, and following up after they’ve purchased.
You should encourage shoppers to sign up to your mailing list so that you can send them relevant products or promotions that encourage them to come back again. Use an email marketing tool like Hubspot or Mailchimp to streamline the process. Setting up a loyalty program is also a good way to increase customer retention and it can motivate them to purchase more often to earn rewards. You can use a platform such as Kangaroo to create a loyalty program that’s simple to run and easy for customers to use.
Focusing on building up customer loyalty and increasing retention is going to be important post-COVID as online competition increases and shoppers have so many different options.
Planning for future disruption
Many businesses were caught off guard at the beginning of the pandemic because everything changed overnight. Now it’s important that your online store focuses on planning for future disruptions and crises. Your plans should cover:
- Handling disruptions to supply chains and operations
- Communications strategy for keeping customers informed
- Key staff and business operations you need to keep things running
- How to effectively operate remotely
- Monitoring customer trends and reacting to them
Going forward your online store needs to be flexible and reactive so that you can easily adapt when things change and stay competitive in a crowded market.
Post-COVID online stores are facing a lot more competition and tighter profit margins, so it’s important that you focus on improving the way you run your business so that you can streamline operations and offer a great service. But you also need to be focused on your customers — building up a strong brand that sticks in people’s minds and establishing loyalty with shoppers is going to be key to succeeding as things go back to normal.
Feature Image Credit: Pexels
By Rodney Laws
Editor at Ecommerce Platforms www.ecommerceplatforms.io
