'Mobile e-commerce sales reached $2.2 trillion in 2023 and now make up 60% of all e-commerce sales around the world.'

- Statista Marketing Insights

A screen-frantic society

The world has moved online - socially and economically - for the most part. Many businesses have struggled to adapt to this change, but not yours if you put the time and effort into learning the essentials of online marketing, an absolute must for any retailer. When used effectively you can build up consistent traffic to your website through your social media channels, blogs, and general website SEO (Search Engine Optimisation). Click here to read up on SEO in more detail - it's really not as complicated as it sounds. And keep reading for some easy tips and sources that will aid in expanding your knowledge so that you can sell the best My Ameego products with the utmost confidence in your online shop.

Research, research, research

'Research is what I'm doing when I don't know what I'm doing.'

- Wernher von Braun, Aerospace Engineer

Whether you're setting up a new shop or building the online presence of an already-established business, it doesn't change the fact that the most important aspect of your online marketing strategy is the time and dedication put into the research. Thorough research of your market will help you understand what will be the most and least successful methods of your personalised content delivery. Think of it like this: everything is always planned; you do not approach this blindly as you might as well be throwing your budgeted marketing money straight into the bin.

Digital marketing can be daunting, and can seem like a completely different world away from more old-school, traditional sales and marketing tactics. The likes of Amazon and Alibaba have drowned out lots of wholesalers and independent retailers, so now is as good a time as any to read up on different online marketing strategies and really get to grips with how they can benefit your business.

Social media and insights, your new best friends

The kings of creating free content: Facebook, Instagram, X and TikTok are the primary vehicles for online marketing, and you can use them organically which means that you don't have to spend a penny if you don't want to. If you target the right keywords, hashtags and follower audiences, alongside creating engaging content, then you will be able to generate free traffic to your site which is as good as it sounds, free! 

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What are the benefits of organic traffic coming through to your site? This can include improving the awareness of your brand, building relationships with new and old customers, and generating leads through your online content just to name a few. Look at this in more detail here.

Alternatively, you can utilise paid social media ad campaigns in which you can refine, tailor and edit your audience reach based on things such as user demographics and interests. However, without intricate market research your paid ads might not perform as well as you might've hoped them to, so make sure your strategy is ironclad first and don't release a campaign until you've exhausted all of your data collecting brain power.

The majority of popular social media platforms nowadays allow you to choose if your account is for personal or business use. Have you ever been curious as to what the 'insights' and 'analytics' tabs are at the bottom of social media posts? These are inbuilt tools to help you see how your content was and is received. From clicks to impressions to more detailed breakdowns of user engagements, you can use these tools to understand what content is and what content isn't working for your online approach.

Originality and brand narrative

Nobody likes a copycat. It shows a lack of consideration, passion and knowledge which can severely dent your brand reputation. That's not to say that you can't take inspiration from other brands and look into the marketing strategies of your competitors, because you really should be doing that (like a lot of that). If you want your brand to stand out then you have to be original - whether that be the uniqueness of the products that you sell, or the type of content that your brand delivers online.

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A lack of strong brand narrative can potentially cause your company to look clumsy, spontaneous and unorganised. The roots of your company are everything, and your audience should be able to see that, online and offline. You definitely do not want to appear as confused because confused customers very rarely make purchases, so make sure your company narrative is clear and concise.

Choosing the right website builder and mastering the back-end

The flashy front-end of your website means nothing if the back-end is a tangled mess. The back-end of your website should be monitored daily, preferably by a member of staff skilled in website maintenance. Errors on the back-end can lead to a loss of sales, customer complaints, and more trouble if it is not harnessed properly and in perfect sync with the front-end. Click here if you want to dive into the pros and cons of different website builders further so that you choose the best fit for your kind of business.

For those of you who might be slightly more inexperienced when it comes to this, Shopify is a great introductory option as they make it very beginner-friendly and easy to use, which can save you from the possibility of hiring more staff to be solely responsible for the upkeep of the entire website.

Product presentation

It comes as little surprise that pretty things sell well, but product photography and image manipulation is tricky and more often than not better left to the experts. This is vital, for e-commerce in particular, as you are selling in much larger quantities than most other retailers. No matter how many products you have on your website, you must ensure that the imagery used for every product or product variation is professional, inventive and crisp if you want it to stand out from the rest of the crowd.

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…help?

It's normal to feel overwhelmed and bogged down by all of this at first, so don't worry if it all seems a bit much. Instead you can enlist the help of colleagues, or even branch out to a digital marketing agency that can help you understand your online marketing approach a bit better. Depending on the size of your business, it is worth considering the scalability of online marketing as a whole and if you will need to hire a dedicated, specialist team of staff who are responsible for all of the above and more. It might not seem like a serious, purposeful job at times to lots of people, but once you start to become more engaged with it you will wonder why you weren't dedicating more time to this before.

Get the ball rolling

What better time to set up your online store than right now with Halloween just around the corner and Christmas already well on its way? My Ameego can help get you started with our impressive range of seasonal products, and if you want something that we don't have then give us a call and we'll be able to source if for you at no extra cost. If you haven't already it wouldn't hurt for you to sign up for our newsletter, too, so that you are always kept up to date with the latest My Ameego company news, insights and products.

See, Ameegos, learning can be fun...