Selling Online. Surviving The Retail Apocalypse

Are you selling online?

Everyone’s talking about the retail apocalypse and how to survive.

If your products and services are not being sold online, you may have to consider a website overhaul. Did you know that many of our most familiar retailers here in the U.S. are closing hundreds of stores? According to Google, 50% of Google searches are done on the go using a mobile device. That’s more than 20,000 search queries per second!! Those are a lot of potential shoppers.

 

If you’re not selling online yet, don’t worry.

 

There are plenty of options available to get your products and services into a secure online shopping environment. It’s really a very inexpensive addition to a website that can make the difference between fly and flop. But putting your products and services online for purchase isn’t the end of the story.

 

Brick and mortar shops really need to buckle down and analyze their customer base and what appeals to them now. Brick and mortar stores should decorate accordingly both on and offline and even offer entertainment options while shopping. Things like videos, “try me on” software, games or sharing discounts are just a few ideas. Staying relevant and attractive to your demographic is more important now than ever with digital retailing.

 

Businesses who don’t actively engage in the modern online world of social media, genre networking, local business meetups, search engine optimization and submissions and regular blogging or posting to keep content fresh are still going to feel the pinch. Like it or not, these have become necessary components to the retail industry and for some, these concepts are very unfamiliar.

 

There are quite a few options available to achieve the online presence necessary to succeed in today’s retail climate, however, they can be confusing for newcomers. Achieving higher traffic with a top listed site is one of the first objectives but keep in mind that what visitors find when they get there is equally important to consider. Free or low rate web, blog or post designers will likely increase your bounce rate… sending potential sales back to Google. Design is key!

 

There is a lot to say about proper design, visitor flow, text and image optimization, size, placement and even shape and color combinations matter a great deal. Taking the time and effort to ensure a pleasant appearance and visitor flow will determine campaign results directly. Think of your website as the first welcoming face that your business shows others. What would it say? Should it be in jeans? A suit jacket?

 

If you don’t have the business for a full website, selling one or two products through an already successful brand like Facebook, Ebay, Amazon or Etsy are also alternatives. Many better established businesses also use them for flash sales to gather analytics for their site and social media accounts.

 

As always, if you need help with anything related to website flow, coding, website design, social media headers and icons, ecommerce, security or analytics give us a call at Eliyahna.com (530) 683-5463 for web development projects in Tucson Arizona and worldwide.