11 OpenCart Tips To Boost Sales
Written by Corey Wilson in Articles on June 12, 2015 | No comments
Imagine if you could make one simple tweak to your website that would increase sales by 28%. Or even better, what if there were 11 of these tweaks and each one would lead to more sales for your online business? Would you implement them? Yes?
Well it’s a good thing we’ve created this easy to follow article outlining 11 simple and actionable tips to drive up your sales.
1. Add Product Review
Did you know that having reviews on your website can increase your e-commerce conversions 10 - 50%? You may be afraid to add a product reviews section because of the potential for negative reviews, but research shows that negative reviews are actually good. Imagine if you saw a product with nothing but positive reviews and 5 stars; you would probably think the reviews are fake. Furthermore, negative reviews give you an opportunity to provide visible customer service through your replies… just make sure you’re polite! Reports shows that 80% of shoppers now refer to the reviews before purchasing a product, so if your product reviews are lacking, it’s time to consider an enhancement.
OpenCart product review setting available at System > Setting > Option > Allow Reviews and make sure you enabled it.
Finally, if you want to take your customer service to the next ultimate level, consider setting up an autoresponder that emails the customer after a purchase asking them what they thought of the product and providing a link to the review page. This can be easily set up so it emails customers 2 weeks after the purchase, enabling ample time between purchase and delivery of the product.
2. Increase Page Rank With Manufacturer Links
Attaining Quality Backlinks might seem like a daunting and difficult task but there is an easy and accessible high quality backlink for every e-commerce website right at your finger tips! Simply contacting the representative of your product(s) manufacturing or distribution companies and ask them to link your website to the list of their authorized retailers. This is a highly effective technique that can drive your website up in Google quickly and help you attain the greatly desired “top spots” in Google.
3. Track SEO Campaign and Achieve First Page Rankings
The absolute best way to dramatically increase your online sales is to know where you rank for each of your traffic generating keywords in Google. This means your product, category and informations pages must be formatted in a way that make major search engines happy. Also, knowing where you rank every day on google for your search terms makes it easier to manage your SEO campaigns. Tools that can help you achieve that are Moz or the Opencart extension: SEOMatic.
Disclosure, SEOMatic developed by the author of this post.
4. Satisfy Your Customers With A Toll-Free Number
A toll free number can be an indispensable business asset, regardless of your company size. The benefits are numerous. Having a number makes it easy for your customers to reach you and let’s them know you’re a legitimate company. If you can’t afford a toll-free number, you could also add your regular business number. Make your number easily accessibly in the header of your website on every page - this will increase customers satisfaction and prevent loss of sales due to unanswered questions.
5. Show Credibility With A Picture Of Your Physical Store
In addition to having a phone number, it is also beneficial to add a picture of the store (inside or outside) to your contact page to let people know there is something tangible beyond the cyber world. Doing this will let customers know there is someone behind the e-commerce store ready to ship their purchased item.
6. Offer Immediate Gratification with Live Chat
Live chat has the same benefit of letting customers know there is someone behind the business. A live chat window is a cheaper alternative to having a 1-800 number. You can answer questions that people may have, in real-time. However, ensure that when you are not available you let people know your hours of operation.
According to Jane Paolucci, VP of marketing for Coremetrics, 68.5 percent of CompUSA customers chatted while browsing the site, and 32 percent chatted while in the shopping cart during the late stages of the buying process. “Out of that,” she said, “over 10 percent of those sessions convert to a sale, 10 times the average website conversion rate.” Paolucci says that only 28 percent of e-commerce sites are currently offering live chat.
7.Reward your Customers, and they will reward You!
Reward your customers with incentives and they will reward you with sales. The best way to motivate customer behaviour is to provide an incentive or reward for that motivation. One of the most common and proven tactics is to offer free shipping. In December 2011, comScore released the results of a holiday survey that reported 36% of online shoppers do not make a purchase online unless free shipping is offered. Another 42% of online shoppers said that free shipping was “somewhat important,” and actively sought out free shipping deals. So offering free shipping can immediately boost online sales, but it can also lead to larger orders if you say, for example, “Free Shipping on Purchases Over $75″.
Another strategy is to offer larger monthly product discounts, or smaller daily sales on alternating products. This will result in lower revenue per an item, but will lead to more sales over the long-term. According to http://www.statista.com , offering free shipping and online discounts are the top two incentives that led to more purchases during the holiday season.
Two more contributing factors to sales are the ability to return the item, as well as offering free returns.
8. Save Money with Email Marketing
According to http://www.custora.com customer acquisition via email has quadrupled over the last 4 years. Email Marketing has been a growing trend in e-commerce, with an increasing number of retailers building communities and collecting email addresses, then converting those “members” into customers. Leveraging in-store customers through email is a low cost form of marketing.
By implementing proper email marketing tactics one can increase website traffic and customer conversion rate as WeDo Technologies provided in a case study. All the testing and fine-tuning of their email campaigns has really paid off. WeDo Technologies sees an average click-through rate of over 20% for their email campaigns. As their understanding of their target market grew and their email marketing content became more targeted, they also saw an increase of 54% in traffic to their site. They’ve increased conversion to customer rate from email by 6.3X in the first half of 2014. Implementing an inbound focus to their SEO strategy has led to a 62% increase in new contacts generated through this source in 2013 and an overall increase of 93% in the generation of new contacts for the business.
9. Enhance your Site Security, Enhance your Sales
It is proven that EV SSL (Extended Validation Secure Socket Layer) Certificates boost sales and greatly improve credibility if they are added to every page. This lets the user know they are shopping within a highly secured and verified business. Furthermore, Google recently adjusted their algorithm to increase rankings for websites with SSL. Specifically, an EV SSL Certificate generates a green address bar that prominently displays your registered company name and provides a visual assurance to customers that your site is secure, immediately giving them the confidence to complete their transaction.
10. Get a Higher Conversion Rate with Trust Logos
Although it is documented that most users have little understanding of the actual technical security of web pages, instead, they mainly rely on what their gut feeling is telling them. It’s therefore recommended that you add visual clues known as “Trust Logos” which convey a perceived security.
According to a survey conducted at http://www.baymard.com the Norton logo was shown to be the seal which gave customers the greatest sense of trust when purchasing online, followed by McAfee, TRUSTe and BBB Accredited seals. Any of these are beneficial but if you want to go all in you may consider investing in three site seals: Norton SSL seal to indicate and encrypted connection, a McAfee seal to indicate a clean, non-infected “hacker safe” site, and finally either a BBB Accredited or TRUSTe seal for establishing trust in consumer relations.
For a case study implemented with a site called http://www.moderncoinmart.com , they did a split test to see if having a trust logo such as McAfee had any impact on sales. At the end of thirty days and 74,890 visitors later, the treatment website featuring the trustmark beat the control with a 14% increase in sales conversions, thereby, proving its benefit on the website.
11. Bridge the Gap Between Online and Brick-And-Mortar Channels
Last, but not least, according to http://www.bigcommerce.com brick-and-mortars that open an online store are making 28% more revenue via there online channel in six months. With this being said, it is important to make you website known to your current customers. Include a business card that has your website address with in-store purchases or even a deal to people that buy online. Additionally, having a website address makes it much easier for customers to share your web address through email and social media.
With all of this being said, know that you are in the right place. E-commerce is a big business and getting bigger every day. According to http://www.emarketer.com reports, Business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce sales worldwide will reach $1.7 trillion in 2015, increasing over 15% from 2014. This includes all products and services ordered or booked via the internet.
Remember, you don’t need to utilize all these tips at once. We broke them up into bite-sized actionable steps so you can do one at a time. So, start small. Pick one, implement it, and watch your sales skyrocket.
