Many people, often unfamiliar with the realities of the Internet, try to build their businesses. This number has increased, particularly in the last two years, when a large part of the business had to work remotely. Unfortunately, many of them, after the initial enthusiasm, now ask: why doesn’t anyone buy in my online store? There can be several reasons why an online store does not sell.
Online business offers considerable opportunities, but starting only an online store is not a guarantee of success. Certain factors can determine the success of an online store and any other eCommerce business. You can successfully sell virtually any product on the Internet by taking specific actions to support sales, though.
So why do a sizable part of online stores disappear from the market soon after opening? In most cases, the answer is simple: The owners of these stores do not use internet marketing tools. Or if they do, they do it ineffectively. There are two types of situations in which the online store does not make money.
Customers do not visit the store or do not know it
Many people who think about starting their store misperceive the functioning of e-commerce. We are talking mainly about people without knowledge of e-commerce and marketing. They may consider a career in the style of Jeff Bezos is open to them. They have a great product, and their friends told them they would buy their products. That means success is their destiny, right?
No. I am so sorry, but reality often paints a different scenario. A fledgling store owner connects with suppliers, creates a store page, lists products in stock, and waits for his e-commerce fortune dream to come true. Unfortunately, this scenario does not come true. There is anger and questions about why the online store is not selling.
The online store is not a greengrocer in the neighborhood
They don’t fulfill a dream of a profitable business because beginners often perceive an online store as if it were a store from a recognizable retail chain located in the center of the neighborhood. One of the residents will always come here. And yet the Internet is not a neighborhood. It is impossible to hang a sign above the door with information about your store. On the Internet, digital marketing tools serve as a signboard and SEO as a street.
No SEO optimization
Search engine optimization is a priority step in developing an e-commerce business. If you just opened your store in a very competitive industry, it will be hard to appear in a good position in Google Search Results. Big players such as Amazon, eBay, and OLX occupy the top 5. You can get into the top 10 or top 20 if you will be good enough.
The right SEO strategy will help you attract customers to your store. In the future, of course.
Remember that SEO activities cover various areas you should include, e.g., technical optimization of the website, building a backlink base, or creating appropriately optimized content.
It is worth mentioning that you should not expect effects immediately. Optimization is a process whose first effects are noticeable only after a few months. Despite optimizing your website, your page may not be visible on Google. It happens when you conduct SEO rashly.
No content marketing activities
Although content marketing is often considered one of the SEO tools, I found it worth mentioning this form of promotion as an independent area of digital marketing. After all, the content marketer and SEO specialist are almost always two different people.
Content marketing is about creating diverse and valuable content to share with your potential clients. Importantly, you provide it for free. Thus, content marketing helps to build brand loyalty, but blog articles supporting SEO activities are equally popular.
When running a store, you should reach for content marketing because the Google Search Engine is one of the primary sources of obtaining knowledge. And content marketing is a great way to educate a potential customer. By publishing content on a blog or YouTube channel, we can pass on valuable knowledge to customers and thus make them want to make purchases in our store in the future.
When it comes to specific content activities, it is worth reaching for such formats as:
- blog articles,
- infographics,
- video materials,
- podcast.
A great way to distribute content is through social media; therefore, you should actively use these channels. Of course, you should check beforehand which social channels your potential clients use.
No advertising activities
Contrary to SEO, advertising is a tool that allows you to reach specific groups of recipients immediately, also those who are ready to purchase the product. It is worth using one of the paid forms of promotion, such as Google Ads or Facebook Ads. If you implement the campaigns correctly, they will increase sales in the store.
And maybe it’s also worth looking around for other channels where you can advertise products from your store. Online advertising specialists are increasingly looking at platforms such as TikTok, Spotify, and Tinder.
Customers go to the store page, but for some reason, they don’t buy
There may be situations when potential customers end up on your store’s website, but, for some reason, they don’t purchase. There may be many possible reasons for this. Below are the most popular ones.
Your online store is not responsive
Slightly more than half of the Internet users make purchases on the Internet using a smartphone. You might be a laptop or a big-screen computer enthusiast, but people are diverse. Imagine how much you lose when smartphones have problems displaying your website. Angry users choose to buy from competitors.
The store is slow to load
Today’s internet user is impatient. Google has investigated the relationship between page load time and the number of users leaving the page, and the results leave no doubt. Research has shown that 53% of mobile users renounce a page that takes more than 3 seconds to load.
To improve the speed of a website, start by diagnosing the reasons for its slow performance. For this, you can use Page Speed Insights and Gtmetrix.
The purchasing process is non-intuitive
You’ve also probably gotten angry while watching a product you wanted and couldn’t buy. Maybe it was impossible to buy it because the store was unreadable. It happens often – we want to add a product to the basket or go to the checkout, and the website is so non-intuitive that we cannot find the right button. It causes an increase in the cart abandonment rate.
Discouraging product pages
Remember that online customers buy with their eyes. Unfortunately, unlike traditional stores, there is a limited experience for the product here. Unfortunately, he cannot touch it, so you have to appeal to his imagination in another way. The text is not sufficient. Show him the best photos and graphics you can! You can also embed a link to a YouTube video.
Remember to play with the client’s emotions, problems, and desires. Make your product description touching.
The product sucks
In every industry, some products are more popular than others. Theoretically, a given store may be filled with them. Maybe the quality of the products is low, or the pricing policy is absurd.
Fortunately, you can solve this problem easily. It is enough to analyze the market using the following methods:
- Trend analysis using SEO tools – we can check what phrases users enter in Google;
- Tools for sales analysis on popular portals, e.g., eBay, and Amazon;
- Newsgroup & Forum Review – you can do online customer research where they are looking for answers.
Too much competition?
According to what I wrote at the beginning of the article, I believe that by skillfully using digital marketing tools, you can successfully sell in any industry. Even the most competitive. Of course, due to high competition in the market, sales may be slightly lower and making it necessary to lower the margin. But competition should not result in no sales in the store.
Conclusion
As you can see, there may be several reasons for the lack of sales in the online store. It is worth analyzing your situation meticulously to identify specific reasons for the lack of sales and strive to eliminate them. The tool that will enable such analysis will be Google Analytics. It allows for a detailed examination of what is happening in your online store.
I am convinced that the analysis of all the above-mentioned factors will help answer the question of why nobody buys in my online store.
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