E-commerce, besides being a massive industry with over $2 trillion in annual revenues and double-digit growth, is also one of the most influential ones around. With eCommerce platforms available for almost every product and service, the challenge that businesses face isn’t anymore about digitation or customer-experience but taking those services with the appropriate audience.
And no matter how great eCommerce developers you hire to create the greatest eCommerce platforms unless you have a large and loyal customer base, there is little chance of you making your identity in the market. But that is much easier said than done because no matter the service you offer, there is no way that everyone would want it. And so, it becomes essential that you recognize the audience that will form the core-customer base of your eCommerce store and around which all your business strategies will be designed. Here is how to recognize them:
Know your product/service
There is no way you can figure out your audience unless you first figure out the core competencies of your product or service. Instead of vaguely trying to create a universal product, you need to precisely answer questions like- what problem does your platform solve? Are you the sole service provider? If not, what differentiates you from your competitors?
Pick the demography
It is after you answer the above questions, you will realize that there is indeed a specific group of people that are most likely to be interested in your services. No, it is not that you won’t sell products to other people, it’s just that all your marketing efforts and resources should be focused on these specific groups for maximum ROI.
Profiling
This is possibly the most crucial stage of your marketing strategy, which largely determines the success or failure of any marketing campaign. After you have picked up your demography, it’s time for you to dig deeper and create different profiles to categorize all your existing and potential customers based on their gender, shopping frequency, categories of interest, among many other factors. This will help you to recognize different niche audience for all your different services, for whom you can implement different marketing strategies.
Don’t reinvent the wheel
A word of caution- in the quest to better understand your customers, don’t get overexcited and blow your resources out of proportion. You don’t need to figure out everything because the market already has certain trends that you can leverage without even thinking about it. Additionally, sometimes simply following your competitor’s successful moves can also save you a lot of time and efforts and help you gain quick profits.
Also Read: Magento vs. WordPress: Comparing Two Top Content Management Systems
Target influencers
There are two kinds of customers- 1. Those who quietly shop and stuff up their closet; 2. Those who shop and post pictures and reviews all over social media talking about their shopping experience with all their contacts. It is these second types that you need to target to reach to larger audiences. Since customer acquisition remains one of the challenging and expensive tasks, you can offer these influencers some incentives to spread the word and get you more customers that will be more compelled by their friend’s recommendation than by any other advertisement.
Surveys & feedback
The best way of figuring out the opinion your customers have for your platform is to simply ask them. Surveys and feedback, though one of the oldest marketing tools, can still bring immense value to your overall business understanding and pave way for your future endeavors.
