By Maitén Milicich – Translated by Micheli
Member of Materialesdefabrica.com & Habitium.com
In an increasingly digitized world, e-commerce businesses are gaining momentum, and online advertising is one of the main tools you can use to promote your e-commerce.
If you want to make the most of online advertising to boost your e-commerce, follow this brief guide to learn all about it.
Before you start
Online advertising aims to spread the word about your website, but before these new visitors arrive, everything must be prepared. Below we will show you the points that should be taken into account when preparing an advertising strategy.
Preparation
A hasty or impulsive advertising strategy is the same as having no strategy at all, so time and planning are of the essence.
The goal of the strategy is the first thing you should consider, whether it is to get more traffic, introduce your website to a new audience, generate more sales, or boost your brand image.
It is a complex process that will need all your creativity and clarity because you will have to think about the message you want to convey, the visual elements you will use for this task, and the words that fit best.
Website
Your brand’s website must be flawless; it can’t have pages with errors, optimization problems, or questionable aesthetics.
The idea is that anyone who sees your advertising and enters the website will want to stay and buy, which you will achieve with a fast website, with good images, a nice color palette, and all the necessary information so that your customers can buy with peace of mind.
Brand
If you haven’t already done so, establish your brand image, what it will represent, what you want to convey, your logo, and colors.
When people look at your brand advertising, you want one element that ties everything together and sticks in people’s minds: your brand name and logo.
Market Research
The age, gender, and interests of the person you are trying to sell to will be some of the most important aspects you should consider as you are trying to get them to see your advertising.
With market research, you can plan the best strategies to reach them, using the most appropriate channels for your target audience.
Types of online advertising
After preparing your website, planning your marketing strategy, and studying your target audience, the next step is to decide which type of advertising will provide the best results.
Below we will describe the types of online advertising you can find.
Search Engines
Search engine marketing (SEM) is a form of digital marketing that involves increasing a site’s visibility in search engines’ results pages, such as Google, through either organic or paid tactics.
Organic SEM tactics include optimizing content and focusing on SEO (search engine optimization), while paid SEM involves buying ads, such as PPC (pay-per-click) ads, to attract more visitors to your website.
SEM can help promote your company and ensure your product is easily found online.
Social media
Social media platforms are a fantastic resource for making a brand known and a product more marketable. There are several types of platforms with different audiences, so market research is key. Advertising on Facebook will not be the same as advertising on Instagram or TikTok because the people who consume content on these platforms are different, and the formats are also different.
It is best to be present on all platforms. Still, the most important thing is to generate quality content with a specific frequency, entertainingly promote your products, and respond to comments and messages from potential customers.
Blogs
Writing relevant blog articles is a great way to promote your website without direct advertising, improving your visibility and resulting in potential conversions.
The idea is to look for blogs that might interest your potential customers, contact the webmaster, and ask for the opportunity to write for them.
Another option is to create a blog, which allows you to write directly to your readers and talk about your brand’s vision, industry trends, and valuable product tips.
When writing articles for a blog, it is essential to choose an interesting topic that is relevant to potential customers, create quality content, optimize it for search engines, promote the content on social media, respond to comments from readers, measure the results, and make sure to update the content regularly.
Email advertising is very effective. Generating an email list of people interested in the product is essential to create a successful strategy. The list can be created by asking for the email address to subscribe to the newsletter, offering a coupon with a small discount, or a benefit such as free shipping.
From there, create engaging emails with quality content, optimize the emails for different devices, segment the email list to send personalized content and targeted promotions, set an appropriate sending frequency, track email performance, and adapt efforts to increase conversion.
SEO
Whatever strategy we use to promote our brand, it is important to apply SEO techniques to everything, be it products on the page, blog posts, banners, and social media posts.
The content should be 100% optimized for search engines because the better your SEO strategy is, the easier the page will be to find on the Internet.
Many apps and websites can help you improve the SEO of your content, but you need to keep up to date as the rules change frequently.
Influencers
Advertising with influencers can increase the visibility of an emerging or established brand, but care must be taken when selecting influencers.
The influencer should be someone of interest to the potential buyer, have many followers, and have an image that matches the brand.
The collaboration should be coherent and not seem forced, so you should do some prior research and see the influencer’s experience with other brands. If you contact someone without experience, you should establish the guidelines and the type of advertising needed to satisfy both parties.
Advantages
The decision to invest in online advertising can be difficult if you don’t know its advantages. Here is a list of the main benefits.
- Constancy: its constant operation, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, will be working to provide more visibility for your business.
- Cost: its cost is significantly less than traditional advertising; it is customizable and, therefore, can be tailored to any company’s expenses.
- Reach: The reach of online advertising is much broader than traditional advertising and allows you to segment your campaigns to reach your target audience.
- Measurability: The performance of such advertising is easily measurable, so it is relatively easy to make changes that will help you to create a successful campaign.
- Time: The time required for advertising to show results is much shorter, and generating an online campaign or hiring an expert is significantly faster.
Conclusion
In summary, there are many ways to increase your e-commerce reach with online advertising. It’s complex work, but you don’t have to do it alone, as many experienced professionals have great ideas for your business.
Once you have found the combination of strategies that best suits your e-commerce, you will be ready to start building your brand and getting results.