Creating a Shopify store is just one part of the online selling journey. After your store is set up, promoting it is the next step. To do this successfully, you need various promotional channels to bring targeted traffic to your site.
Choosing the right channel for your Shopify business will depend on various factors, including your available time, budget, and personal interests.
The right sales channel can help your Shopify store grow and bring in additional revenue; however, using the wrong channel can quickly turn your business into an expensive time-sink.
This article will walk you through different promotional channels to help your Shopify store find new customers and increase sales.
Let's dive deep into this topic.
The Importance Of Choosing The Right Promotional Channel
Before we get into the different promotional channels, I want to discuss why it's essential to use the right channel for your business.
The beauty of building a Shopify store is that you can quickly and easily sell products. However, just throwing up a website isn't enough to bring customers in through your virtual doors.
You'll need some method of driving traffic to your site before customers will buy anything from you. This is where promotional channels come into play. Promotional channels are marketing vehicles designed to attract consumers interested in the type of product or service you offer. For example, if you sell fashion accessories on Shopify, Pinterest would be an excellent promotional channel since its users love fashion.
Finding the right promotional channel for your business can be challenging. Not all channels are good choices for every Shopify store, so you'll need to do some research before you get started.
Budget
When it comes to ways to promote your Shopify store, there are many different options out there. However, not all promotional channels are created equally.
Based on pricing and performance expectations, some promotional channels offer more value than others. Some low-value promotional channels (that many consider free) usually require a lot of traffic before they become effective.
This makes it common (yet highly ineffective) for Shopify store owners to jump from channel to channel as they test various strategies.
This approach can be resource-intensive since you'll need to invest time and effort in getting traffic from these sources. If these investments don't result in conversions or sales, then you may end up wasting a lot of time without achieving the business results that you're looking for.
On the other hand, if you have a budget to test sources to promote your Shopify store, you can avoid this scenario by focusing on channels with a better return on investment (ROI). For example, Google Ads offers a great value proposition because users can assign ads to show up when potential customers look for specific keywords.
Once you find higher-value promotional channels, you'll need a lower amount of traffic before this converts and becomes effective (when compared to other channels). This makes it easier to get better results with a lower time and money investment.
Keep in mind that this all depends on your market and your budget.
Promoting Your Shopify Store
With all of that out of the way, let's look at the various promotional channels that you can use to drive more traffic and increase sales for your Shopify store.
Organic Social Media
This is by far the most popular promotional channel for Shopify stores. Unfortunately, it's also one of the least effective due to the large number of businesses competing for consumer attention on social media.
However, consider sharing Facebook and Instagram content if you want to get started with a low-risk strategy. These services offer free page management tools, and they both have huge audiences, so building an audience over time is a great idea.
Organic post promotions on these networks work, but it does take a long-term plan and consistent effort to get any traction.
Paid Advertising
When paying for ads on social media, it's essential to be on top of what you're doing.
The channels themselves are great, but the cost of customer acquisition is usually high. The great thing is that you can test various strategies on these channels, so it's common for Shopify store owners to use these channels to get traffic to their site.
Both Google Ads and Bing Ads offer a great solution to Shopify business owners, allowing them to offer solutions to people's problems.
These services also offer great ROI because they provide helpful ad analytics that show the number of clicks your ads are getting and how many people visit your website from each campaign. These insights help you make changes to improve performance over time.
SEO
This is another one of the most popular promotional channels for Shopify stores, and it can be an effective way to get started with selling products on your online store.
The cost of customer acquisition is usually low compared to PPC ads since your site will get shown organically on the search results, but it does take time to start appearing at the top of search engine result pages.
With that being said, you can improve organic search engine results over time to target customers even better simply by creating content that answers the questions of your target audience.
If you're ready to drive SEO traffic and aren't sure where to start, consider hiring an SEO expert to help your online store rank better in the search engines.
Search engine optimization goes well with many other marketing strategies, as you can use the content you'll be creating for your target market on various other promotional channels.
Email Marketing Campaigns
Consider email marketing if you want to promote your online store using a tried and tested approach.
This approach has the potential to offer one of the highest ROI because your audience would be highly targeted, and you can send promotional messages at any time - typically at no extra cost per email. When you create great content that helps people answer their questions and solve their problems, they'll become subscribers, happy to open your emails when you have something new to share.
As a general rule, most Shopify store owners see the best results from email marketing when they have a large audience of genuinely interested people in what they have to offer - which means that now is a great time to start building your list.
Once you have several subscribers, they'll be more than happy to open your emails, and you'll be able to convert them into paying customers.
At this point, you might be wondering how you can grow an extensive enough subscriber list. One approach is to create great content that helps others and drives potential customers straight back to your website. When people realize they can get genuine help by going directly to your site, they will also subscribe with their email address to avoid missing any future updates.
The beauty of this method is that you can also set up automated follow-up sequences that get people back to your site for extra sales using email marketing automation workflows.
In a nutshell, if you want to promote your Shopify store, then providing valuable follow-up while keeping your leads warm is the best way to go.
Referral Marketing
While this will take some time to get the ball rolling, a referral program can effectively promote your Shopify store to get more sales.
This approach is all about encouraging people who love what you have to offer and want others to benefit as well, so they will end up building social proof for your online store in the process.
Creating a great product or service will make attracting first-time buyers and friends of those buyers much more accessible. Still, it's also essential to treat those customers like royalty by offering them something special as a reward when they help you spread the word about your store.
Affiliate Marketing
Finding products that align with what your Shopify store offers can be a great way to generate additional revenue.
Shopify affiliate marketing can be a practical approach because it allows you to earn commissions whenever someone makes a third-party purchase through your link. It's not uncommon for people familiar with this approach to promote several different shops to diversify their income while building goodwill with their audience through the solutions they provide.
If you're going with affiliate marketing as one of the ways to help promote your store, you can speak to the vendors whose products you're promoting and ask them to do the same for you.
This means that they'll promote your store by placing your links on their site, driving traffic to your store in the process.
Moreover, ensure that affiliate tracking software is correctly installed and used to track your links accurately. This will not only help you avoid broken links, but will also provide an accurate performance report for each of your promotional partners.
Influencer Marketing
Having influencers promoting online stores can be a great marketing strategy for online store owners.
While working with influencers might seem like a straightforward process, finding the right ones to work with is critical. These people can make a big difference to your success.
There are many different ways to approach this method, and the most important thing is finding what works best for your business type.
It's also worth noting that these types of partnerships aren't just about paying for tweets, YouTube videos, or Instagram posts promoting your product. Instead of focusing on quantity, you should be creating quality content together to maximize both parties' value.
Getting started with influencer marketing isn't always easy because you will need to build relationships before anything else happens. This means reaching out to famous people on social media with an audience similar to yours. This will help ensure their followers are, on some level, interested in your products or service.
With that being said, it's essential to be patient and build the right relationships with relevant influencers and bloggers. Having a solid rapport before making the initial ask can go a long way.
Content Marketing
You can't just create a Shopify store and expect people to find it organically - not anymore, at least. Content marketing is all about understanding how your target audience thinks, feels, and behaves so that you can provide them with something that they genuinely want.
For example, if you're looking to promote an eCommerce store as an affiliate and create an article on how to use this type of product, it makes sense to link out to this store through your affiliate link.
At the same time, you need to be careful not to spam your audience or overwhelm them so much that they'll start avoiding your posts. This means only referencing external websites that provide a ton of value rather than getting a quick sale.
Also, ensure that your content provides actionable steps that your audience can act on - nothing drives your value in customers' minds as when you help them get over something they're struggling with.
Essential Factors To Consider When Marketing Your Shopify store
While the above marketing channels all work when properly used, there are a few things that you should be taking into account before deciding on which ones to use.
Let's have a look at these factors.
Target Audience
The main thing you should be looking to do when it comes to marketing your Shopify store is getting in front of the right people while also ensuring that they are interested in what you have for sale. This means getting specific about who you would like to attract while using the appropriate keywords, hashtags, and even email lists.
Remember that not everyone will want to jump onto your bandwagon early on - this doesn't mean that they won't see your business later down the line. It just means that there's no point in trying to push them into buying something before they're ready. This applies to any business you want to run - both online and offline.
Another factor worth thinking about is how responsive your intended audience is to marketing messages - you might find that they respond well to blog posts but not so much when exposed to Facebook ads or even retargeting ads. This means that you need to be flexible in how you interact with them and understand why they are responding the way they do - being able to optimize your Facebook advertising strategy is key to long-term success.
Competition
When it comes to making sales, you always want to compete on an even playing field; however, this won't happen if everyone has more experience than you. This could be down to the fact that they offer something that you can't (yet), have a better offer, or are better marketers.
Focusing on differentiating yourself from the competition and ensuring that people know exactly who you are and what makes your business unique is the way forward.
Getting an edge over your competitors is easier said than done, of course - especially if they have more experience than you do. However, don't give up even if this is the case because you never know when someone will make a mistake and slip up. If this happens, then there might be an opportunity for you to step in and take a bite of the cake - all you need to do is make sure that you're ready for when the moment comes.
Products
Having a wide range of products is excellent for a business, but it can also have negative implications if it is too complicated.
While some businesses might be able to handle this, most stores do best when they focus on selling a few items. This helps generate more income for you and your staff because it allows everyone to become experts in these products - an essential requirement if you're running an online store.
The more products you have on sale, the more you need to think about promoting them. Just throwing these products on your website and hoping that they're going to sell isn't the best option; instead, it's better if you take some time out to focus on each product individually - this includes writing content that is aimed at helping people understand why they should buy these items.
Not only is it essential to promote these products after writing this content, but you also need to think about how people can find them. This means that you need various tools that will help customers discover new items - for example, having great headlines and descriptions is a must.
Trustworthiness
Building trust is another factor that you need to pay attention to when promoting your store - whether this is building up a rapport with customers or making sure you go above and beyond their expectations. Without this, nothing else will matter because even if they bought something from you, they'd wonder if they've made the right decision and might end up asking for a refund.
Trust is a process that takes effort and is often something that you need to build up over time - meaning that it's crucial to provide several different types of content, especially if you want to connect with those who visit your website or come across your social media profiles.
Pricing
If you're selling affordable products, this makes marketing your store a lot easier. This is because people are more likely to buy from you if they can spend less money.
Of course, there's no point advertising low prices if people don't believe that your products will solve their problem - this is where trust comes in again. After all, nobody likes to be played for an idiot.
However, when it comes to having lower prices, it's worth noting that price isn't always the main aspect buyers consider in some cases. If customers know exactly what you sell, understand why you're offering it at a specific higher price and the benefits that this brings them over time, then having a higher price tag might work in your favor.
Conclusion
As you can see from this article, there are many ways to promote a Shopify store. It's essential to experiment with the different promotional channels and strategies to determine which ones work best for your business.
There is no simple solution for improving conversions, but rather it's a combination of various things put together. Having a way to get customers through the door and then making them stay with you for life is the way forward.
While starting out, picking out one main channel and focusing on it should be your priority. Over time, however, this won't be enough because you'll want to expand to different channels and possibly markets.
With that said, your target audience is out there - all you need to find is find it, show these people what you're offering through your Shopify store, and inform them how your solution can help make their lives better.
Want to learn more how Shopify compares to other platforms?
Further reading on MikeVestil.com: Check out my Shopify vs. Wix and Shopify vs. Amazon FBA reviews.