A fully ecommerce solution for your business will provide a competitive advantage to gain market share. It will improve the digital capability of the business, as it will meet customer demand for ecommerce in your industry. Customers expect to find the products they have searched for and expect to be able to check out there and then with an online payment.
The Covid-19 lockdown has accelerated online preferences and customers are highly likely to go elsewhere if ecommerce is not an option on the website. Your website should be a digital hub for the business. An omni-channel, which will be integrated with multiple marketing and social media channels.
The website will save costs, increase revenue, and profit margin. As you can sell direct to the customer, you will save on paying listing or selling fees for other websites like Amazon to sell their products.
It is recommended that your website should be a content management system, with ongoing maintenance and updates to product listings, ensuring there is continuous improvement to the website user experience, ensuring a smooth customer journey from start to finish. This will lead to customer loyalty and boost long-term revenue for the business to expand further.
The Numbers
Two years ago, only 13.6% of sales were made from online purchases. Today, that number is expected to reach 19.5% in 2021, a 45.8% increase (via Shopify). The global ecommerce market is estimated to be worth $4.89 trillion dollars in 2021.
What Can You Do To Make Sure You’re Adapting and Taking Advantage Of This Boom?
So, how do you make sure your ecommerce / retail business is adapting to these changes and getting a slice of the online action? You firstly need to be prepared and educated in order to make the right decisions to move your business forward. You need to be thinking of your strategy and planning in order to laser focus on the key areas that are going to help move your business forward. One way of doing this is tapping into Social Ant’s expertise and experience in the world of social media and digital marketing.
We help businesses on a daily basis to increase their face to face sales, discover their customer journey and make sure they’ve optimised their user experience. In addition we help them attract more tourists and customers through Digital Marketing, SEO and Pay Per Click campaigns via Google.
The Workshops
In our workshops, which are delivered by The CEO of The Business, Jon Exton, we will look at various aspects of digital marketing. It all starts with Brand Storytelling for your target audience.
Brand Story Telling
One of the key goals with your marketing should be to create an emotional connection with your audience. To do this you firstly need to know who your audience is. Where do they exist online and what behaviours do they have when they are there? What kind of content would they consume and where would they consume it? In this section you will learn how to:
- Identify a target audience and establish a customer journey.
- Build custom audiences for online advertising
- Best practices for engaging content
- Techniques for driving social engagement and customer relationships
- Facebook ad opportunities with video story telling
- A/B testing with customer profiles
Content & Social Media Marketing
When your online as an individual / consumer, what is it you notice in your favourite brands? What is it that makes them popular and stand out? It’s their content! You need to be showing the most relevant and well created content to your customers and in this section we will cover a variety of different content types such as images, videos, blog posts, graphics and stories to engage your audience.
You will also learn the importance of well written website copy, reviews and social proof.
We will also highlight the importance of email marketing and help you develop engaging email content plan that your users will look forward to receiving and reading on a regular basis. Email, whilst one of the older of the channels is potentially one of the most lucrative ways to bring revenue into your business. In this section we will cover in full:
- Understand the best methods for managing your social media accounts
- Boost audience engagement and grow brand awareness
- Analyse your social media reputation (reputation management) to help your better reach social media users
- Create and schedule posts for your social media platforms which advice on the best tools to use
- Understand how to increase interaction with your audience through responding to comments and messages
Search Engine Optimisation
Search Engine Optimisation or SEO as it is more commonly known is perhaps one of the lesser known and more technical aspects of online advertising and website marketing, but one of the most important ways to help drive traffic and sales to your website.
In this section of the workshop you will discover how to optimise your pages so that you appear in search engines when people need you most. You will also research your industry, your competitors and your audience.
That research will involve unearthing the best possible keywords and phrases for your pages so that search engines can find and rank your website. We will also look at monitoring your search engine rankings and discover link building opportunities at a local level. Here’s what’s included:
- What is SEO and why does it matter?
- Keyword and keyword research
- Website analysis for attendees
- On site SEO including meta titles, descriptions and page content
- Best practices for Google and other Search Engines
Google Ads and Facebook Advertising
In this section we look at paid for advertising. Done properly, this can really help drive immediate sales and leads into the business and can help to drive business whilst your SEO marketing is taking time to have an effect.
We will teach you on how to create targeted ad campaigns across multiple advertising channels to help you reach the right people. We will also carry out research to determine the best audience and ad content to meet your goals. Whether you need to create and manage video ads, search ads, social media ads, understand how to plan, implement and monitor campaigns we will show you in this section. Here is a breakdown of what to expect:
- Introduction to online advertising and platform options
- Overview of current advertising for attendees
- Facebook Advertising and other social platforms
- Facebook Pixel and retargeting ads
- Google Advertising search and display networks
- Keyword planning and research
- Budgeting and testing
- Campaign management and rules
- Landing pages and lead generation
- Ad objectives and calls to action
- Measuring conversions and tracking events
Reporting & Analytics
Underpinning any successful digital marketing campaign is data. You have to know what’s working and what isn’t. You can use the data from analytics to get a positive return on your advertising spend. You will feel empowered to make informed decisions for your marketing strategy with a dashboard of marketing tools and custom data reporting in this section of the workshop. Here’s what’s included:
- What is Google Analytics and why its used
- Analysing page data, behaviour and acquisition sources
- Reporting and navigation
- Setting up goal conversions and events
- Syncing with Google Ads
- Understanding Facebook insights
About Jon
The workshops will be delivered out by Jon Exton who is the CEO of Social Ant.
Jon is passionate about supporting clients to reach their business goals, with experience spanning across a range of different industries. As a Social Media Consultant for the likes of NHS Scotland, City of Edinburgh Council, SQA and a number of Scottish bars and restaurants, he’s developed a deep understanding of social media engagement, customer profiling and online advertising.
He’s passionate about social media management and monitoring, as part of a wider digital marketing strategy. As a professional teacher and blogger, he’s provided social media training to clients, delivering innovative and creative content marketing plans, integrated with PR opportunities and video marketing. He has a strong understanding of global audience tastes and is an expert at enhancing targeted campaigns to increase reach and conversion rates. He also manages web hosting and email campaigns to enable remarketing opportunities for clients.
As a website developer with core skills in SEO and creating calls to action, he’s supported SMEs with their online presence. He works hand in hand with businesses to help them get to grips with modern ICT and cloud computing solutions, identifying cost-effective solutions for business growth and is an accomplished trainer. Find out more about Jon and his experience on LinkedIn.
About Social Ant
Social Ant is a digital marketing and social media consultancy, based in Edinburgh, that works with your business to develop your online presence, from effective web design to training workshops or a personalised consultation.
Enquire about workshops
Workshops can be carried out anywhere in the UK, but especially in and around Edinburgh and Cumbria where we are based. To enquire about a workshop email hello@socialant.co.uk, complete the form below or drop us a private message on any of our social media channels.