Based on Bloomberg’s report on Shopify’s first-quarter earnings, the e-commerce platform’s total revenue in the first quarter of 2023 grew by 22% to $1.2 billion — driven by stimulus money and the pandemic lockdowns. Shopify merchants are emerging much stronger in the market after the past two years and many are using the platform to support their growing online businesses.
AskMoney’s feature on Shopify suggests that one of the main reasons why it is so popular is because it offers entrepreneurs a number of business tools in one place. With low startup costs, accessible interface, secure site hosting, analytics reports, customer service, and easily customizable templates, all you need is a solid internet connection to run your online store. Plus, Shopify boasts many features, including an extensive marketing platform that covers blogging, SEO tools, and social media ad campaigns to attract new customers. Here are a few tips to take advantage of Shopify to boost business in 2023:
Prioritize your site’s mobile capabilities
As per Top Design Firms’ survey on mobile apps, 48% of small businesses currently have mobile applications to connect with their customers. Small companies are recognizing that people spend much more time on their mobile devices, so creating a mobile-first strategy is essential. You don’t even need to spend money on an app, as Shopify has a design tool that allows you to manage the mobile version of your site. Shopify tweaks the page to fit mobile screens automatically, but it’s important to double check how the site looks across devices. Is the CTA button large enough? Are the photos intact? These are some of the things you should check.
Add valuable pop-ups to your site
Pop-ups are considered by a lot of online shoppers to be kind of annoying, but this is because many sites use them incorrectly and don’t add value to the experience. One better way to use a pop-up is to offer a welcome discount when someone lands on your site, in exchange for their email address or phone number. If you’re selling multiple items on your Shopify store, you can try to cross-sell with pop-ups. For example, when someone adds a bath soap to their cart, a pop-up will appear recommending related products or “frequently bought with” items like a loofah. Shopify apps like Privy are particularly useful for this strategy.
Maximize email marketing strategies
Email marketing often gets pushed aside by small businesses because it feels outdated in our social media-heavy landscape. However, a good email campaign — one that isn’t sent too often and always provides value for the recipients — can still drive high returns. Your email campaign can include discount codes, educational content, community updates, and product announcements to name a few. Another way to maximize email marketing is to nudge customers who added products to their cart but have yet to follow through with the purchase. You can send abandoned cart emails after a customer leaves the site, maybe with an additional coupon. These follow-ups are so effective that ProTexting’s expansion on messaging services will now include SMS reminder alerts for abandoned Shopify carts to promote lower abandonment rates.
Include product reviews for your homepage
When it comes to e-commerce, finding your best-selling products requires some trial and error. It would be helpful to have customer reviews so you can easily see which products are popular (and why). This strategy also increases a customer’s confidence to buy your products and trust in your business. Rather than making shoppers look elsewhere for reviews, you can integrate these directly on your Shopify product pages through one of Shopify’s 300+ product review apps. You may need to decide whether you’re willing to invest in a premium app or go for a free option; as we mentioned in our post called “5 Profitable Best Small Business Ideas in 2023”, too-high costs and low capital can make it difficult for you to grow your business. Among the free apps available, you can add and install Shopify Product Reviews through the Shopify app store.
