With COVID-19, people across the globe started shopping online first out of need, but now it has become a leisure activity for most. And this is good news for virtual store owners like you! With this beginner-friendly guide on How to Attract More Customers to Your Virtual Store in 2024, you can easily ride the seemingly evergreen waves of the online shopping trend and create a loyal customer base for your virtual store!
There are many people out there who would love to buy from your online store despite the competition, given that you follow a few things that this guide will show you below. This guide will cover everything you need, from attracting clients to making them fall in love with the products listed on your virtual store and even turning them into loyal recurring customers!
We have listed plenty of ideas for you to choose from below. It is totally up to you which one you prefer. With that said, let’s dive right into the basics first!
Understanding your target audience
In the online world, to make the right decisions about your products and services, you must know what your audience wants. And the thing is, they don’t tell you that. You have to add one plus one and make sense of what works best for them.
This can be quickly done by using the analytics tools and point-of-sale (POS) systems in your virtual store. With these at your disposal, you can easily understand what your customers want!
To go even further, you can contact your customers by asking them genuine questions via emails, chats, or even phone calls. You want to be open to every ounce of feedback your customers have stored in their minds.
Mainly, it’s a question of trying a few things and deciding which one works best for you. As every brand has a different story, so do their paths to success.
Finding your unique selling proposition (USP)
Your USP is your superpower. It is something that you, as an online or virtual store, can offer. Now, most people confuse this with their product lineup, but it is just the surface.
Look at Starbucks. On a surface level, we know that they sell coffee. Still, their USP is about an environment where you can focus on your work with an uninterrupted internet connection while momentarily sipping coffee. See how they’ve entwined these two things together so gracefully.
Similarly, make sure your brand has a USP. It is the only thing that ensures your customers turn into loyal customers!
How to attract more customers to your Virtual Store in 2024
Work on your website’s User Experience (UX)
User Experience denotes how easily users can interact with and navigate your online store. It is important to do everything you can to ensure the customer finds what they are looking for!
Any design hurdles in the way are chipping away at their limited patience, and you should always keep that in mind. You should always use colors that contrast nicely and fonts that stand out and are consistent across stores.
And lastly, high-quality product images on your virtual store are a must. Your products should match their respective images as closely as possible. Always use crisp images that highlight your products well.
That means a good-quality camera, a well-lit room with a solid background, and multiple shooting angles are a few essential prerequisites to make sure that your images turn out crisp and look professional.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
SEO is a primary method of driving traffic to your webpage. And it is the same for your online store as well!
The higher you rank in the search engine results, the more traffic your virtual store will receive.
Let’s say, for example, that you own a pet supply virtual store. You may want to rank for products like “colorful cat collars” or “unique cat food bowls.” People searching for these terms online are looking for such products to buy.
A few good things that go a long way to Attract More Customers To Your Virtual Store are writing and posting high-quality content and keyword optimization.
Optimize your social media bios
Your social media bios are the deciding factor in whether a new visitor will visit and buy from your virtual store! If your Instagram handle is your hoarding, the bio is the text.
Here, you have to be very specific about what you sell. You have to attract highly specific clients and make sure that they visit your virtual store and actually make a purchase.
Social media sites like Instagram only allow one link in their bios. And if you wish to display a handful of your best-selling products or services, you can use Linkpop to create an external landing page.
Once there, your target audience can go to the popular item category pages, featured product pages, other social media platforms that you as a business are on, and even lead magnet landing pages!
Also Read: What Is Social Selling And 4 Ways To Use Social Media To Sell Your Products
Pro tip: Watch a few copywriting videos online to learn how to sell with words!
Run limited-time offers and promotions
Research suggests that 37% of shoppers always look for coupons before making an online purchase. You can use these as a hook to ensure you receive all that extra attention a business would jump over if it never considered giving away coupons.
You can easily create coupons using MyBulk, Builder.ai , or Wheelio. You can then strategically join a few Facebook groups and post your coupons with a welcome message. Here’s a quick example:
Get 30% off on your first purchase of our bestselling [product name], an offer valid for the next hour!
Use coupon: [XXXXXXXXXX] [Link to your webpage/funnel]
Facebook has also been one of the leading social media platforms where online shoppers actively hunt for coupons. Take a look at this infographic from Statista:
Pro tip: You can take this to the next step further by launching a multi-tiered customer loyalty program
.
Build an email newsletter
Email newsletters are another powerful way to reach your target audiences directly without worrying about SEO. This can be done quickly with Convertkit or Mailchimp. But, the prerequisite is that you must have a mailing list.
Also read: Top 9 Email List Building Plugins Of 2023
You can quickly swell your mailing list by initially giving away some coupons or limited-time offers for free to your target audience. You can also give away a free PDF, which has valuable information that might help your customers, and free quizzes are also a delight!
Take a look at how creatively Pearly Drinks does this:
Use SMS campaigns
Like email newsletters, you need not worry about SEO here too! You can start collecting your customer’s phone numbers at different checkpoints.
You can use capture boxes on your most popular pages, or you can also always collect the phone numbers at the checkout pages.
Not only do they help drive traffic and, in turn, sales to your site, but they also help you convert the ones into loyal customers who are momentarily still on the fence.
You can have your customer support team ease shoppers’ anxiety about tracking their shipments. All they need to do is take a quick peek at the SMS, and they’re satisfied.
SMS campaigns can also help you initiate conversations that prove useful for gathering valuable feedback as well.
Running Google Ads campaigns
Google Ads Campaigns are a sure-shot way to specifically target the people who are proactively looking for the product or service that you sell.
There are basically three types of Google ads:
Search Ads are the ones that appear as text ads when the user looks for a specific term on the engine.
Video Ads are the ones that mainly appear on YouTube, which is also a Google owner platform.
Display Ads are the ones that appear in the Google Display Network.
Running Google ads requires a small percentage of your budget. And, if done mindfully, the results are overwhelmingly positive, and many brands and businesses are doing it as you read this.
Conclusion
We can safely say that, after the COVID-19 pandemic, the shift to virtual stores has only skyrocketed. Businesses now have plenty of opportunities to meet the demands of their existing and potential customer bases.
This guide provided some ways that you as a business can implement and make sure that you Attract More Customers To Your Virtual Store. No single strategy is a one-size-fits-all approach.
You may have to try one, two, or more to come to the one that works best for you. While the basics always remain the same. Start by understanding who are your target audiences and then identify your USP.
FAQs
Why is it important to understand the target audience to attract more customers to your virtual store?
Understanding your audience ensures that you tailor your products and services for a few specific people who need them as opposed to the ones that do not. This also makes sure that your business receives a higher conversion rate. It is a matter of quality over quantity.
What is my USP?
A common formula to get closer to your USP is “We help [your target audience demographic] achieve [transformation] with [your product or service].” Your USP is not limited to your products or services; it can always go above and beyond it. Remember the Starbucks example from earlier?
How can I improve my virtual store’s ranking with SEO?
It would be best if you focused on delivering high-quality and relevant content. Keyword optimization and getting quality web page backlinks are the cornerstones of improving your SEO rankings.
