Title: Grow Your eCommerce Business with Analytics
1Grow Your eCommerce Business with
Analytics Whether theyre shopping for groceries,
electronics, or apparel, eCommerce continues to
make shopping easy and convenient for online
consumers. Online shoppers are even willing to
pay more for a better shopping experience.
According to Statista, global eCommerce sales
are projected to reach 7.4 billion and comprise
close to 25 of all retail sales by 2025. Having
said that, there is ever-increasing competition
in the eCommerce space. Online stores that
collect and utilize data from their business
operations are better positioned to grow relative
to their competitors. According to this Forbes
article, companies that have adopted data-driven
predictive intelligence solutions reported a
40.38 increase in their revenues in just three
years. As online stores generate large data
volumes, effective analytics can help drive
eCommerce revenue and profit. Lets take a
moment to explore the value of eCommerce
analytics. What is eCommerce Analytics? Simply
put, eCommerce Analytics is the means of making
sense of existing customer or business data for
businesses selling products or services online.
It is the process of collecting data from
different areas of eCommerce operations, which
can impact the online store and the customer
experience. For instance, eCommerce analytics
can look at multiple industry metrics like
bounce rate, customer acquisition cost, sales
funnel metrics, and the most effective SEO
keywords.
2- How does eCommerce Analytics provide businesses
with a competitive advantage? - Fundamentally, analytics can help to improve
decision-making processes, customer
relationships and business outcomes. In addition
to providing valuable customer insights,
analytics tools have been developed to help
process customer orders, streamline
order-to-cash management, and improve order
fulfillment. - Depending upon specific business requirements,
there are multiple categories of eCommerce
Analytics, including - Target audience, where analytics provides
insights into target audience profiles including
demographics (age, income, location, spoken
language), devices used for online shopping,
shipping options chosen, etc.
3- Customer acquisition, which focuses on the
marketing channels bringing shoppers to your
site (i.e., traffic) and the channels driving
the highest conversions. - Customer behavior, providing insights regarding
which products customers are buying, time spent
by users on your site, and pages with the lowest
bounce rate. - Conversions, understanding factors that are
driving actual purchases, and which online
shopper journeys are most effective at
converting shoppers into customers. - Next, lets discuss how analytics can help grow
your eCommerce business. - Five ways that analytics can help grow eCommerce
4- Product recommendations
- A recent Salesforce study found that while
product recommendations comprised just 7 of any
website traffic, they generated 24 of all
orders and 26 of revenue. Similarly, the
conversion rate for visitors clicking product
recommendations was 5.5x times higher than for
visitors who did not click recommendations. - Popular tools and platforms like Netflix and
Amazon are good at recommending products based
upon the individuals past behavior and personal
interests. The same can be achieved on any
eCommerce store. Using AI and machine learning
algorithms, technology can be leveraged to track
the users online behavior and make appropriate
recommendations. - Market basket analysis
- Market basket analysis (MBA) is the process of
identifying products that are typically
purchased together. A simple example is that of
a consumer buying a shampoo and conditioner. - Similarly, there is a popular legend about
grocery stores finding out (after performing
MBA) that men often buy beer when they buy
diapers. - Market basket analysis uses data mining to
increase sales by understanding customers'
purchase patterns and then using that knowledge
to improve customer experiences, increase average
order values, and optimize marketing campaigns.
5- Customer sentiment
- Recent studies have shown that customers are
likely to spend 140 more on brands that provide
them with a positive experience. On the other
hand, unhappy customers typically share their
negative brand experience with 16 other people. - Customer sentiment refers to the positive and
negative emotions that online consumers have
when engaging with any brand. - Data-driven customer sentiment analysis provides
valuable insights into what consumers say about
your brand on online forums and social media
platforms. With more customers "expecting" a
response within 60 minutes of posting their
comments, sentiment analysis can help shorten the
response times and quickly address customer
concerns. - Merchandising
- Returned products cost American retailers around
284 billion each year. - eCommerce merchandising is all about how online
stores sell their products to consumers. This
includes critical elements like product
placement, product images and videos, effective
branding, and much more. - Apart from product recommendations, AI and
machine learning algorithms have evolved to help
process customer requests and provide augmented
reality-like experiences. For example, AR mobile
apps allow online consumers to "view" products in
context (e.g., furniture in a room) as part of
the shopping journey. An interesting case study
is retail brand Nordstrom opening a 3,000
6square-foot store (without any merchandise) used
only for try-on and tailoring of online
purchases. 5. Customer retention According to
Microsoft, 58 of American consumers will switch
to another seller following a poor customer
experience. Conversely, 89 of consumers are
likely to make a repeat purchase following a
positive brand experience. The takeaway is that
while eCommerce must always be concerned with
customer acquisition, customer retention is an
important driver of success. Analytics helps
measure repeat purchase rate (RPR), which is
among the most crucial metrics for understanding
the success of your customer retention efforts
like reward and loyalty programs, customer
outreach programs, customer service initiatives,
etc. Conclusion In summary, the efficient use
of eCommerce analytics can deliver multiple
benefits like improving the effectiveness of your
digital marketing campaigns and personalizing
your customer experience. At EnFuse Solutions,
we specialize in providing customized digital
solutions that solve key eCommerce pain points.
With our range of eCommerce services, our team
can help you improve business processes and
outcomes that are crucial for your sustained
success. If you are looking to enhance your
eCommerce business, dont hesitate to call us.