9 Ways To Boost Traffic For Shopify Store

There is this common misconception.

That, you can only boost your Shopify store traffic using paid advertising for you to drive sales.

From research done, paid advertising is the quickest way to boost your Shopify store’s traffic store but not the best way when under a tight marketing budget. Search advertising alone has hit $148,488m in 2020.

9 Ways To Boost Traffic For Shopify Store

Again, with this kind of amount, it’s hard to rise above the competition. The bidding price for your ad to show on your customer’s feed or top researched keywords is continually increasing.

It would help if you had additional ways and channels to boost your Shopify store traffic.

Today, you will learn nine ways to boost traffic for your Shopify store. The best-paid advertising channels underpriced, and how to utilize these methods with evergreen examples to increase your Shopify store traffic.

Let’s begin

Table of Contents

1. Invest in influencer marketing

Building relationships with influencers in your industry who can then promote your product will drive traffic to your Shopify store.

89% of users of influencer marketing say ROI is comparably better than other marketing channels.

Before you consider investing in influencer marketing, you need to answer these questions;

  • Which media channel your ideal customers spend most of their time?
  • Who are the key influencers and micro-influencers they follow?
  • Are these influencers a good fit for your product?

First, Instagram is the most effective channel for influencer marketing. With over 1 billion users and 500 million daily active users, your customers spend their time on Instagram.

Again, visitors from Instagram spend the most time on a website, making them the most engaging traffic to your Shopify store. A great  Shopify store example using influencer marketing on Instagram is Fashion Nova.

fashionnova

After getting a list of influencers and micro-influencers, you would love to work with, send a simple direct message, offer to ship them a sample for your product. If they like it, strike a deal on how they will promote it.

You can do this with Youtube influencers as well.

Blogger influencers still generate a ton of website traffic for online stores. Their followers highly trust most of them. Get some to feature your product in their blog post and drive traffic to your online store.

The new kid in the block is Tiktok Influencers. Strategies like Brand Takeover and Hashtag Challenge need influencers to push your product. This ultimate guide on how to make your Shopify store go viral on Tiktok is what you need to get started

2. Use underutilized paid advertising.

As I said earlier, paid advertising is the best way to get a quick boost to your Shopify store’s traffic. Your marketing budget may not allow you to spend as much as your competition on the leading platforms; Google and Facebook.

The good news is that there are other underused and underpriced platforms you should consider to drive traffic to your Shopify store.

  • Pinterest ads

1 in 2 people purchase the product after seeing a promoted pin. Also, Pinterest has 332 million users, and 78% say the content is useful, including ads.

If you are selling any women related product, you should use the platform from now on.  71% of global Pinterest users are female. shophearts is an excellent Shopify website example using Pinterest to boost online store traffic.

  • TikTok ads

Shopify recently partnered with Tiktok to help Shopify merchants advertise on Tiktok directly without leaving the Shopify ecosystem.

This partnership simplifies the TikTok ad setting for the Shopify store owners. Even before that, big brands like Adobe and Levi have already embraced the new platform and are running different ad formats. It would be best to learn more about how to use TikTok ads to boost your Shopify store traffic.

3. Running email marketing campaigns

You have built an email list from your customers. Why not send them time-sensitive offers and discounts?

Research has proven that for $1 spent on sending email campaigns, you can expect an average return of $42.

Running email marketing campaigns

Let’s say a customer has just purchased from you and signed up for your discount campaigns. You can almost immediately send them a welcome email with a down-sell offer they can’t refuse if they take action within that time frame. There is an 82% open rate for these emails.

Again, customers abandon the cart for many reasons. With an email marketing campaign sequence of three emails, your Shopify store has a 69% of the customer converting. A great Shopify store example is Wurkin Stiffs.

You have dead stock in your fulfillment partner’s warehouse and need to get rid of it. Email marketing campaigns are a great way to offer huge discounts and offer to your repeat customers.

Plan campaign offers like Buy 1 Get 1 or Free Shipping; you will get rid of most of the dead inventory.

4.  SMS marketing

Short Message Service (SMS)  open rate is 98%  in 90 seconds than 20% for emails. 75% of people prefer to receive offers via text.

SMS marketing can boost traffic for your Shopify store fast because opening rates are almost a hundred percent. As a Shopify store owner, you can easily use SMS apps like SMS Bump or Postscript to send texts.

Gearbunch, a women clothing wear or hand-sewn apparel, generated $8.1k sales in 24hours using SMS marketing.

However, you are not guaranteed the same result, but you need a strategy to surpass those numbers or even get close.

5. Engage in social media channels

Your Shopify store’s social media channels can generate traffic by you or your team engaging on the platform.

Whenever you post your product, respond to comments within the shortest possible. Users know and understand that behind every business account like on Instagram is a real person updating it.

A customer buys your product, shares the photo on social media, and tags your store. Be sure to respond to them in the comment section. New customers are more likely to buy because 56% of consumers believe in User Generated Content (UGCs) than promoted ads.

Again create engaging content like what chubbies Instagram. This encourages users to comment and more likely to visit your Shopify store and check out what they sell.

Sweepstakes, viral contests, and giveaways drive massive traffic to eCommerce websites when done right. Shopify had tools that can help with setting the right giveaway or contest. 94% of the time, contestants share a  contest after they register. This drives engagement for your brand and drives traffic to your store.

Your family and friends are on Facebook; instead of selling your product to them, ask them to share your store with their networks. If you are launching a new product, give discounts. This will drive sales for your online store faster and almost with zero markets spend.

6. Consider referral marketing

A customer has bought from you, why not ask them to refer a friend or family and give them a discount on their next offer?

Referred customers have a 20% higher annual average order value. However, developing a referral program can be challenging at times. A two-sided incentive program where both parties( one who refers to the one referred) stands to gain is the best option.

Leesa mattress has a great referral program of getting $75 cash when you refer a friend.

You can also steal referral program ideas from these 21 other Shopify store examples to boost your e-commerce store traffic.

7. Use affiliate marketing.

Affiliate marketing is a reward-based system where your partners get a percentage of the sale for every product they sell for you.

Trust is a significant factor between the affiliate marketer and its customers. There is a need for trust in the recommendations that the affiliate marketer is pushing for customers to buy.

Refersion, a Shopify affiliate marketing app, is used by various Shopify stores to boost their website traffic.

Knowing which affiliate website to choose for your affiliate can be confusing. Here is the complete guide to 2020 eCommerce websites for affiliate marketing.

 8. Use search engine optimization(SEO)

75% of clicks go to the top three results of the search engine according to research done by Brian Dean of backlinko.

If your customers search for your store today, will it appear even on the first page?

Using relevant keywords in your store’s product pages and landing pages will increase store rankings in the search results.

Use search engine optimization(SEO)

Optimizing your meta titles and meta descriptions with relevant keywords will determine which position your online store will appear on the search engine’s first page.

 An example Shopify that is using SEO to drive organic traffic is Weave Got It Canada. They give a detailed approach in this Shopify article.

Do some research on keywords your customers typing on the search bar using Ubersuggest or Gooogle keyword planner tools. Then naturally, add these keywords in the title and product descriptions.

Long-tail keywords work best in answering customers’ queries. Ensure you use them within product descriptions.

Don’t forget to optimize your product images. Image search account for 29% of queries.

If possible, take unique photos for your products and avoid using stock photos but if you have to use them, do some editing on tools like Canva.

Search Engine Land studied rich snippets and found that they can increase the number of clicks on the page by 30%.

Rich snippets are search listings with product information like reviews, price, and availability. Shopify already has snippets feature like breadcrumb list on the product pages. If you optimize your product pages right now, don’t worry if you don’t see results right away, it takes time to rank.

Pay attention to technical SEO as well. Issues like page loading speed, site structure, and submitting site maps are solved using Google Search Console or PageSpeed Insights.

9. Content marketing

Creating content is one of the best ways to retain customers in these changing times.

From written words like blogs, audio for podcasts to creating videos on channels like Youtube or IGTV, you need to continually produce content in all formats for your customers to engage with your Shopify store continuously.

Podcasts are not optimized for traffic, but you can always provide show notes for your listeners for every episode with relevant links for them to take action. Podcasts consumer results of 2019 indicate that 54% of podcast listeners are likely to check out a brand when they hear it being advertised on a podcast.

Youtube has 2 billion users and the second largest search engine in the world. Produce educational video content for your customers to learn new skills centered around using your product to solve a problem.

Add storytelling and entertainment into the mix to capture the viewer’s attention and communicate your brand. Luxyhair brand does a great job at this with its three million subscribers currently.

60% of consumers buy a product after organically reading a blog post about it. 50%  of search keywords are four words or longer. The best way to use long-tail keywords is in writing blogs.

First, research what your ideal customers are searching for and compile a list of keywords. Shadowing your competition is healthy. You learn what works fast. Please read some of their blogs to get ideas on how to do blogging for your Shopify store.

digital marketing strategy

The list of Shopify stores using blogging to drive organic traffic is enormous. But the two examples are Casper mattress and Bulletproof.

Bulletproof creates guides, newsletters, and recipes to teach its customers how to leave a healthy and fitness lifestyle, while Casper helps customers learn how to get the best night’s sleep of their life.

Over to you

There is no one right way to boost your Shopify store traffic. But you need to have a mix of short-term traffic results like running paid advertising and long-term like blogging/ vlogging for you to build a lasting brand.

To execute any of the above ways and drive traffic to your Shopify store, you need a digital marketing strategy that works. Pick one tactic where your ideal customers spend most of their time and provide value to them. They will eventually convert, generating a ton of traffic to your Shopify store.

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