20 Ways to Increase Revenue for Your Online Store

Online stores everywhere are looking for ways to increase their revenue. However, where do you start?

With new strategies constantly emerging and the to do list of store tasks always in the back of your mind, it can be difficult to narrow down your list to easy-to-implement wins for your store. However, this list of changes can have a big impact on the revenue for your store.

Target Existing Customers

Stores often associate growth with new, but that is rarely the case. In many ways, the customers who have already made purchases on your website are the biggest source of additional revenue. They have already invested in your brand, so winning them over is less effort than converting a new customer.

1. Recover abandoned carts with a series of emails. If your checkout flow requires a sign in or captures their email address early, then you can send a series of emails aimed at getting them to complete the checkout process. You’ll be able to bring visitors back after cart abandonments, which will increase your online sales. This type of email marketing can be automated, so it increases sales while saving you time!
2. Offer a discount for customers who are about to convert. Although most stores should use discounts sparingly to protect their bottom line, offering a discount late in the conversion process when the customer has clearly stalled can be a great way to turn that hesitation into a purchase. Alternatively, you can also offer free shipping or money back guarantees as motivation to buy.
3. Capture the email address early so that you can retarget. Do you have a popup or form on your website that connects potential customers with your email list? You should! Getting the email addresses of people already interested in your brand can help you convert people who have already warmed up to your brand’s messages.

Increase Your Average Order Value

1. Add related products on your product pages. Increasing your Average Order Value (AOV) could be as simple as offering the accessories for the products that you already carry. If you sell bikes, then it is logical to add bike helmets and gloves to your store. With Carro’s Brand Partnerships, you can sell the products from top-selling Shopify stores on your own site. Carro keeps the stores in sync so that the supplier store can fulfill the order and you’ll split the profits!
2. Add new products. While you shouldn’t add products for the sake of adding products or services, strategic product offerings can help your website feel fresh and new. Look for products you can add that will help customers make impulse purchases. Accessories to your existing best-sellers are a great place to start when looking for new products. If you add new products with descriptions optimized with keywords and common search queries, you may also improve your SEO ranking.
3. Up-sell within the cart with Order Bump, In-Cart Upsell, or Discounted Upsells by Booster Apps. When a customer is finalizing their cart, they are ready to purchase. This can be a great time to suggest related items so that customers can add a small item to their overall purchase. Using Order Bump, In-Cart Upsell, or Discounted Upsells can give your store to options for upselling that it needs.

Improve Your Conversion Rate

Who wants to increase conversions? Trick question: everyone! When working on your conversion rate, the key is making small optimizations that add up. Here are a few subtle changes that can help you improve your conversion rate and increase your sales!

1. Display trust icons on your site. Your site should instill confidence in potential customers. Whether that’s an SSL certificate, or a security badge (or two!), these little cues can help a customer feel secure when shopping your site.
   
2. Make your website and checkout flow as mobile-friendly as possible. Whether you like it or not, at least half of your customers are shopping on their mobile devices. Taking the time to make sure buttons are easily clickable and text is readable can help you get more mobile conversions. The more you can optimize the mobile experience, the easier it will be for the couch shoppers to complete their purchase.
3. Create urgency. Urgency can be a powerful motivator for customers if used correctly. Scarcity tactics, revolving sales, countdown timers, low stock alerts, and other warnings can help customers convert faster. We recommend that you use this tactic sparingly so that you don’t overwhelm your customers too much. We’ve seen great success with using timers and low stock alerts for seasonal sales and other short-term promotions.
4. Accept more payment options. If a customer is interested in making a purchase, then you should reduce friction as much as possible so that they can complete their purchase. Accepting more payment options allows the customer to pay as they’d like, and you’ll have money rolling in!
5. Remove distractions from the checkout flow. While upsells and other small pieces can have positive effects on your average order value, you need to focus on checkout once they’ve entered the checkout page. Don’t bog them down with too many decisions. Auto-filling the delivery method to save them some button clicking, removing any information from the header and footer that isn’t needed, and keeping steps short and clear can help you close the deal. There should never be buttons that allow them to click away from checkout. Instead, keep them moving forward with Back and Next buttons instead.

Make your product learning simple and easy

When your customers visit your site, can they easily make a purchase decision? You need to provide all the information that they need to make a purchase, while also making it easy to digest.

1. Explain your products with videos. Videos are becoming an increasingly important part of the buying process. You can incorporate video content into your blog posts, or on your product listings to clearly and easily explain your products to your target customers.
2. Add trust with photos on your customer testimonials. Ask your customers to share a photo when they share their review. If you sell clothing, they may share their entire outfit. Make it easy for customers to upload photos of the product they are reviewing. You can also accomplish this same effect by displaying user-generated content from social media on your website. There are several Shopify apps that can do this for you.
3. Make customer service accessible to customers who need help. While you may not have the resources to put together a live chat option, having customer service that is prompt and easy can be the difference between a sale and an abandoned cart.
4. Offer clear return and exchange policies. There are many instances in which a customer may need to return an item. Making it easy to find this information and complete a return or exchange is essential to a great customer experience. Even if you don’t accept returns, be sure to have a customer service email or phone number clearly posted so that customers can get the help they need.
5. Display social proof. Social proof is another way to grow your audience’s trust. Whenever possible, find ways to incorporate these numbers and facts into your product listings. At the very least, you should have a way to display product reviews on your site. You can also display numbers like the quantity sold in the past year, how many people currently have it in their cart, or how many people have added the item to their wishlist. These cues help potential customers see that if other people like it, then they should too.

Make your website NAVIGABLE

1. Feature your top-selling products prominently on your site. Your best-sellers are best-sellers for a reason. Rather than overwhelm visitors with your entire catalog, be sure to highlight the best-sellers prominently as the visitor navigates the site. You can sort your collections by best-sellers, and put carousels of your best-selling products on your homepage. They may not have to scroll any further when they see what they’re looking for right at the top of the page!
2. Keep your navigation menu simple. Your navigation menu needs to have clear and effective organization so that customers know exactly what to click on. Navigation menus at top of the site should only have a handful of items, and dropdowns should be shorter than the height of the screen.
3. Find a great search app or plugin to make search super easy. If a customer finds your site while looking for something specific, can they search for it? Do the search results make sense? Having an amazing search plugin that incorporates logic and effectively displays the result can help visitors find what they’re looking for and convert even faster.
4. Break your campaigns up with separate landing pages. Sometimes different products appeal to different audiences. Setting up a landing page that caters to each visitor can help you improve your conversion. For example, if you have a bracelet that appeals to college students and moms with young children, the messaging you’ll want to use is unique to each group. When you email a segment of college students, you can send them to a landing page that changes the headline, call to action, and images, while the email to moms would have images that picture women with children wearing the bracelet. This level of customization can help you make the information easier to understand for each group because it is personalized to their demographic.

#20 Sell More, Together: Carro Brand Partnerships

Carro Brand Partnerships can help you grow your revenue and your online store through partnerships with top-selling Shopify stores. With Carro Brand Partnerships, you can:

• Expand your product catalog
• Offer more related products
• Increase your Average Order Value
• Share brand authority and build your own brand trust by carrying reputable brands

Learn More about Carro Brand Partnerships

When you’re optimizing your online store so that you can increase your revenue, there are many options for quick changes that can make your website more effective. Start at the place that is most logical for your unique brand and continue to A/B test for improvements at every step along the way.

Good luck!

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