Have a Shopify store?
Today we are going to discuss five ways to boost sales…
#1 Use a Shopify Theme Designed For Conversions
The purpose of your online store isn’t to look pretty, it’s to generate revenue by converting store visitors into paying customers. That’s why you should use a Shopify theme that was designed for conversions.
Booster theme, which is promoted as being the best converting Shopify theme, is the obvious choice here.
Its creators, Marc-Olivier Lafleur and Justin Binette, came up with the idea while reading the popular conversion rate optimization blog CXL.
For them, increasing conversions wasn’t an afterthought, it was their primary focus since day one.
Today Booster theme is used by over 46,000 Shopify merchants and includes an assortment of features that you’d otherwise need to cobble together with a bunch of different apps:
- Smart variants.
- Sticky add to cart.
- Dynamic checkout.
- Upsell popup.
- Promotion timer.
- Frequently bought together.
…and more.
Of course, Booster theme isn’t the only Shopify theme out there that was designed for conversions, so you might want to explore other options as well.
But whether you decide to go with Booster or with some other theme, what’s important is that you optimize your Shopify store for conversions. That is the quickest way to increase sales!
#2 Provide As Much Social Proof As You Can
Social proof is a psychological principle that says that whenever people are unsure of what to do, they look at what others do in order to determine the best course of action.
In the business context, this means that whenever the potential customer is unsure of whether to trust you, they will look for indications that other people trust you.
Online marketers use the term “social proof” to refer to those indications of trust. When it comes to e-commerce, the three most important types of social proof are:
- Customer reviews.
- Customer case studies.
- Media mentions.
Let’s take a closer look at each of them:
Customer Reviews
Spiegel Research Center did some research on the financial impact of consumer engagement via online reviews.
They discovered that as products begin displaying reviews, conversion rates escalate rapidly.
In fact, the purchase likelihood for a product with five reviews was 270% greater than the purchase likelihood of a product with no reviews.
Reviews had a higher impact on the conversion rates of more expensive products:
“Our research found that when reviews were displayed for a lower-priced product, the conversion rate increased 190%. However, for a higher-priced product, the conversion rate increased 380%.”
A five-star rating proved to be suboptimal from the conversion perspective. The purchase likelihood peaked in the 4.0 – 4.7 star range and then started declining as the rating was approaching five stars.
This may be due to consumers being wary of perfect ratings and seeing them as too good to be true.
Reviews from verified buyers turned out to be substantially more positive than reviews from anonymous buyers.
“We found that verified buyers are more likely to give four- or five-star ratings than anonymous reviewers are. Conversely, anonymous buyers are significantly more likely to give one- and two-star reviews.”
Spiegel Research Center provides these data-driven strategies for leveraging the power of online reviews:
- Display reviews and ratings on your product website: Retailers that choose not to feature ratings and reviews risk losing customers to a site that does.
- Embrace negative reviews: While it may seem counterintuitive, negative reviews can have a positive impact because they establish credibility and authenticity.
- Prioritize generating reviews for products with a low volume of reviews: Retailers should focus their efforts on making sure all products have at least a handful of reviews.
- Further prioritize generating reviews for higher-price and higher-consideration products: Retailers can help consumers overcome the risk of buying expensive or unfamiliar items by sharing additional reviews for these products.
- Overcome selection bias to improve the value of reviews: A larger pool of reviewers is not always more representative, particularly if it includes a large number of anonymous reviews.
- Identify reviews from “verified buyers”: Identifying purchasers with “verified buyer badges” enhances the credibility of a review and improves the odds of purchase by 15%.
If you don’t have any customer reviews at the moment, you might want to focus on getting five reviews for each of your products. Why five?
Because according to the Spiegel Research Center, “The marginal benefit of additional reviews begins diminishing rapidly after the first five reviews.”
Case Studies
We also recommend writing up customer case studies, creating a separate page for them, and adding a “Case Studies” tab to the navigation bar.
Case studies don’t have to be long to be effective. A few paragraphs might suffice. What’s important is that you:
- Describe the problem that the customer was struggling with.
- Explain how your product helped them solve that problem.
- Provide a testimonial from that customer.
You want to have at least one case study for each customer segment that you serve.
Say, if you sell tea flasks, travel mugs, and food containers designed to keep food warm, you might find that these products appeal to several distinct demographics: hikers and campers, frugal office workers, parents of school-aged children, etc. You should create a case study for each of these customer segments.
Case studies appear to be underutilized in B2C e-commerce, so using them might help you gain a competitive edge!
Media Mentions
Finally, you want to add an “As Seen On” section to your homepage and display the logos of media outlets that have covered your business.
Ideally, this section should be above the fold, so that potential customers would see it immediately.
#3 Use Email Marketing to Promote Your Products
Email marketing is another great way to increase Shopify sales. You probably already have an email list. But are you making the most out of it?
Email Marketing Software
We recommend using email marketing software that was designed specifically for e-commerce businesses. Why?
Because generic apps can’t compete with specialized apps. The latter will always be a better solution for the particular use case that it has been designed for.
When it comes to email marketing for e-commerce, SmartrMail is one of the best solutions out there.
SmartrMail’s most noteworthy features include:
- Email templates.
- Email automation.
- Smart segmentation.
- Email newsletters.
- Welcome emails.
- Winback emails.
- Abandoned cart emails.
- Browse abandonment emails.
- Product recommendation emails.
- SMS marketing.
The company offers two paid plans: the Essential plan which starts at $14/month and the Pro plan which starts at $99/month. There’s also a free plan that you can use if you have fewer than 250 subscribers.
It’s also worth mentioning that SmartrMail integrates with all major e-commerce platforms including Shopify!
Drip is another solution that you might want to consider.
It’s a multichannel marketing platform that started out as an email marketing app for ecommerce but has since expanded beyond that. It still has a heavy e-commerce focus, though.
Drip offers detailed analytics that allows you to understand your customers, make data-driven decisions, and create marketing campaigns that drive revenue.
There’s also a powerful marketing automation functionality that enables you to create evergreen multichannel marketing campaigns and run them on autopilot.
You can use Drip’s Shopify integration to connect it to your Shopify store in just a few clicks.
As for pricing, there’s only one pricing plan that starts at $39/month for up to 2,500 subscribers.
Both SmartrMail and Drip offer free trials so you can simply try both apps and see which one you like more.
Email Popups
Email popups can help you grow your email list faster.
Here are the three types of popups that you might want to consider using:
Welcome Popups
Welcome popups are triggered when the visitor arrives at your website.
There’s no denying that they are incredibly annoying and can alienate potential customers. This makes them the riskiest type of email popups.
However, welcome popups can work well for Shopify stores if you use them to offer a discount on the first purchase.
After all, the visitor likely intends to purchase something, so a discount is relevant and will probably be appreciated.
Timed Popups
Timed pop-ups are triggered once the visitor spends a certain amount of time on a page.
They can work well on product pages when combined with a discount for that particular item.
This can give the potential customer that final nudge they need to proceed with the purchase.
Exit-Intent Popups
Exit-intent popups are triggered when the visitor is about to leave the website.
At that point, you don’t have anything to lose, so you might as well make one last attempt at getting their email address. This is the least risky pop-up type.
Email Popup Software
Both SmartrMail and Drip allow you to create email popups and offer pre-made popup templates.
There are also specialized email popup apps such as Sumo.
Welcome Sequence
We don’t recommend hitting someone with a sales pitch the moment they give you their email address.
Instead, use this six-email welcome sequence to start off the relationship with that person on the right foot:
- Email #1: Introduce yourself to the new subscriber.
- Email #2: Share the origin story of your e-commerce business. Why did you start it?
- Email #3: Explain in more detail what it is that you sell on your online store. What makes your products different?
- Email #4: Explain what makes you qualified to sell these products. Share relevant experience, credentials, and accomplishments.
- Email #5: Explain who your dream customers are and share a case study on how such a person benefitted from your products.
- Email #6: Pitch your most popular product to the new subscriber. You can also give them a limited-time discount along the lines of “25% off if you buy within the next 72 hours”.
The purpose of this sequence is to build trust by showing the new subscriber that there’s a real person behind this store, that you and your team take pride in what you do, and that you are qualified to do it.
Ideally, you want to create a narrative around your brand that resonates with your dream customers. This can help you stand out from the competition!
Abandoned Cart Emails
According to the Baymard Institute, the average cart abandonment rate is 70.19%.
This means that 7 out of 10 people who put something in their shopping carts abandoned them without finalizing the purchase.
It’s not possible to completely eliminate cart abandonment but you should be able to reduce it with automated abandoned cart emails. Both SmartrMail and Drip allow you to set them up.
Use this email structure:
- The subject line should remind the potential customer that they have items in their shopping cart.
- The body copy should start with another reminder that they have items in their shopping cart followed by the list of those items accompanied by product images.
- The call to action should encourage the potential customer to go to their shopping cart and finalize the purchase.
We also recommend introducing an element of scarcity. You can do that by having the cart expire within a certain period of time (e.g. 72 hours). This should help create a sense of urgency.
Also, don’t just send one abandoned cart email and leave it at that. Use this 3-email sequence instead:
- Send the first email 24 hours after cart abandonment.
- Send the second email 48 hours after cart abandonment.
- Send the third email 71 hours after cart abandonment to let them know that their cart will expire in one hour.
This is just a starting point, though. You want to experiment with abandoned cart email frequency to see what works best for your business.
Product Recommendation Emails
You should also send your email subscribers product recommendation emails.
Ideally, these recommendations should be personalized based on each person’s browsing behavior and purchase history. Both SmartrMail and Drip allow you to do that.
Promotional Broadcast Emails
You should use broadcast emails to let your email subscribers know about various limited-time offers such as product launches, holiday sales, Black Friday and Cyber Monday promotions, etc.
You might also want to consider sending broadcast emails on special days that are relevant to your niche.
Say, a cat food store Cat Person once sent out this email with the subject line “How much do you really know about your cat?” to celebrate International Cat Day:
Email Newsletter
Here’s an email marketing conundrum:
On the one hand, you need to email your subscribers regularly if you want to stay top of mind with them.
On the other hand, no one wants to be bombarded with endless sales pitches, so you also need to be careful and not overdo it with sales emails.
So how can you keep in touch with your email subscribers without being obnoxious?
We would argue that launching a weekly email newsletter is the best solution to this problem because it gives you an excuse to reach out to them every week.
You can start with a simple link roundup format where you share links to interesting content related to your niche (articles, podcasts, videos, etc.).
You might also want to consider producing original content: educational articles, case studies, and interviews.
Providing free value with a weekly email newsletter allows you to build trust over time which is essential if you want to establish a loyal customer base.
Also, newsletters seem to be underutilized in the ecommerce industry so starting one might help you gain a competitive edge!
#4 Grow Your Shopify Store With a Cart Funnel
A cart funnel is an e-commerce sales funnel designed to convert new visitors into customers.
It consists of four pages:
- A sales page.
- An upsell page.
- A cross-sell page.
- A thank you page.
Creating a cart funnel and then driving traffic to it is the best way to grow your Shopify store.
Here’s how you can create a cart funnel in five steps:
Step #1: Identify Your Best-Selling Product
Look at your sales data and identify your best-selling product. That’s the product that you want to promote with your cart funnel.
Not your latest product, not your favorite product, not your most expensive product.
The best-selling product.
Step #2: Create a Sales Page For Your Best-Selling Product
Now that you have identified your best-selling product, it’s time to create a sales page for it. This is the page that you will be driving traffic to.
Here are some of the sales page copywriting basics that you need to get right if you want your sales page to convert:
- Headline. Your headline should convey the value of your offer. How will it make the potential customer’s life better? Lead with that.
- Body copy. Appeal to the emotional buyers first with emotion-driven copy, then to the logical buyers with benefit-driven copy, and finally to the fearful buyers with scarcity-driven copy.
- Social proof. Provide as much social proof as you can in the form of customer testimonials, endorsements from well-known people, and “As Seen On” media badges.
- Call to action. Use an offer-specific call-to-action button copy (e.g. “YES! I Want [The Product]!’”) instead of generic copy (e.g. “Buy Now”).
- 30-day money-back guarantee. Make sure that your money-back guarantee is explained clearly and is featured prominently next to the call-to-action button. It should be impossible to miss!
There’s much more to sales page copywriting than that but unfortunately, we can’t adequately cover this subject here due to space limitations.
But if you want to learn how to write copy that converts, we highly recommend our friend Jim Edwards’ book “Copywriting Secrets”.
You can get it for FREE. All Jim asks is that you cover the shipping!
Get “Copywriting Secrets” for FREE!
2-Step Order Form
We recommend using a 2-step order form on your sales page:
- Step #1: Shipping information.
- Step #2: Payment details.
The reasoning behind splitting the order form into two steps is that the potential customer makes a micro-commitment by providing their shipping information.
This mico-commitment then makes them more likely to provide their payment details and finalize the purchase.
Order Form Bump
We also recommend adding an order form bump to your order form.
You know those small items that you see in the grocery store checkout area? Chewing gum, candy bars, etc.
They are there because store managers know that people will be tempted to grab a KitKat and throw it in their cart as they are about to check out.
An order form bump is the ecommerce equivalent of that KitKat: something inexpensive that the potential customer might add to their cart on an impulse because why not.
The key here is to keep it simple because an order form bump should be something that doesn’t need an explanation (e.g. rushed shipping).
All this is super easy to implement with ClickFunnels, because our cart funnel sales page template includes both a 2-step order form and an order form bump.
Step #3: Create the Upsell Page
An upsell is an offer that you make to the potential customer after they have accepted your initial offer – it’s supposed to be an upgrade on it. Think “Would you like to supersize that?” at McDonald’s.
The easiest way to upsell is to offer more of the same product but at a better price. Say, if your original offer is a supplement bottle, you can upsell a second bottle or a bigger bottle of the same supplements.
Of course, this isn’t applicable to all products, so if you don’t have a way to upsell, you can replace this page with a cross-sell.
That way, instead of having an upsell and a cross-sell in your cart funnel, you will have two cross-sells.
Step #4: Create the Cross-Sell Page
A cross-sell is also an offer that you make to the potential customer after they have accepted your initial offer.
However, instead of being an upgrade on it, it’s supposed to be complementary to it. Think “Would you like fries with that?” at McDonald’s.
Do you sell anything that would complement your best-selling product? Say, if you are selling travel gear and your best-selling product is a backpack, consider cross-selling travel accessories such as packing cubes.
And if you don’t have anything that could serve as a cross-sell, you might want to consider expanding your inventory.
Step #5: Create the Thank You Page
The thank you page is the last page of your cart funnel where you should:
- Thank the customer.
- Provide shipping information.
- Provide customer service information.
You can also display your other popular products in case the customer wants to continue shopping.
#5 Optimize Your Cart Funnel With A/B Testing
You will probably see an immediate increase in sales once you start driving traffic to your cart funnel. But you shouldn’t stop there.
The next step is to optimize your cart funnel for conversions with A/B testing (also known as split testing).
Here’s how it works:
- You create two variants of the same page: variant A and variant B. There should be just one difference between them (e.g. the headline). This is the element that you are testing.
- You split your traffic in two and send half of it to variant A and half of it to variant B.
- You run the experiment until it reaches statistical significance, evaluate the results, and keep winning the variants.
The vast majority of A/B tests won’t lead to big changes in the conversion rate, especially once you run out of low-hanging fruit.
However, tiny conversion rate increases add up over time, plus you’ll probably stumble upon a big win occasionally.
This can have a significant impact on your bottom line, especially over an extended period of time.
That’s why we recommend adopting the Always Be Testing mentality:
You shouldn’t view your cart funnel as a finished project. Instead, you should see it as a work in progress and continue tweaking it. This can help you 2x, 5x or even 10x your funnel profits!
Build a Cart Funnel For Your Shopify Store With ClickFunnels!
ClickFunnels has everything you need to build a cart funnel for your Shopify store:
- A cart funnel template.
- A visual editor that you can use to customize that template.
- An A/B testing functionality that enables you to optimize your funnel.
We also have a Shopify integration that allows you to connect ClickFunnels to your Shopify store in just a few clicks!