Creating and Executing an eCommerce Marketing Plan

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September 7, 2021 Marketing

eCommerce marketing is the process of driving visitors to your online store and converting those visitors into paying customers.

But in order to achieve this, you will need a solid marketing plan. A marketing plan is an important road map for establishing a successful operation and should be done thoroughly so that you have a clear understanding of your goals.

In this article, we show you how to write a clear and simple eCommerce marketing plan.

Company, Purpose, and Goals

Start by describing your company and the products you sell. Write down what is unique and what benefits you offer. You can do a SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) as this can give you a better idea of your company, product, or service and what you need to do in the future.

If you think about what your marketing goal is, the rest of the marketing plan will be so much easier to write. Maybe you want more customers to buy from you? Do you want existing customers to become more loyal and perhaps buy even more? Or do you just want to create attention and be recognized for something?

Think about what your biggest focus is. Is it quality? Discounted prices? Availability? Find out what your customers want and it will be easier to continue working with the marketing plan and the strategy in mind.

Find out information about your competitors, their products, their advantages, and their disadvantages. If you have done this research beforehand, it will be easier to understand the differences and benefits that exist between you and them. Based on this, you’ll be able to show how your product or service can create better value.

Target Group

Based on purpose and goals, you should know what type of people you want to reach. Describe your target audience in detail and write down where they live, how old they are, and what gender they are.

More in-depth analysis about their lifestyle, what they work with, their buying behavior, and whether they are social or antisocial can add value to your marketing plan. The more you understand the type of customer that can buy your product, the better you can tailor your marketing to them.

Defining your target group can often be tricky. But fortunately, specialized eCommerce marketing services that use business intelligence to evaluate your store orders, product, and customer data can now assist you in targeting the right audience.

Choose Marketing Channels

When you have a better understanding of your goals, target groups, and competitors, you should make the plan more detailed in order to achieve them. What marketing channels will you use to reach the target group and what messages and content do you need to create to reach them in the best way?

There are many different places you can market your store, including paid advertising, blog posts, press releases, social media, and email. Certain marketing channels are better suited for short-term goals, while others are preferred for long-term customer retention.

Why not also try and develop a mix of channels to use in different ways. For example, you can pay for online advertising to attract new customers and maintain a blog to create recurring visits to your store.

Timeline and Budget

Set dates for all of your activities, once you’ve got them all figured out. When should things be done? And how often? It costs money to market your products, so set a budget before choosing your marketing channels and beginning to develop advertising and content.

If you have the opportunity, it’s good to set aside as much as you can in the marketing budget, to be able to invest wholeheartedly and test things. With a small budget, you may not get a fair result. Ultimately, the budget should be reasonable concerning the value of what you want to get out of everything.

Evaluation

Something that many easily forget is to follow up on the plan. You need to find out if your marketing has yielded results, so it’s crucial that you measure and follow up.

Look at your marketing plan, compare and see if it went as you intended. If not, then you may need to adjust something. Decide how often you’ll do this, and write it down in the plan. Also, make sure your goals are specific and measurable so that you can track your progress.