E-commerce Optimization: 6 Steps to Boost Your Conversion Rates

For online stores, increasing conversions is the key to long-term success.

After all, if visitors don’t buy, then you’re not making any money! And with $7.31 trillion dollars projected to be spent on e-commerce retail by 2025, you want to make sure to optimize your CRO so you can receive as much of that spend as possible.

That said, optimizing your e-commerce store can be confusing.

Even if you’ve done everything right, from driving traffic to your website to running digital ads, you might still see low conversion rates. The average conversion rate for US e-commerce stores was 2.8 percent in the second quarter of 2021 (which is the most recent data available).

So what gives, and how can you push past a three percent conversion rate? E-commerce optimization is all about making it easy for your visitors to buy from you.

How do you do that? It starts with diving into your analytics to see where visitors are getting stuck. If that sounds complicated, don’t worry—I’m going to walk you through it.

First, however, let’s talk about why CRO is different for e-commerce websites.

How Is Conversion Optimization Different for E-commerce Stores?

Conversion rate optimization (CRO) for e-commerce stores is different because e-commerce stores sell physical products, which can be more complex and time-consuming to purchase than, for example, a service – which has an average 9.3 conversion rate across the industry.

The difference in average conversion rates is partially because a service website might have one or two steps in the checkout process, while an e-commerce store could have five or six – meaning it’s all the more important for you to optimize your CRO.

This means e-commerce stores need to pay more attention to the purchase process, from product pages to the checkout page.

E-commerce stores have unique friction points, such as shipping and returns, which can impact purchase decisions.

Because of this, e-commerce owners need to take a holistic approach to optimizing their stores.

This might mean looking for opportunities to increase customer confidence through social proof and streamlined checkout processes.

Ultimately, e-commerce owners should focus on creating a frictionless purchase experience to boost their conversion rates.

E-commerce CRO Strategy #1: Add Recommended Products

Adding recommended products to your e-commerce store is a great way to increase conversion rates.

When someone visits a product page, they want information about the product and how it can meet their needs.

If you suggest additional products that might be of interest, you can help guide their purchase decision and increase your conversion rate.

Invespcro found that 37 percent of shoppers clicked a recommended product during their first return visit to a site.

Similarly, shoppers that click on product recommendations are four and a half times more likely to add items to the cart and complete a purchase.

Amazon, for example, recommends products based on previous purchases or items you looked at. This helps keep customers engaged with the site and increases sales.

They also use “Frequently Bought Together” prompts to show customers related items they may like.

Recommending relevant products to your customers also improves the personalization of your e-commerce store.

86 percent of consumers say website personalization affects their purchasing decisions. This is an e-commerce conversion rate optimization tactic you don’t want to miss out on.

You can add recommended products in several different ways. Some examples include:

• adding recommended products at the purchase stage, somewhere above or under their shopping cart
• adding recommended products in the confirmation/transaction email you send to customers when they make a purchase
• add recommended products on search results pages for similar/related products

The steps for adding recommended products will vary based on your e-commerce platform. Here are instructions for the most popular platforms:

• Shopify
• Big Commerce
• WooCommerce

E-commerce CRO Strategy #2: Make Sure Your Product Pages Shine

High-quality product pages are key to your e-commerce success.

When customers can see what they’re buying and get an idea of how it will look and function in their lives, they feel more confident about the purchase.

Since your visitors can’t touch and feel your products, you need to make sure the media you use on each product page does them justice.

Start with high-quality photos that depict the product from various angles at different levels of detail.

Make sure your photos are high enough resolution to support a zoom feature to show texture and details.

If you have the space, add a 360-degree view of the product so customers can get a complete look.

If your e-commerce store sells clothes or accessories, use models to show how the items look on various body types.

Besides images, consider using demo videos or explainer videos to show your products in action.

Remember, you don’t have to generate all the content yourself either.

Encourage customers to submit visual content or source your images and videos from social media, which perform double duty as social proof, which will help increase conversions.

Product descriptions that highlight key features are also key to getting shoppers to buy.

Be sure to include all pertinent information, such as size, color, and fabric content.

Use clear and concise language to avoid confusion and highlight the unique features of your products.

E-commerce CRO Strategy #3: Streamline Navigation

You can’t make sales if site visitors can’t find what they want.

Your site’s navigation is often the first place shoppers look if they have a specific product or category in mind.

Navigation that is confusing, too complex, or difficult to understand will cost you sales and customers. In fact, a HubSpot case study found that simplifying or removing navigation elements from middle-of-the-funnel landing pages resulted in a 16-28% increased conversion rate!

There’s no one-size-fits-all solution for e-commerce website navigation. The best way to design a website menu depends on the nature of your products and how your customers like to organize information.

Here are a few steps for creating effective e-commerce website navigation:

1. Use heat maps or do user testing to find how and where users click.
2. Prominently display categories on every page.
3. Include clear labels and concise descriptions for all menu items.
4. Create intuitive and logical menus based on how your customers browse your site.
5. Avoid burying essential menu items in nested sub-menus.
6. Test different navigation structures to see what works best for your customers.

An example of great e-commerce navigation comes from Apple.

If you have a large number of products, a drop-down menu that lists everything can be overwhelming.

If Apple included all its products and services in a drop-down menu, its website would have very clunky and confusing navigation.

Not only would that work against the brand’s minimalist image, but it’d also be hard for customers to find what they need.

Instead, Apple opts for clean top navigation with no dropdown or secondary menu item:

When visitors click on a top navigation item, they’re directed to a menu page that lists options within the category:

Doing away with a complicated drop-down also helps streamline the mobile user experience, which is increasingly important.

Clear navigation also has SEO and UX benefits.

Providing a clear path to the products customers are looking for makes it easier for shoppers to find what they need on your site—which increases sales.

This can help improve your search engine ranking, as Google (and other search engines) favor sites that are easy to navigate.

If you’re unsure if your site is easy to navigate, or have seen drop-off points in your analytics, consider using a heat map tool like Crazy Egg to see where people click on your pages.

You can also use a tool like Optimizely to test different versions of your navigation and see which one leads to more conversions.

Once you’ve identified any potential drop-off points, it’s time to start making changes!

E-commerce CRO Strategy #4: Add a Wish List or Favorite Option

Wish lists and favorite options allow users to save items they might buy later.

This is a great way to increase conversions because it gives users the opportunity to “test drive” your site and come back later to buy products they love.

Creating a wish list also requires customers to create an account for your e-commerce store.

This allows you to offer relevant promotions and gather customer data to improve user experience and increase sales.

Wish lists can help you:

• alert customers about special offers available for items on their wish lists
• deliver targeted content based on items they’ve shown interest in
• identify retail trends and seasonal activities to improve demand forecasting
• understand what your customers are looking for and offer similar products

Research from Google found 40 percent of online shoppers think their experience would be better if they were offered a wish list.

In addition, make it easy for your customers to create wish lists on other platforms. For example, enable “Pin It” buttons so visitors can share your products on their Pinterest wish lists.

Or, promote the use of the “Save” feature on Instagram and Facebook.

There are many ways to make it easy for your customers to save products they are interested in.

If you use Shopify as your e-commerce platform, you have two options for adding a wish list feature: add custom code to your site, or add a wishlist app, like Wishlist Hero.

On BigCommerce, all you need to do is enable wishlists in your shop’s settings.

WooCommerce offers an extension so you can allow users to add items to their wishlist when they shop your store.

E-commerce CRO Strategy #5: Streamline the Check Out Process

According to the Baymard Institute, 69.82 percent of e-commerce carts are abandoned at checkout.

This rate increases on mobile and desktop devices, which have some of the highest cart abandonment rates.

Cart abandonment rates by device:

• desktop: 66.1 percent
• mobile: 80.6 percent

To avoid losing customers at the checkout, make the process as quick and easy as possible.

This means offering clear and concise shipping information, providing a guest checkout option, and ensuring all payment methods are available.

You should also ensure the checkout process is easy to navigate with all required information requested upfront.

Here are a few ways to streamline the checkout process:

• Use a single-page checkout: This will keep customers from going through multiple pages to check out.
• Save billing and shipping information: Customers hate having to enter their information each time they make a purchase, so make their checkout process easier by saving and auto-filling their information.
• Use a progress bar: Let customers know how far along they are in the checkout process so they don’t get impatient.
• Offer a shipping calculator: This will help customers determine how much their shipping will cost and whether or not they want to continue with the purchase.
• Personalize page to their local currency: Customers feel more comfortable when they’re making a purchase in their local currency.
• Reduce clicks: Try to make the checkout process straightforward, so customers don’t get frustrated and leave.
• Provide order confirmation: Once a customer has completed their purchase, send them an order confirmation to let them know everything went through successfully.
• Include trust symbols: Add trust symbols like security seals to reassure customers their information is safe and their purchase is legitimate.

Remember, the easier you can make it for customers to buy, the more likely they are to convert!

E-commerce CRO Strategy #6: Add More (and Better) Social Proof

Social proof is one of the most powerful tools at your disposal to boost e-commerce conversion rates.

Adding social proof elements to your site increases confidence in potential buyers and nudges them towards completing a purchase.

Some effective ways to add social proof include testimonials from happy customers, reviews from unbiased third-party, or user-generated content of your product in action.

According to Trustpilot, 89 percent of global consumers read online reviews before making a purchase.

This implies reviews are a regular part of a consumer’s purchase journey, but they can also be a deciding factor in the purchase process.

That said, reviews don’t just exist on your product pages.

Other digital channels such as social media, email marketing, and even paid search can be used to display reviews.

For example, brands that work with influencers can benefit from video and social posts that include reviews.

This can include YouTube reviews, unboxing videos, or branded TikTok promotions.

There are a few things you can do to increase your reviews, including:

• asking customers for reviews after purchase.
• making it easy for customers to leave reviews on your site
• including social media icons on your product pages that link to your profiles
• using review aggregators like Trustpilot and Bazaarvoice
• reaching out to influencers for social content creation
• promoting UGC on your social channels

Frequently Asked Questions About E-commerce CRO Strategies

How can I improve my e-commerce conversion rate?

To increase your e-commerce CRO, consider adding recommended products, making sure your product pages shine, implementing simple navigation, providing a wish list option, streamlining the checkout process, and adding social proof.

How are e-commerce conversions calculated?

E-commerce conversions are the total number of visits to your e-commerce site divided by the number of purchases.

What is a good e-commerce conversion rate?

The average e-commerce conversion rate varies depending on the type of product you sell but is typically around two percent. Some of the top e-commerce sites have conversion rates between 5 and 10 percent.

What is CRO in e-commerce?

E-commerce conversion rate optimization, or CRO, is the process of making adjustments to your site with the goal of increasing the percentage of visits that result in a purchase. In e-commerce specifically, CRO is focused on optimizing the product page, checkout process, and overall user experience.

Conclusion: E-commerce Conversion Optimization

E-commerce conversion optimization is key to driving growth for your business.

While blogs and service sites rely on traffic from search engines and social media, e-commerce sites need to optimize SEO and every step of the buying process.

When starting an e-commerce conversion rate optimization strategy, start by looking into your customer data and website analytics. Use heat mapping tools to see where customers are clicking and what they scroll past.

Once you understand what is and isn’t working, start making changes to your website.

Test each change to make sure it improves conversion rates before rolling out the change to all visitors.

What CRO strategies have you used to boost e-commerce sales?

from Neil Patel's Digital Marketing Blog https://ift.tt/4uIl2bH

We Analyzed 50,000 Social Media Posts From the Last 12 Months to Learn How to Get More Organic Traffic. Here’s What We Found.

Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest and every other social network you can think of eventually does the same thing.

Can you guess what it is?

They adjust their algorithms to cram down reach and sharing. That means you won’t get as much traffic from them unless you start advertising.

But even with their algorithm changes, there must be a way to maximize the traffic you can get from each social network, right?

In order to find out, we analyzed over 50,000 social media posts sharing content in 10 different industries.

The posts analyzed were some of the most shared on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest from the last 12 months and contained a link to industry-related content. We couldn’t get access to enough data from other social media channels.

What Industries Did We Look At?

Although there are tons of different industries out there, we focused on the following 10 that contained the majority of posts and social media engagement. This allowed us to share better insights on what can be done to get more organic social traffic.

Here are the 10 industries we looked at:

• Business
• E-commerce
• Fashion
• Food
• Health
• News
• Politics
• Sports
• Technology
• Travel

Analysis #1: Social Media Engagement For Each Industry Over the Last 12 Months

The first graph below shows the total social media engagement for content related to each industry over the last 12 months. This is the grand total and not a monthly average.

The key highlight is that News-related posts had the most engagement followed by Sports and then Politics.

It’s worth noting that social media posts related to Business and E-commerce received virtually no engagement which might highlight some trends for both industries.

To make sure the data wasn’t biased or skewed, we also looked at the average engagement data for each post versus just the total.

The results were similar for the majority of industries, but with one key difference. Even though News received the most total social media engagement, it was behind Politics when looking at the average engagement per post. 

But as everyone knows, don’t talk about politics at the dinner table. In other words, you don’t want to polarize your audience.

Regardless of which industry you belong to, incorporating news-related subjects in your content could be a great way to get more engagement and traffic.

For example, if you own a music-related website, you may try to break news or write about it on your blog such as when Apple bought a company called Beats by Dre years ago. If the acquisition took place today, Apple would want to make sure their blog covered the move and then share it across their social media channels for added engagement.

Alternatively, if you were a business-related website, you could discuss the Beats by Dre acquisition from your perspective. Even if you aren’t the first company talking about it, you can discuss why they made the move and share your top 5 predictions for what will happen over the next 5 years.

On another note, let’s say you own a travel-related website. You could talk about restrictions each country has with quarantining and how it gets adjusted on a monthly or even weekly basis.

Regardless of what industry you are in, there are always opportunities to tie in the news which can lead to more social engagement, resulting in more organic traffic to your website.

Analysis #2: What Type of Content Works Best on Social Media Networks?

For fun, we also looked at which industries performed the best on each social network in terms of shares.

Here are the average Facebook shares for content related to each industry:

And here is what the data looks like for Twitter.

And Pinterest…

No shocker, but Facebook and Twitter prefer News-related content. Pinterest, on the other hand, prefers content that is more visual so industries such as Fashion, Travel, and even Food performed better.

As I mentioned before, if you want to get more traffic from Facebook and Twitter, find ways to tie in News-related topics or events to your content. Even if you aren’t a part of the industry it can help you get traction.

But if you want more traffic from Pinterest, focus on anything that is visual.

Now, none of that is really eye-opening. So we decided to dig a bit deeper to see the types of content that were most popular on these platforms.

I would assume infographics would perform best as they are easily shareable and are easy to generate links to.

Funnily enough, infographics had the worst performance from a social standpoint.

On the flip side, I would never have guessed that “why” posts and “interview” based posts would do so well.

List-based content is pretty much a given as everyone loves lists such as “The 7 benefits of green tea”.

As for the appeal of why-based posts, think of topics like “why isn’t there an eclipse every month” or “why don’t people wear white after labor day”.

For interviews, people want to hear from people who intrigue them. For example, if you were to be able to get an interview with business leaders like Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos, athletes like Lebron James or Cristiano Ronaldo, or even political figures who are trending at the time, you can bet it will get a lot of social shares.

In case you were curious about which content type was leveraged most by each industry, the graph above shows that. You can see how the News industry releases a lot of why-related content but industries like Business or E-commerce don’t leverage them as much.

You can use this data to find gaps and leverage the content type that has the highest likelihood of generating traffic for your industry.

Analysis #3: The Relationship Between Total Engagement and Total Shares of Each Industry

Some content gets shared a lot while others get a ton of engagement such as comments and likes. However, just because a piece of content gets a lot of comments, it doesn’t necessarily mean people like it and want to promote it to their network.

The more shares a piece of content has, the higher the chances are of you getting more traffic.

The graph above clearly shows this for each industry. If you create polarizing content, such as political content or sports-related content with a lot of diehard fans and haters, it doesn’t mean engagement alone will result in more traffic (it can but not always).

A great example of this is if I posted a piece of content on “Why the Los Angeles Lakers will win the NBA championship”. I will get tons of comments from people who support any one of the other 29 NBA teams on why I’m wrong and how their team has a better chance of winning.

Engagement on social media is great, but it can only take you so far. That is why the goal of this study is to figure out how to use social media sites to generate more organic traffic for your website and not just get “engagement”.

News clearly is the winner on both fronts if you look at the chart above. So, again, try to tie it into your content wherever possible.

Analysis #4: How Long Should Your Content Be And When Should You Share It?

For the next analysis, we thought it would be fun to look at how long your articles should be and when you should share them to get the most social traffic.

Did you know that the average article that ranks on page 1 of Google contains 1,447 words?

It used to be around 3,000 words, then in the low 2,000s and now 1,447.

With social media, we wanted to see how long content should be to generate the most shares.

Let’s first look at the average word count per industry for the 50,000 most popular articles shared.

As you can see, they are short. Really short (700 words or less for most industries).

E-commerce had the highest word count, followed closely by Business. However, both of these industries had the lowest number of total engagements and total shares based on the previous charts I shared above.

Although Google may prefer long-form articles, people on social media prefer short articles over longer ones.

When you look at the articles people prefer sharing (not liking, but sharing), it is also clear that people prefer sharing shorter articles.

More than 90 percent of all content pieces shared on social media from this analysis were less than 2,000 words in length.

Getting someone to actively share an article is a lot rarer than simply clicking the “like” button. Keep in mind that people can share the same article over and over again.

As for when to release and promote your content, not all days are equal. It also varies per industry as well.

In general, people enjoy engaging with content most on Wednesdays followed by Thursdays and Tuesdays.

However, it isn’t that simple. Releasing content on Wednesday won’t guarantee success as it is different for each industry.

I know the graph above is hard to see as News dominates the results. So here is a version that doesn’t include News.

If you are in the “Food” industry you can promote your content on Wednesday but you will also do really well on Friday even though that day doesn’t work as well for other industries.

Analysis #5: Most Common Type of Facebook Reaction for Each Industry

This one was fun because we were able to pull the most popular reactions people give to posts on Facebook.

This graph shows the type of Facebook reaction (Angry, Haha, Love, Sad, Wow) that users had for posts related to each industry. Facebook reactions are the next generation of “likes” for the platform.

The key finding is that the two most popular types of reaction for all industries were either “Haha” or “Love”.

Outside of News and Politics, where the top reaction was “Haha”, “Love” was the most popular reaction for all industries.

If you want your content to do well, create content that conveys the feeling of “love” or makes people laugh. Those are the two types of reactions that people want to give the most.

Conclusion

There were a lot of interesting findings from the charts above.

The big takeaway for me was to create why-based content and write short articles if you want to do well on social media.

In general, you’ll want to:

• tie content to relevant news
• create why-based content or interview well known figures
• write shorter posts of 700 words or less to share on social media instead of 2,000+ word articles
• promote your content on Wednesday (for most industries) to get the most engagement
• create content that leverages the feeling of love or makes people laugh

Did you learn anything new from the above charts and data?

from Blog – Neil Patel https://ift.tt/E6ngzK8

The User-Generated Content Ultimate Guide: How to Use It, Why It’s Important, and Timing It Perfectly

User-generated content (UGC) is a marketing goldmine and knowing how to use it properly can create a snowball effect of higher engagement and more social media followers.

That’s not all.

Taking advantage of the right opportunities will let users do most of the work for you—generating product interest, conversation, and even revenue.

How?

It’s simple. Consumers trust organic, user-generated content more than they trust traditional advertising. In other words, your audience would rather hear from your customers instead of you.

Here’s the proof: 37 percent of consumers rely on social networks for their pre-purchase research. Based on this data, user-generated content is a surefire way to win over your prospects, right?

Yet some marketers still aren’t using UGC to its full advantage because they don’t know where to start.

Below, I’m going to show you everything you need to know to craft a winning UGC strategy that will explode your growth, engagement, and bottom line.

Let’s dive in.

What Is User-Generated Content?

User-generated content (UGC) is content created by individuals rather than brands.

If you’ve ever gone to a cafe, snapped a picture of your latte art, uploaded it to your Instagram Stories, and tagged the coffee shop, you’ve created UGC.

User-generated content usually comes in the form of images, videos, reviews, or testimonials—which leads to users promoting a brand through online content, rather than the brand promoting themselves.

The result? Powerful online social proof that has the potential to increase trust, authenticity, and sales.

Why You Should Use User-Generated Content

You’re leaving money on the table by ignoring UGC.

Close to 80 percent of people say user-generated content impacts their purchasing decision.

UGC outranks other forms of marketing content like promotional emails. In fact, 64 percent of Gen Z and 60 percent of Millennials indicated they did not buy from an e-commerce store because the site didn’t include customer images or reviews.

Incredible, right?

These statistics beg the question: what about UGC makes it so successful? Why does it have such a powerful pull over our purchasing decisions?

People Trust Real People, Not Brands

Word-of-mouth recommendations from friends and family are worth their weight in gold.

Remember when sleazy salespeople going door-to-door was a thing?

A stranger knocks at your door, trying to convince you to buy the latest vacuum cleaner, makeup products, or a revolutionary anti-aging serum.

Immediately, your defenses are up. You don’t trust this person and you don’t want their product.

However, if you are sharing a problem with a trusted friend, such as a broken vacuum cleaner, you are more likely to trust their review and recommendation of a product.

What was once word-of-mouth has now evolved into user-generated content.

Eighty-eight percent of people trust recommendations from people they know over advertisers, whether it’s a friend, family member, or influencer.

UGC Is More Authentic

Authenticity is a key ingredient in establishing trust with your audience.

In a study by Stackla, 90 percent of consumers say authenticity is an important factor when deciding which brands to support.

Consumers today don’t just buy products, they buy into brands. In fact, 55 percent of consumers will purchase from a company that shares their values, while only four percent say it’s not something that influences their purchasing decisions at all.

How does UGC make your brand more authentic?

It humanizes your company, helps people connect to you on a deeper level, and shows (not tells) your audience that your product will deliver on its values.

UGC Is Time and Cost-Effective

How long does it take you to plan, shoot, edit, upload, and write a caption for a single post on social media?

If you’re publishing 5x per week, the minutes each post takes quickly adds up to a couple of hours.

Then there’s the cost.

Whether you’re outsourcing your graphic designers or relying on the talents of your in-house team, their time costs your business money.

User-generated content helps you shave off time and money by letting your community create the content for you.

Need some convincing?

Busabout reduced its content creation costs and grow its social audience by 350 percent with user-generated content.

The ROI for User-Generated Content Is Sky-High

The high ROI isn’t only for sales.

The impact UGC has on purchasing decisions isn’t the only advantage. It can also increase brand engagements.

In a digital world where reach dwindles by the day, this type of content can go a long way to improving your follower count and click-through rates (CTR).

Brands like Air France have used user-generated content to increase their CTR by 11 percent and reduce the CPC by 21 percent for Facebook ads featuring user-generated content.

Types of User-Generated Content

Now that you understand what UGC is and how it can benefit your business, let’s look at the three main types of user-generated content.

1. Photos and Videos

Visual content is some of the most powerful UGC because it shows potential customers what they can expect from a product without physically inspecting it.

For example, an experience like staying at a hotel or a new pair of shoes.

Seeing these images or video clips is immersive and makes users feel more confident buying an item online.

This is especially true for younger demographics, with 52 percent of Gen Z preferring video reviews over images.

Where can you find visual user-generated content for your business?

• Customers: Encourage and incentivize your customers to post photos and videos about your product or service.
• Influencers: Team up with influencers in your niche to create UGC content. It allows you to reach their audience while adding new content at the same time.
• Employees: Encourage your employees to give people an inside look at what your company culture is like. Not only is this type of UGC content great for attracting talent, it shows your audience your brand values are real.

2. Testimonials

Are you collecting customer testimonials? If not, you’re missing out on leveraging the best kind of social proof.

Whether you’re selling an online course or a physical product, testimonials from real customers can go a long way in boosting your sales.

If you can show people your item gets results, you’re helping people on the fence feel more confident and secure in their purchasing decision.

How do you get testimonials?

• Reach out to past happy customers and ask for a short paragraph on how your product or service has helped them.
• Send out customer feedback forms after every purchase.
• Browse your comment sections on TikTok, Facebook, and Instagram. Take screenshots of comments complimenting your business and ask permission to use them in your marketing materials.

3. Reviews

Reviews are similar to testimonials but are on sites like TripAdvisor, TrustPilot, product pages on Amazon, or Facebook business pages.

With 89 percent of customers reading reviews before making a purchase, using this type of user-generated content can increase:

• trust
• authenticity
• sales

If someone is taking the time to read reviews, you know the person is at the bottom of the sales funnel and is close to making a purchase.

That doesn’t mean you should save reviews for the end of the sales cycle. Using reviews in your top-of-funnel strategies can build the necessary brand awareness and trust early to boost your brand’s reputation.

How to Get User-Generated Content

Since user-generated content comes from your customers, you need to find a way to incentivize and collect the content you need.

Motivating Your Audience

Just like on your Instagram captions and landing pages, you need a strong call to action. Tell your audience what you want, and you’ll motivate your customers to create the type of UGC you need.

How do you achieve this?

Review your buyer’s journey, identify parts with a high emotional charge, and add a CTA for user-generated content.

This is when your customer is excited about their purchase, for example:

1. right after making a purchase
2. unboxing your product or getting access to your service
3. seeing the result your product or service promised.

Some of the ways you can encourage UGC at these touchpoints are by:

• Adding a tweet or share button on your after checkout page.
• Encouraging users to take a screenshot, share it on their Instagram Stories, and tag you.
• Sending a note with your product with a CTA, your brand hashtags, and social media handles.
• Emailing customers a few days after receiving your product to write a review.
• Sending out feedback forms at the end of an event.

Incentivize Customers With a Prize

User-generated content competitions are a strategy you can use a couple of times a year. They increase brand awareness and create powerful social proof you can use for months to come.

What is a UGC competition?

It’s when you ask your audience to create and share a piece of content related to your brand and the winner gets a prize.

For example, fitness app Shreddy runs competitions asking users to share their progress over a specific time period. The person with the biggest transformation wins a cash prize.

Not only does it encourage users to sign up and use the app, but it motivates users to get the results the app can use as social proof.

Chipotle did something similar with its TikTok campaign. The brand asked users to make a video explaining why they should win a free year of Chipotle using the hashtag #ChiptotleSponsorMe.

The result?

The brand hashtag received over 2.3 billion views.

Create Shareable Events

Social media is all about visuals.

Leverage this by creating beautiful and unique unboxing events, in-store spaces, and brand activation.

One of the best examples of this is Kynd Community in Bali. Thanks to its pink palm leaf wall and Insta-worthy smoothie bowls, the small cafe went viral on social media.

If you visit the cafe, you’ll often see customers lining up to take a photo in front of the famous wall, creating an endless stream of user-generated content and FOMO among travelers who want the same experience.

How to Start Incorporating User-Generated Content in Your Content Marketing Efforts

Have you tried implementing UGC before but didn’t see results? Or are you just getting started and feeling a little overwhelmed?

Just like with any other marketing initiative, you need to have a clear plan on how you will achieve results with your new content efforts.

Here are a few things to keep in mind when creating your user-generated content strategy.

1. Decide on Your UGC Campaign Goals

Before you can start calling for and collecting content, you need to know exactly how you plan to use it.

• Want to increase brand awareness? Create a hashtag like Audi’s #WantAnR8 campaign. A Twitter user started the hashtag, and the brand hopped on board to promote the launch. Soon other users took notice, and the hashtag was used 75,000 times.
• Want to increase conversions? Focus on a campaign that generates reviews and testimonials. Takealot, an online retailer in South Africa, offers users the chance to win a voucher for leaving reviews on recent purchases.
• Want informative content that influences buying decisions? Take a page out of GoPro’s book and use UGC that shows the different ways your product or service can be used.

2. Brainstorm Which Type of UGC Will Help Meet Your Goals

Not every piece of user-generated content will work for each stages of the buyer’s journey.

In order to get consistent results, you need to analyze what works at each touchpoints and make changes accordingly.

Your UGC competition is perfect for creating top-of-funnel awareness while a user’s video review of your product works best for bottom-of-funnel conversions.

3. Use Different Types of User-Generated Content

You don’t need to post every type of user-generated content on each platform. Selectivity is key to any winning strategy.

Ask yourself what type of content is going to work best at each stage and test it out.

Let’s say you’re an online business coach ready to launch your next group coaching session. Testimonials and reviews are the types of UGC most likely to get results.

Collect testimonials regularly to add them to your content bank. This social proof can also be used in your emails, Instagram Stories, and landing pages.

Hotels are another good example of this strategy.

Reviews and testimonials are the perfect type of UGC for their booking and product pages. On the other hand, photos and videos of customers enjoying their stay would work really well on Instagram.

4. Find or Ask Users to Create UGC

If your brand has been around for a while, there’s a good chance users are already creating UGC.

Use a social listening tool to find what people are saying and implement the content into your marketing strategy.

Didn’t find anything?

Start asking your audience to create what you want. Encourage users to use your brand hashtag, incentivize reviews, and create campaigns centered around user-generated content.

Whatever you decide, make sure it’s clear to your audience what you want.

4. Request Permission to Use the Content

Just because your brand is mentioned in a post doesn’t mean you can re-publish it without permission.

Always reach out and ask if you can use the content on your social media pages or website. Without permission, you might upset even your most loyal brand advocates.

Besides, when you reach out, it shows the user you like their content. They get those positive feelings while you get permission, everyone wins.

5. Always Credit the Original Creator

The most important rule of UGC is to always give credit where it’s due.

Don’t take someone else’s content and share it without tagging their account. That’s a big social media no-no.

Not crediting the original poster can also land you in hot water with your followers.

Plus, there’s an even bigger incentive to do it.

By tagging the creator, you show your followers that the UGC is authentic and wasn’t created by your team.

6. Promote Your User-Generated Content

Once your UGC starts rolling in, it’s time to start using it!

Schedule your photos and videos for Instagram and TikTok. Use the content to create ads on Facebook.

Share reviews on your next email blast and start adding your best testimonials to your sales pages.

The more you promote your UGC, the more you’ll incentivize your followers to participate.

A big part of UGC is the community. It brings you and your audience closer together and makes everyone feel like they are a part of something.

7. Track the Success of Your UGC Campaign

How do you know if your UGC campaign is successful? By tracking the following metrics:

• number of impressions
• total reach
• organic traffic
• social follows
• engagement rate
• total number of interactions
• volume of posts created
• total number of conversions
• conversion rate
• total revenue
• total ad spend
• click-through rates for ads
• return on ad spend
• growth of visual asset library

Monitor these KPIs throughout your campaign and make adjustments as needed to hit your goals.

Examples of Brands that Use UGC

Let’s put everything together and explore some of the best user-generated content campaigns that you can take inspiration from.

Coca Cola’s Share a Coke

Remember when Coca-Cola launched their “Share a Coke” campaign?

Featuring bottles named after people in every destination took the world by storm.

The brand asked customers to share photos of themselves with their personalized coke bottle resulting in 496,000 uses on Instagram and 89,000 tweets on Twitter.

Plus, more than 1.25 million teens tried the drink, and sales rose by sales rose by 11 percent in the United States.

Burberry’s Art of the Trench

Over ten years ago, Burberry capitalized on the social media revolution with its UGC Art of the Trench campaign.

The brand asked its followers to upload pictures wearing their iconic trench coats. Burberry curated the best submissions and showcased their picks on Facebook and a dedicated microsite.

The results?

Burberry’s Facebook page grew to over a million and became the largest page in the luxury sector. Their ecommerce sales went up by 50 percent, and the microsite had 7.5 million views from 150 countries within the first year.

Lululemon #thesweatlife UGC Campaign

Lululemon is a yoga clothing brand known for its strong sense of community.

One of the reasons behind its billion-dollar success is the brand’s user-generated content. Lululemon launched a hashtag campaign to encourage brand partners and users to post pictures using their gear on Instagram.

#TheSweatLife campaign was a huge success. It hit $4.6 million EMV across 1.4k posts from 678 creators.

T-Mobile Break-Up Letters

One of the greatest examples of a user-generated content campaign is T-Mobile’s break-up letters.

Mobile users didn’t want to switch carriers in the U.S. because of high cancellation fees.

T-Mobile’s solution? Encouraging people to submit break-up letters explaining their reason for leaving their current provider.

In exchange, T-Mobile would cover the termination costs.

More than 113,000 break-up letters were submitted, the app for the campaign received 2.7 million page views, and the campaign generated 67 million social media impressions.

This was topped off by T-Mobile’s CEO personally re-tweeting break-up letter posts and welcoming the new customers.

User-Generated Content Frequently Asked Questions

Do you have to pay for user-generated content?

No, you don’t need to pay for user-generated content. All you need to do is encourage your audience to create content featuring your product/service and tag your account in their posts. Don’t confuse UGC with sponsored ads from influencers.

Why is user-generated content used in marketing?

User-generated content is used in marketing because it’s powerful social proof. People trust recommendations from friends, family, and other humans online over the lip service of a brand. It humanizes your business and creates trust between you and your audience.

Do you have to get permission for user-generated content?

Yes. The best way to get permission for user-generated content is to ask. Reach out to the person in the DMs or the comment section and ask if you can repost their content on your profile.

What does user-generated content do?

User-generated content creates social proof. By posting content made by your customers, you’re increasing your credibility and showing potential customers your product/service will deliver on its promises.

Conclusion: User-Generated Content

Are you using social media to help drive your brand recognition?

Too many brands rely on their own content to drive social growth for their brand.

User-generated content not only takes a bit of pressure off of content creation demands but also builds credibility with your audience and naturally attracts more followers.

It’s time to think of user-generated content as an offensive strategy instead of being on defense against what people might say about your brand.

Be the kind of brand that people want to share with their peers and talk about on their social accounts.

How are you leveraging user-generated content to boost your social media footprint?

from Blog – Neil Patel https://ift.tt/vOBiYRJ

Google Made Its Algorithm Public: What Will SEOs Do with It?

The exact algorithm Google is using to rank web pages is something many SEOs would want to know. If you’ve read it, how would you change your SEO methods?

Jim Boykin, CEO of Internet Marketing Ninjas, and Ann Smarty, IMN’s analyst, discuss how they would use the information and if it’s even going to be useful.

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Doesn’t we know what we need to know already?

We already know what we need to know: You need a genuinely useful and authoritative website to achieve high rankings in Google.

There’s no magic number hidden inside Google’s algorithm that would give you a shortcut to higher rankings.

But let’s pretend you have their whole algorithm to read.

What’s next?

How would you apply that knowledge?

Even if you knew exactly how Google use all their multiple signals, there’s still a question of how to build them.

You will still need to:

1. Research and create great and useful content for people to read and link to…

2. Figure out ways get those natural backlinks…

3. Figure out the way to make those pages user-friendly enough for people to engage with them.

If there had been any shortcuts years ago, there is certainly none today.

Besides, Google algorithm is more than a decade old: I am sure even Googlers are not quite sure exactly how it works and which signals overpower other signals in certain situations.

Stop trying to find a secret source: What you need is a great website that your customers love and other people link to.

And we can help.

The post Google Made Its Algorithm Public: What Will SEOs Do with It? appeared first on Internet Marketing Ninjas Blog.

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