Several different elements go into a successful ecommerce strategy. Besides just having an online store, you want to make sure that store is found. You want the customers who find it to be able to use it easily. And when they’re using it, it’s also important they’re having an experience that’s consistent with your brand. 

At Responsival, we’re Shopify pros, design aficionados, and marketing wizards. We hit all the angles of your e-commerce strategy–your site’s usability and structure, shopify marketing, and more–from the perspectives of our 3 core service areas: web development, marketing, and design. 

Every “ring” of our logo represents one of these service areas, each of which is crucial to your ecommerce strategy. In this post, we’ll use these 3 rings to explain the components of a top-performing online store. 

Ring 1. Why Web Development Crucial For Your Shopify Marketing

Optimize Your Store for Customers With Tools Like Shopify: Marketing it Through A Good User Experience

You probably won’t be surprised when we tell you that your online store itself is a huge component of your overall ecommerce strategy. Obviously, customers can’t buy from you unless you give them a space where they can see your products, pay for them, and get them shipped over. So step 1 in any good ecommerce strategy is just creating that online space. And doing that is easy using website builders like Shopify. Marketing and promoting your store can only happen after it’s been built. 

But even before moving onto promoting it, you’ll want to consider the quality of the site you’ve made. After all, just creating a site only gets you part of the way there. The rest of the way is having that store developed for the best possible customer experience. And there are several items to consider when it comes to providing a quality experience for your customers: 

• Site Architecture: It’s crucial that customers are easily able to navigate your store. Setting your products up in a clear, logical, and hierarchical structure can make it much easier for users to find exactly what they want. When a customer visits your store looking for a new winter parka, it’s likely pretty intuitive for them to use the category “jackets” to navigate down to “winter jackets” and from there down to specific types of winter jackets. But if instead of flowing down that logical sequence, they’re sifting through a sea of unrelated products, they might decide to look for that parka elsewhere. 
• Buying Process: Nothing is more annoying for online shoppers than a website that gets in the way of them buying what they want. The irony is, a customer can be completely sold on your product, only to be blocked from purchasing it by a poorly planned website. It’s always important to think about what would be easiest for your customers. Is the checkout process unnecessarily difficult? Are your shipping processes optimized? Do you offer multiple payment options? When a frustrated customer abandons their cart because they’re being bombarded by ads during checkout, everybody loses. 
• Mobile friendly: If a store works on a desktop, and no one is around to buy from it, does it ever make a sale? These days, it’s no longer an option not to optimize your store for mobile. This year, mobile commerce is projected at almost 70% of all online sales. If your online store is difficult to use on mobile devices, you might be missing out on $3.56 trillion in sales. 

Responsival’s expertise in web development is a huge reason why you want us on your team. Here, we prioritize supercharging the selling power of your store. And we love working with companies to create and develop customized online stores that are easy and pleasant to use. And when it comes to the nitty gritty logistics that go into brainstorming creative shipping and logistical solutions, we can’t get enough. (Oh, and by the way, mobile first is like a religion here).

Ring 2. Marketing Your Online Store 

Now That You Have a Store, It’s Time to Get it Found 

If you have a store you’re proud of, you have to show it off. But the Internet is a big place. Unlike traditional brick and mortar locations, the chances of someone just stumbling upon your store are slim. This is where Responsival’s shopify marketing strategies really shine. We know all the best ways to help your online store get seen. 

• Social Media: Once you’ve chosen the right platform for your business, creating and maintaining a social media presence can be a powerful way to cultivate an audience of people who are already interested in you. If you know how to do it right, a quick social post about a new product that links to your store can generate a huge amount of traffic. 
• Ads:  Crafting compelling advertisements is no small feat: but it’s necessary to get the word out to a wide variety of people. Plus, knowing how to use the advanced targeting capabilities of platforms like Facebook and Google can help you get the word to people who want to hear it.  
• SEO: It’s easy to underestimate the power of organic search results and just focus on ads when promoting your store. And–as we mentioned– ads are an important component of your overall marketing strategy. But traditional advertising needs to convince customers they want something they hadn’t considered before. On the other hand, if someone finds you while they’re already in the middle of searching for something they want, they’re halfway to buying already. That’s the space where you can do things like research and strategically place  keywords in product descriptions + titles. Or maybe you can build some backlinks. These, and other strategies like them can help ensure that your store shows up prominently in your customer’s search results. 

The marketing department here at Responsival knows what’s up when it comes to showcasing your store in the digital space. Designing personalized marketing strategies for your online store is old hat for us. We can help you craft the strategy that’s right for you, and we can also help you implement it. Our seasoned copywriters are at your service: ready to churn out the type of quality content that will delight your audience and drive your sales. Marketing is an essential part of your ecommerce strategy, and that’s why we’re a powerful force you want to have in your corner. 

Ring 3. Designing a Distinctive and Attractive Store

How To Design an Experience that Speaks to Your Brand 

You might think that all your ecommerce strategy needs is a solidly developed online store and some marketing for shopify. Plenty of people would consider the actual design of the store to just be window dressing. But there’s a reason design gets a whole ring on our logo–it’s just as important as the rest of it. The fact is, a prospect can see your ad and click to your well-functioning store, and if they immediately don’t like the way it looks, exit out and continue on with their lives. 

This happens. All. The. Time. On the Internet, where it’s never been easier for customers to leave stores they don’t immediately like, first impressions matter–and 94% of those snap judgments are influenced by design. That makes a difference for your bottom line because 75% of users judge your credibility based on your web design. If a customer doesn’t trust you, they’re not going to buy from you. 

The reason design’s huge impact on our experience is often overlooked is because most people don’t notice design when it’s good. Unless a color clashes terribly with the one next to it, or a font is just unreadable, most of us take design for granted. We don’t pay any attention to how the color of that “buy now” button makes us more likely to click it or how the boxes around the product descriptions make them easier to read. But whether customers notice it or not, the way your website is designed can be the difference between making or losing a sale. 

Not to mention that maintaining consistent design across all your offerings–be it your store, your logo, or your product packaging–is huge for brand awareness. Your brand is a chance to make a deeper connection with your customers–to make that pair of shoes more than just a pair of shoes by connecting them to a bigger narrative. When a user can recognize you from the colors, fonts, and logo you use at your online store, your products immediately become more attractive to them.

Like we’ve talked about, most of us don’t notice the subtle design choices that go behind a top performing online store. But our designers at Responsival are some of the lucky few who know how to leverage that mysterious tool to your company’s advantage. We’ll work with you to carefully create and showcase the design that best reflects who you are and who your customers want to see. 

Whether you’re building a store on Shopify, marketing it, or designing it, in the end, any successful ecommerce strategy is going to center around building a store that’s functional, discoverable, and beautiful. Here at Responsival, we can help you do all of the above. Our extensive expertise in these 3 areas makes us the perfect addition to your team. 

Ready to take your ecommerce strategy to the next level? Feel free to reach out and get started.