5 Revenue Optimization Strategies to Help Your Ecommerce Business Thrive

For most challenging ventures in life, people can’t expect to excel just by showing up. They need a plan — a strategy to keep them on track and ready for the tumultuous nature of anything hard to do.

The same goes for an ecommerce business.

There are a few key revenue optimization strategies to consider if you want your ecommerce business to maintain sustainable growth. In this post, you’ll learn about the five strategies you can implement to protect your ecommerce business and help it become a consistent success story!

1. The Overarching Data-Driven Strategy

On your journey to optimize revenue, start with a data-driven strategy. All other strategies will only be better served if you prioritize collecting and analyzing customer data first. The more reliable information you have, the more likely you are to make good data-driven decisions.

According to a Harvard Business Review survey, data-driven organizations are more profitable than those that don’t prioritize data. When it comes to revenue optimization, track factors that tell a story about conversion, churn, and customer retention to figure out what’s working and what isn’t. Set specific key performance indicators (KPIs), such as:

• Product discovery: Impressions, reach, and engagement
• Acquisition metrics: Email click-through, cost per acquisition (CPA), organic traffic, and social media engagement
• Conversion metrics: Shopping cart abandonment rate, checkout abandonment, average order value (AOV), and sales conversion rates
• Retention metrics: Customer retention rate, customer lifetime value (CLV), subscription rate, and repeat customer rate
• Advocacy metrics: Net Promoter Score (NPS) and program participation rate

With KPIs clearly laid out, you can now start gathering data through various methods, like A/B testing. A/B testing will help you gather significant data, like which products, layouts, or offers lead to the most conversions.

Rebuy's personalization platform includes a robust A/B testing tool to support your revenue optimization strategies.

Conduct data analysis of these metrics so you can use them to improve your ecommerce business. Today, many artificial intelligence and machine learning programs track customer behavior and sales revenue to provide an accurate story. You can use that information to automatically serve the customer.

SaaS programs like Rebuy provide A/B testing tools and real-time insights into your customer segments to develop a top-notch merchandising process for every shopper.

2. The Personalized User Experience Strategy

Another way to optimize for growth is to personalize the customer experience. That means using the data you collect on customer behavior and creating a UX that individually serves each of your existing customers. According to a Zendesk report, 70% of consumers spend more with companies that personalize the experience.

Personalization helps customers find exactly what they’re looking for and reduces the likelihood they’ll go looking elsewhere. There are a few key ways to personalize your ecommerce website and optimize for revenue growth.

Intelligent Shopping Cart

A modern shopping cart, like Rebuy’s Smart Cart™, creates a custom checkout experience for each customer. As your customers add items to their shopping carts, an intelligent cart will make product recommendations based on their choices, their behavior, and their purchase history. This includes cross-selling or upselling relevant products, offering dynamic bundles, and recommending subscription options to save. Not only is this helpful for increasing the average order value, but it also reduces the likelihood of shopping cart abandonment.

Smart Checkout Process

A smooth checkout experience is another way to reduce churn due to abandoned carts or disgruntled customers. Add checkout features or extensions that support the shopper’s goals. Once your customers are ready to complete their purchases, a smart checkout process will make a few final product recommendations based on their entire cart. It will also show them any discount options or promotion reminders that fit with their specific purchase.

Additionally, give your customers ample payment options and make it easy for them to check out as a guest rather than requiring them to create an account.

The checkout experience includes the shopping cart, checkout page, post-purchase offer, and the thank you / order status page.

Custom Post-Purchase Experience

Post-purchase is yet another opportunity to personalize and delight your customers while driving repeat business and loyalty. The post-purchase experience should make it easy for customers to see the value of your company and products by using simple reminders such as:

• A pop-up with a personalized recommendation before closing their browser window
• A branded thank-you email with a unique offer or marketing story
• An email or text with detailed tracking information
• A data-driven discount offer for their next purchase
• An invitation to join a loyalty program

To streamline and optimize the post-purchase experience, use a software service like Rebuy that uses data to make real-time adjustments that lead to more successful post-purchase engagement.

3. The Proactive Customer Service Strategy

Customer service shouldn’t just be about solving problems by being reactive. You also need to anticipate questions and make relevant suggestions to create a smoother customer journey. In fact, proactive communication from a company can positively change consumer perspectives. According to a Zendesk survey, “81% of consumers say a positive customer service experience increases the likelihood that they will make another purchase.”

Proactive customer service and sales strategies use a mixture of data, social psychology, and empathy to prioritize customer satisfaction. Sales teams should have direct insight into customer behavior or other historical data that helps them anticipate customer needs and questions. Not only will this help reduce shopper frustration, but it also reflects well on your brand.

Click the image to read hiver's full interview with Rebuy's VP of Customer Support, Christian Sokolowski.

Preempting your customers' wants and needs is easier than it sounds. Many tools offer solutions for your customers before they even have a problem in the first place:

• Provide predictive assistance: Notify customers of potential shipping delays due to weather conditions, offer alternative options on sold-out items, or make product recommendations.
• Live chat support: Initiate conversations with customers who appear to struggle with purchases or spend a lot of time on certain pages.
• Create an FAQ page or help portal: Update the FAQ section and knowledge base regularly with current information, how-to guides, and solutions to common issues based on customer inquiries and feedback.
• Seek out customer feedback: Request feedback on the shopping experience, potential issues, and overall product feedback through surveys and email follow-ups.
• Apply a customized process for new leads: Guide new shoppers through the sales process with examples and recommendations. Encourage them to reach out directly if they have questions.

To further boost sales performance, implement a rewards program to encourage and recognize sales reps who do an outstanding job. Not only is this a good way to reinforce great work, but it’s also good for their morale and can motivate them to continue their stellar performance.

4. The Targeted Marketing Strategy

A targeted marketing strategy is all about personalizing your marketing campaigns and brand messages for a specific audience. If you attract potential customers with the right offers and messaging, you get one step closer to another sale.

Just like your website and customer service, a targeted marketing strategy is data-driven and personalized. To start, get clarity on who makes up your customer base and group them into cohorts. Marketing segmentation is based on consumer behavior, demographics, and self-reported data. As you dive deeper into the intricacies of the various personas of each cohort, develop consistent branding and messaging that will resonate with each.

This type of precision targeting will help you produce marketing campaigns that draw in your ideal customers at exactly the right time. For example, say you have a customer who has only purchased once from you (and that was six months ago). This isn’t a loyal and consistent customer, but they could benefit from a nudge. Send a personalized message through email or SMS and remind them of what you have to offer. You can even include a reorder landing page to make it quick and easy to order the same or similar products.

Other targeted marketing strategies you should have in your arsenal include:

• SEO blogs: Write about topics that are educational, helpful, and relevant to your target market.
• Retargeting ads: Display ads to customers who have visited your site without making a purchase yet.
• Webinars or other free education resources: Whether you sell cosmetics or power tools, there’s always something new or interesting happening in your industry that you can teach your audience about.
• Social media influencer partnerships: Influencers help you gain visibility in new markets, such as a younger age demographic.

As long as you take a targeted and personalized approach, you’ll be well on your way to securing another rung in the ladder toward revenue growth.

5. The Demand Forecasting and Pricing Strategy

Demand forecasting, or using data to predict the future demand for consumer goods, is another data-based revenue optimization strategy. When you accurately forecast demand, you can adjust your inventory, revenue streams, and other factors that affect pricing optimization.

There are a few types of demand forecasting: macro-level, micro-level, short-term, and long-term. In general, the process involves:

• Keeping an eye on market trends and conditions: Whether it’s the economy or the manufacturing industry, having a pulse on the ups and downs will help you make more informed decisions.
• Social media listening: Your customers often talk about their needs and desires openly on social media.
• Tracking competitor pricing: A competitive price point will help you grow.

Once you’ve done that work, you can develop a dynamic pricing strategy that reduces financial risk. For example, when you set flexible prices based on current market demand, you don’t end up with overinflated prices that lead to a decrease in sales and an excess of inventory. Instead, your predictive models can help you automatically set the right price for your products and maintain a healthy inventory.

Knowing When to Re-Strategize

The revenue optimization process is just that: a process. It’s always evolving. At some point, you will need to revamp or adjust one of your strategies. Whenever you get together for a new strategy session, schedule time to evaluate how each existing strategy is or isn’t working and how it can be improved.

You might find that you need more bandwidth or team members to accomplish certain tasks. Or you might want to add a new tool to your lineup of helpful ecommerce assistants.

Rebuy is one of those tools that can cover for you if you’re constantly running out of bandwidth. It helps you build and maintain the perfect revenue optimization strategies for your business using customer data, AI, and machine learning. You’ll attract the right customers at the right time, helping you optimize your revenue and keep on running a thriving ecommerce business.

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