D2C experts market rocket offer tips to give your ecomm a boost
As UK internet shopping tops more than $120 billion, accounting for around 30% of total retail sales, Direct to Consumer (D2C) experts Market Rocket offer top tips for how brands can give their ecomm strategy a boost.
4 out of 5 UK consumers now reportedly shop on-line, so cutting through the noise and standing out from the competition to reach new, thumb-swiping audiences is now even more critical than ever.
With more than 20 years experience in on-line retail, Market Rocket CEO, Matthew Peck has developed a simple mantra to help D2C brands become more successful, “Optimise Everything, sell everywhere”.
Growth of D2C
The Covid-19 pandemic saw many brands pivot towards a D2C strategy, cutting out the ‘middle-man’ to sell directly ‘from factory to sofa’. While some chose in-house solutions, others chose to sell through third-party retailers or on a variety of global marketplaces. Since then, brands have continued to embrace D2C as a way of supercharging their growth, and without retail margins increasing their profitability and building their brand.
But despite new platforms popping up regularly, offering direct routes to market, brands still have to fight to generate and maintain an audience and despite the lack of bricks and mortar, there remain other costs and overheads associated with this strategy.
As Matthew warns, “Despite the explosion in earned revenues, selling online successfully is still very difficult as well as very resource heavy. Behind the scenes you need accountancy, bookkeeping, stock management as well as conformity and understanding about taxes and levies in various different channels and different territories.”
One website does not an ecommerce strategy make
However, in the days of omni-channel marketing, relying on a single, own-brand website is no longer sufficient to compete in today’s crowded and competitive marketplace. Instead, brands need to widen their net as organic Google rankings alone will no longer lead to sustainable growth.
As Matthew explains, “Selling on one website and hoping consumers will simply find it is insanely arrogant, but it’s also quite naive. Even Apple, one of the world’s most iconic brands, now sells and ships through Amazon because they recognise that there are consumers that only go to Amazon to buy a laptop. If Apple are not represented on this marketplace, then potential customers will simply buy a HP or a Dell instead.”
So what can brands do to create a more successful D2C strategy? Here are more of Matthew’s top tips.
Harness the Power of AI and Machine Learning
While AI technology cannot replace humans entirely in the marketing function, it can definitely augment marketing processes and assist brands with many elements of their marketing strategy.
For example, Matthew suggests that brands should use AI to automate the task of collecting customer data in order to gain invaluable insights into consumer behaviour, preferences, and needs. Along with AI-powered data analysis brands can identify patterns and trends faster, allowing them to segment customers better and create highly tailored campaigns with personalised content, backed up by AI-powered optimised stock management and delivery systems.
Embrace Social Commerce
The new age of shopping from home, the train, in bed or even the bath has driven exponential growth in online retail channels, which has included an explosion in Social Commerce. While Amazon remains by far the most popular platform, earning $30.1bn alone in 2022, its growth has been checked by the emergence of ‘Social Commerce’ as social media platforms have evolved from a place to engage with friends to a place to engage with favourite brands to a place to make instant purchases without leaving an app.
The ability to capitalise on impulse buys has encouraged more and more brands to up their social commerce game in a bid to monetise their following on different ecommerce and social media platforms.
Matthew explains. “Platforms like Facebook Shop, Instagram Shopping, Pinterest Shopping and TikTokShop make it easy for businesses to get their products in front of audiences and encourage impulse buys, so brands need to consider their presence on a range of platforms that can attract different subsets of their audiences at the same time.”
Adding, “We know that eBay, for example, can represent a further 18% of Amazon turnover and while TikTokShop is still very new, it is growing massively, attracting new customers every day, while Amazon brands effectively compete for market share already on that platform.”
Create Immersive Customer Experiences
Like the once aspirational high street concept stores that went beyond simply selling products and instead supported the dream of an aspirational lifestyle, brands need to prioritise their content creation and customer experience in order to see revenue growth. Unhappy or disengaged consumers can switch to a competitor brand with the swipe of a smart screen.
The most successful brands use immersive experiences as part of a broader strategy to connect with their audiences on a deeper, more meaningful, level. As such brands can become a touchpoint for shared experiences and become an important part of how customers define themselves.
Emotional connections like these are vital to building a community around your brand because they bring together people who don’t just passively consume your product or service. They become brand advocates and strengthen the bonds to popular culture and people’s identities.
Grow your email marketing list
One of the more ‘traditional’ forms of direct response marketing, the e-shot, e-newsletter and subscription list are still key elements of a D2C strategy, according to Matthew.
We know that consumers will spend time swiping between platforms, channels, web sites and apps, but in the last three years we have also seen the resurgence of email marketing as a profitable D2C strategy.
“This channel can support branded content created in video, audio, image or copy form and so can be a great way to aggregate assets that have been used on other platforms or as a way to direct customers, who already know about your brand, to the latest offers hosted on a website or in-app shop”, says Matthew.
Optimise Everything, sell everywhere
Finally, Matthew is adamant, brands need to have a presence on multiple platforms all the time, but given the competition for consumer attention their strategies need to be optimised at every touchpoint in order to win and retain customers.
“Any brand in the world wants to be in front of a customer who wants to transact with it, but some people only want to shop on Amazon, or on TikTok, or eBay, or Facebook Marketplace or Etsy; they’re looking for a product on their preferred channel. That means consumers – and therefore brands – have to make that choice exclusively. Whatever you sell, you should be represented on all the marketplaces that matter to your products, your brand and your consumers.”
But managing a brand portfolio across multiple social and ecommerce platforms is also extremely time consuming and comes with additional costs and regulations. Barriers that expert D2C agencies like Market Rocket remove.
Says Matthew, “From a brand’s perspective, Market Rocket removes the need for additional agencies or staff to manage growth across all the required platforms, instead it offers the choice to either plug existing Fulfilled By Amazon (FBA) stock, third party stock or current warehouse stock holding into our channels outside of Amazon and we will transact on your behalf. We’ll find your customers, build your impressions, improve your click-through rate and your conversions and then pay you retrospectively.”
Adding, “From a consumer perspective, this type of First Party relationship means they know they are transacting with a competent, compliant retailer on a range of preferred platforms that are all able to provide a see it, buy it opportunity.”
Jesse Pitts has been with the Global Banking & Finance Review since 2016, serving in various capacities, including Graphic Designer, Content Publisher, and Editorial Assistant. As the sole graphic designer for the company, Jesse plays a crucial role in shaping the visual identity of Global Banking & Finance Review. Additionally, Jesse manages the publishing of content across multiple platforms, including Global Banking & Finance Review, Asset Digest, Biz Dispatch, Blockchain Tribune, Business Express, Brands Journal, Companies Digest, Economy Standard, Entrepreneur Tribune, Finance Digest, Fintech Herald, Global Islamic Finance Magazine, International Releases, Online World News, Luxury Adviser, Palmbay Herald, Startup Observer, Technology Dispatch, Trading Herald, and Wealth Tribune.