You’ve got the products and you know which marketplaces to sell them on. Or maybe you’ve decided to set up your own direct-to-consumer website and have started building out your online storefront. But how to do you actually present your products to customers in a way that makes them want to buy? This is where online merchandising and marketing come into play.

What is Digital Marketing?

Digital marketing refers to the use of digital channels and services to help promote and sell products. With digital marketing, brands leverage channels such as social media, email, search engines and more to help drive awareness of their products, to build audiences of shoppers, and to drive those shoppers to their products in order to make a purchase. That is the main goal of digital marketing – to drive traffic to your website or product listings, boosting your chances of making a sale.

What Are Some Examples of Digital Marketing?

There are many ways to market or promote your products digitally. Some of the most common examples include:

Pay-per-click advertising on a search engine
Email marketing and lead generation
Social media marketing
Content marketing through blogs, guides and more
Affiliate or influencer marketing

What is Online Merchandising?

Merchandising refers to the way in which a product is presented to shoppers. If you think about a physical store, a merchandiser is a person who ensures a store has the right products and enough inventory, and displays those products on shelves or racks in a way that will draw a shopper’s attention to each item.

Online merchandising is very similar. As an eCommerce seller, it is important that you display your products in a way that will entice shoppers to click and buy. This includes anything from a hero image to a product description – the way in which you display a product online, and the content that is created in order to do so.

How Do I Merchandise My Products Online?

1. Know Your Audience and What They’re Searching For

Perform research into your target demographic to see where they’re shopping online, and what terms they’re using to find products. There are many online tools available to help you do so.
Decide what kind of language you’ll use in your product content to resonate with this target shopper.
Search engine optimization (SEO): Take the search terms they’re using online and incorporate them as keywords within your product content to help your listings rank in search engines.

2. Write Engaging, Persuasive Copy

In addition to ensuring your product content is optimized for search, it is important that it speaks to shoppers in a unique, engaging and persuasive way.
Copywriting has the power to tell a story that goes beyond the simple specifications or features of a product, and includes its benefits and applications.
Be sure to include all of the important information that a shopper would need to know before making a purchase. Do so within a product title, product description, and feature/benefit bullets.

3. Create Enticing Visuals

Leverage your image gallery to expand on the product’s story through high-resolution product images, shot on a white background for a clear and distraction-free appearance.
Include lifestyle images that showcase the product in use, and/or infographics that highlight important features in a visual way.
Boost your visuals even further with enhanced marketing content, video and 360-degree imagery to truly showcase your product from every angle.

4. Build a Great Customer Experience

Make sure your products are listed properly under their correct categories to make the shopping experience as easy as possible.
Include technical specification charts or comparison charts if relevant in order to provide as much information as possible.
Respond to customer questions and reviews to show transparency and availability.

5. Develop a Consistent Brand Story

Leverage additional content like blogs, recipes, how-to guides and more in order to continue your brand language and messaging across multiple touchpoints.
Ensure your social media pages align with the branding on your website or marketplace listings.
This helps shoppers recognize and remember your brand the next time they’re shopping for the products you offer.

How Do Merchandising and Marketing Lead to Higher Sales?

When products are properly merchandised and marketed online, the ability to make a sale increases tremendously. The main goal in digital marketing is to bring shoppers to your storefront or product listing page. Merchandising comes into the picture once the shopper has landed there, by providing them with all of the great product content they need to make a purchase. According to Google Manufacturer Centre, better product content can increase conversion (sales) by up to 25%. The journey looks something like this:

A shopper is on the hunt for a new white t-shirt. They search for “white t-shirt” on Google.
Various product listings for white t-shirts appear, ranked partially on their content – the way they’ve been merchandised.
- This includes the search terms, or keywords, that have been incorporated into the product title, description and bullets
Some of the results that appear are advertisements, boosting certain products above the rest on the search engine results page.
One of the pay-per-click ads stands out to the shopper based on the language used (this t-shirt sounds like it’s exactly what they’re looking for). The shopper clicks.
When the product listing page appears, the shopper sees an image gallery full of beautiful photos of the white t-shirt. They see that the title explains clearly what the product is, and there’s a longer product description with bullets explaining the features of this t-shirt. It’s been merchandised perfectly, and the shopper feels confident that this t-shirt is one they’ll love.
Based on the above, the shopper makes a purchase.

How Do I Get Started?

The key to getting anywhere is to start. Based on your product offering, your audience and your goals, decide which digital marketing channels will work for your brand. Get to work on creating amazing merchandising content for your products, or connect with an eCommerce services agency like geekspeak Commerce to help you handle it all.

Learn more: www.geekspeakcommerce.com

More resources

Digitization Sprint for Retailers