Reading Time: 7 minutesDo you know online stores with a social media presence have an average of 32% more sales than those that don’t?
Yes, social media is more than memes and funny posts. It’s a goldmine for e-commerce platforms to connect with their audience and drive more sales.
With the right social media e-commerce strategies, you can:
- Reach your target audience
- Increase your ROI
- Build brand awareness
- Drive more sales, and more.
However, it’s only possible when you move in the right direction with the right strategy.
To make it easier for you, we curated this list of 10 important ‘must-use’ social media strategies for your e-commerce business, backed with examples.
Let’s get into the details!
Here are some of the best strategies to incorporate to boost your e-commerce business through social media.
1. Lay down Your Goals
Before you move ahead, the first thing to do is lay down your goals.
There are two primary goals for e-commerce business owners: driving sales or getting more traffic on your website through social media.
Both have their own benefits, but before you work on your strategies, clearly define your measurable goals. Do you want to…
- Create brand awareness?
- Drive more traffic from social media to your store?
- Get more sales?
Note that your goals can vary depending on your niche, requirements, audience, and more.
Without having goals, you won’t be able to measure results and understand what is working for you.
2. Choose Your Social Channels
Each social media platform offers different features for different products. Your business should choose platform(s) that appeals to your target audience.
You should also check if your product is the best fit with the platform’s visual appeal and functionality. For instance, if you’re targeting fast fashion, TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat will be your best bet because this is where young adults and teens will find your products.
Remember, what works for one e-commerce business doesn’t mean it’s going to work for others. Check your Google Analytics referral traffic reports to understand where most of the audience comes from, and select platforms accordingly.
To help you understand each platform’s working for e-commerce, here is a quick breakdown:
Facebook (Meta)
Meta introduced Facebook Shop in 2020, which lets e-commerce business owners set up their online store directly on Facebook.
Your customers can explore products and make purchases without leaving the app using Facebook checkout.
Note: Facebook Shop removed the web-based shopping feature in December 2023. The Shop feature is only accessible via the mobile app.
Instagram (Meta)
70% of shoppers look for their next purchase via Instagram, which means your product has a higher chance of popping up for your target audience.
Owned by Meta, Instagram syncs with your Facebook shop, making it easier to showcase your products and stories on both platforms.
You can set up an Instagram storefront where you can upload your products along with their details so your customers can check them out.
However, you can only sell products using checkout on messaging or another website. It doesn’t support built-in checkout yet.
TikTok
TikTok is one of the largest social media platforms and ranks second for highest consumer spending.
According to Statista, TikTok is also home to Generation Z (Gen Z), which makes it a perfect platform to promote short and engaging videos of your products there.
YouTube
If you’re including video marketing as a part of your strategy, there may be no better platform than YouTube.
Firstly, it’s the only platform that can be used for long-form videos such as tutorials, guides, reviews, etc. Second, considering it is the 2nd largest search engine, optimizing the videos correctly can also help in ranking on search engines and drive more traffic to your channel.
3. Content Creation and Curation
Once you have laid down your goals and selected a platform, the next step is to prepare a content creation strategy.
At this stage, you want to select preferred post formats as well. Do you want to create more infographics? Video content? Guides?
A mix of promotional and value-driven content is a way to go as too much promotional content can push your customers away. Instead, incorporate different elements in your content, such as storytelling, user-generated content, education, etc.
Moreover, keep track of how each piece of content is performing and what your audience likes the most.
4. Run Ads Regularly
Running paid ads from time to time to promote your product can help you reach more of your target audience faster. Plus, the average ROI from social ads is around 250%, so it makes a lot of financial sense to do so.
We recommend running a combination of direct response ads to drive more people to your website, and brand awareness campaigns that get them more engaged with your social media profiles. The latter will pay off in the long run as engaged audiences are most likely to be loyal to your brand and have the highest lifetime spend value (LSV).
Make sure to include product links for featured products in your ads. Here are a few examples:
Pro Tip: Set up audience targeting based on your understanding of your customer base for the most effective ads. You can set their age, behaviors, income range, location, etc. in ad settings.
5. Use Social Commerce Tools
In recent years, all social media platforms have introduced tools inside their native platforms to help e-commerce business owners. For instance, Pinterest, Facebook, and Instagram have shop features to help you display your products.
The storefront on Instagram also allows you to upload your products along with their details, making it easier for your customers to check them out.
You can also use shoppable posts on Instagram for your products with direct product links. This feature is specifically helpful if your goal is to drive more traffic to your e-commerce website.
6. Offer Flexible Payment Options for Your Customers
Say you’ve got some social media traffic coming to your website. Now what? You need to make it easier for these customers to purchase from you either directly via the website or through your social media channels.
13% of all customers abandon the cart due to a lack of payment options. Essentially, the easier you make it for your customers to pay, the more likely they’re going to buy from you.
Make sure that you also promote these payment options on social media channels so they can see that your brand pays attention to what customers use, and is customer-centric.
Pro Tip: When you’re setting up payment options, study your audience’s local payment options. For example, if you’re selling in the USA, include all major debit and credit cards along with Stripe, Apple Pay, etc. On the other hand, if you’re selling in India, you should consider UPI payment methods.
7. Use Automation Tools
If you’re opting for multiple social media platforms as a part of your e-commerce strategy, using automation tools will streamline your workflow and minimize manual hassle.
Besides, your customers need personalized and timely interaction from you, and you’ll need help meeting your audience’s expectations.
When your social media storefront is live 24/7, it is practically impossible for you to sit and respond to important queries from your customers all the time.
In such cases, using automation tools as a part of your strategy can:
- Improve customer engagement
- Improve lead quality
- Streamline sales and marketing efforts
- Increases number of leads captured
There are various social media automation tools that you can explore, including free ones.
Here are our top 3 recommendations for automation tools to check:
- Hootsuite: Best for social media management and scheduling
- CoSchedule: Best for content planning, marketing, and scheduling content, including blogs.
- Buffer: Best for scheduling and responding to comments across multiple social media channels.
8. Partner up With Influencers
When you partner with different creators, you can reach a new audience, create brand awareness, and get endorsements from people they already trust.
If you’re just getting started, you don’t necessarily have to opt for macro influencers. Nano or micro-influencers can also create a powerful impact.
A study found micro-influencers have an engagement rate of 6% on Instagram, whereas mega-influencers have just 1.97%.
An excellent example is Dove, which won an award for the micro-influencer strategy for its various campaigns, such as #DetoxYourFeed, #OneRealPressure, #PassTheCrown, etc.
9. Showcase Reviews and Testimonials
97% of customers say online reviews influence their buying decisions. Another corroboration for the fact that social proof is key in building trust and credibility with your customers.
If you’re using Facebook Shop (Meta), you can also collect ratings and reviews of users who purchased from your store and display them directly on your page.
Similarly, you can use eye-catching graphics with positive reviews to post across your social media channels. This will make for great user-generated content.
You can also ask for reviews from your customers directly via email, messages, or through review sites like Trustpilot.
10. Have Clear CTAs
Strong CTAs guide your customers into taking specific actions after seeing your posts. Analyze what steps they should take concerning each post and include a clear call to action that guides them toward that step.
Your CTA can include a link to your website, questions, or a clickable button.
Note: Make sure the next step is equally optimized for conversion for them (landing page, website, or more). Learn how to optimize your e-commerce website here.
Conclusion
With $992 billion in global social commerce sales, it’s clear that integrating social media into your e-commerce business can directly impact your success.
Understanding your target audience and fulfilling their requirements is the key to successful social media e-commerce.
While you will be implementing the strategies mentioned above, do not forget to track your performance every quarter. Some important metrics to use:
- Engagement metrics (likes, comments, and shares)
- Traffic on your website from social media channels
- Leads and sales generated from each campaign.
You can check out this complete checklist for social media e-commerce metrics and analyze the strategies that are working best for you!
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