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Ecommerce & Retail Marketing

6 Ecommerce & Retail Store Metrics to Improve Sales

February 1, 2016 by Daniel Laws Leave a Comment

Put Your Retail Metrics & Ecommerce Analytics Into Context

There are so many metrics to help businesses improve sales, but there is so little time for the VP of Marketing or Sales.  Let’s take a look at a few retail marketing metrics or ecommerce analytics to help you gauge success and improve your sales in-store & online.  I recommend that you look at these metrics in the context of your product categories, marketing tactics that lead to visitors, geography, and your types of customers.

Sign-ups or New Accounts to Grow Your Customer Base

The growth of new sign-ups and new accounts gives you an opportunity to nurture the customer relationships and to ask questions to improve the business’s ability to cross-sell or up-sell your existing customer base. It will give you more details on the demographics new accounts or new customers. Ask in-store and online customers to sign-up for your newsletter, coupons, and notifications on upcoming ecommerce promotions or retail store events.

6 Ecommerce & Retail Store Metrics to Improve Sales

Coupon Redemption Rate for Insights & Sales Revenue

You are offering customers discounts, coupon rates, or rebates but are they redeeming your offerings? Improving the redemption rates will provide insights into which incentives lead to more (profitable) customers, in-store visits, online visits, and increase overall sales revenues. You will also discover whether or not in-store or ecommerce discounts lead to higher average order/in-store purchase value. If you don’t already know the answer, run a test to gather the information to identify which components are helping to increase your revenue.

Percent of Assisted Revenue Contributing to Market Share (dollar)

Assisted Revenue is monetary value of sales a channel (Direct, Email, or Organic) assisted in earning the sale.  You want to know which marketing channels are contributing to the business’s revenue to guide the marketing budget allocation and future decision making. For example, if a customer initially comes to your website via paid search and later purchases directly on your website, you would attribute some of the sales to paid search as well as direct traffic. By identifying the marketing channel that is increasing the market share, you must use the information to evaluate opportunities to grow the market share while increase profitability. Start using the data import features within Google Analytics or Adobe Analytics for a complete picture of your retail marketing metrics or ecommerce analytics.

Average Order Value or Value Per Transaction for More Sales Revenue

You will generate more sales revenue by increasing your average order value or value per transaction. In addition, you will have insight into the Product SKUs and Product Categories that are increasing the overall value per transaction.  With information on Product SKUs and Categories, you can make recommendations to increase your profits and return on investment (ROI). Identify the best mix of products to maximize your profits.

Shopping Cart Abandonment Rate for Better Conversion Rates

You worked hard to get a new account and have given the new prospective customer a coupon, but the product is still sitting in the shopping cart.  Reducing your shopping cart abandonment rate means more sales and revenue.  So, work to get better conversion rates by identifying the sale process and simplify the process for your customers.

Conversion Rates That Go Beyond Just Transactions

You always want to increase sales transactions, but consider the process that customers take before making a purchase. It often includes downloading some information, clicking on product reviews, signing up for a newsletter, sharing a product via social media, searching onsite for product details and more.  You can and should capture this information as a conversion or an event, both online and in-store whenever possible.  Have an internal discussion on questions the business has and the metrics that help you get answers.

Want more information on retail marketing & ecommerce?  Subscribe to our RSS feed or our newsletter!

Filed Under: Adobe Analytics, Digital Analytics, Ecommerce & Retail Marketing, Google Analytics Tagged With: eCommerce

eCommerce PPC Christmas Wish List

December 21, 2015 by Justin Miller Leave a Comment

eComrece PPC wish list being checked by Santa

Dear Santa,

This year for Christmas eCommerce PPC account managers would like:

1 - Preview Functionality for Shopping Ads

Why is it that I can preview my Search and Display Ads without skewing my Impression data, but can’t do the same for Shopping Ads? As marketers, we would like to know exactly what our ads will look like before they are live on the internet.

2 - Average Position Data for Products and Product Groups

We can see the Impression Share lost (Rank), but not the average position that our Shopping Ads are shown. This information would help make decisions concerning bid adjustments at the product group or product-specific level.

3 - Multiple (and more specific) Conversion Columns for each conversion being tracked

While it is great being able to track Conversions,  being able to quickly see the amount of each type of conversion (newsletter sign-up, sale, or phone call) would be beneficial. This would be useful in maximizing Return on Ad Spend (ROAS.)

If we can get these 3 new features we will have a very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Did we include your Christmas wish for eCommerce PPC in our top three, or do you have additions for our Christmas wish list? Let us know in the comments.

Filed Under: Ecommerce & Retail Marketing, Paid Search (PPC) Tagged With: eCommerce, Pay Per Click, PPC

Are You Afraid of PPC Advertising?

October 28, 2015 by Justin Miller Leave a Comment

With Halloween in a few days, we want to look into why some small business are afraid to run PPC advertising campaigns. After taking a closer look at some of the spooky aspects of PPC, hopefully, you will find that it is not scary, but that Pay per Click is an opportunity to help you increase leads and sales for your business. Here are the top 3 reasons small business are afraid of PPC:

1. Scary Expensive or Scared of Wasting Marketing Budget

Sure you can set a daily and monthly budget to control cost, but that doesn’t mean that it is being used wisely. Did you know that you can schedule your PPC ads to only run during specific hours of the day to maximize the effectiveness of campaigns with limited budgets? In addition, there is geo-targeting for localized businesses, and device specific bidding if mobile or desktop traffic is more valuable for your business. If you are already running PPC, these are a few settings that you might want to check to ensure you are getting the most out of your campaigns.

PPC Advertising Halloween

2. Scary Results (or lack thereof)

As a digital marketing agency, we hear “PPC doesn’t/didn’t work for our company/industry.” Really? Are you sure? Before you dive into doing PPC advertising, set your goals and know how you are measuring success. Are you trying to generate phone calls, form submissions or online ecommerce sales? Whatever the end goal might be, set-up Conversion (or goal) tracking. This can be done within the PPC platform (Google AdWords, Bing Ads, etc.), but ideally it is set-up through web analytics (Google Analytics.) Connecting web analytics to your PPC will allow you to see beyond the basic Impression and Click data, and uncover if there is a problem with your landing page(s) or conversion funnel/process.

If you are already running PPC but are not currently tracking conversions, then this is something that you should set-up ASAP. We cannot imagine anything scarier than spending marketing dollars and having no way of knowing/measuring the return!

3. Scary Complicated and/or Too Time Consuming

Pay per Click may seem simple and easy at first, but there is a reason Google requires a person to pass 2 of 6 different PPC proficiency exams to earn their AdWords Certified status. To properly setup and manage an account one needs to know the ins and outs of the AdWords platform and understand how search (both paid and organic) works. While there are several tools available to help make monitoring and management easier, these are only tools. The person using the tools still needs the skills and know how to make the most out of the tools. For instance, a carpenter can do a lot more with a saw and hammer then a chef can.

If you don’t have the time to learn, set-up and manage your own PPC advertising, we highly recommend that you seek help from someone certified (Google AdWords or Bing Ads) to help manage your PPC. Before you seek the help of just anybody, make sure that you have FULL access to your account and that if for any reason you decide to fire/disconnect from them managing your PPC, that you get to keep your account. Because the second scariest thing we can think up is not having any insight/access to your own PPC account.

Even though PPC can be scary and be a daunting task for some companies, if you take the time to truly understand the value of PPC and its ability to gain leads and sales and reach potential customers, then there should be no reason to be afraid of PPC advertising.

Filed Under: Ecommerce & Retail Marketing, Google Analytics, Paid Search (PPC)

5 Facts that Impact Holiday Shopping Advertising

September 29, 2015 by Dabrian Marketing Group Leave a Comment

The impending Holiday season is upon us. Is your business ready to compete for your consumers attention? A recent article from Google noted that Holiday shopping, advertising research, and purchasing begins to see more and more upwards momentum beginning in August. Mothers, Fathers, and Brother-in-Laws all alike are searching for “Christmas ideas” and “meaningful gifts.” With this ever changing and growing capitalistic world at our fingertips, how can your business hold your customer’s attention and gain sales?

1. Including Local information in Search can drive Store Visits

Whether your business is a Mom-and-Pop shop or a chain store of equally desired products/services, your store information and details regarding those products and services are crucial. A recent Google Study found that 75% of customers are searching for the prices of your products, 66% are searching for the location of the closest store carrying their item of interest, and 63% are searching for your hours of operation, phone number, etc. These critical elements are high priority to Holiday shopping advertising, and all play a role in a consumer’s readiness to buy and likeliness to choose your company.

2. Over 50% of Shoppers will go to a Brand’s website to look for Coupons

“Best Price Guaranteed”, “Lowest Price around”, “Competitor Coupons Accepted” – all phrases your customers are hearing from your competitors. Keeping up to date coupons readily available for your buyer can change their “I want” ’s to “I need” ’s. This recent infographic by Adweek details more of shopper’s wants. Offering exclusive or custom coupons is also a habit that leaves your shopper feeling special and more likely to come again. These coupons, coupon codes, and premium offers can be advertised around the globe easily by Television, Email, Newspaper(s), Print Mail, on your Website, and more. Don’t let your customer find a better deal while shopping during this holiday season.

5 Facts that Impact Holiday Shopping Advertising
This image is part of an infographic from Google’s recent Mobile Search Study. Learn more

3. 90% of users use Screens simultaneously to Accomplish a Task

Your next customer can be on their phone, tablet, desktop, or laptop, searching for your products and services. Can they find you? Can your website fit a tablet, cell phone, or desktop screen quickly and seamlessly? When April’s Mobilegeddon was fast approaching, Mobile-Friendliness was top of mind and high priority. A user’s experience across all devices should be top of mind and crucial to your website’s design. Advertising your products and services within an environment that can be easily compressed and expanded to become compatible with your customer’s screen is highly beneficial when optimizing for the upcoming Holiday shopping advertising season. This Mobile Search study, The New Multi-screen World, details more pertinent facts such as 67% of users use multiple screens for their online shopping needs.

4. Last Year, 40% of Holiday Shopping Occurred Online

Google’s Recent Study “5 Holiday Shopping Trends to Watch in 2015” detailed the differences we’ve seen with shopper’s online presence and intent to stay there. 41% of shoppers purchased from a new retailer, which is a significant jump from 2013. Your company’s online presence should be relevant and engaging to appeal to all shoppers. Creating a marketing strategy to outline your company’s “plan of attack” to grab your future customer’s attention is key.

5. 22% of consumers feel most influenced by Emails sent directly from a Brand

Email marketing has become second nature for advertising and marketing initiatives. Simple online Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tools such as MyEmma.com and SalesForce.com allow businesses to not only create email marketing initiatives, but also connect to and keep track of prospects and important customer relationships that may otherwise be left behind. Emails sent to customers may detail upcoming events, sales, coupons, etc. that your retail business may be offering. Holiday themed emails, company “Christmas Cards”, and special Holiday savings are key holiday email marketing strategies to plan for.

Holiday Shopping Advertising Recap

In conclusion, digital marketing efforts during the holiday season are essential for Ecommerce/Retail businesses. Assuring that your company’s local information is up-to-date will lead to more in-store purchases. Offering coupons to within your company’s website will in turn create a unique user experience for your customers. Guaranteeing that your business’ website is easily adjustable for various screen resolutions and devices sizes will lead to a better user experience, and in turn, higher ROI. Your company’s plan of attack should address your business’ online presence and how to engage more frequently with consumers. Email marketing utilizing CRM’s allow customers to gain a feel for your brand and offerings with personalized messages that may lead to more inquiries and more purchases. Creating a sound strategy to encompass these Holiday shopping advertising thought-provoking statistics and facts, may lead to a better brand and better customer experience alike.

Sign up for our Newsletter or Get Social to find out more facts that can impact your business’ success!

Filed Under: Ecommerce & Retail Marketing, Email Marketing, Marketing Strategy, Mobile Marketing Tagged With: digital marketing, marketing

Data Import Tools Review

September 9, 2015 by Dabrian Marketing Group Leave a Comment

What is Data Importing? 

Data Importing is a process that is extremely beneficial for your business. In this case, data importing is based on the concept of getting cost data from social media websites such as Twitter and/or Facebook into Google Analytics. These data import tools provide you an easier way to import your cost data. These tools can save you time and help your business grow!

How will these tools impact your business?

Do you know where your advertising spend is going? You should know the tools you can use to import data into Google Analytics, so you know where your advertising spend is going and know what ads and campaigns have positive returns. This will help you make quick and efficient decisions. Knowing what your options are, can help you decide what you need and what is important or best for your business. Although you can manually import data, there are other ways that can be less time-consuming, but costly. Each of these platforms are different and have special features, but which tool is right for your business?

Supermetrics 

Supermetric is a tool that lets you import advertising cost data from any external advertising sources into Google Analytics. You can schedule automatic daily uploads from Facebook Ads, Bing Ads, Twitter Ads, and Linkedin Ads or upload CSV files from any data source. You can also connect Supermetrics to Bing Ads or Facebook Ads and set an outgoing daily upload.This way the information from Bing Ads and Facebook Ads will automatically connect to Google Analytics through Supermetrics.

This means less work is required and no formatting needs to be done, which saves time. The benefits of this tool include importing your cost data, seeing your advertising cost, and measuring advertising Return On Investment (ROI) in Google Analytics. Supermetrics combines your advertising cost data with Google Analytics ecommerce and goal conversion metrics to see if your campaigns are paying off. The only con for this tool would be the cost associated to purchase it. To schedule automatic uploads for each social media platform, the cost is separate, so the cost for Bing Ads, Facebook Ads, and file uploads are all different. Supermetrics has many things to offer, but is it the right fit for your businesses needs?

NEXT Analytics

NEXT Analytics is a tool that imports advertising cost data from external advertising sources such as Bing Ads and Facebook Ads into Google Analytics. This allows you access to the reports of all your advertising costs and their effectiveness. NEXT Analytics processes or formats the CSV file of the cost data for you, but it doesn’t do it for you completely. In order to format the data completely, you would need to filter or fix the data yourself. The good news is that you would only have to do this once because all of your actions are recorded, which can then be automatically reinforced each time you want to import cost data into Google Analytics.

With this tool, you can upload any number of accounts to a single license. In this case, a single license would mean that NEXT Analytics would be entitled to that one computer, but if needed you can always transfer the license to another computer. The one factor that needs to be considered is that there is a limited number of times you can transfer the license. One opposing factor would be that you can only upload seven dimensions and ten metrics, and another is the cost associated to purchase it. The cost depends on how much data you import. This can be purchased monthly or annually. The good news is that with NEXT Analytics, you can replace previous uploads. This allows us to add up to 19 more uploads to the original data set, this is useful if you have a lot of data to upload. NEXT Analytics is one tool out of many to import your data into Google Analytics.

Analysis Engine 

Analysis Engine is a tool that helps you to import advertising cost data from external advertising sources such as Bing Ads and Facebook Ads into Google Analytics. It automatically syncs Bing Ads cost data into Google Analytics, and then automatically imports the cost data. In order to automatically import the cost data into Google Analytics, you have to connect Bing Ads to Analysis Engine and then connect Google Analytics to Analysis Engine. This tool can help you determine your ROI and Return on Assets (ROA), provide reporting on your cost benefit marketing efforts, and much more. The cost of the tool isn’t provided right away, but you can request a demo for more information. Analysis Engine has many features for you to use, could this be the tool you are looking for?

Analytics Canvas 

Analytics Canvas is a tool that imports cost data from external advertising sources such as Bing Ads into Google Analytics. It allows you to check your marketing spend across multiple sources and campaigns. It can automatically link and import your cost data to Google Analytics if you have connected it to Bing Ads or another source. Analytics Canvas lets reports be automated, so it can be refreshed every day. This provides you with the information you will need, and it is easily accessible. One con of this platform or tool may be the cost. Depending on what features you may need, the cost will vary. Analysis Canvas has additional features that may interest you, but may hinder you because they are not needed or necessary for your business.

Analytics-Toolkit

Analytics-Toolkit is a platform that lets you import cost data from external advertising sources into Google Analytics. However, Analytics-Toolkit may limit your prospects. You have to manually get the cost data (CSV file) from the source (Bing Ads, Facebook Ads, etc.) and then use Analytics-Toolkit to upload and format the data. One issue that can come up is that the data is limited to a 90-day time period. Additionally, the cost can vary, but is relatively lower than most tools that help assist with importing cost data. Analytics-Toolkit is one of many options to choose from, but is it your cup of tea?

The great benefit of having a tool to import your cost data is that it allows you to adjust where your spend is going. Knowing what tools you can use to import data into Google Analytics can help you decide what fits your business best needs and how it will help your business grow, gain sales, and customers.

Start using these tools to import your data, check and see which tools best fits your needs. Contact us today or leave us a comment below for more advice or information!    

Filed Under: Digital Analytics, Ecommerce & Retail Marketing, Google Analytics Tagged With: Data Import Tools, Google Analytics

Ecommerce Website Platforms That Help Grow Your Business!

July 8, 2015 by Justin Miller Leave a Comment

Make Sure Your Ecommerce Website Platform Is Up To Par

With summer time quickly passing by, the daunting thought of back to school shopping approaches every parents mind. If your Ecommerce platform is not up to par with your competition, parents will be choosing them over you for their back to school needs. Even if your website doesn’t have a shopping cart, you may lose business to competitors who do. Did you know that U.S. eCommerce sales will increase over 11% this year, and over 10% again in 2016 and 2017.

If you’re considering changing or adding an Ecommerce function to keep up with the shopping trends, here are a few platforms that can give your website the shopping power it needs, when it needs it the most!

ecommerce

Volusion

Volusion has a lot of features, simple interface, and good security. It has over 900 features which include store builder, design, built-in marketing, social media tools, inventory management, secure hosting, and 24/7 customer support. It also features a mobile-responsive website and administrative section. If you have a small number of products (100 or less) and still want all the features, then a $15/month Mini Plan, which includes unlimited storage and no transaction fees, is perfect for you. The Premium Plan is $135/month for unlimited products. Could this platform help you with the influx of shoppers online?

Bigcommerce

Bigcommerce is easy-to-use and has a lot of built-in features which let you create a store that converts interest into sales. It offers mobile responsive themes, flexible product management, inventory control, optimized checkout, analytics and 24/7 support. In addition, a setup wizard and Bigcommerce University offer lessons in online store design and marketing. Standard pricing is $29.95 per month, with a 1.5% transaction fee, in addition to other credit card processing fees. A Plus account is $79.95 per month with no transaction fees. Will bigcommerce be the right platform for your business needs?

3dcart

Opening and running an online store is fast and effortless as 3dcart includes many of the most needed features. The dashboard is easy to navigate and quickly allows you to access the most important store areas. The dashboard includes data on SEO, social media, mobile store templates, product management, statistics, and security. 3dcart also offers an app store with a substantial number of add-ons. Their “Mini” costs $19.99 a month for up to 200 products, while the Power Plan costs $129.99. Both plans offer no transaction fees. Will the 3dcart platform help your business when it needs it the most?

Shopify

Shopify’s features include over 100 themes, mobile commerce capabilities, your own domain name, marketing/SEO, a blogging platform, the ability to host an entire website, and online education. Shopify also has many apps that you can download and install in your store. Pricing starts at $29 per month, with a 2.9% plus 30 cent rate if you use their credit card processor. Higher plan’s have lower per-transaction fees. Does Shopify seem to fit your business needs?

Big Cartel

Big Cartel is a basic platform which targets artists looking for easy solutions to sell their products online. If you are looking to sell a few products online and don’t mind basic features and limited themes, this is for you. A basic Gold Plan allows you to feature five products for free, with no inventory management. The Platinum Plan is $9.99 per month for up to 25 products, while Titanium is $29.99 per month for up to 300 products. The more you pay the more features you unlock. Does the Big Cartel have all the things your shopping platform needs?

With Ecommerce sales on the rise year after year will your platform be able to handle the rush at back to school time or during the Holiday season?

Contact us today or leave us a comment below for more advice and information.

Filed Under: Ecommerce & Retail Marketing, Marketing Strategy, Paid Search (PPC) Tagged With: digital marketing, eCommerce, strategy

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