Content marketing is a critical activity for all ecommerce businesses today, regardless of the products that they sell.
If you’re new to selling online, you may be wondering how content marketing works to the advantage of stores on the internet.
A well-designed ecommerce content marketing strategy can help you generate sales leads, build trust in your brand, establish yourself as an expert in your field, increase conversions, and much more!
However, the goal of content marketing is not to advertise the amazing attributes of your product but to strengthen your relationship with your audience.
When you provide potential customers with thoughtfully crafted content that can help improve their lives, they’re more likely to trust your business and purchase your products.
For this reason, it’s easy to see how content marketing can have a positive impact on sales for your store!
What are some popular forms of content marketing?
An important part of your content marketing strategy will involve determining what types of content to use. Note that different kinds of content can help you reach and connect with your audience in different ways.
It’s therefore a good idea to do some serious market research before you invest your time and other resources into creating content for your online store.
Your choice of content will ultimately come down to what types can most effectively promote your business and build a relationship with your audience.
If you’re relatively new to the exciting world of ecommerce, you may want to stick with one or two forms of content in the beginning to avoid getting overwhelmed.
Once you’ve developed a better understanding of your target market and your business, you can gradually start to add in other content as needed.
Here are several of the ways that you can create informative and entertaining content to attract potential customers to your ecommerce website!
1. Blog posts
If you’re passionate about your product and niche market (which is always a good thing in online sales), creating a blog for your website can be an excellent way to connect with your audience.
By providing helpful and engaging information on a regular basis to readers, you’ll establish yourself as an expert in your industry.
In addition, the more engaging your content is, the more likely that people will share your blog posts on social media and other channels. This in turn will help to increase the amount of traffic to your website even further.
If you’re an entrepreneur on a tight budget, blogging is an especially great option for you. Although it takes a bit of time to churn out a high-quality post, it’s super cost effective!
You understandably may be tempted to use this space to advertise whatever you’re selling. However, try to stay away from writing countless articles about how amazing your product is.
Readers are more likely to appreciate posts about topics linked to your product that can help them. Consistently publish content that’s fresh and different from what’s already out there to entice new visitors.
2. Social media
Including social media in your content marketing strategy is pretty much a necessity these days, no matter what product you sell online.
Many members of your target audience are likely to be using some form of social media, so creating content on these different platforms is an easy way to reach a larger group of people.
Furthermore, your competitors are probably on social media as well. For this reason, if you’re not sharing content here, you’ll unfortunately already be a few steps behind!
The best social media networks to utilize in your content marketing strategy will depend on the customers you’re trying to target and your individual goals. Some of the most popular options for ecommerce include Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and Twitter.
Your posts across your chosen platforms can be used to introduce a new product, share promotions and contests, and encourage customer engagement with your brand.
3. Infographics
If you have a lot of data to share, creating infographics allows you to present that information in an organized, visually captivating manner. While this form of content isn’t as commonly used as others, it can actually generate quite a few shares and inbound links when done well.
Be careful with sharing infographics, though, as they work better for some kinds of data than others. This type of content often includes information like statistics or explanations for processes.
The goal of any infographic is to compile complex information, say obtained from research or a survey for example, and present it in a simplified format that’s easy to understand.
4. Videos
Although it usually calls for a larger investment in time and resources, video content can be well worth creating if it makes sense for your product and brand. This is because videos are extremely engaging and can easily be shared on other websites and social media.
In fact, videos are one of the most preferred forms of content by internet users!
One of the best parts about video content is that there’s a ton of versatility here. You can create videos on all kinds of topics related to your product and brand to generate audience curiosity and interest in learning more about your ecommerce business.
Videos also demonstrate another side of your business, and you can even use them to share a bit of your personality as well.
5. Podcasts
To appeal to an audience who prefers more auditory forms of content, you might consider starting a podcast for your business. If you’ve never listened to a podcast before, let alone produced one, it might seem intimidating.
However, podcasts have been increasingly popular over the last few years, and they can be especially effective for your business if your target market is frequently on the go.
They might not have time to read a blog post or watch a video, but listening to a podcast may be the perfect accompaniment to their morning commute or evening run.
One thing to note, though, is that a podcast isn’t something that you can just throw together in 20 minutes. High-quality podcasts require research, planning, and basic equipment.
As far as podcast topics go, consider how you can bring more awareness to your brand or product. You may even know some interesting people who you could interview to provide a new perspective on a particular issue!
6. How-to guides/courses
Depending on your product and niche, how-to guides or courses may be a wonderful way to educate your target market on any number of topics related to your industry.
By supplying your audience with an interactive, easy-to-understand course, you can help improve their experience with your product.
This can also give site visitors who are on the fence about making a purchase from your store more confidence, encouraging them to click that “Buy Now” button!
When designing your guide or course, consider offering different levels, such as “beginning,” “intermediate,” and “advanced.” This ensures that audience members who are new to the subject won’t be scared off, while more-experienced users won’t get bored.
7. eBooks
If you’re not big on writing, the idea of creating anything with the word “book” in it may seem a little overwhelming at first, but stay with me!
Though you won’t be writing a novel, the aim is to provide potential customers with a lot of valuable information and insights. A well-done eBook can be a serious lead magnet for your business and can remain that way for a long time if it includes evergreen content.
Avoid creating a multi-page ad for your online store. You should instead focus on building a relationship with your audience by helping them to solve a problem or gain new knowledge.
This can assist in strengthening trust in your brand so that shoppers are more likely to purchase from you.
As eBooks tend to be gated, meaning viewers must provide information about themselves before accessing the content, they’re excellent for gathering lead details.
Note that because eBooks are longer than other forms of content you’ll be using for your content marketing, they do require more time to create. If you don’t want to write your eBook yourself, it’s going to require a greater financial investment to have somebody else write it for you.
8. Case studies/testimonials
Case studies and customer testimonials offer additional proof as to how your business’s product can improve your target market’s lives. With case studies, you provide stories that demonstrate specific instances in which your product brought value to your customers.
When you’re preparing case studies, try to select enthusiastic customers who not only give their permission to use their stories but are also happy to supply you with quotes and other info to further boost your credibility.
This type of content is beneficial for your brand for numerous reasons. It builds trust in your product, establishes authority in your industry, and is highly shareable online.
Once you start generating sales, you’ll also want to include customer testimonials in your content marketing strategy. These brief notes from satisfied customers help show potential customers why your brand and product stand out from the crowd.
9. User-generated content
Besides posting your own, original material on social media and other platforms, you can also opt to share user-generated content. This can involve anything created by other people rather than your brand, such as images, videos, reviews, and more, to promote your product or business.
Incorporating user-generated content is an excellent method for boosting audience engagement. When people enjoy using a product, they’re often happy to share their experience via a video or a photo with a short caption.
If you, as the creator of that product, share that customer’s post on your own platform, this shows the customer that you appreciate their purchase. Furthermore, content created by other users always has a bit of extra authenticity with potential customers.
You can also choose to work with influencers to expand your brand’s reach on social media and other platforms.
In these instances, you would provide influencers, or people with a large following, with discounted (or free) products to test and then have them create content detailing their experience.
These users share their content with their followers, which helps to get the word about your brand and boosts your credibility.
10. White papers
A great way to build authority in your industry is by creating a white paper on a particular subject. White papers are informative reports filled with lots of detail and can provide a significant amount of value to your audience when they’re performing research of some kind.
These data-driven guides can become very effective lead magnets for your online store. Many of your target customers will likely be willing to provide you with their information in exchange for access to a professionally constructed white paper.
Note that these documents can take a bit more time to create than other types of content and can also be more expensive if you’re having somebody else do one for you.
Be sure to prioritize a visually appealing design when creating your white papers. Because this type of content is rather information-dense by nature, it’s essential that you pay attention to the formatting to keep readers interested.
Try to use fonts that are easy on the eyes while incorporating simple charts and graphs that can further help with understanding.
11. Checklists
Well-done checklists have the potential to bring a ton of value to potential customers.
These worksheets are generally pretty easy to create and provide an audience with a step-by-step process on how to achieve a specific result. They can become an excellent resource that users can refer back to time and time again.
When deciding what topics to include in your checklists, consider your audience’s daily routine and how your product can be incorporated.
Ensure that you present the information in a way that’s clear and easy-to-understand, regardless of the level of experience or knowledge the user has with your product.
One of the best things about checklists is that they don’t require a lot of money or time to create. After you’ve crafted a helpful, concise checklist that’ll add value to your target market’s lives, you can opt to add it to a blog post or share it on social media.
In addition, to encourage subscribers to your newsletter, you can even gift visitors a checklist in exchange for an email sign-up.
12. Quizzes
Quizzes can do amazing things for boosting audience engagement. People love finding out things about themselves or seeing how much they know about a certain topic.
By supplying them with an interesting quiz to take, you can get them to stay on your page for a longer period of time.
Test your audience’s knowledge regarding your product or niche and discover opportunities where you can educate them further with future blog articles.
You can also use quizzes to make product recommendations. After site visitors complete the quiz, have them provide their email address, which you can then use to send a list of products that best fit their needs.
Finally, why not create quizzes to obtain additional insights from users?
For example, say you make handmade candles and are trying to determine what scent to add to a new product.
In your quiz, one of the questions might ask “Which one of these scents is most likely to make you swoon?” Then, offer several choices from which to choose, such as “floral,” “sweet,” “fresh/citrusy,” and “woody/smoky.”
Based on the popularity of responses, you can decide which scent might be the most profitable for your business.
13. Memes
Okay, you might be a bit surprised to see memes on this list, but trust me on this one!
Though comparatively new to the content marketing scene, memes can be a powerful tool for connecting with your audience.
They create a sense of community by communicating an idea that’s universally understood and culturally relevant, allowing the audience to feel like they’re part of an inside joke.
Creating memes is very easy with a free meme generator. Simply choose an image and then add your text.
Although you can make memes that are relevant to your specific product or industry, you don’t necessarily have to. You can alternatively opt to design memes for the sole purpose of entertaining your audience.
Memes are also a great place to let your creativity run wild. Just be sure that you have a pretty good understanding of your audience, as you want to be sure that the tone of your messages will appeal to them.
Because memes are super easy to share, if your current audience appreciates one you’ve created, they’ll likely share it on their own social media. This in turn can help expand your ecommerce business’s reach in no time!
Conclusion
Now that you know some of the most high-performing forms of content for ecommerce businesses, you can get started on creating a rockstar content marketing strategy today!
You’ll likely need to do some experimenting in your marketing efforts when determining which types of content work best for your brand, but that’s okay.
Once you strike the right balance, your hard work will pay off in the long run with content marketing’s numerous benefits for your business!
