This year, AJA Design is focusing in on a new way of looking at user interaction in the digital space. With mobile device sales consistently outstripping desktop since March 2014, the question is how can lessons be learnt from this success story and applied to your website, regardless of your product or service, to maximise your ROI? Here are five talking points from our creative and strategic teams.
Harness an eCommerce platform’s multi-site functionality
If you’re considering a revamp of your website in 2015, allocate some serious time to thinking about the platform. There are ready-built, well-supported, open-source eCommerce systems that are quick to implement and malleable to your design that may have slipped your shortlist before. These platforms often have super plug-ins for any purpose, product, or service, and back-ends that easily integrate with your current 3rd party software. Furthermore, there are excellent options for multinational site “storefronts” operating from a single administrative hub.
Measure the value of each visitor
eCommerce sites are exceptionally good at measuring the worth of a site visit, producing statistics independently of Google Webmaster Tools and Universal Analytics. Having the ability to attribute financial value to site goals can really aid future digital policy decisions.
Personalise the experience
There are wonderfully innovative ways to tailor your website experience to your visitor within eCommerce platforms. Spend an hour or so visiting some of the big name retailers, leaving the domain and returning, either directly or from social channel links, and you’ll start to notice subtle (and occasionally not so subtle!) changes in navigation and/or focus points. This is an example of the CMS platform taking cues from your cookies, browser history, and any engagement information from your social profiles. It’s an excellent technique, proven to increase order value.
Target your follow-ups
Continuing on from the unique experience, online retailers are very quick to follow-up both successful and unsuccessful site visits. You know how it goes – one visit to a furniture website and suddenly every advert in the world is trying to entice you back to complete your order. eCommerce is moving this to the next level, turning direct adverts into “click-bait” instead. User tracking is best suited to a more human feel: target customers based on their demographic and browsing habits, inviting feedback, product suggestions, offers, and social campaigns rather than the hard sell.
Create high quality content media to share
At the end of it all, it’s about relevance and sharing quality. Keep creating fresh content – of all media – that’s on trend and seasonal. Just because you’re not in the fashion industry doesn’t mean you can’t capitalise on the Spring/Summer ’15 collection buzz. Consider how your end user is engaging with other industries in everyday life and carefully infiltrate it with your brand message.
For a more detailed, informal discussion about your new digital strategy, or to simply talk over some of the ideas raised here, get in touch with our team next time you put the kettle on.
