How To Increase Traffic To A New E-Commerce Store

So you’ve got a new e-commerce store set up, looking slick and ready to start selling!

But there’s just one core ingredient missing…

TRAFFIC! (aka visitors)

Now, most people will probably tell you there are only TWO ways to drive traffic to a new e-commerce store: 

Paid Advertising or doing SEO for e-commerce stores.

BUT…

There is a third option that people don’t talk about…

And this option can be essential if you don’t have the budget to invest in SEO and PPC initially and you also don’t have the technical ability or willingness to learn!

The reason most people don’t do it however – is because it involves hard work, or at least commitment!

If you’re still with me though and you’re committed to growth, then here it is…

Building An Engaged Audience

Now just to be clear…

This doesn’t mean buying followers, or doing silly follow, un-follow techniques on Instagram…

I’m talking about the manual work of building relationships; 1 follower at a time.

Whether this be through a page, a Facebook Group, a YouTube channel or any other channel you can give VALUE to the audience, instead of simply promoting.

The crazy thing is, most of you reading this will probably have hundreds of warm, ready-to-buy customers ALREADY within your existing network.

You just don’t know it yet!

Remember, just because someone doesn’t engage with your content – that doesn’t mean they aren’t interested in what you do!

They may just not be seeing it because of the algorithm or maybe they’re just too scared to make the first move!

6 Ways To Start Generating Traffic To Your E-Commerce Store From Scratch

Here’s just a few ideas to begin increasing traffic to your e-commerce store and unlocking the hidden profits in your business:

1. Ultilising your existing network to increase traffic to your e-commerce website

Start reaching out to ALL of your existing followers, connections, friends and email subscribers individually.

Get to know them, let them know what you’re up to and ask if they know anyone who may be interested in what you’re selling.

2. Start networking and giving value in groups and forums that ALREADY contain your ideal customer

Start hanging out in Facebook Groups relating to your product/service/industry, give value and build relationships with the members.

Be sure your profile is linked to your business page/website, because once you start building a reputation, people will start taking an interest in you and checking out what you do.

3. Tap into your competitors audience to start driving traffic to your own social media pages and website

Start going through the individual FOLLOWERS of other companies and brands in your space or those who sell a similar product.

Check out their followers profiles individually and begin engaging with their posts. I’m not talking about silly bot comments like “cool post” but real meaningful comments that help you stand out.

When you show a genuine interest in others they will begin taking in interest in you. Again, be sure your company website is linked to your profile so people can click through.

4. Start turning followers into fans and fans into customers

If you already have followers on social media platforms like Instagram; start going through all of those followers individually and send them a DM.

Thank them for following you and make an effort to get to know them. You’ll be amazed at how effective this can be for generating traffic and sales.

5. Create evergreen market assets that can be used over and over again to increase traffic to your website 

Create a pillar piece of blog content that relates to your e-commerce store and the products you sell…

For example if you run a health food store; maybe create something like “5 health hacks you NEED to know in 2021 and beyond”.

Then search forums, Facebook Groups and other mediums in the health space and start contributing to the community and delivering value.

Don’t just spam your link but look for places where it may be relevant to direct someone to it. For example, if someone is complaining about certain health issues that your blog addresses, this could be a perfect opportunity to link to it. 

6. Utilising Micro-influencers to grow your e-commerce business

When I mention influencers to people, the first thing they usually see is dollar signs! 💰💰💰

However, influencer marketing doesn’t have to be expensive; especially when you can tap into passionate micro-influencers.

A micro-influencer is typically anyone with between 1,000 to 50,00 engaged followers. What you’ll find is that a lot of these influencers at the early stages will be happy to take freebies from brands and share their thoughts, reactions or feedback with their followers.

Larger influencers on the other hand, will often charge hefty fees for sponsorship or promotional content.

The irony is, micro-influencers can actually produce better results as they tend to have more genuine and engaged followers. So if you’re in the right market, this can be a phenomenal way of growing your brand for little to no cost.

An example of this might be a vegan cake store, reaching out to a number of vegan food/lifestyle bloggers and influencers and offering them a free custom-made cake to share with their audience of THOUSANDS of hungry VEGANS (starting to see the power in this?).

After all, who wouldn’t want a free custom-made cake!

Managing Your Time & Resources For Sales & Marketing

People often say these methods are too time-consuming…

And look, there will be a time, where it’s not possible to do this ever single day.

But the reality is, 90% of people aren’t there yet.

And those same people who say their time is too valuable; spend years bouncing around, always looking for the latest marketing hack or secret strategy to magically increase traffic to the e-commerce store…

Yet never really getting any REAL traction 🙄

We’ve all been there!

But as Michael Masterston talks about in his incredible book, Ready, Fire, Aim; until you’ve hit 1 MILLION in sales, your main focus and priority needs to be on driving traffic and generating sales.

In other words 80% of your time should be on sales and marketing activities – 20% goes on everything else.

Otherwise, you’ll soon find yourself struggling year after year just making enough to get by whilst never gaining the traction you need or deserve.

However, it’s all too easy to get caught up in the day-to-day admin and other activities that these numbers get reversed and get trapped in a never-ending cycle.

Please do your best to avoid this!

You’ll also find that by taking this manual approach and spending the time to engage with people one on one by actively going to where your customers are.

You won’t only start driving traffic…

But you’ll begin building an ENGAGED following of people who will actively share and promote your content.

Imagine having your own marketing team that promote the business for you… For FREE!

And even if a few of them aren’t ever going to buy from you; building an engaged audience like this will help you to amplify your brand organically and start increasing traffic and visibility over time.

This is the true compound effect of building an audience.

And as Kevin Kelly found in his phenomenal article; 1,000 ravings fans are worth FAR more than 10,000 disengaged followers…

When To Start Using SEO & Paid Advertising For Your E-Commerce Store

Once you’ve built up that initial traction from your audience and you’re generating consistent profitable sales each month from your ecommerce website; it’s time to start re-investing part of those profits into an SEO or paid advertising strategy to really take your results to the next level! 📈 

Now it’s your turn to driving more traffic to your e-commerce store today

If you follow these steps persistently whilst always keeping your customer front of mind; you’ll be well on your way to increasing your traffic whilst ALSO building an egnaged community of fans.

And as always, if you want personalised suggestions and feedback on how to generate more traffic leads and sales from your website, be sure to book your FREE Digital Review today.