Running an E-commerce site is not as easy as it looks. If you want to hit your business goals, then you will need the right marketing strategy. There are plenty of common e-commerce marketing mistakes that businesses often fall victim to. It’s important to understand these issues early on so that you can boost growth and sales without restrictions.
With E-commerce becoming the new norm in shopping, competition between sites has become really tough. Common marketing mistakes will make a huge impact on your website – holding back your customer base and revenue from really taking off.

Follow our guide below on some of the main marketing mistakes:

1- Trying to Appeal to Everyone

An incredibly easy E-commerce marketing mistake to make, but one that can be fairly devastating.

It’s easy to appeal to as many people as physically possible, hoping that each one has the potential to become a customer.

Here’s where that typically fails: When you’re trying to appeal to everyone, you can easily end up censoring parts of your brand that would have helped you make yourself more distinct. Those parts you sliced away could have been what made you unique, and what caused your target audience to love you.

Let’s say that you’re marketing hiking boots. You try to create marketing campaigns that will be general enough to appeal to everyone who hikes, including the following audience niches:

• People who want a cute pair of “hiking”/walking boots that can go on a flat, one-mile loop.
• Casual hikers who like to check out a national park a few times a year.
• Park rangers who work outdoors daily.
• Intense mountaineers who are training to climb Everest.

These are entirely different customers looking for different products. And if you try to appeal to them all, you won’t get any of them, because they’re each looking for a brand that meets their specific needs. The Everest hiker will laugh if they come to your site and see mentions of the visual aesthetics of the boots instead of high-performance stats and features. 

These are two very different approaches to branding, even though both sell hiking boots:

This applies to branding as well as regular marketing campaigns. Knowing who you want to be as a brand and who you want to be as an audience will help you succeed in the end because it will make you stand out. 

2- Not Having A Proper Marketing Budget

This is mistake number one that seems small but can be disastrous: Not having a proper marketing budget and/or not having your marketing budget allocated properly. 

It’s crucial to know upfront exactly what your marketing team can spend. And not just on paid campaigns, but on third-party freelancers or consultants, the tools needed to get their work done, and even on paid sponsorships or promotions.

You want to determine how much you can afford to spend, and then divide the money up accordingly. 

3- Not optimizing for mobile

During the first months of 2021, 79% of smartphone users purchased something online at least once. These numbers continue to grow, and a seamless e-shop design that works on all mobile devices is essential.

With so many online shops available, potential shoppers will not think twice about choosing your competitor over you if they have an issue with your website on their mobile devices. 

Plennix team will provide you with a very quick return on investment (ROI). You need to meet and exceed your potential customers' expectations from the start if you want to beat out the competition. That begins with a user-friendly site provided by us, that works on all types of devices. 

4- Assuming you Can’t Afford PPC Advertising 

You don’t need to drop 20k a month on a Google Search Ads campaign to get results.

Some brands may only need $100 a month. Others may invest $10,000. Both can get results, the scale will just be different. 

Most pay-per-click platforms charge when users take a specific action, and you typically have a solid idea of what the approximate cost may be going in. 

If you know that you can spend $3 on a click as long as 3% of those clicks convert into paying customers, for example, you can make sure that your bids stick to a $3 limit for each click. 

Don’t count yourself out of platforms that can support you in scaling. Plennix will help you take a look at different PPC ad strategies, look at average costs, and see what you can afford to invest. Keep in mind that you’ll need a few weeks for Google to learn how to get you optimal results, but after a month you should have an idea of a platform’s potential for your existing campaigns. 

Final Thoughts

It doesn’t matter how great your products are, without an effective E-commerce marketing strategy your business won’t be able to reach its sales goals. Poor marketing efforts and common issues will lead to your website being lost in the competition.

For any E-commerce business, regardless of size, avoiding these common marketing mistakes is essential. As soon as you realize that you might have made one of these issues, fix it and move on. You will soon see a boost in sales!

If you’re looking for someone to handle your digital marketing needs, feel free to contact us.