Here’s some bitter truth – about 8 out of 10 eCommerce companies fail within the first two years, even when the eCommerce market is getting better by 13% every year! There must be something right that the other two companies are doing to hang in there. What about the top performing eCommerce companies? What strategies are they following to be able to successfully make it to the top and stay there? As a wise man once said – “You don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Just realign it.” The top players at the eCommerce industry are standing out because of some stringent strategies that they follow.

According to a three year sales analysis of eCommerce companies by RJmetrics, they found that the most successful eCommerce companies where making about two and a half times more than the other companies who started out at the same time. And in the first six months, these successful companies made about $450K in monthly revenue. These top companies must have been making the right moves, taking correct decisions and implementing strategies that the rest haven’t thought about. Lessons learnt from these top-of-the-ladder eCommerce companies will go a long way in building a promising eCommerce brand for yourself.

A product that’s perfect for the market

In an interview with Inc.com, Andy Dunn, the founder of the very successful eCommerce brand Bonobos, was talking about why he started with selling jeans although he had a lot of competition there. “A great brand starts with a hero product. Denim is one of the most crowded markets, but if we do well there, we know we’ve got something exciting”, he said. So his product was a perfect fit for the market.

According to a report by Fortune, the main reason why eCommerce companies are failing (42% of them) is because they spent their time building a product that the market did not need. A lack for the need of your product is the biggest cause to get you down. Before you start working on your product, you will need to do tons of research and surveys to make sure if people really need it. Some companies still go ahead and launch a product thinking that people may come around sooner or later as market trends change. However, this is very unlikely and highly irrational. When you launch the perfect product for the right market, you will see an accelerated growth in revenues right from the start.

Jazz up your traffic

It is good to invest in marketing and let the world know about your brand. But it is even better when people come looking for you. Users are hooked on to the internet and look up for products they need via a search. If they find your brand in the first page of their search results, you have made your first move towards customer acquisition and thus increase your conversion rate.

Planning your SEO strategy in the early stages of your brand building is extremely vital. Implement all well-known SEO best practices and follow them regularly. You have to constantly make sure that your SEO practices are getting you ahead of your competitors. A superlative eCommerce website design will also help attracting a lot of visitors.

Content with your content?

Michael Dubin, CEO of Dollar Shave Club, had quoted in an interview “If you can create content that goes viral it’s going to be cheaper for you to build your business”. This successful subscription based eCommerce company had created and marketed such creative content that they got 5000 subscribers on their first day alone!

Merging your Content strategy with your SEO approach will help you reap higher sales and revenue. When you have a good content strategy in place, you are using all the right keywords and presenting it in the best way possible that can appeal to you user. The ultimate goal is not to just lure in traffic, you need them to convert users into customers and increase those conversions.

Deliver superior service

As Jeff Bezos, founder of the legendary Amazon.com, says “You can earn reputation by trying to do hard things well. The right way to build a brand is by delivering a great service”. He believes that a brand is for a company like a reputation is for an individual. When a customer interacts with you via any means, they are getting to know you better. When you do hard things well, people will notice it sooner or later.

When you keep your customers happy by delivering a great service, they will talk about it. Marketing via word of mouth is the best way of marketing as it helps build trust immediately. Your customers are not just buying products or services, they are buying experiences. Make it count.

Retain your existing customers

Did you know that if you increase your customer retention by 5%, you can increase your profits by 25-95% (a Harvard Business School study)? You don’t even have to spend too much on marketing to an existing customer. A research also shows that top repeat customers are willing to spend 30 times more than an average customer!

Give your existing customers a lot of attention. Keep in touch with them by sending out regular and helpful newsletters, thank you notes and social media reach-outs. Maintain a loyalty program for them and reward your customers.