E-commerce and the way the world is conducting business transactions in the 21st century is a whole new ballgame than what many people are used to. If you don’t get on board the technology train with your business, it’s going to take off without and leave you – and your product – behind. The good news is that sites like HubSpot are there to walk you through what needs to be done so that you can fully enjoy the benefits of online marketing, too.
From SEO to automating your email lists, HubSpot can do it all with minimal effort on your part. And though getting your business up and running online can sound daunting, once you understand the behind-the-scenes work, it’s not quite so scary anymore.
Here is what HubSpot can do for your business when you’re ready to optimize your marketing strategy and hit the ground running in the field of e-commerce.
E-Commerce – What is It, and Why Should You Care?
Before you can decide whether or not you want to direct your marketing digitally, you should have a firm grasp on the statistics and do your research. And when you do, you’ll see that the numbers are astronomically pushing you to go digital with your sales.
Statistics show that as of 2017 there were over 1.66 billion people buying online, which is almost ¼ of the entire 7.6 billion population in the world. That number is projected to do nothing but rise with more and more people realizing the purchasing power of pressing a button from their digital devices and computers.
Sure, the number of people making online purchases is impressive, but looking at the actual sales is mind-blowing. As of 2017, e-commerce transactions made up a total of $2.3 trillionin sales that year, a number expected to grow to over $4.5 trillion by 2021. You can be part of that insanely high number, that is if you do it right.
Why do people love digital shopping so much? There are hundreds of reasons, but the main draw according to many shoppers is the ability to have 24/7 purchasing opportunities and quick, sometimes immediate, shipping or download options. E-commerce is an industry that is growing by almost 25% annually, but statistics say that almost 50% of small businesses in the United States don’t have a website to target customers.
While these numbers are great for your potential pool of purchasers, they also are bringing more of your competitors out from the woodwork. This makes it even more important for you to be smart with your marketing strategies. The problem is that what works today may not work tomorrow, so you have to stay up on marketing business, too – which is why sites like Hubspot are invaluable to small and large businesses.
What Does HubSpot Do For Your Business?
Marketing your business requires a complete strategy that covers your content, your advertising, and your site itself. These are all full-time aspects of running your business by themselves, so it would make sense that each part would require a separate platform to thoroughly run them.
That used to be true, but now HubSpot has entered the scene as an all-in-one platform that does everything your business needs, from optimizing your content to watching over your advertising feedback. If you are looking to set up an inbound marketing strategy, HubSpot is a smart choice.
Inbound marketing contains all of the following aspects and more:
1. Email marketing
Let’s talk dollars for a minute. Email is one of the only marketing techniques that pays for itself over and over and over – in fact, for every $1 you spend on your marketing through email, you can expect an average return on your investment of $38. That’s a huge amount of money that you get for doing very little.
Through HubSpot, you can create professional email campaigns that work on any platform or device by designing your own or using one of the premade templates. You can customize your layout and design your content to match your brand, then schedule your email to send automatically!
2. Landing pages
Your landing page is the first impression many consumers will get of your company. It drives your traffic and builds your brand, and it’s crucial to make that first impression a fantastic one or people will simply click off of your site. There’s no reason for them to stay, no person behind the counter to engage with and make them want to wander around, no guilt in not buying.
Your landing page is used to lead your customers to a specific product or service and make them want to order or purchase it. HubSpot helps you to design a landing page and launch it so that it looks professional, and you can even change your content to be audience specific.
3. Managing your leads
The days of paper and pencil address books, and even Rolodex’s, are long gone. You can’t store your contacts in your phone and do anything with them that’s productive, either. There has to be a better way to manage your leads – and there is!
HubSpot allows you to access all of your contact’s information and all of your interactions. This helps you to target your campaigns to specific users and drive more sales.
4. SEO
SEO, or search engine optimization, is the buzzword in marketing strategies. SEO is how you plan your content strategically to maximize how many visitors you get to your website. Your SEO dictates how high up your site is on the list of results a search engine returns to a user.
With HubSpot, you can choose to implement content that will increase your search engine authority and get instant feedback as to the content you have created.
5. Social media marketing
Social media is a free, crucial way for you to get your name and your product out in front of millions of potential customers, but HubSpot takes that capability and brings it up a notch.
Through the HubSpot platform, you can monitor when your brand is mentioned and check conversations about it, track your engagements, and schedule social media posts to show up when your target audience is online.
Similarly, HubSpot also tracks your Facebook and AdWords advertising to help you determine exactly what your ROI is and which marketing techniques are working versus which ones need to be adjusted or stopped altogether.
6. Precise calendar scheduling
You’ll quickly find that marketing entails you to be organized and plan ahead, sometimes months or years in advance. There’s no paper calendar that can help you see everything you have scheduled without dealing with a mess, but HubSpot’s calendar is clean and easy to read and navigate.
You can clearly see what’s coming that day, week, or month, including your scheduled posts, emails, and blogs, and also monitor when they have been published.
7. Customer segmentation
Customer segmentation splits each contact into a specific list, helping keep them engaged and receiving only content that they are interested in. This is important because too many emails on non-relevant content will cause your customers to unsubscribe completely from your lists.
HubSpot lets you segment your lists by a multitude of characteristics, such as actions (opened emails, downloaded content), location, gender, and more. Every aspect of your reader’s interactions with your email and content is visible through HubSpot.
8. There’s an app for that, too
Not all platforms are easily usable on your phone, making transition time from place to place a wasted opportunity. HubSpot’s app is simple to use so you can check your reports, schedule posts, manage your content, and more from your mobile device in between appointments.
There’s also a HubSpot community where people like you are ready to listen and lend a helping hand with advice, share ideas, and offer you support as you go into your new e-commerce industry.
9. Flexible prices
Getting started financially inhibits a lot of small business owners from making the jump into digital marketing, but HubSpot offers flexible packages to get you started and then help you grow. And with their included ROI technology, it’s easy to watch your investment pay for itself and then some so you know when it is time to move up to the next level!
Check https://sharpspring.com/hubspot-pricing-and-reviews/ for the latest pricing, reviews, and information.
10. It just keeps getting better
HubSpot is not a one-and-done program. In other words, the creators of this platform continually strive to improve their services, make tweaks and updates to help users optimize their choices, and update their app with new changes as better technology and content becomes available.
Bring Your Business Into the Trillion Dollar Industry of E-Commerce Today
You may be a small fish in a big pond, but simply by swimming with the millions of potential customers, you are going to get fed. When you arm yourself with the knowledge and tools that HubSpot provides, you can take your business to the next level and become a successful e-commerce marketplace.
