What is an online sales promotion?

The development of the Internet and Technology has changed the way companies communicate with their customers. Every industry is making big steps towards digital transformation. 

That has made the sales and marketing strategies develop and transform explosively. Soon we will not specify these strategies anymore with the words “online”, “digital” etc. They will be essential parts of business, sales and marketing strategies.

Online sales promotion is a combination of communication instruments designed to lead the site visitor to purchase a specific product or a service. In other words, online sales promotions are meant to turn site visitors into consumers.

In this post we list 10 actions you can take to prepare yourself for the actual sales promotion activities.

1. Use Inbound Marketing to generate Direct Sales

Good things take time, they say. We agree. The era of quality content is a constant hustle. The moment you hit a home run as your online sales promptly increase comes indeed suddenly, but there’s normally a long time of hard work behind it.

Inbound marketing, by definition, is using content marketing, social media marketing, search engine optimization and branding to draw customers to products and services. 

Briefly, before you even come close to closing the deal, you need to already be in the process of content creation, through which you are constantly creating brand awareness and authoritativeness, proving your expertise and building trust.

Now, the fast lanes for online sales promotion exist, no worries, but if you aim for sustainable results, please do consider finding ways to constantly create and share quality content. The most common way to do it is to create either a Blog, a YouTube Channel, to build up any social media account or even do all of it. Don’t hesitate to continuously address the problems and questions of your potential customers through these channels.

2.  Include Sales Motivations in your Copy

Make the customers feel that they get this extra something when purchasing your products. Be it a specific status, a special membership of an appealing community, safety, a pleasant feeling or a good conscience – make sure they really get it through buying your products. Tell them what they are supporting through consuming your services. Be honest.

Apart from that, creating urgency with deadlines and discounts is also proven to be a well-functioning practice for increasing direct sales online.

3. Be consistent with Social Media Marketing

Social Media is developing to become faster and faster. Only bored people scroll through the whole feed of a company’s or an influencer’s Instagram, Facebook, Twitter or Tik Tok account. 

It is mainly used daily, on the go. Social Media is like drinking coffee from a to-go cup. You drink it, enjoy it, get pumped up, throw away the cup (or keep it aside if you are environment friendly) and then forget about it until the next time you feel the urge to get a little extra kick.

This is why, when you include Social Media Marketing in your Online Sales Strategy, you better be consistent. Create create create. Post post post. Otherwise, you are just not there when they need the new kick.

4. Take SEO seriously

Make sure you have taken care of the basic SEO on your Website, e-Commerce Platform and Social Media Channels. Your Website may look divinely beautiful and your Product photos may be mesmerizing, but if no search queries lead to them, their beauty will not close the deals.

Other than that, there are so many simple Off-Page SEO practices that will support creating your brand awareness and building trust. Learn more about different SEO services and download our free SEO Checklist to get started.

5. Get featured in the Comparison Shopping Engines

If you are selling actual products online, please do consider getting featured in one of the following shopping engines. Google Shopping, Amazon, eBay, Shopzilla, Zalando… you name it. While managing accounts on these platforms might be time consuming, think it through and calculate the possible beneficial impact it might have to your online business.

 Ignoring these tools will not let you benefit from the enormous traffic that these sites are getting. Find ways to support your ads with quality copy that leads to direct sales and therefore outweighs the investment in ads.

6. Provide as many payment options as possible

Simple. When I don’t see my preferred payment option in the list, I will probably look elsewhere. The only way I will go through the hustle of adding a new payment method is when I can’t find the product anywhere else. You don’t want to risk that if you’re not 100% sure that you are the only one out there offering your products and services.

7. Implement Tiered Pricing

By including three options in your pricing structure, you can guide your clients toward the middle option – the one you actually want them to buy. Leverage this psychological principle to make your customers buy what you want. Learn more about decoy pricing at MarketingLand.

8. Don’t underestimate Email Marketing

Rock and Roll is dead. Email Marketing is not. 91% of consumers check their email on a daily basis.

Generate leads on your Website to build an email list and start sending right emails at the right time. The best email list is the one you created by consumers sharing their contacts voluntarily because of their interest, trust or hope in your brand.

9. Make an exact Online Sales Plan and stick with it!

As you can see, there are way too many possibilities for creating an online sales strategy. There is no general best plan out there that would work for everyone. There is even no way of categorizing the existing practices. They are all mixed up with each other. It is a lot of work and testing to find out which plan works best for your business.

Our main advice remains the same – make a plan and stick to it! The only way to be successful is to analyze, plan, try out here and there, find what works the best, fix the final details and then stick to it. As soon as you start to reconsider and take different actions you diminish everything you have done so far.

That’s why it’s so important to plan first and then do. While planning, keep the search intent in mind throughout the customer journey. It’s all connected! Find your spot in the Matrix! I mean, there is no email marketing without keyword analysis and there is no referral or social media marketing without target audience analysis and vice versa etc.

At that point I really feel to tell you that you should either become a pro or hire a pro. You don’t want to be a Jack of all, King of none. Hire some experts, bro. If you believe in your business, it’s worth the investment!

10. Be a nice guy (also applies to women)

Stay inspired, stay positive, stay creative. This is our last and in many ways our most important advice. If you can do that, you can do anything! Don’t forget to smile!