5 Ecommerce Marketing Ideas that are Actually Bad – 2024 Guide

When we build our marketing strategy, we need to include more tools and methods as we can at the very beginning, and as we are developing it through time. That will help you detect the weak sides and points, and let you fix the mistakes before you upgrade it. The purpose of marketing is to help you promote your products, tell your story to the customers, attract them to check what you offer, and then increase the sales. No matter what type of business you run, a few things are a must, including a nice website, presence on social media, launching paid ads and sponsorships, and have an exceptional strategy to help you implement all of your ideas.

The development of the digital era is allowing us to embrace eCommerce, especially during the pandemic, when most people realized there is a way to buy everything you need with just a few clicks on your phone or computer. As you know, when it comes to marketing, everything seems like a good idea, until you try it and see if it really works or not. If you can’t do it all by yourself, then you can hire an outsource company, or even use online tools and services as Digital Muscle, to improve your performance. No one can avoid mistakes and bad ideas, and they take a huge part in the work. But, have you ever asked yourself what ideas were actually bad from the very first moment, and how to avoid them?

Even if you did some of them, and they affected badly the company’s performance at some moment, the good thing is that there is always enough space to fix that in a few hours and proceed with your work, waiting for better results with your improved campaign strategy. Here are a few of the most common ideas that may affect eCommerce marketing badly:

1. Targeting everyone

There are just a few business areas in the world that are targeting the whole general audience. This is one of the worst ideas, to try to optimize your marketing to reach everyone. Even when you offer products and services for babies, children, teenagers, adults, and elders, you need to manipulate the audience and precisely who you want to “call” or “invite” with the new campaign. Targeting the audience is an important tool to improve your business performance. You should follow who is the most interested in your work, and try to adjust the targets for the next time. Use analytics tools, that will help you do that, and give a unique insight into your customers’ habits and preferences.

2. Thinking that a photo of the product is enough

Some brands have an absolutely wrong strategy – they just publish a photo and give a short description, to get the potential even more interested to message them and ask for details and price. But, the truth is that you must have your important details available on your website or social media. If the clients wanted to send messages to ask for every possible product they are interested in, they will probably go out and visit a store, instead of online shopping. The point of eCommerce is to make their life easier, and let them just add the product to their virtual cart, while they complete everything in just a few minutes. Also, while you do that, list everything that they may be interested in, including the ingredients, materials, and dimensions. Just put yourself in the role of a customer, and you will know exactly what you need to do.

3. Not having a proper customer service

Customer care service is a crucial part. You need at least two people to provide good customer care and don’t skip that part when completing your eCommerce strategy. They will be there to listen to the customer’s complaints and offer them proper solutions. Many businesses suffer due to poor customer service, and you surely don’t want to be one of them. If you do that badly, they won’t ever come back to buy from you. That will improve the whole user experience and will lower the number of complaints.

4. Not having a mobile version of the website

We don’t even need to say how important is to optimize your website for every device. People today spend most of their time on smartphones, so a mobile version of your website is a must. Some companies offer even mobile apps that can be downloaded and used to shop online. Is there anything simpler than that for the customers? Very often, the desktop versions of your site may not work properly on every device, and it’s a small investment for you to hire a professional who will make a mobile version of your website in a few days.

5. Avoiding social media as an important marketing tool

Just because you’ve met someone who is not on Facebook or Instagram, doesn’t mean everyone is avoiding it. There are a lot of examples of successfully run brands just through their Facebook page, or Instagram profile, who receive orders through the messaging apps and deliver them to the customer. You don’t need to focus on social media, but you surely have to include them in your eCommerce marketing strategy, because they are the most inexpensive way to reach more potentially interested customers, attract them, and lead them to visit your website and buy your product.

Digital marketing tools shouldn’t be missed while creating the strategy. If you want to be present on the Internet, then you must embrace everything it offers, even the bad customer experience received from the unsatisfied clients. That will help you improve your service and be even better for the next time. Until then, you should never stop improving your service and marketing strategy, so you can offer an even better user experience to your customers. Use every tool that you think it’s appropriate for the business, and wait for the good results to come. Everyone is making mistakes and using bad strategies, but we are lucky to have enough time to fix that in a few minutes and be better at your work.