8 Viable Suggestions on How to Increase Revenue and Expand Your Horizons
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Expanding your horizons and stimulating sales can turn into a trying task. Sometimes it requires a shift of perspective to find new determinants and drivers for your strategy that will help you increase revenue, like empathic communication or a simplified refund policy. Yet, small things, such as content optimization, mobile-friendly design, or an original approach to advertising, can surprise you with the extent of their effectiveness.
5 Productive Ways to Increase Revenue and Course-correct Your Business
Spring-cleaning is essential for our housekeeping, but it can become a productive tradition for your venture too. Invigorate your business and facilitate your sales by conducting a thorough investigation to determine your strategies and tactics that show successful performance, call for a repair, or need to be ceased. These 5 helpful tips will guide you through the process.
1. Know Your Way
Your road map with goals, objectives, and stages has to be honest, unambiguous, and realistic. Otherwise, you risk making a mistake in both the “make an error” and “wander” senses. For the surefire outcome of your action plan, you should:
- Prepare two strategies: for recession and stagnation. In case of declining profits, your primary task is to reverse the curve. When you have reached a plateau, aim for steady and gradual growth.
- Be smart while planning your budget. Focus your arrangements on the most pivotal expenditures first.
- Keep in mind your strengths and weaknesses. You cannot fix all things at once. Therefore, you should invent techniques to neutralize and compensate for the detrimental effects of the remaining shortcoming.
2. Tailor Your Product for Your Audience
It is most likely that when you developed the concept of your store, you had a portrait of a specific person in mind. Hence, if you want to charm and lure this particular type of shopper, you have to design the set of your products and services to match the expectations of this demographic. The most potent ways to accomplish this target are:
- Create a Unique Selling Proposition. USP answers a hypothetical question, “Why should I buy this product from this company?” Anything that distinguishes you from your competitors, whether it is quality materials, delivery options, on-demand service, advanced technologies, or hybrid shopping tools (e.g., BOPIS), can be positioned as your unique selling option.
- Gather feedback from active users and current buyers. It is especially important when you are launching a new product. Offering free samples or trial periods might help detect flaws or errors before it appears in the store. Pet food dealers often put supplementary portions of new flavors or formulations as a test drive and promotional campaign combined.
3. Stick to Consumer Empathy
Of course, putting yourself into buyers’ shoes can unveil plenty of mysteries behind their motivation. Here are some aspects you need to pay attention to if you strive to, on the one hand, learn more about your customers and, on the other hand, put this knowledge into practice.
Optimized Features and Content
Incorporate only helpful features in your products or services and optimize the content on your site to explicitly inform visitors about how these functions can be of use (e.g., “Do you like falling asleep, listening to your favorite melodies? Just turn on a sleep timer and enjoy lullabies for as long as you need”).
Personal Touch
Do not shy away from utilizing contact forms and profile enrichment to make your messages and recommendations more personal. For instance, pop-ups built with Claspo have integrations with 3rd-party APIs that add users’ data from public sources or your CRM/CDP software.
Established Reputation
Publish reviews, testimonials, and pictures of happy clients to create a trusting environment.
Extensive Social Media Presence
Be active on social media. Tell people more about your product, team, or company, engage in conversations, respond to comments, share and react to mentions of your brand, do everything to conquer shoppers' hearts and proliferate your fan base.
Excellent Support
Equip users with multiple tools to reach you (live chat, chatbot, phone, email, etc.). Provide comprehensive explanations of procedures and policies. Adhere to the cordial, compassionate, understanding communication style. Actively listen to and solve clients’ problems or provide compensation for inconveniences.
Pleasant Design and Layout
Try not to overwhelm visitors with elements and widgets but highlight the important information. Do not let anything block your call-to-action (CTA) buttons. Plus, you can make your website easy to navigate by applying familiar design patterns, “1 step per page” forms, inline messages (that you can install with Claspo), etc.
A/B Testing
Conduct A/B tests to identify innovative features and modifications that your audience approves of.
Mobile-Friendly Formats
Make sure that mobile users can browse your platform or application with no inconveniences on any device or operating system.
Informative Surveys
Ask buyers to participate in surveys to discover their preferences, likes, and dislikes. If you want something more entertaining, turn to Claspo for pop-up quizzes. Tests like “Do you have a sweet tooth?” or “What dress suits you best?” are captivating and give insights into the participants’ behavior patterns.
4. Choose Prices Wisely
Naturally, your instant response to the need for higher revenue would be to change your price list. However, if it is done without proper consideration, you might end up losing your clientele. Follow these rules to achieve a desirable effect:
- Make sure that you stay within the boundaries of your niche. Compare your price with the competitors’ regularly to confirm that the number is reasonable.
- Opt for a gradual increment instead of a drastic one.
- Try to be cost-effective. For example, look for a supplier with a better price/quality ratio.
5. Revise Your Shipping, Payment, and Refund Options
As reported by Marketing Charts, shipping deals closely follow the product’s pricing on the list of shoppers’ priorities. It proves that nuances and small details of your service are as influential as substantial changes. Thus, it might be beneficial to introduce:
- free/economy shipping (alongside fast/urgent delivery);
- flat-rate shipping;
- estimated/guaranteed delivery date;
- tracking number;
- automated refund;
- exchange option;
- easy-to-print return labels;
- more payment methods (not only credit cards), including PayPal, direct invoices, gift cards, and even cryptocurrency (with explicit warnings and instructions for customers).
3 Out of the Box Ideas to Increase Revenue and Impress Customers
Being unconventional often brings long-awaited refreshments and sparks enthusiasm in shoppers. Many companies struggle with that, but if you are up to the challenge, your ability to stand out from your competitors can become your most powerful advantage.
Experiment with Advertising Techniques
You should not abandon traditional advertising, such as Google Ads, email marketing, flyers, commercials, or billboards. Still, being lavish and diverse with your offerings will result in a huge payoff. So, concentrate on generating exciting ideas for:
- Complimentary products. When you offer a shoe care kit, if a client buys a pair of leather boots, you do not just cross-sell them but propose a solution to the possible upcoming problems.
- Free samples and trial periods. It is always better to offer a tangible experience rather than just a show.
- Bundle packages. Buying a matching scarf, cap, and gloves as a package saves customers plenty of time and effort.
- Partnerships with other companies. Do not provide related services. Recommend someone who does it as a part of the mutually beneficial agreement. For instance, clients of your travel agency get a 10% discount as remuneration for your referral.
- Loyalty discount program. Please your brand’s enthusiasts with special prices, sales, and offerings to secure a lifetime of future purchases.
Make New Additions to Your Marketing Arsenal
Are there instruments that can help you implement your discount proposals impeccably? Indeed, there are. For instance, with Claspo, the pop-up building is as easy and creative as it gets. But, of course, there are more tools in the box:
- welcome messages allow you to make a favorable first impression;
- exit-intent discount offerings are your last chance to change people’s minds before they quit the site without making a purchase;
- follow-up emails and retargeting provide you with instruments to stay in touch or remind visitors about your store and items they liked;
- gamified pop-ups help you get rid of the “all work and no play” image and add thrills to the shopping process;
- pop-up quizzes with intriguing topics like “Which Game of Thrones character are you?” tempt participants to share their results with the world;
- social media presents you with the means to gain social proof by asking your followers to share your posts or tell about their experience with your product (e.g., take a picture with your product). Of course, your fans will do it for free, but the overall impact will be more significant if you offer a discount, a free item, or a prize in return.
Don’t Be Indifferent
However surprising and irrational it may sound, caring about something other than chasing profits can open the way to new revenue streams. IMB reported that 44% of modern people decided to become purpose-driven shoppers. This implies that their loyalty lies with companies that are sustainable, eco-friendly, and support their views on important matters.
Of course, you do not have to take a fake stand. But if you strive to do your bit, it is the audience you can appeal to. You do not have to host a major event like a charitable auction or a fundraiser. Even small steps, such as being pet-friendly or inclusive to people with disabilities, contribute to the cause.
You can even encourage responsible customers’ behavior. For instance, offer a free pancake if clients take beverages to-go in their mugs instead of plastic ones. It will show people that you share their values and induce them to come back for seconds.
Conclusion
Spring is back in town, and farmers return to the fields to plant the seeds of their future harvest. Business owners, regardless of the season, need to grow revenue, if they seek to reap the fruits of their labor. The “first-aid” measures listed in this article can be your lifeline at any time of the year. Still, if you want your profits to start flourishing like blooming trees outside, you’d better start applying them now.