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4 Productivity Tips Amazon Used to Boost E-commerce

Posted: 28 Apr 2019 08:00 AM PDT

Only a year after its inception, Amazon was just selling books. Within a month, the company was already shipping books to more than 40 countries and expanding sporadically. Since then, Amazon emerged as an unstoppable juggernaut, accounting $141.92 billion worth in e-commerce sales last year. So, how did Amazon manage to pull off such an impressive run? Here are the four game-changing strategies Amazon imbued into its e-commerce business model to increase productivity and beat its competition.

1. Become truly omnichannel

Omnichannel retailing is the next key stage for every growing e-commerce venture. However, very few know how to successfully accomplish it. Omnichannel simply means using a creative combination of online and physical channels to generate sales by providing customers continuously, seamless experience from whichever channel they use to shop, be it a device or any store location. The concept of this strategy is to build a unified brand experience for the customer, eliminating any administrative, logistical or financial impediments from the system.

For example, if you buy a pair of sneakers from Nike using your smartphone, you have the option to pick them up from the nearest store or have them delivered to your home. Similarly, if you wish to return those sneakers for any reason, you can simply send them by mail to their designated store. In this entire transaction, your relation with Nike flows from through one channel to the other, minimizing your efforts and improving the quality of your shopping experience.

Amazon succeeded in its Omnichannel approach by incorporating these key components into its business model. Amazon not only succeeded in building a successful omnichannel strategy but kept optimizing it, using key metrics such as sales, marketing and logistics to streamline its retailing activities across all active channels simultaneously. This allowed the eCommerce giant to merge all complex channels as one entity and achieve its ultimate mission of becoming, "Earth's most customer-centric company."

2. Logistics and supply chain management

Supply chain management and logistics make two critical components of any online retaining business. Despite shipping cost being the biggest of its business expenses, Amazon successfully runs a flowing supply chain and logistics network that handles everything from warehousing, fulfillment, sortation, to shipping, transportation and even delivery services.

From managing millions of SKUs in warehouses and fulfillment centers to packaging, distributing and shipping millions of products to the doorstep of the customer's home, Amazon is a logistics mean-machine. From its 95 warehouses and fulfillment centers, 29 sortation centers and around 149 facilities outside the U.S., Amazon's physical footprint accounts for more than 250 million square feet of leased space worldwide.

The insides of its fulfillment centers are equipped with a meticulously coordinated system of slides, conveyor belts and lifting machines. These centers do everything from attaching labels to boxes, check weighing, shipping locations and delivery protocols.

In 2017, Amazon shipped 5 billion items through its Prime business from the U.S. Postal Service, private carriers and regional shippers. While 40% of its packages are shipped through the Post Office, Amazon has been keenly working to launch its own independent delivery service. Currently, Amazon has a network of more than 7,000 of its own trucks and 40 airplanes. Recently Amazon has also introduced its own branded delivery vans to strengthen its ground network and minimize the delivery time for customers. The initiative has invited entrepreneurs to invest as minimum as $10,000 and run their own local delivery network of up to 40 vans.

3. Impeccable customer service

Good customer service is a direct determinant of how successful your online business can become. In e-commerce, bad customer service is usually the area in your sales model where conversions are leaking. Good customer service helps retain your customers, keeping them associated with your brand and motivating them to spread word of mouth to other prospects. If you are aware of this practice, retaining existing customers is 25 times cheaper than finding a new one. Moreover, a well-formed customer service strategy helps engender trust within your customers, improving customer-merchant relationship, generating loyalty and serving an impetus for repeat business. According to Sage, loyal customers are worth up to 10 times the amount they initially spend.

Because of Amazon's commitment to world-class customer service, the e-commerce giant has invested millions of dollars in developing a range of tools to help customers accurately track their packages, or quickly initiate return or exchange requests.

As a result, it has brought simplicity and convenience to the online shopping experience, while giving customers the incentive to speak positively about the brand. Amazon's impeccable customer service has also significantly contributed to building powerful brand equity for the online retailer in the market.

Similarly, Amazon actively uses social media to engage with its shoppers, learn about their experiences and use the data to rework on its strategies and improve the quality of its customer service. By intertwining its online marketing strategies with social media, Amazon has achieved immense success in increasing the lifetime value of its customers and turning them into passionate followers who advocate for the brand. 

Amazon's dedication to its efforts in providing the highest standards of customer service was recognized when Amazon customer service team has won multiple awards for its commitment to addressing issues for customers and providing helpful solutions to their problems. 

4. Building an empire from ideas

Last but not least, one of Amazon's biggest secrets behind its success is the assimilation of innovative ideas. While most companies consider ideas as disposable thoughts, Amazon has always placed an asset value on them. Amazon's founder Jeff Bezos was keen on building a continuous pipeline of unconventional concepts, grand innovations and futuristic ideas to serve as a mechanism of growth. Bezos believes a continuous stream of ideas is what fuels the growth of a company and enables it to maintain its competitive edge in the market.

Indulging in newer technologies, Amazon has set the tone for many aspects of customer's future in e-commerce. With its ever-growing affinity toward Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning, Amazon has taken things leaps ahead by reorganizing the company's management, administration, sales and financial operations with AI.

Currently, AI is being widely used across different departments in the company. For example, Amazon has been using machine learning technology to generate product recommendations and produce more accurate product forecasts for a very long time.

The company also uses an AI management strategy 'Flywheel' to drive knowledge throughout the organization, connecting one department with the other and influencing the efforts of their respective teams to build innovative products.

From self-learning voice-powered AI Assistants such as Alexa, to trend-tracking AI bots used in Amazon Go, and powerful recommendations engine that is responsible for generating 35% of the company's revenues, Amazon has been on the forefront of AI technology, contributing a major chunk of research and development into its business applications. Thanks to Amazon, Virtual Personal Assistants (VPA) such as Alexa have become so popular that VPA-enabled speakers are expected to experience sales worth $2.1 billion by 2020.

Final words

For many of you who have read this article, you can either take note and embrace the e-commerce stratagem Amazon used to become the juggernaut it is today, or pay no heed to these tips and risk at losing relevance in the online market.

To fully understand how Amazon established itself as the e-commerce market leader, it is imperative that you study these key strategies and use them to overcome the challenges and establish a robust footprint in the online market.

 

7 Ways Small Businesses Can Develop a Social Media Presence

Posted: 28 Apr 2019 05:30 AM PDT

Small businesses throughout the United States recognize that social media isn't just a trend. Even if you know that, it does not mean that you've had the time and energy to build a strong presence on any of the best platforms.

The good news is that if you have yet to optimize your social media existence, there's still time. The numerous benefits will be worth your effort. The advantages are endless; it can help you better your customer service, allow you to efficiently communicate with current and prospective customers, enable you reach a new audience and engage your current audience as you strive to build authority. Take a look at these seven ways you can improve your social media presence.

Editor's note: Looking for the right social media management tool for your business? Fill out the below questionnaire to have our vendor partners contact you about your needs.

 

Choose the best networks for your business

The use of social media has completely exploded, and there are countless networks available for those who want to join.

With all of the options available, how can your business know which to hone in on? Most experts advise to join any or a few of the popular ones. Let your audience (and where they're active) guide you, keep your goals in mind and remember to keep your promotional content to 20 percent.

Facebook is the largest platform and an ideal site for small businesses that intend to build relationships and generate leads.

LinkedIn is the platform businesses can use to network, create trust, engage audiences and build authority. It works for both B2B and B2C companies.

Twitter is a great platform for those who seek immediacy. It's great for businesses with customers who are under the age of 50. It's ideal for sharing information like trending topics with your audience.

Pinterest is a photo-sharing site that acts as a wonderful platform for businesses with visual appeal. It's great for driving sales; so many users check the site to plan purchases. Businesses such as restaurants, or those that focus on fashion, travel, art and weddings find great success on Pinterest.

Snapchat is an expiring content platform. Small businesses can utilize Snapchat by offering exclusive promotions, providing personalized content and building relationships in order to drive loyalty and brand recognition.

Set goals

There are many benefits of being active on social media for your business, such as engaging customers, expanding your audience, increasing online traffic, generating leads, performing customer service and gaining feedback and insights.

However, if you want to achieve these with any measure of success, you have to set goals you can work toward. You need to create a strategy to reach those goals. For example, your approach will be different if you want to drive sales than if you want to improve your customer service skills. It's essential you establish what you want to accomplish.

Figure out a strategy

Always remember to keep looking for ways to improve your business and management knowledge. Setting goals to improve your social media presence is a good start, but that is just the tip of the iceberg. Once you decide what you hope to achieve, you need a plan to ensure it comes to fruition.

First designate the individual or group who will make up the social media team. Then break up their responsibilities so each person has a clear understanding of what is expected and when.

Determine how often you will post and create a content calendar to ensure you don't miss any days and can plan posts in advance. The content calendar is a key part of your strategy and will lay out the subjects your audience likes to learn about, the usable content you have, the content that needs curated and which platforms content will be published.

Engage your audience

Content is extremely important on social media, but it's not enough to post your content and call it a day. Social media is about the very important connection you make with your audience. That is the only way you can foster the relationships you hope to build and a good way to gain the trust of your audience.

There are various ways you can engage with your audience. You can start and participate in conversations, making sure to comment on posts. Share relevant information and answer any questions your audience may have. Always address any complaints or inquiries made by your customers and never forget to show them your appreciation. If you don't have customers, you won't have a business.

Reduce the time you dedicate to promoting your business

The practice of social selling is popular among marketers, but the actual process of using social networks to grow a business is different than what people are used to. Instead of turning to social to promote your business exclusively, utilize it as a tool for communication and engagement. Once you build rapport with your customers you will see an increase in sales.

Maintain a constant presence

Social media is more than just posting here and there and allowing numerous days to lapse between posts. It takes patience and consistence to cultivate a reliable presence. The right automation tools will allow you to minimize the time you spend planning what you share, but it's still essential to monitor what you post, respond to questions and comments and participate in conversations.

Keep your voice consistent

Social media is a good place for both brand building and recognition. This is why it is crucial that each post you make aligns with your brand and image. You may run into problems if you have numerous employees assigned to the task of social because each person will bring their own personality and flair to the task.

It's smart to limit the number of team members responsible for posting on social and make sure they all have a clear understanding of the image you want to present.

Social media use continues to grow and every month there are even more active users than the last. It is not necessary to have a presence on each social network and it's a smart idea to define your goals, understand and locate your audience and choose the sites that are best for your business based on those factors.

The Cheapest Ways to Market Your Small Business

Posted: 28 Apr 2019 05:00 AM PDT

What's stopping you from marketing? For most small businesses, the answer is time and money.

According to Drip, 49% of all small business owners spend less than two hours a day on marketing, and half of all owners say they do their marketing themselves.

Business Insider explains that cash flow problems are a fact of life for many small business owners, causing 82% of all small businesses to fail. When business owners have to choose between paying for marketing and paying operational expenses, marketing may seem like a luxury.

It's also true that large companies have an advantage when it comes to ad spending. They can pay for high-budget video ads, spread their message on billboards and radio, and cause consumers to hear their ads more frequently.

But you don't have to go head-to-head with Google and Pepsi or spend millions of dollars to increase your bottom line. In addition to regularly updating your blog and actively using social media, we discovered three cheap, unique ways to grow your business – without spending thousands of dollars.

1. Use Google's free tools.

"Creating a Google My Business account is the single most underutilized marketing opportunity for small businesses," said Robert Baillieul, marketing manager at Lombardi Publishing.

A Google My Business account is a free account from Google that allows you to publish your business online. It allows your business to become visible when people search and to appear on Google Maps.

Once your My Business account is established, it can result in a steady stream of passive website traffic. With 97% of internet users searching Google for local business information, you can be certain that your local audience is trying to find you online.

"I recently helped a small wedding photography business set up his Google My Business account, in addition to some other minor SEO tweaks. Within a week, his page ranked near the top for 'local wedding photographer,'" Baillieul said. "We also targeted keywords his competitors had overlooked, such as 'engagement photographer' or 'wedding planning tips.' The result: hundreds of passive visits to his website and several booked gigs. It's like his marketing now runs on autopilot."

2. Try texting.

One uncommon way that businesses are driving engagement is through text messages. According to Alfredo Salkeld, marketing manager at SimpleTexting, 98% of all text messages received are read, compared with a 15% email open rate.

"Small businesses don't just have limited budgets – they have limited time too," he said. "They can't afford to waste time writing messages that may never get read. Email marketing may be inexpensive, but the open and click-through rates leave a lot to be desired. On the other hand, people almost always read their texts."

Promotional text messages cost pennies to send, and you aren't charged for any messages you receive in return. That makes it possible to have two-way text conversations at a low cost, making it easy to engage customers.

Salkeld's real-world example of text message success is compelling: "Delta Sonic is a car wash chain with under 30 locations. They offered a free bottle of water when people signed up for their text club. Soon they had 20,000 subscribers who they could text time-sensitive promos to anytime business was slow."

That means Delta Sonic increased its bottom line with a small upfront investment.

Similar to an email list, you'll only want to text customers who have signed up to receive communications from you. But with effort and a small investment, you can generate many repeat customers.

3. Use Facebook in a unique way.

Using Facebook's free features to engage with your audience and potential clients can help improve your bottom line at no cost to you.

"While you should continue posting content to your Facebook Business page because it's free, you should use Facebook in other ways," said Lori Ramas, business efficiency expert at Relezant.

She suggested joining groups where your audience is. "Are your customers women or moms? Are they interested in family-friendly events, beauty products or other hobbies? Join the Facebook groups that they're a part of. Introduce yourself, get related, and say hello." 

Ramas has had success with this herself, managing to book four new business appointments by responding to a post in a local group. She also encourages asking your friends to share your business posts to increase their reach.

The bottom line

Marketing your small business doesn't have to break your budget. By signing up for a free Google My Business account, engaging directly with your audience in their favorite Facebook groups and spending pennies per text on a direct marketing campaign, you can increase your business's bottom line without spending a lot of money.

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