• Explore. Learn. Thrive. Fastlane Media Network

  • ecommerceFastlane
  • PODFastlane
  • SEOfastlane
  • AdvisorFastlane
  • LifeFastlane

Unlock The Potential Of Writing And Storytelling To Drive Ecommerce Sales

A man sitting on a chair surrounded by flying paper, illustrating the chaos of ecommerce marketing.

Ecommerce marketers are constantly looking for new ways to promote their products, and entrepreneurs know just how important it is to keep growing their businesses. While there are trends that come and go now and then, there are some techniques that can be used in all kinds of marketing campaigns.

One such tool that should be in your kit is storytelling. Using it in your writing can drive e-commerce sales consistently and build a solid client base. So, without further ado, here’s how to unlock the potential of writing and storytelling to drive e-commerce sales.

Table of Contents

  1. Make the Message Simple and Memorable
  2. Let Customers Share Your Ideas
  3. Use Your Brand Values
  4. Remind Customers About Feelings
  5. Show That You Truly Care About Your Customers
  6. Expand to Other Markets When the Time Comes
  7. Wrapping Up
  8. FAQ

#1 Make the Message Simple and Memorable

One of the most important things you should remember about storytelling is that the story itself is something you build onto the core message you want to convey to your target audience. This is why the first thing you should do when defining your brand is creating a message that will be behind all your products.

This message needs to be both simple and memorable. If it is easy to remember, more people can recall it quickly and remember your brand that way. Moreover, a simple and special message can help you connect with your customers if it resonates with them.

Could you try to remember some well-known brands and their slogans? Not every brand has a slogan that everyone knows, but there are many examples of companies having great slogans. For instance, you can check out Top 50 Famous Brand Slogans and Taglines, a video with the slogans of fifty popular brands. Some examples include “Just Do It!” (Nike), “Because You’re Worth It.” (L’Oreal), “Connecting People.” (Nokia), and “I’m Lovin’ It.” (McDonald’s).

If you have defined your brand already but never thought about your core message, it’s about time you came up with it. Your slogan will need to reflect this message concisely yet interestingly. Moreover, you need to develop something that hasn’t been used before – you can’t copy other brands.

What you can imitate, on the other hand, is the message. For instance, if the unique selling point of your brand is that it is affordable, then your core message can be “Best quality for the lowest price!” Many e-commerce brands specialize in high-quality, cheap clothes so that you will have a similar core message. However, this doesn’t mean you will have the same slogan.

If you need more clarification on developing a good slogan for your brand, you can use your brand values. By declaring them out loud in your message, you will be doing two things at a time: conveying your message to your audience and sending a core message to your customers.

It’s a good idea to sit down with your entire team to brainstorm different versions of your slogan and find the one that fits your brand the best. The more people you gather to brainstorm, the more ideas and options you will have to choose from. Making such decisions with a team rather than alone is always better.

Don’t settle for a good slogan – look for the best option. This slogan could define your brand image for a long time and directly impact your e-commerce sales. So it’s not right to make rash decisions and try to find a solution quickly. Brainstorm with your team, let the ideas you came up with rest in your mind and then gather again to brainstorm some more.

Once you are confident that the slogan you decided on is suitable for your e-commerce brand, you can start using it in your marketing campaigns. It will constantly remind your audience what your core message is. You can also pair it with slogans specific to different movements, but always ensure they align and reflect what your brand stands for.

#2 Let Customers Share Your Ideas

As explained above, a compelling core message will resonate with your audience and connect your customers to your brand more. Also, you'll need to look for a core message relevant to your audience. It should align with their needs, priorities, worries, interests, concerns, pain points, etc.

Besides these qualities, your message should also be easy to share because you must let your customers share your ideas and promote your brand. In a way, they will be helping you with your marketing simply by sharing what you said and letting more people know about you and your brand.

Just think about the way marketing works today. For e-commerce businesses, most, if not all, marketing happens online, which means all your content has the potential to go viral. Virality is hard to generate naturally, but creating the right conditions for your content to have more chances to go viral is possible.

When writing your content and copy for your marketing campaigns, hiring professionals who will do the job well is best. You can check different custom writing service reviews at Best Writers Online to find experienced writers who will create high-quality texts for your marketing strategy. Along with quality, you will need to ensure the shareability of your content.

A message that resonates with your audience will ensure that your story will resonate with your customers and potential customers. In turn, these people need to be able to share your content and give you even more exposure to people who could become your customers. This kind of chain reaction ultimately leads to virality.

Some of your most dedicated customers of yours will be purchasing your products continuously again and again, but there’s another level they can get to – promoters. These are clients who actively promote your brand and products by recommending them to their friends, family members, and colleagues. They may even post about your products online, giving your brand more exposure.

E-commerce companies can benefit greatly from having such customer promoters. While other types of customers and non-customers may share your content and message because it resonates with them, customer promoters will continuously spread the word about your brand out of loyalty.

Such customers can help you further improve the chances of your marketing content going viral, so it’s in your best interests to aim to have such customers. It would be best to build strong relationships and continuously show how much you value them. And even if your customers aren’t interested in becoming your promoters, you should still nurture positive relationships with them.

Please always ensure you share your core message in your marketing campaigns and use your brand slogan to represent it. Your message is one of the essential tools for telling your stories and connecting with your customers, so you need to realize its potential and use it whenever possible (but wherever appropriate).

I'd like you to find ways to include your message even in your product design and packaging. Something as simple as a small gift in every package you send to your buyers could be a great way to show that you care about your audience. Moreover, the quality of your customer service could also help you communicate your message, so make sure that your efforts extend beyond marketing to product design, packaging, and customer service.

#3 Use Your Brand Values

While your message is essential for storytelling, your brand values are also. As mentioned earlier, you can use them to help you construct your message and slogan. But even outside of your message and slogan, your brand values can be effective in helping you tell the correct stories in the right way to the right audience.

Above all else, I want you to position your products as corresponding to your brand values and principles. Your products’ features and functions could reflect your brand values, while your product design and packaging could also show what your brand stands for and wants to promote actively.

What if you haven’t defined your brand values yet? Then it’s time to think about them. Here are some tips on how to choose your brand values:

  • Brainstorm values with your team to see what your employees think about your company and what principles they feel connected to.
  • Ask customers what they want if you have the opportunity. If not, perform market research to understand your target audience better.
  • Get inspired by negative customer experiences – what went wrong, and how could this be avoided by upholding specific values?
  • Think of what you’re doing already. Maybe you are implementing specific principles that you can continue using in the future.
  • Find brands you can look up to. There are other e-commerce companies similar to yours that can help you come up with your first brand values.

Remember that your brand values will guide how your company operates, from sourcing or creating products to how products are delivered to customers. Likewise, your brand values will show how you will treat your customers. That’s why defining them as early as possible is essential when creating your brand.

Keep in mind that your brand values don’t need to be original. Most companies share brand values to some extent, though there are still differences here and there. Customers tend to focus on aspects such as quality, affordability, and sustainability when buying products, as well as care about customers and transparency regarding the brand.

It would be best if you were careful about mistaking your brand mission, vision, and values for each other. There are apparent differences between the three – you need them all for your brand to succeed. The terms can be defined as:

  • Mission – The reason why the company does what it does.
  • Vision – The company’s aspirations or goals for the future.
  • Values – The standards and principles the company upholds.

All three are necessary for your brand to prosper, but you must still understand their differences to use them correctly. Your mission and vision are equally important in helping you decide how your company operates and which decisions are correct in specific situations.

You should also implement your brand values inside your company, not just outside, during your marketing activities. Brand values should guide how you, as an employer, treat your employees and organize your company. What goes on within your company will, in turn, influence the way you communicate with your customers, so don’t overlook this aspect of your brand values.

#4 Remind Customers About Feelings

It is the right decision to rely on facts, statistics, and research in your marketing. Customers indeed want to see solid proof of what you’re claiming. That being said, only using points can work against you because some customers are more susceptible to emotional arguments that rely on feelings.

That’s why you need to remind your customers about feelings when utilizing storytelling in your marketing. There are many ways to do it, but you should always aim to understand how your customers feel and how you can use their feelings to your advantage. Here are some tips on how you can use textures in storytelling and marketing:

  • Find meaning in your stories. Trying to tell an exciting tale could entertain your audience, but you won’t necessarily connect with your customers. That’s why you need a core message you can send and some meaning your story has overall. What is it about? Why is it relevant to your audience? How can you give it meaning through the emotions you add to it?
  • Use different emotions. Simply trying to make your customers happy will be significantly limiting for you. It’s much better to create different emotional reactions in your audience, such as happiness, surprise, curiosity, anger, and sadness. If you want to create negative emotions, make sure that they are appropriate for the story you are telling and that you can follow them up with positive emotions.
  • Try to be as authentic as possible. Any person you target will value authenticity and choose it over fakeness and pretentiousness. If you can be original while relying on your brand values, you can show the most exciting sides of your brand and truly connect with your customers. It’s not easy to be authentic when marketing e-commerce products, but it’s still possible if you find the right approach to storytelling.
  • Interact with customers wherever and whenever you can. It’s not enough to enrich your stories with certain emotions and try to cause specific emotional reactions in your customers. It would be best to try engaging and interacting with them actively. If they respond to your calls to action, you need to reward them by further building a dialogue and nurturing your relationship with them.

Of course, deciding which feelings or emotions are appropriate for specific stories takes work. Moreover, predicting how your audience will react to your marketing can be challenging. Nevertheless, the more you practice creating your content and the more experience you get promoting your products, the more you will start understanding your audience and how to communicate with it.

While you are at the starting stages, you may even need some help creating your marketing materials. You can hire expert writers from the writing agency Trust My Paper who will help you make your content while using feelings and creating emotional reactions in your customers. While working with professional writers, you will learn many helpful writing tips and practices to use yourself.

Emotions and feelings are critical for storytelling, so pay attention to them. Your stories will rely more on them than on facts. Even if you decide to use some statistics in the content where you are using storytelling, emotions, and feelings will still be central there. Don’t be afraid to make mistakes with them – you will eventually learn to use different emotions and feelings in your marketing.

#5 Show That You Truly Care About Your Customers

As mentioned multiple times, please show that you genuinely care about your customers. There are many ways you can do this, both in terms of storytelling and in general, so here are some tips you can start implementing in your marketing customer service as soon as possible:

  • Host Giveaways – Let lucky customers try your products for free by hosting giveaways regularly.
  • Start a Loyalty Program – Start your e-commerce loyalty program to build stronger relationships with customers and encourage them to spread the word about your brand.
  • Add Free Gifts to Purchases – Put gifts or handwritten notes to every purchase for a personal touch and an additional serotonin boost for customers.
  • Provide Discounts and Special Offers – Create special offers for and discounts to loyal customers who keep returning to your brand. Similarly, encourage first-time customers to return by offering discounts.
  • Organize Exclusive Events – Organize and host exclusive events for particularly loyal customers to connect and talk to them face-to-face. Alternatively, sponsor events that are relevant to your company.
  • Upgrade and Improve Products – Regularly introduce product upgrades and updates to improve them and deliver the best quality to your customers.
  • Feature Customers on Social Media – Shout out to customers on your official brand accounts or share user-generated content you like.
  • Deliver High-Quality Service – Make sure your customer service is always at the highest quality level and consistently delivers good customer support.
  • Prioritize Customer Satisfaction – Put customer satisfaction at the top of your priority list to ensure that you always aim for your customers to be happy.
  • Respond to Customer Complaints – Listen to your customers and show that you hear them by proactively responding to their complaints.
  • Find Problems and Provide Solutions – Similarly, find the problems your customers are struggling with and aim to provide them with actionable solutions (in most cases, your products could be these solutions).
  • Understand Paint Points and Worries – Try to understand your customers better by learning about their paint points and worries. You can use these in storytelling, but don’t abuse this knowledge.
  • Recognize and React to Emotions – When your customers show emotions (e.g., as a reaction to your stories), recognize them and respond. Encourage engagement and interactions with you.
  • Ask for Feedback Frequently – Actively show that you want to hear your customers’ opinions by asking for feedback frequently (e.g., on social media, via email).
  • Deliver on What You Promise – If you promise something, fulfill these promises and live up to your customer's expectations about your brand and products.
  • Own Up to Your Mistakes – If you make any mistakes, don’t deny them or try to find excuses. Instead, own up to them and show that you are willing to learn and improve to avoid making them again in the future.

Caring about your customers should be something you do genuinely rather than simply for publicity. If you pretend that you care when you don’t, your customers will quickly notice and call you out. For example, say that one of your values is affordability with high shipping prices. Your customers could point out that your shipping rates are unacceptable despite affordable product prices.

You don’t need to use all the techniques listed above to show that you care about your customers, but you should think of their problems, pain points, worries, and emotions. Ask for feedback even if you don’t do it often. And most importantly, create a dialogue where you communicate in a two-way manner with your customers.

#6 Expand to Other Markets When the Time Comes

Last but not least, storytelling can help you reach more customers, even those who weren’t in your initial target audience. However, it would be best if you only tried to expand to other markets when the time comes and you are genuinely ready to make this step. Storytelling will help you show that you can appeal to new and current customers by demonstrating other sides of your products.

When is the right time to start looking for other markets? But when you feel you are established in your current need. If you have a solid customer base in one market and the resources to expand to other markets, you can consider targeting new audiences you want to be selling to.

That being said, the right time for any e-commerce company to expand depends entirely on the company itself. Different situations, circumstances, and factors can influence your decision to start looking for more customers that you weren’t selling to before. It is up to you to decide when the right time is to expand.

Just to let you know, your venture into other markets could be unsuccessful. There could be many reasons (e.g., bad timing, insufficient marketing), so you can try targeting those audiences again until you find a steady footing in the new market. On the other hand, you should try a different call entirely or settle for the one you are currently in.

You should always remember that the type of customers you currently sell to could differ significantly from the one you want to target. This means that how you promote your products to potential buyers will need to be very different to be effective. You can’t market your products the same way you did, considering that these are very other people you will be addressing.

You may need to reinvent your storytelling and find new sides of your products to show. For instance, your current audience might prioritize the affordability of your products above all else. The audience you want to target could be prioritizing the exclusivity or uniqueness of your products. This means that you will need to highlight a different aspect of your products than you were before.

How you approach storytelling for the new audiences you want to target will depend entirely on who these people are. That’s why you must thoroughly research your target customer’s pain points, worries, interests, likes, dislikes, etc. All of these are the same things you learned about your current audience.

You'll need to do all the steps you've done with your current customers. Establishing a particular brand image, building customer relationships, delivering high-quality customer service, and so on are all essential to succeed in the new markets you are interested in.

Storytelling is just a tool, but it is a potent tool that will help you do all of these things. Tell stories in a way that will make this potential audience pay attention to you and start caring about your brand and products. Don’t rush things – building a solid customer base in a new market will take time. It can be challenging at times, but if you are resilient and dedicated, you can expand to new markets successfully and find new buyers.

Wrapping Up

All in all, storytelling is a powerful tool you can and should use in your marketing consistently. It will help you generate more e-commerce sales and build a client base that is both loyal and engaged. You can use the tips in this article to help you use storytelling in your marketing campaigns. Below are the most frequently asked questions you might still be curious about.

FAQ

What are the 5Cs of Storytelling?

Good storytelling often includes the 5Cs: circumstance, curiosity, characters, conversations, and conflicts. When creating texts for your marketing campaigns, it’s a good idea to use these 5Cs to guide how you construct and tell your story to your audience.

What are the 4Ps of Storytelling?

Alternatively to the 5Cs of storytelling, you can use the so-called 4Ps: people, place, plot, and purpose. Both the 5Cs and the 4Ps approaches can be effective in helping you construct more exciting and engaging stories. There is no one way to become a good storyteller, so it is up to you to decide what method you use.

Why is storytelling important for e-commerce?

Humans have used storytelling for as long as humanity has existed, so it is natural to see storytelling utilized in all kinds of industries, especially marketing. For e-commerce businesses, storytelling can be a valuable tool to promote their products more interestingly and find customers dedicated to the brand in the long run.

What are some effective storytelling tactics?

There are many different ways you can construct stories which means there are other tactics you can use in your marketing. This article has six main tips that will help you use storytelling successfully and provide you with the basic knowledge you need to develop your own approach to storytelling.

Prev
Understanding The Five Stages Of Small Business Growth
A dart in the center of a marketing campaign.

Understanding The Five Stages Of Small Business Growth

Next
How A Mastermind Business Coach Can Help Reach Your Goals
A woman is giving a presentation on ecommerce marketing.

How A Mastermind Business Coach Can Help Reach Your Goals

You May Also Like