How to grow sales on a small budget

Many ways to grow an online store’s sales take a long time and a hefty budget. Here are 5 you can start today, on a small budget.

1. Use high-quality, distinctive images

Images and banners that speak to your potential customers are an effective way to stir emotion. And visitors form a first impression almost instantly.

You may well sell products that shoppers can also find in other stores. So put effort into clear images and messages.

Popular stock photos often appear on many other websites. Look for distinctive images that fit your message instead.

Tips:

• Choose distinctive, eye-catching images.
• Show products in context, for example a toy in a child’s hand or a decorative piece in a furnished bathroom.
• Unsplash has a large library of free photos. Look beyond the most popular ones.

2. Support sales with live chat

Live chat can give your store an edge, as long as it works for you and your customers.

Shoppers don’t want to wait long for an email reply, and you lose out when they leave your store.

Over the phone, you can’t send pictures or links, so it’s harder to support a sale. In a chat, you can.

With chat on the product page, visitors can get help with a purchase without leaving the page.

To make chat work for you and your customers:

1. Let the chat sit in the corner as an icon, instead of popping up.
2. Show the business hours when customers can chat with a support agent.
3. Don’t ask for unnecessary details before a conversation starts.
4. Answer customers in their own language.
5. After answering a question, ask whether that was enough or if you can help with anything else.

If you have a support team, reward the fastest responders or those who turn chats into sales. Or set your own criteria.

Help shoppers decide in their own language

Once a shopper starts a chat, guide them to the right choice:

• Give a thorough, expert answer, and always link straight to the best option.
• Ask whether your suggestion fits, or whether they’d like more options.
• If an item is out of stock, don’t just end the conversation. Suggest the best alternative.
• Before you close the chat, check that they found what they were looking for.

Chat also makes multilingual service easy. A person can’t take 2 phone calls at once, but they can handle 3 chats in different languages.

Whatever languages your team and your customers speak, multilingual chat removes the language barrier.

Maybe you run a local store with a single-language website. Even so, plenty of people in your market speak other languages.

Surprise them with professional support in their own language.

3. Analyze the user experience on your website

Building a store that sells well starts with understanding what gets in your visitors’ way. Good user experience (UX) helps you sell more online.

Focus on a customer-friendly site structure and a smooth experience. To start today, test your store and check:

• whether your store’s structure is clear and logical
• whether customers can easily find their way around
• whether all call-to-action (CTA) buttons are clear and well placed
• whether customers need support to reach a buying decision
• whether the desktop and mobile versions both make it easy to decide and pay

Want to know exactly what needs to be smoother and clearer? Try a user testing service, such as Sharewell from Estonia.

4. Increase your average order value

Cross-selling raises your average order value. If a customer is looking for running shoes, suggest this season’s most popular warm tights and gloves.

In cold weather, it’s nice to feel that a store is looking out for you.

Point out which promotions are running, or the minimum order for free shipping. A banner on the cart page works, and so does the chat.

You can also ask an influencer to recommend the season’s bestseller, on your banner and on their own channels.

Customers know influencers are paid, but bestsellers and recommendations still carry weight.

5. Make checkout simpler

Abandoned carts are still one of the biggest problems for online stores. The good news is that you can start fixing this today.

A smooth, fast checkout is essential. The fewer extra clicks, the more you sell.

• Let people buy without logging in, and make creating an account optional.
• Don’t make customers verify their email before they can buy, and ask for as little data as possible.
• Aim for about 30 seconds from cart to payment. How long does it take in your store?
• Offer as many payment options as you can: cards, bank payments, Apple Pay, Google Pay and so on.
• Make sure your payment provider offers a strong service level agreement (SLA).
• Offer live sales help in the chat, to speed up the purchase when needed.

Tip: ask an e-commerce expert to test your store. You’ll get feedback on your checkout and the whole customer experience, from the home page to after-sales service.

Where Askly fits

Askly combines an AI agent and your team in one chat window. The AI answers from one knowledge base, and a person can take over mid-chat with the full context.

• Automatic language detection: 30+ languages work instantly, and 100+ are available on request.
• Order status: the AI agent answers order questions with data from Shopify and WooCommerce.
• More channels: the same AI agent answers on Facebook Messenger, Instagram DMs and email. The AI Voice Agent takes phone calls.
• Quick setup: the chat installs in minutes, and building the knowledge base takes about an afternoon.

Start with one change today

None of these 5 steps needs a big budget, and you can start each one today. Which will you try first?