Why and How Brand Marketers Need to Adjust Their E-Commerce Strategies

People change, and not just trend by trend. Societal norms are known to progress every few years. The pandemic expedited that process when it forced everyone to go digital. Now, after two years of temporarily shifting strategy to meet the current consumer "want and need," brand marketers are desperately trying to determine their next game plan and understand how to best cater to seismically shifting consumer buying behaviors in the new e-commerce frontier.

The inherent problem is that brand marketers are lacking a long-term strategy when it comes to reaching the new, high-value consumer. If marketers want to get ahead of the next industry curveball, they need to stop solely relying on short-term strategy, anticipate and identify the seismic shifts early, and be prepared to adjust accordingly if the original plan doesn't quite go … to plan.

Work Smarter, Not Harder

Here’s the thing, brand marketers know exactly what the problem is before it happens. Every single time. The only way to make a real change and work towards the future is to develop a carefully thought-out, long-term strategy. This doesn't mean throw the entire playbook away; it simply means to pivot and adjust.

First, let's dive into the ultimate customer experience. The pandemic’s effect on consumer shopping behavior has demanded more authentically curated experiences and more personalization in brand’s marketing efforts. Brand marketers should strive to ensure a seamless journey for their target customers, from browsing through checkout.

Agility is key. Marketers who got to know their new-to-online shoppers used it to their advantage by building tactics to successfully target them quarter after quarter. In fact, brand marketers that fared the best were those that were able to define and analyze the newly unfolding “pandemic personas” and adjust their strategies accordingly.

Where We Go From Here — Embracing the Endemic Era

Today, the online shopping category only continues to grow. Meaning there's no room for broad stroke marketing. Do your due diligence; first, take time to research your target customer demographic. NetElixir data shows that 70 percent of customers are never returning to e-commerce sites after they've made an initial purchase. This has only been further compounded by the measurement/attribution challenge due to third-party cookie deprecation. If brand marketers aren't working to identify, target and win those high-value shoppers across channels and platforms, they'll be losing substantial revenue. Now is the time to get aggressive, build or fine-tune those targeted, cross-channel engagement plans based on customer insights.

Brand marketers will need to revisit every obstacle that occurred since the onset of the pandemic, analyze their previous solution, and re-evaluate if said solution will continue to be the most viable, and successful, option. Let your customers be your compass. Take time to understand who they are and how they've changed since the onset of the pandemic. It starts and ends with the consumer. Understand their shifting buying behaviors and find inventive ways to appeal to them.

Tauseef Sayed is the senior director of marketing at NetElixir, a premier digital marketing agency with expertise in the retail industry for digital strategy consulting, search engine marketing, search engine optimization, web analytics consulting and social media marketing.