Onsite Website Merchandising: Transforming Online Window Shoppers into Loyal Customers

You've invested significant effort in your digital marketing campaigns, attracting potential customers to your website. You have a curated selection of products that they will love, but just as they’re about to make a purchase, they leave your site. This scenario is all too common for online retailers.

Just as traditional brick-and-mortar stores utilise merchandising techniques like end-of-aisle displays, window displays, and in-store samples to boost sales, online stores can leverage onsite merchandising to provide personalized shopping experiences. Onsite merchandising is a powerful conversion rate optimization tool that can enhance the shopping experience on your SME website.

What is Onsite Merchandising?

Translating visual merchandising strategies from brick-and-mortar stores to the online environment is the essence of onsite merchandising. With the aid of sophisticated technology, retailers can craft engaging virtual experiences, presenting tailored product assortments, personalised onsite search results and deal messaging for shoppers. This process mirrors the layout design of a physical store, employing crisp visuals and a structured design to smoothly lead customers along their shopping path.

Onsite merchandising ensures that customers receive the right (even personalised) content and information at precisely the right moment, facilitating an effortless buying journey.

Building Your Onsite Merchandising Strategy: 6 key tactics

1.Homepage Merchandising

• Personalise the homepage experience for each visitor by displaying products relevant to their local weather or tailored recommendations based on their browsing history. This personalisation can significantly reduce the initial bounce rate.

2. Product Assortment

• Get the right product infront of the right shopper... Effective product ranking within your collection pages is crucial. Ensure the right products are prominently displayed to the right shoppers, and move inventory efficiently. Implement a multi-parameter product sorting strategy that considers factors like bestsellers, profit margins, stock duration, real-time conversion rates, and audience segments.

3. Onsite Search

• Personalise onsite search results when a user searches for products on your website. Personalise the products they see based on various factors such as session source, user demographics, and location. For instance, a search for ‘red dress’ can yield personalised results tailored to summer dresses if the weather is hot, or evening dresses if the user has previously viewed evening dresses.

4. Product Detail Page Merchandising

• Optimize your product detail pages with comprehensive content. Include product specifications, high-quality images, clear call-to-actions, detailed descriptions, and personalized upsell suggestions.

• Use video content to give customers a more tangible sense of the product, bridging the gap between online and physical shopping experiences.

• Incorporate enhanced content that goes beyond basic information, offering additional details and interactive elements to enrich the shopping experience.

5. Website Navigation

• Just like a well-organized physical store, your website should provide clear navigation to help users find what they are looking for effortlessly. A structured and intuitive layout is key to enhancing the user experience.

6. Onsite Promotions

• Make your promotions and sales offers prominent and consider personalizing them. Tools like Revlifter can display promo code pop-ups when users copy product titles, potentially preventing them from comparing prices on competitor sites.

What are the benefits of Onsite Merchandising?

Onsite merchandising can significantly improve your conversion rates by:

• Personalised Shopping Experiences: Tailoring the shopping experience to individual users reduces the number of clicks to purchase, thereby increasing the conversion rate.

• Reduced Bounce Rates: Offering personalized and relevant information keeps users engaged, reducing the likelihood of them leaving your site prematurely.

Top Onsite Merchandising Tools

• Searchspring: Offers product bundling, advanced site search, and personalized product assortments based on user behavior and audience signals.

• Stamped: Enhances product detail pages with customer reviews.

• Loox: Collects and displays photo reviews from customers, enriching product pages.

• Octane AI: Gamifies the shopping experience with interactive tools like chatbots, quizzes, and conversational pop-ups, guiding customers to products that match their preferences.

Check out the Salsify and Kimonix blogs for further info.

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Interested in testing onsite merchandising for your SME business? Contact us today to discuss a project.

Read our other search marketing and sponsored product blogs, including Amazon & TikToks partnership, & Tesco Marketplace.