Furniture retail is a competitive business, and to go toe-to-toe with competitors, your online presence needs to be effective, engaging and optimised to sell.
Here are our five tips to ensure you’re making the most of the online opportunity.
Be found and be engaging
First and foremost, your website needs to be found by people who are searching for the products you sell. A big component of that is to get your search engine optimisation (SEO) working well and optimise your website design and user experience to ensure you’re creating the very best experience for your customers. Thanks to Swan’s integration with fellow ClearCourse brand Sellerdeck, Swan users can access SEO and pay per click (PPC) services to help ensure your website’s found – and keeps growing.
Create a seamless experience from online to instore
Your website should look and feel like a digital version of your physical store. The colour palette should be similar, and the experience online should be reflective of what people will find when they visit you in person. Is your store relaxed and calming, or busy and packed high with products? That feeling should shine through. Through Sellerdeck, we can help refine your website’s user experience (UX) and your user interface (UI) so you can rest assured your website’s always delivering.
Ensure you’ve got up-to-the-minute information
When you’re using a complete retail management system, your stock levels across multiple physical locations and online will be accurate in real-time, while product data and information, orders and promotions will always be accurate. By ensuring your website information is automatically kept up to date, you can elevate the experience your customers enjoy.
Optimise your website for sales
Your website is no longer a shop window. It’s a retail outlet in its own right – and just as you train your sales staff to convert a sale, your website needs to be primed to convert, too. By using features such as click and collect, customer loyalty promotions, accepting quotes online and more, you can reduce the chances of carts being abandoned and enjoy increased digital sales.
Take a multi-channel approach to maximise sales
As well as your website, you can increase your digital sales strength by directly publishing your products on online marketplaces, including eBay and Amazon. By expanding your sales reach you get in front of an increased number of customers, while all orders and information are sent back into your Swan platform to ensure everything runs smoothly.
Making the most of online retail opportunities is a key challenge facing furniture retailers today.
