Online stores depend on digital traffic the same way brick and mortar stores depend on foot traffic.

The problem is no matter how much you spend on Google Ads, Facebook Ads, promoted Tweets, SEO, social media, content or other marketing options, if you aren’t converting the traffic once they get to your landing page, then you’re simply throwing good money after bad.

The aim of any marketing spend should be increased traffic, increased conversions and increased order value per-conversion. Ad spending can get you more traffic, but if there’s holes in your e-commerce bucket then that traffic will pour right through.

Here are some methods you can apply to ensure those holes are plugged, thus giving you the kind of conversion rates you need to improve the bottom line – especially with the holiday season fast approaching.

Make sure your fundamentals are working

Some basic errors, like poor product descriptions, carelessly shot product images, confusing user experiences, bad customer service or high shipping prices all result in flood of traffic pouring out of your bucket — none of which will come back.

Make those kinds of mistakes, which are more careless than anything, and you need to go back to e-commerce 101. So let’s consider holes which you may not spot straight away.

Increase revenues 10% to 30% by leveraging the upsell

Take DODOcase for example, a San Francisco based e-commerce store which sells custom made iPhone and iPad cases. They invested in making their store, images and descriptions as beautiful as their cases.

Once you select your items and get to the check-out page, they add an upsell to the equation. You might think that would put shoppers off, but instead Forrester Research found that complementary products are responsible for 10-30% of e-commerce revenues.

When someone is at your checkout with credit card in hand, they’re already in “buy” mode, so why not take advantage of that and offer them an upsell?

Offer a 10% discount to people who sign up for your e-newsletter

What if your customer isn’t ready to make a purchase? DODOcase puts in a secondary call to action — a newsletter sign up with an offer of 10% discount. Many people find popups annoying, but the numbers suggest they can have conversion rates 100% higher than standard sign up options which are embedded into a website.

Despite the fact that pop-ups are often viewed as background noise, they can actually help with conversions. Especially given the very high ROI from email marketing.

Use marketing automation, re-targeting and other techniques to target people who abandon your shopping cart

A high percentage of people abandon their carts. Based on the average of 28 detailed studies between 2006 – 2014 the abandonment rate is 68.08%. Don’t give up on these customers. Marketing automation, follow on emails, online ad re-targeting and social media ads can all be used to entice the customer back, especially when you use offers.

One study found that those hit with retargeted email / internet and social media offers were 70% more likely to convert than those who weren’t.

Keep these tools top-of-mind

Here’s a quick recap of the tools we’ve just covered so that you can keep them top-of-mind:

  • Upsell
  • Popup for newsletter sign up, with offers
  • Abandoned cart emails
  • Google Adwords retargeting
  • Facebook retargeting ads

Just because a customer isn’t ready to buy at the point of sale doesn’t mean they will never be ready. It can be worth putting in the extra effort if it results in a conversion – which once you have tried and tested a method which works for you on a few hundred customers then roll it out for everyone. You may end up with a bucket full of money instead of holes.

About the author: Benjamin Kerry is Head of Marketing for Jigoshop. Empower your e-commerce with Jigoshop, a powerful WordPress plugin trusted by 370,000 stores worldwide.