Shoppable Content: A New Way For Ecommerce Businesses To Boost Sales

What Is Shoppable Content?

Content marketing has been a driving force in terms of generating organic leads and conversions for e-commerce businesses. However, the challenge of attracting prospects and retaining current customers is rising with the rapid evolution of the e-commerce landscape. People nowadays prefer qushopiick results and instant gratification. Therefore, digital marketing experts are increasingly adopting measures to shorten users’ buying journeys and provide a seamless experience. One such reform is the advent of shoppable content. Through this, brands can dramatically elevate their user engagement and gain a competitive advantage in the e-market. Let’s learn what shoppable content is and what are the various types of shoppable content.  

What Is Shoppable Content?

Shoppable content is a type of interactive content that allows shoppers to directly purchase an item in a few clicks. It can be any type of content on social platforms, including articles, images, and videos. With shoppable content, brands can attractively showcase their products and entice the buyers to purchase. In addition to bridging the gap between browsing and buying, it expedites the buying decisions of consumers. Hence, along with being convenient to buyers, shoppable content can also boost your conversion rate. Besides, you can easily measure conversions with the help of shoppable content.

Why Is Shoppable Content Important?

Using shoppable content is increasingly gaining momentum because it is what shoppers want. A survey by DemandGen shows that 91% of consumers prefer visual and interactive content over traditional content. Therefore, integrating shoppable content in your e-commerce marketing services can render several benefits in terms of yielding higher ROI. To list a few, here are some of the benefits of a shoppable content:

  • Provides your customers a simple and convenient way to discover and purchase your featured products
  • Drives traffic directly to your product page, speeding up your users’ buying decision and generating higher ROI
  • Delivers an authentic brand message with the help of user-generated content

Suppose a user is scrolling through their social media and comes across a product they are interested in buying. Now, they don’t have to go browsing through e-commerce sites or offline stores to buy that product. Instead, they can simply click on the shoppable content, which is any product in an image, text, or video. On clicking the shoppable link, they can land directly on the product page and make a purchase. As it makes the buyer’s journey convenient, therefore they prefer it over traditional content.

 

Additionally, Styla reports that Shoppable content allows brands to drive more traffic and enhance the conversion of those leads. To understand it better, let’s have a look at the below image:

(Source: Styla)
 

As we can see, shoppable content dramatically improves engagements in several ways by easing the buyers’ journey. Therefore, digital marketing companies emphasize on incorporating shoppable content in their marketing strategy. Let’s explore some of the most lucrative types of shoppable content. Subsequently, you can decide which of these can benefit your business the most and include them in your marketing strategy.  

Types of Shoppable Content


Text

Shoppable texts are the simplest form of shoppable content. Brands can add a simple CTA like Click to Shop or Get the Look below an attractive product image. Then, link it directly to the product page to encourage consumers to buy the product. It gives a clear message to the readers and a direct path to buy a product. Therefore, it enhances your user-engagements and boosts ROI.  


Images

Product images are essential for e-commerce marketing services businesses to showcase their products and attract customers to their e-store. However, they become even more valuable for the brands when you add shoppable tags to them. On clicking the tag, it leads users directly to the product page or popup window with the buying option. With attractive shoppable images, brands increase the buying tendency in consumers, improving their conversion and retention rates.  


Videos

Videos are a great way of effective storytelling, and marketers can use them to attract customers to their product or service. They can effectively drive a 157% increase in organic traffic from SERPs. Therefore, 87% of online marketers use video content to drive traffic and boost their ROI. By including shoppable tags or hotspots, brands can further increase the value of their high-yielding video content. Consumers can click on a hotspot to buy their desired product or continue watching the video to find other products. If they hit the Click to Shop button, a popup appears with the product description, price, and the CTA. By clicking the CTA, a consumer either lands on the product page or can directly buy the product.  


Social Media 

Social media platforms incorporated the shoppable trend quite early. Facebook made their photos instantly purchasable by directing users straight to product pages. Instagram did the same by including a shopping bag icon that directs users straight to the seller’s product pages. Pinterest created its buyable pins that let users shop without even leaving the app.   


Articles

When it comes to articles, shoppable technology bridges the gap between e-commerce stores and published content like blogs, digital magazines, etc. You can integrate every product visuals in the articles with a simple CTA like Add to Cart or Buy it Now. The option allows readers to add the product directly to the cart without leaving the current page. As a result, users can get a seamless experience of shopping without interrupting their reading experience.   


Create Interactive Content To Boost User Engagement

In today’s time, when people favor instant gratification, interactive content plays an influential role. Users prefer to make instant purchases from videos, digital magazines, and social media when they find products that inspire them. Thus, the traditional forms of content may no longer yield as much ROI as interactive and personalized content. Using shoppable technologies, businesses can allow readers to shop directly from images, videos, magazines, etc. As you provide a short and convenient buying journey to your users, it improves your user engagement. 

 

Businesses must understand that it is more than creating a new content format. It is about enhancing your content with more features by blending e-commerce with content. As a result, you can deliver a seamless shopping experience to your customers. 

 

For further guidance on shoppable content and providing personalized experiences for your consumers, talk to our experts! Our team of professionals can help you build interactive shopping experiences for your audiences.