Addressing customers via digital channels is standard, and online sales have become indispensable. Nevertheless, manufacturers who leave their distribution primarily to their retail partners are going through a lot of potential untapped regarding online marketing and e-commerce.
Several possibilities exist in online marketing and e-commerce.
Anyone who runs their website knows and (hopefully) uses Google Analytics: Who was on the site, who was informed about what for how long? Even if no shop is connected, these evaluations have long been standard for every website operator. Also, use your visitors’ information to stay connected with them through retargeting. In this way, you can constantly remind your target group of your brand and motivate them to enter the “brand bubble” as soon as possible and to become part of the fan community in the broadest sense. Also, consider retargeting in connection with video ads or moving images on YouTube!
Networks such as LinkedIn offer excellent opportunities for B2B targeting. You can, for example, recruit new sales partners and increase their awareness there. Advertising measures on the platforms according to purchasing decision-makers from potential partner companies. Target group information from LinkedIn can also be booked via Microsoft’s search engine Bing in combination with search terms: For example, an ad is only displayed to a user if he enters the search term “coffee machine” into the search engine and at the same time it fits into the specified target group, such as “Managing director or buyer of an electrical appliance dealer.”
Native advertising platforms allow advertisers to distribute “editorial” content. This gives brand manufacturers, in particular, the opportunity to explain their new products or attach themselves to specific topics: “10 recipes for detox smoothies”, for example, could be a vehicle to advertise the in-house mixer by integrating a picture of it into the article.
The brand can also be conveyed authentically via selected influencers. Incidentally, it does not always have to be the all-round stars. Micro-influencers often transport a brand in a much more authentic and target group-oriented manner. Although they have a smaller fan community, they have greater credibility in their circle of influence. Of course, it is essential that the influencers fit the brand and voluntarily stage the brand.
The Google Manufacturer Center is a new type of account that manufacturers can use to make their items available to retailers in an ideally structured way for Google. In addition, manufacturers can use co-sponsored shopping ads to give a direct advertising cost subsidy on selling selected Google Shopping product feeds. This works, for example, by paying a percentage surcharge on the click price to push the sale of your products with selected retail partners.
Online inspires not only online. Stationary sales also benefit from targeted online advertising. In this way, customers can be passed on to trading partners who only sell stationery. For example, in the Google Manufacturer Center, local campaigns can be controlled in the retail partner’s catchment area using the Affiliate Location Extension. These potential guide customers to local shops and thus increase stationary sales. The only requirement for the affiliate location extensions is that the trading partner has more than ten branches.
You don’t always have to open an (online) shop immediately to get into direct sales. There are enough marketplaces where manufacturers can try out direct sales to customers. From various e-commerce companies, a lot of scopes should be tested. Because every marketplace follows different rules, Amazon is undoubtedly the most universal but only sometimes the most individually suitable marketplace.
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