8 Ways Your Ecommerce Blog Can Contribute to Conversions

Investing in content marketing is one of the best (and most budget-friendly) ways to drive business growth.

If you look at the latest data from Forbes Advisor, you’ll find that 90% of marketers plan on investing in content in 2024. More impressively, businesses that use content marketing achieved six times higher conversion rates than their competitors who didn’t.

With this data in mind, you’ll want to transform your company blog into a key driver of sales and business growth.

This guide will give you eight tips on how your eCommerce blog can contribute to conversions. Let’s get into it.

Improve Brand Recognition with SEO

When given a chance to choose between a brand, they’re familiar with or a business they’ve never heard of eight out of ten consumers will opt for the former. So, if you want to maximize eCommerce conversions, one of the best things you can do is work on your brand’s reach and reputation.

Now, one way to do this is to invest in paid advertising. But while efficient enough, this tactic has two downsides: 

• It’s often an expensive marketing strategy — especially when trying to break into competitive industries. 
• Paid ads usually come off as intrusive, frustrating consumers instead of inspiring them to interact with your business.

So, looking for more natural ways of improving brand awareness is better. Content marketing can help you do this, allowing you to grab your target audience’s attention in a way that’s more natural (not coming off as sales-oriented) and relevant to their position in the buyer’s journey.

Of course, when waiting for your audience to discover you (instead of going after them with paid ads), you need to ensure that your brand’s content ranks high on SERPS. Ultimately, the #1 position on Google will outrank the #10 result in clickthrough rates by 10x. So, do your best to win that top SERP position.

Optimizing your posts with the right keywords and improving your site’s technical performance can do wonders for your content’s rankings. This will allow you to attract more web visitors, whom you can then nurture into customers.

Qualcomm’s What Is 5G article is an excellent example of a blog post optimized to rank high on SERPs. The article educates readers by targeting all the right keywords and offering comprehensive insights. It convinces them of the benefits of investing in new 5G phone equipment and gives them directions on what to look for when upgrading to a new smartphone.

Use Your Blog to Generate Exceptional Social Proof

Ranking high on SERPs is an excellent way to grab your prospects’ attention, but it’s no guarantee they’ll convert into customers once they’ve read your blog post. People need evidence that a solution genuinely does what it promises before spending their hard-earned money.

Why not use your blog to generate exceptional social proof to boost eCommerce conversions?

For example, do you have a particular item in your offer that’s been getting stellar reviews? If so, use the positive feedback to create a blog post to channel sales toward that product.

This is what Shop Solar does in its Patriot Power Generator Reviews article, where it shares the immense amount of positive reviews this solution has received over the years.

This type of content can boost sales for one particular product and elevate your brand’s overall credibility.

You could implement this tactic on distribution channels other than your company blog. However, because the content would not be as easily searchable as a simple article, it would most likely not have the intended effect. 

Of course, that shouldn’t stop you from sharing positive customer reviews on your social media. But remember that it will only provide a temporary boost in product interest, as opposed to a well-written, keyword-optimized blog post.

Generate the Right Kind of Traffic

One way to approach content marketing is to see it as a numbers game, where your main goal is to attract as many organic visitors as possible.

To achieve this goal, throw the net wide by targeting high-volume keywords. Then, all that’s left to do is wait for some of the people you’ve reached to slot into your sales funnel.

Now, while this strategy can (and does) work for some brands, it may not be the best way to secure a high ROI. Research shows that attracting quality leads remains the top challenge for 45% of marketers in 2024. This shows just how important it is to align your content marketing efforts with your target audience’s wants and needs.

So, instead of only aiming for quantity when producing blog posts to attract traffic, go for quality.

Do your best to produce resources that offer exceptional value to your ideal customers. Target super-specific long-tail keywords that align with your prospect’s pain points. And present readers with value in a way that can help them remove their frustrations instead of presenting them with information they already know or neglecting to address important details.

Bay Alarm Medical does a great job with specific content that can attract high-quality leads to its website. Along with using keyword research to identify search terms relevant to its potential customers, the brand does its best to cover each pain point in depth — like in the article What Does In-Home Dementia Care Cost. It creates content clusters around broader topics to ensure web visitors can find all the information they need to make the best care decisions.

Lean into Lifestyle Content for Emotional Connections

According to scientific research, one in five eCommerce sales is a direct result of impulse buying in 2024. So, if you’re trying to improve conversion rates with content, why not invest in resources that rely on emotional marketing?

By implementing this tactic, you will build relationships with your audience by appealing to their interests and aspirations. You will also create a setting where your web visitors will feel inspired by the lifestyle you offer and motivated to invest in your products.

In addition to your social media profiles, your brand’s blog is the perfect distribution channel for publishing this type of content. It offers plenty of flexibility regarding length and format, and it makes it super easy to move prospects to the lower stages of the sales funnel with well-placed CTAs and product links.

For a great example of how a brand uses lifestyle content to inspire purchases, check out Chisos. In its How to Get the Perfect Cowboy Boot Fit guide, the brand provides lots of valuable info. It includes an entertaining video that educates viewers on footwear fit while communicating, “You can be a cowboy too.”

Help New Customers Get the Most Out of Their Purchase

What do today’s consumers look for when deciding whether to invest in a product? In addition to price and convenience, most online shoppers want value for money.

According to PWC, people are more than willing to spend up to 16% more on a superior customer experience. And if that’s not enough to convince you to invest in CX, remember that providing a great shopping experience also increases your chances of earning your customers’ loyalty.

Content marketing can be an effective tactic for generating loyalty and repeat sales. If you create educational resources that allow new buyers to get more out of their purchases, you’ll maximize their satisfaction with your products. Plus, you’ll increase their customer lifetime value and boost their chances of becoming advocates.

Now, there are many ways to approach CX-enhancing content. Training resources, comprehensive product manuals, and maintenance guides are all excellent ways to wow first-time buyers. 

But, if you want to invest in content that will delight your audience, consider producing blog posts that inspire buyers to seek more value out of their newly acquired purchases, like Greenhouse Emporium’s 42 Easy to Grow Greenhouse Plants For Beginners guide.

Demonstrate the Superiority of Your Solutions Compared to Competitor Products

Most consumers compare multiple products before deciding which one to buy. So, if you can use your content marketing strategy to prove that you offer the best solutions in the market, you can effectively boost conversions and position your brand as the go-to in your industry.

Naturally, producing evaluation-stage content can be daunting, but remember that this content marketing tactic offers two major benefits:

For one, using your eCommerce blog to compare your products to those of your competitors creates an opportunity to highlight the unique value your brand offers. Whether that’s an extended returns period or better performance, emphasizing these benefits could help you win over new customers. Check out how Apple does it in its product announcements below.

Secondly, product comparison content helps consumers gauge whether a solution is the right fit for their needs. So, if you publish this post on your eCommerce blog and lose a few potential customers to your competitors, rest assured that it’s not bad.

Ultimately, the goal when converting new clients is to ensure their satisfaction. Sometimes, it’s better to make one less sale than gain a client who’s not the right fit for your brand and risk them harming your business’ reputation with a negative review.

Be Bold with Product-Page Links

The sales cycle can get pretty long. Convincing consumers to invest in high-ticket items can’t be fast, but you can easily use content to speed up the buying process for affordable products.

By adding commercial links to your blog posts, you can inspire web visitors to purchase on the spot. 

Of course, don’t put too much sales pressure on your prospects. Instead, take inspiration from Vitamart’s Magnesium Bisglycinate vs Citrate article and find opportunities to transform relevant keywords into subtle text links that move buyers through the sales funnel.

For a more direct approach, enhance your blog posts with attention-grabbing CTAs at appropriate intervals. Belkin’s 7 Benefits of Using an iPhone 15 MagSafe Charger article features bold product links with one-click add-to-cart functionality on the margins of the text, encouraging instant purchases.

Finally, if you want an approach that’s neither overly subtle nor too bold, consider taking inspiration from Smartwool’s Hiking & Backpacking Socks 101 article. This brand includes direct product page links in its articles. But instead of disguising them as headings, the brand directly mentions its solutions in the text and allows readers to go straight to the product pages to check them out.

Use Photos in Blog Posts to Demonstrate the Aesthetic Appeal of Your Products

Finally, to employ your eCommerce blog to boost conversions, remember the immense impact of a beautiful visual.

When shopping online, 83% of people rely on product photography to make their purchase decisions. So, if you can find opportunities to enhance your awareness and evaluation-stage content with stunning visuals, you’ll undoubtedly nudge first-time web visitors closer to choosing your brand’s solutions.

The best thing about this tactic is that you don’t have to wait to show off your offer. Instead, use images (or videos) that feature your products in use, like those in Solace Jewellery’s How to Clean Bracelets Like a Pro, to call readers’ attention to your brand’s stunning items they might enjoy owning.

Let’s Wrap It Up

Boosting conversion rates on your e-commerce blog is an effective and budget-friendly way to grow your business. With these eight tactics, you’re sure to see impressive results.

To guarantee that your hard work yields returns, remember to always optimize your content to appeal to your target audience. That way, you will maximize your chances of reaching the right people and make it easier to delight them with your resources, significantly boosting their chances of buying from your brand.