Every year, the Internet Retailer Exhibition & Conference (IRCE) draws in retailers from all over the globe to learn, discover new technologies, and build relationships. With over 200 experts, pre- and post-show workshops, and two sets of 5 tracks to choose from each of the main days, IRCE was an educational opportunity not to be missed! Here are just a few of the many, many takeaways you can use to help your business succeed:
1. Three quarters of B2B firms are already upgrading their ecommerce platforms or plan to within 3 years.
2. It’s estimated that US firms will spend $2.1 billion on licensing ecommerce technology by 2019.
3. When it comes to taking your business online, you need to:
- Find your sweet spot & accept the differentiators
- Make online ordering & reordering easier
- Make customers feel welcome online
- Make it personal
4. 52% of B2B buyers expect to be able to make half or more of their work purchases online in the next 3 years.
5. 70% of time online is spent searching.
6. Use journey mapping to remove friction between your customer and ownership of the product.
7. The average B2B buyer executes 12 different searches before buying a product.
8. Social media does work for B2B – it’s all about building relationships, reputation & education, and monitoring & insights.
9. LinkedIn is the leading social network for B2B:
- 94% of B2B marketers use it to distribute content
- 63% say it’s the most effective platform (generating the most leads)
10. When it comes to social, keep three things in mind:
- KISS (keep it short & simple)
- BOSO (beware of shiny objects)
- DOOM (decide on objectives & metrics)
11. If it forces you to learn and makes you better, failure is a good thing.
12. Be guest-obsessed, not channel-obsessed.
13. Reinvent your assets.
14. Get comfortable with saying, “Yes.”
15. A guest who shops on multiple channels is more valuable – they shop more and usually have a higher AOV (average order value).
16. Clinging to legacy models simply because it’s easier is a bad business move. Say, “Yes” (if it’s right for the customer) and deal with the short-term pain of change for the long-term benefit and vision.
17. Lessons learned from Reddit:
- Consider a mascot for your brand, but make it cute
- The hard part of chess is not learning to make the moves, it’s learning when
- “Life is not a paint-by-number, we’re all figuring it out.” - @AlexisOhanian
18. If you really want to use SEO for better listing visibility on eBay and Amazon, focus on the quality of the listing and remember that it is not a static listing – it will change over time.
19. 63% of consumers are more likely to buy something if they received promotions on mobile while they were nearby.
20. 47% of consumers are open to trying a new brand when receiving coupons from them on a smartphone.
21. When it comes to mobile promotions, it’s more important to consider the stages of consumer shopping and the role promotions play during each stage.
- Pre-Shopping:
- Stage 1: Monitoring the environment - promotions help refine the consideration set
- Stage 2: Getting triggered to shop - promotions trigger in-store and online shopping
- Stage 3: Preparing to shop - promotions influence what to buy & where
- Shopping:
- Stage 4: Browsing with intent to shop - promotions validate price & value
- Stage 5: Evaluating options - promotions solidify purchase decisions
- Stage 6: Purchasing & post-purchase - promotions drive brand loyalty, overall customer satisfaction, and incremental sales
22. Mobile is necessary to reach millennials:
- 81% of millennial moms note that shopping is the #1 way to use their smartphone
- 54% say their mobile device is their most important shopping tool
- 33% spend 11+ hours a week using social media
- 59% say social ads prompt them to start research a product or retailer
23. The average smartphone user will look at their phone 221 times per day.
24. Getting personalization right can make a big difference on your bottom line:
- 50% increase in number of items per order
- 53% AOV (average order value) increase
- 33% customer conversion rate increase
- 19% increase in revenue
25. “A culture of change is a culture of innovation.” A culture of innovation “allows us to take these disruptive technologies and turn them into eruptive innovation.” – Christopher McCann, President, 1-800-flowers.com
26. The IoT (Internet of Things) is a symptom of two bigger trends: consumers hyper adopting technologies and companies using disruptive technologies.
27. Ask yourself these 5 questions to help determine whether a social network is right for you:
- Is the network brand-friendly?
- Ask why not how many.
- Does your audience use it?
- Can you leverage it uniquely?
- Does it work for you?
28. “With any marketing decision, the answer lies in the data. If the data says to do it, you have your answer.” - @JasonFalls, SVP Digital Strategy, Elasticity
29. 1.6 billion photos are “liked” every day on Instagram.
30. 65% of consumers seek out UGC (user-generated content) before making a purchase.
31. Vary your social post types to drive engagement:
- Ask a question
- Pique curiosity
- Give a how-to
- Make a connection
- Tease with It/These/This/Here
- Host a contest/promotion
- Repurpose & repeat
32. Non-branded traffic in Google AdWords has a 34% higher CPC (cost per click) than Bing Ads, but Google’s CTR (click-through rate) is 74% higher.
33. 96% of people who visit a site leave without completing the actions marketers want them to take. Remarketing/retargeting keeps your brand top-of-mind and can re-engage some of these visitors.
34. 70% of people abandon their shopping carts without completing a purchase.
35. More Google searches happen on mobile than on desktop in 10 countries, including the U.S. and Japan.
36. 73% of U.S. adults are more likely to purchase after watching an online video that explains the product or service.
37. In 2015, four times as many consumers would rather watch a video about a product than read about it.
38. Check your SEO to ensure you are not keyword stuffing in your title tags, meta descriptions, and pages, and ensure it is up to par with best practice standards.
This is by no means a complete list of takeaways. Without an entire team as back up, it wasn’t possible to hit all the tracks and sessions. However, with these takeaways from just a small section of the event, you’re already way ahead of the game. Grab a one-up (or two) for your business, keep playing, and we’ll see you next year!