Written by Alan Morkan, CTO at StudioForty9.

Alan shares the benefit of 15 years experience in the tech industry and his ability to zero in on what really matters. In a world where Web3, crypto and AI are dominating the headlines, Alan shares some down to earth perspectives on technology in the real business world.

Technology and ecommerce

Technology moves fast. Things don’t stand still for long. At least, that’s the message we hear every day.

On the one hand, this is true. Innovation is happening all of the time and there is a constant stream of new releases both in hardware and software.

However the number of these that genuinely impact retail ecommerce is much smaller and less frequent than you might think. It’s the constant visibility of column inches dedicated to the new and the shiny with the advertisements to back these up which make it hard to know which tech innovations to embrace and when to invest.

Major shifts in the last 15 years

In 15 years in ecommerce, I see only 3 major game-changing technical innovations:

1. Smartphones, their capabilities and their mass adoption as the way to connect online and shop online, anytime.

2. The meteoric rise and slow decline of social media as an incredibly cheap method to do targeted advertising.

3. The maturation of cloud computing whereby it has become far more cost effective to outsource key technology requirements (the checkout, security, peak traffic spike provision) to SaaS providers such as Shopify.

These innovations point to a pattern where major shifts in technology occur only about once every 5 years! That’s a lot of space and time to let one’s mind focus on more pressing topics, which I’ll come back to below.

What factors do hyped technologies have in common?

When you meet a technological innovation that you do feel is worth investigating, what should you consider? How do you determine if it’s the right fit for your business? How do you calculate the cost/benefit analysis?

As an example, that serves as a cautionary tale, let’s look at 2 innovations that were, and still are to a greater or lesser extent, touted as the next big thing but haven’t made the same mark as the more successful ones listed above.

1. Mobile Apps.

2. Progressive Web Apps / Headless Architectures / Composable Commerce

When the dust settled on these innovations, they had a couple of things in common:

They solved problems for only the largest of ecommerce merchants.

The ones that had loyal customers that would be returning to the site multiple times per week (and so wanted an icon on their home screen) and where percentiles of performance transformed into millions in revenue lost or gained. You needed to be earning more than 10 million online each year to justify the costs of ownership of such technology.

They were built on shifting sands.

Smartphones have proliferated in versions and vendors over the past 10 years with different operating system versions, browsers, screen size, etc. The skilled developer base is small and demands high fees, and with these constant changes it was difficult to institute any efficiencies when faced with the prerogative of upskilling. In reality the biannual hot fashionable Javascript framework, that powers much of the PWA/Headless approach to ecommerce, has become a running joke in development circles in terms of its inability to stick with an agreed approach to solving problems and build longevity into the ecosystem.

Where should you focus your attention?

The majority of the technology that is at the core of retail ecommerce and drives value for the customer has been around for a long time.

For example:

1. MySQL database first came out in 1995. Changes have been minimal in the past 10 years.

2. PHP is reported to power 64% of the websites around the world and was the original programming language for Facebook. Again it has only seen incremental changes in the past 10 years – it is a fundamentally stable piece of technology.

3. Even the enabling technologies of Web 2.0 (i.e. AJAX) which once depended on third-party Javascript libraries such as jQuery, are now baked into the browsers that we use on our devices.

Instead of chasing new technology, merchants would benefit much more from standardising tried and tested technology and aiming to minimise the total cost of ownership. 

With the time and space that this creates, you could be focusing on your own data. This can be the data already in your IT systems (EPoS, ERP, ecommerce, etc.) or data currently stuck in the heads of employees or customers.

Effectively utilising your data can lead to better decision making, finding opportunities, identifying losses, increased efficiency, reduced costs and improved margins.

Some pertinent questions to ask about the use of data in your business

As you focus on the potential that your data can offer your business, here are some questions to consider:

• How do we leverage the existing data to drive market or customer insight?
• How do we leverage the existing data to drive automations to increase productivity and minimise costs?
• How do we capture more data? Even if we don’t have a current use for such data, as long as it’s stored somewhere in a structured format, we can use it at some point in the future. Often the most valuable data is time-series data where we can extract trends, patterns, average or lifetime values. 
• What are your employees or your customers doing every day that might be useful to encode? 
• How can we make capturing that data frictionless so people don’t even realise they are recording it – it just becomes part of their everyday routine?

More about StudioForty9

StudioForty9 are experts in everything ecommerce. We’re adept at taking complex problems and finding sound solutions.

Our services include consultation, platform migration, bespoke integrations, UX/UI design and performance marketing across email, PPC, paid social and SEO.

Trusted by over 70 of Ireland’s best known businesses, we build long lasting partnerships where you can lean on our knowledge and experience to guide your business forward. 

Build your success with StudioForty9.

Email info@studioforty9.com to start finding solutions to your ecommerce challenges.

Photos by Igor Miske | Towfiqu barbhuiya Unsplash

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Some new Shopify Flow features are being introduced to Advanced and Shopify Plus plans.

What are the new Shopify Flow features?

The new Shopify Flow features will allow you to schedule workflows to run at a specific time and date, without needing a commerce event to kick things off. You can also leverage the new features to get data action, to fetch specific Shopify data needed for daily reports.

With these new Flow capabilities, you can build:

• Daily reports that notify about unfulfilled or draft orders
• Automatic notifications when a customer places multiple orders shipped to the same location within a 24-hour period
• Daily summaries of low or out-of-stock items

What problems do the new Shopify Flow features solve?

The new features expand automation possibilities exponentially, allowing you to run routine operations regularly, reducing the need for manual work.

Here are some example of operations:

* Every day you could get a summary of orders older than 2 days that are unfulfilled

* Use tags to segment customers based on their orders for last 6 months

* Every hour you could get orders with chargebacks and tag the customer

* Daily notifications on products that are out of stock and a summary email

* Hold orders if customer placed more than 1 order in last 24 hours

* Remove new product tag 90 days after product was created

How to use Shopify Flow

Schedule workflows using these methods:

Time

Launch an operation regularly at fixed intervals every day or month
Example: Sending a reminder email every day to review cancelled orders at 5pm

Each

To do an operation over “all orders”, or “all clients”, etc. You can combine with time scheduling for great automation.

Example: Retrieve a list of unfulfilled orders every day at 5:00 pm. Add the Expedite shipping tag every order in the list.

Count

Determine how many times a certain event happens

Example: Count the number of orders placed by a customer on the last day. If it’s greater than three, send an internal email.

Sum

Add together the total of items in a list, provide the sum value.

Example: The total price of orders placed by a customer in the past week is totaled. If the total amount is equal to or greater than 1,000, then a customer tag is applied.

How do you get the best out of the new Shopify Flow features?

By combining time scheduling and operations like count, sum, and for each, it’s possible to generate automations that save several hours of work and can run around the clock. The insights can also help to inform important decisions.

There are endless possibilities to explore to utilise Shopify Flow to alleviate manual work. These features will offer the opportunity to optimise data in inventory, orders, and certain financial figures.

StudioForty – Shopify Plus Partners

StudioForty9 are Ireland’s only Shopify Plus Partners. We have helped many of Ireland’s best known retailers to excel in a dynamic and fast paced online marketplace. With over ten years experience in ecommerce, we can help you to develop strategies that will give you an edge in your industry.

Contact us to get advice on platform migration, customisation or performance marketing, email info@studioforty9.com for more information.

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What is GA4 ?

Google Analytics 4 often referred to as GA4 is a web analytics service offered by Google that provides insights into the traffic and user behaviour on your ecommerce store.

It allows you to track and analyse user interactions with your website or app including page views, clicks, and conversions. It also provides detailed reports and insights based on the collected data.

Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is the latest version of Google Analytics, while Universal Google Analytics (UA) is the previous version you are probably already familiar with.

Differences between GA4 and UA

There are several key differences between the two versions:

Data collection with GA4

GA4 uses a different data collection method than UA, using a more granular approach that allows for more detailed and accurate tracking of user interactions. GA4 also supports data collection from multiple devices and channels, including web, app, and offline.

Event tracking

In GA4, event tracking is more flexible and easier to set up than in UA. GA4 automatically tracks a wide range of user interactions as events such as page views and clicks. It also allows you to define your own custom events.

Machine learning

GA4 uses machine learning to automatically identify and classify user behaviour patterns, allowing you to gain insights into user behaviour without having to set up complex segmentation or analysis.

Data

Overall, GA4 provides more advanced data collection and analysis capabilities than UA, making it a more powerful tool for understanding user behaviour and optimising your website or app.

What you need to know about your current Google Analytics

GA4 will be replacing UA, here is the timeline:

• Universal Analytics will no longer be available by July, 2023 with GA4 becoming the next generation Google Analytics tool. 

• Universal Analytics will continue to collect data until its sunset in July 2023, and data will remain accessible for at least 6 months afterwards. 

Why you should transition to GA4 sooner rather than later

If you are currently using Universal Google Analytics, it is important to start planning for the transition to GA4 before the sunset date. 

Reasons why you should move to GA4 today:

• Utilise advanced features

GA4 is designed to be better than its predecessor offering users more. The sooner you can benefit from its enhanced capabilities and features the better for your business.

• Start collecting data

If you wait until Universal Analytics is sunset, you will miss out on several months worth of the extra data that is available on GA4. That means at the end of 2023 you will only have half a year’s worth of data when you could have had more. There is also expected to be a blackout period where you won’t be able to access UA data at all.

• Learning curve

The new features that GA4 will bring will mean that it will take some time to get to grips with how they work as well as updating your reporting and analysis processes which may in turn require more learning. Leaving it to the last minute could put pressure on your team’s resources and put you in the position of playing catch up.

Adopting GA4 now will ensure that you are able to continue tracking and analysing your website or app’s performance without disruption.

How StudioForty9 can help

Worried about transitioning to GA4 and getting your head around its advanced data and features? Our performance marketing experts at StudioForty9 can help you to understand and optimise your strategy for GA4.

Get in touch our expert team on info@studioforty9.com

Photo by Myriam Jessier Unsplash

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The rise of live commerce

One of the latest trends in ecommerce is Live Commerce also known as Live Selling. This form of ecommerce allows shoppers to view and interact with products as they’re being sold online. Although the growth of the trend has taken a step back with the announcement that Facebook and Instagram will be removing the ability to tag products in live streams in March 2023, the progression towards video over static content still paves the way for live selling to become an important sales tool in ecommerce.

Live selling has already firmly planted itself in Asian markets. In 6 years it reached a market penetration in the East of ~10% according to McKinsey. China’s live commerce market alone grew at a Compound Annual Growth Rate in excess of 20% between 2017 and 2020. According to estimates by China’s Ministry of Commerce, 89% of all goods sold on Alibaba’s Singles Day were live-streamed.

Live commerce growth intensified exponentially across the world during lockdown. Retailers were forced to close stores and over time, the human longing for in-person experiences and connection grew, providing live selling the chance to take hold in countries where it previously hadn’t had much traction.

One of the earliest EU adopters was Douglas, a German beauty retailer who worked with the startup Livebuy to offer their customers a host of different stream formats ranging from streams with influencers to workshops with experts. These events had reported conversion increases of up to 40%. Douglas were having so much success with this model that in the weeks leading up to Christmas, they livestreamed every day for multiple hours a day.

Since then, many larger businesses have been dabbling in the model for example Walmart tested a fashion live stream on TikTok that resulted in 7x more views and an increase in their TikTok following by 25%.

A 2020 study from Facebook IQ showed that almost a quarter of all those surveyed wanted to discover new products via live streaming either from an influencer or brand representative.

The increased demand in live commerce not only offers an efficient way for merchants to promote their brands through social media channels, this method has also been shown to increase sales conversion by up to 67%.

Types of live commerce

1. Live Streams

When we think about Live Commerce, live streams are often the most popular starting point. These events offer the customer a chance to view certain products up close and in action. They can also ask questions, see live examples of the product in action and they can directly interact with the brand.

Here are some examples of popular live streaming:

• Interviews

With niche influencers that align with your brand and products. There are primarily focused on awareness and traffic.

• Tutorials/showcases

How to use product. Examples could be:

Makeup: Customers are shown variations on how to apply the makeup product as well as what other products complement it.
Clothing: Care instructions on how to get the most from your products as well as an upsell opportunity to sell those care products e.g. shoe protectant

• Behind the scenes / Product creation

This offers an opportunity to build brand awareness and customer loyalty. It can involve showing the product creation process, speaking to those behind the scenes in creating the product, speaking to the owner about the nature of the business (family owned, ethically sourced materials, quality materials, years of experience, etc.), speaking to the designer on where they got their inspiration for the product, etc.

In all of the above it can often be helpful to include interactive portions to help keep customers engaged such as a questions and answers section or even a quiz with prizes such as store discounts.

Beyond live streaming, there are a number of additional approaches to supercharge your live commerce offering.

2. Pre-Recorded Events

An alternative method of doing live streams is using pre-recordings. You can either live stream a pre-recording or you can save recordings of prior live events for customers to review at a later point on your website or in email campaigns. The live pre-recording is seen as less effective as it hampers customer engagement.

3. Personalised Shopping

Personalised shopping offers a more exclusive take on the standard live stream in that a customer can have an event tailored to them similar to a style consultation. These 1:1 events have been found to not only increase AOV through recommendations of cross-sell and up-sell products, but also greatly reduce returns as the customer has received tailored advice on their purchasing journey.

This can be done through a sign up form where an appointment can be scheduled and the stream is hosted on a private link on your site.
Klarna, a company that facilitates the Buy Now Pay Later model, offers another method of “personal shopping” via a live chat widget on your storefront. When the customer opens it, they are sent through a call funnel. When the customer initiates the call, Klarna will connect them to a customer service agent that has an ‘available’ status.

The key difference here is that Klarna’s solution will, if an agent is available, immediately connect the customer to complete their purchasing journey. This approach is great for moving customers through to purchase but is more demanding on retailers’ resources.

Booking appointments on the other hand has a greater chance of cancellations given the time decay of interest but it allows for better management of resources and a more tailored approach as you can collect customer information prior to the call and have time to prepare their session in advance.

4. Shoppable Videos

Shoppable videos bring a sense of familiarity to social users with short snappy videos that can be placed on any page of your website. They will play as a gif and, when the customer clicks on them, the full short-form video will play with scroll up to purchase functionality.

Building a strategy for live commerce on your store

As we explored earlier, live commerce has a multitude of layers and thus requires some forethought in to developing your unique strategy.

Employees

• What are the requirements and availability of employees for live streams, personalized shopping, or on-demand customer requests?
• Do you have members on the team that are confident in speaking in front of a camera? Some training/upskilling may be required to achieve the best results.

Budget

• How much capital can you allocate to this strategy? 
• Consider whether you will take a concentrated approach to live streaming where you engage with influencers or you take a more widespread approach at the variations of live commerce at which point app costs will be a strong consideration.

Customer Behaviour

• It’s important to understand the bracket of customers you’re targeting so you can best address their specific needs.
• Generation Z (10-25 years old) are the most likely to purchase products on live streams, with more than one third having done so in 2020. The survey results also showed that more than half of millennials and Generation X (26-41 and 41-57 years old respectively) have purchased items from live streams, compared with just under a quarter of baby boomers (55+).
• To complement the above, in the infographic below we can see that Gen Z is disproportionately influenced by social media and this gradually decreases as we move up generational increments.

Type of Live Commerce

• What method of live commerce will get the best ROI for your specific niche?
• McKinsey completed a survey on live stream selling which showed the following ranking of popularity based on sales.
  1. Apparel & fashion – 35.6%
  2. Beauty – 7.6%
  3. Fresh food – 7.4%
  4. Consumer electronics – 4.6%
  5. Furnishing & home decor – 3.6%

After reviewing the above considerations and choosing a method of live commerce, it’s time for launch.

The launch of live commerce elements should be tested in a low pressure environment i.e. not on Black Friday. 

Once the model has been tested and the team are comfortable with it, you can start looking at the expansion and growing phase. This can include:

• Testing different forms of Live Commerce.
• Creating a weekly/monthly schedule that provides a consistent timeline for customers.
• Evolve from simple staff run events to bringing in industry experts and key leaders in the space.

What impact could live commerce have on your brand?

Finally, we will take a look at Live Commerce within the context of the two most important variables to any business; customer satisfaction and bottom line.

Live Commerce offers an unparalleled level of engagement with your customers. They have an opportunity to get an inside look at our business model, see and speak to the people behind the brand, and engage with others that love your products.

Showing the customer what motivates you, who the people behind the brand are, what the brand stands for and how passionate you and your team are about the products/services you offer has a significant impact on the psychology of a customer.

Short Term: Customer hesitation can be addressed and there is a greater chance they will purchase the product. Moreover, the purchase itself no longer feels like an impulse buy but rather a sound logical decision to support a brand they know and connect with.

Long Term: The sale becomes less about selling a specific product and more about selling the brand. When a customer believes in a brand their lens expands beyond the immediate purchasing journey into a wider interest in the company’s product range. The results are increased retention, sales, and word of mouth referrals.

Bringing live commerce to your online store

StudioForty9 are experts in all things ecommerce, our clients lean on us to find solutions for their business to help them to grow and succeed online. We make it our mission to know and explore the latest technology and trends and bring the best of them to our clients. We have already successfully integrated live commerce for some of our clients and can offer expert guidance and advice. Talk to our team about the benefits and feasibility of live commerce for your business.

Email info@studioforty9.com to chat with us about bringing live commerce to your store.

References

Facebook IQ. “How COVID-19 has Changed Shopping Behavior.”

Business of Apps “Walmart sees success with live-stream shopping events on TikTok.”

Klarna. “Klarna launches Virtual Shopping, bringing the in-store experience to online shoppers everywhere.” 

Livebuy

LyveCom

McKinsey. “Live commerce is transforming online shopping.”

TechCrunch “Instagram is killing live shopping in March, will focus on ads instead”

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Summary: Increase your revenue with Google’s performance max and brand search campaigns

• In 2022 Google introduced Performance Max ad campaigns where you can access all of the Google ads inventory from a single campaign.
• Google Performance Max campaigns are reported to increase conversion. You can also target new high value audiences and gain more insights.
• StudioForty9’s PPC specialist team recommend using Performance Max in conjunction with Brand Search Campaigns as a winning formula for Google Ads.

What are performance max campaigns?

In April 2022 Google rolled out a new campaign type which enabled users to upgrade their Smart Shopping campaigns to Performance Max campaigns. The key features of the upgrade was that it added brand new inventory, audiences and automation insights.

Google describes Performance Max as a goal based campaign type where you can access all of the Google ads inventory from a single campaign. It can be used to convert customers across channels such as YouTube, Display, Search, Discover, Gmail and Maps. With Performance Max you can tap into your customer’s shopping both online and offline.

Benefits of performance max campaigns

Increased conversion

According to Google, advertisers making the most of Performance Max campaigns are seeing an average increase of 13% total incremental conversions at a similar cost per action.

One of the main drivers of this is the ad’s automation technology. Google can automatically optimise your budget and bids across all of Google’s ad platforms.

High value audiences

Google’s machine learning technology in Performance Max campaigns allows you to increase relevance around who you show up to and when. It analyses intent and preferences of shoppers helping you to target audiences that have given reason to Google to be considered interested audiences, rather than relying on demographics alone.

More insights

Performance Max delivers better insights using Google Analytics’ insights page. You can use it to assess audience insights such as how audiences are responding to specific copy, imagery or videos. You also can look at diagnostic insights as it highlights set up issues and provides recommendations for improvement. Wider analytics are also available such as search trends and demand forecasts.

Optimised assets

Google can mix and match your assets to determine what works best together. This enables your creative assets to become more targeted and relevant.

PPC expert tips

Performance Max has become a game-changing tool for Google Ads. The technology behind it allows our clients to reach a broader audience and reach customers who are more likely to convert.

In our recent Performance Max campaigns, we have added the following steps to enhance the strategy for our clients.

• Multiple headlines and description lines to capture the attention of the potential customers by pointing out the main values, products benefits and mission behind the brand.
• Image and video assets with content that represented the business’ brand.
• Sitelinks, callouts, structured snippets, location extensions to improve the quality of the ad.
• Call to action “Shop Now”.

Performance Max runs on a smart bidding strategy in combination with the “black box” principle which uses a complex algorithm to determine which ads to display to users. Therefore it is highly important to feed the campaign with the high quality data (products, assets, tracking) to make it work at its full potential.

We recommend using Performance Max in conjunction with Brand Search campaigns for a winning formula when it comes to Google Ads.

Brand search campaigns, as the name implies, are about brand specific search words. These types of campaigns can focus on your company brand name, names of products, names of people associated with your brand or even misspellings of any of these.

The bottom of the marketing funnel is also known as the “decision” or “purchase” stage. It is the final stage in the customer journey, when potential customers are ready to make a purchase. At this stage, the goal of advertising campaigns is to convert potential customers into paying customers and drive sales.

Brand search campaigns are designed to reach users who are close to making a purchase decision, meaning they are bottom of the funnel campaigns.

What are the benefits of a Brand Search Campaign?

Besides creating additional revenue, there are several benefits that come with creating a brand search campaign in Google Ads:

Higher ROAS

Creating a brand search campaign helps the business to reach high quality in-market audiences and capture high-intent users. Introducing the brand and establishing positioning will result in a higher Quality Score, which will help lower the cost of your ads.

Protect the brand from competitors

Due to a constant competition for the ad rank on Google Search engine, many business competitors may bid against your brand name, to effectively steal organic traffic from your website. By not including your company name you can open up the advertising space for such competitors. Investing in branded campaigns will effectively allow you to take ownership of the search results pages.

Higher visibility in search results

When users search for your brand by name, your ads will appear at the top of the search results making it more likely that users will click on your ad and visit your website.

Performance Max and Brand Search Campaigns in action

We carried out a combined Performance Max and Brand Search campaign strategy with one of our clients and you can see how we were able to drive traffic to the website, capture the attention of potential customers and eventually increase the loyal customer base.

Results

Snippet of the performance: 1st of September – November 30, 2022

1. The total reach has dramatically increased from 2,667 impressions in September to 58,266 in October and 104,363 in November.
2. The number of conversions followed a similar trajectory with total conversions increasing from 12 in September to 31 in October and 54 in November, 2022.

Get expert support with your Google Ads strategy

Running Google ads is an important revenue stream for retail businesses. Developing and maintaining a strategy requires expertise and time that is not always possible to resource for busy marketing teams. Our specialists at StudioForty9 can support businesses to optimise important channels like Google Ads to deliver the best results for your business.

Get in touch to learn how we can help, email info@studioforty9.com

Image by Solen Feyissa on Unsplash

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Summary

• 31% of marketing professionals in a WARC survey reported plans to invest in marketing in 2023.
• Data from previous downturns suggests that investing in marketing in a downturn delivers positive results.
• In answer to a potential downturn, our team recommends diversifying your digital channels, tuning into your customers, developing brand awareness strategies, utilising marketplaces and working smarter with automation technology.

Marketing during a recession

We’ve all heard the adage before that when a recession comes, businesses should double down on marketing rather than slashing budgets. In the midst of speculation of an economic downturn in 2023, it seems that some businesses have decided to follow this advice. One large global survey of marketing professionals by WARC found that 31% plan to increase their brand marketing in 2023 with the prospect of a recession looming. 

This 31% are seeing an opportunity where others are seeing caution, but what do they stand to gain? Read my article to learn more about what the data tells us about marketing investment during a recession.

“31% plan to increase their brand marketing in 2023 with the prospect of a recession looming”

The economic outlook for 2023

The possibility of a recession in 2023 has come to be a pressing matter for most businesses as they look ahead to the new year.  In a global survey of 1700 professionals by WARC, 95% said that a potential recession was affecting their marketing strategy.

The latest global report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has predicted a significant slowdown in the Irish economy in 2023, along with many other countries across the world. Businesses who have displayed resilience over the past few years in the face of lockdowns, staff shortages and rising energy costs will once again need to dig deep and strategise on ways to sustain growth and protect themselves.

Arguably one of the most important growth strategies for all businesses is their marketing activities. Historically marketing is one of the first areas to be cut during a downturn and this seems to remain the case for some as the WARC report indicates that 36% of those surveyed are planning to decrease their marketing spend. 

However it’s very interesting that 31% do not plan to decrease their spending, instead they plan to increase it.

What history tells us about those who invest in marketing during a recession

Analytics Partners has gathered data over the past 20 years measuring hundreds of billions in marketing spend across 50 countries. 

Their report published in August 2022 revealed that the brands who increased paid advertising also saw a 17% rise in incremental sales, while those who slashed spend risked losing 15% of their business to competitors who boosted theirs. The report suggests that businesses who cut marketing spend expose themselves to the risk of losing business to rivals who do not make cuts.

This pattern has become something close to a phenomenon as it appears to have happened repeatedly throughout the last few decades.

In a study of over 600 companies by McGraw Hill covering 1980-1985, they found that companies who continued to advertise during the two-year recession saw 256% higher sales than their counterparts post-recession. Those who chose not to advertise during the economic downturn lagged behind with a rise in sales of only 18% once the economy regained traction. 
Again during the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) of 2007-2009, Kantar found that in the year following the crisis strong brands recovered almost three times faster within two years.

“Brands who increased paid advertising also saw a 17% rise in incremental sales, while those who slashed spend risked losing 15% of their business to competitors who boosted theirs”

Anecdotally speaking, even the powerhouse brand McDonald’s got it wrong when they cut advertising rather than investing during the 1990-1991 recession. An article by Forbes notes that Pizza Hut increased sales by 61%, Taco Bell sales grew by 40% and McDonald’s sales declined by 28% as a result of this cut in the face of competitors who invested. 

Even at product level there is opportunity. Today’s retail giant Amazon made an imprint in our lives when they launched the must-have Christmas gift of 2007 during the financial crisis, the Kindle. Launching in November, the ebook sold out within hours on the marketplace.

These stories along with the wider studies demonstrate that cutting marketing investment for short term survival can mean missed opportunities, stagnation of growth and a longer recovery period post recession. However this does not mean that marketers who were successful during these challenging times simply ignored the economic realities and carried on as normal.

In the Analytics Partners study of marketing spend, they found that 60% of brands who increased their media investment during the recession saw ROI improvements. This means that 60% saw a direct return on their investment, while 40% did not. Carefully considering where you are going to spend your all important budget is key to the success of a marketing investment strategy during an economic downturn.

What the big guys are doing

In a recent survey of the top spenders on advertising in the UK  reported by The Guardian, the Incorporated Society of British Advertisers (ISBA) found that the biggest brands plan to cut spending on TV, radio, print and billboards while over 30% revealed that they intended to increase spend on formats such as paid search and social channels, podcasts and music streaming, and digital screens.
This is further backed by a report published by media investment and intelligence company Magna who predict that digital advertising sales will grow by +8% globally.

“Over 30% revealed that they intended to increase spend on formats such as paid search and social channels”

What your business can do

Here are five actionable tips for deciding your marketing strategy with a potential economic downturn looming.

Brand building during a downturn

Building confidence and clarity in a business’ brand comes up time and time again as the key to success during economic challenges.

Kantar carried out a meta-analysis of growth drivers and found that brands with strong clarity contribute 70% more to sales. They cite being meaningfully different as an advantage when it comes to brand marketing.

When it comes to digital marketing, businesses should purposefully allocate advertising spend on building brand awareness and not just on their products. This my look like:

• Ensuring your ads look distinct from competitors – consider graphic design and/or photography styling
• Create educational, helpful content around topics that are relevant to your brand and products
• Use video content to really show customers who you are
• Partner with influencers who can tell audiences more about your brand
• Considering copy – is the tone and personality of your brand coming across in your organic and paid content?
• Brand activation – don’t forget that hosting events both online and offline can bring your brand to life for customers.
• Loyalty – a topic that is growing more and more momentum as customers become more careful about which brands they support, loyalty offers so many benefits when it comes to brand awareness, those who you reward will become your best brand advocates.

“Brands with strong clarity contribute 70% more to sales.”

Tune in to your customers

In an article published in 2009, the then Chief Global Analyst at Millward Brown encouraged brands who were competing in the challenging economic environment of that time to regain lost sales by understanding consumer mindsets and motivations. 
In the same year, Harvard Business Review published an article by a HBS Professor and Research Associate which urged retailers to “educate consumers on how to shop smart and save money”. The writers propose that marketers should stabilise the brand and look for ways to connect with changing sentiment with customers. They identify four product categories: essentials (perceived as necessary for survival), treats (justifiable indulgences), postponables (needs or desires that can be put off) and expendables (difficult to justify).

“Chief Global Analyst at Millward Brown encouraged brands…to regain lost sales by understanding consumer mindsets and motivations.”

Using this guide, it can be easier to articulate your products in line with how they might be feeling. Ask yourself, does your brand offer some kind of answer or substitute to where customers might have to cut down on spending?

You will see this has already started to happen due to inflation with big brand names such as Sainsbury’s launching ‘Feed Your Family for a Fiver’ campaign. The campaign resulted in a direct sales impact of £540m for Sainsbury’s, with a profit ROI of £5.55 for every £1 spent.

Reviewing your marketing messaging will be important not just now as you make your plans for the year but reassessments will need to be done throughout the year to ensure you are truly listening to your customers.

Diversify your channels

As we saw earlier from the ISBA survey of biggest ad spenders in the UK, top brands are opting for digital channels over traditional advertising in 2023. Digital channels offer much more flexibility to respond to what could be a very dynamic market. These channels also offer the opportunity to monitor return on investment at a much more granular level.

“Digital channels offer much more flexibility to respond to what could be a very dynamic market.”

Diversifying your channel advertising is backed by wider data by Partner Analytics who reported that brands who use multiple marketing channels can increase advertising impact by 35%.

Some of the key channels that businesses should be using to reach their customers include:

• Email marketing
• Social media paid advertising
• Google ads
• YouTube
• As well as keeping an eye on platforms that are predicted to dominate more in the future such as TikTok, Pinterest, Twitch and more.

Marketplaces

Giant marketplaces such as Amazon may feel like an intimidating competitor especially for SMEs but there is an opportunity to leverage marketplaces too. 

According to Statista, in May 2022 Amazon.com had approximately 2.4 billion combined desktop and mobile visits. That’s a pretty large audience to ignore however it’s understandable for brands who don’t want to lose more margins to the ecommerce giant than they would with their existing resellers.

It’s worth considering that the marketplace model is universally applicable across industries B2B and B2C. Niche marketplaces such as Farfetch can give smaller sellers a competitive advantage by reaching more audiences and different margin opportunities.

Smart resourcing

There’s a number of ways that you can use your team’s time more efficiently which will ultimately affect your marketing output in a positive way. 

The first is utilising automations especially for repetitive tasks. Technology such as social media management tools, email management platforms and project management tools can give back precious time to your team.

Another way to resource effectively is by engaging with agencies who can offer specialist support on specific areas of your marketing that your core team don’t have time to learn about or manage. This can make scaling your marketing team much easier as well as delivering the best results.

How StudioForty9 can help

We offer a team of experts across every channel at StudioForty9 who can help you to optimise your spend on each channel for improved return on investment. 

We understand that ecommerce and marketing teams are busy keeping up with all the different facets of their marketing strategy and as a result, resourcing specialists across all these different areas is just not possible. 

Our Performance Marketing team at StudioForty9 are here to offer the deep sector expertise you need to optimise your performance across each channel. 

Talk to us about enhancing your business’ performance across email marketing, social media and PPC. Contact info@studioforty9.com for more information.

Photos by Roman Kraft | Eleni Afiontzi | Patrick Perkins on Unsplash

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• Shifts in algorithms, user behaviour and evolving trends mean that businesses will need to adjust their content strategy in 2023
• Our content expert Hollie dissects how you can create a killer content strategy in 2023 taking into account these key changes
• Top tips include using video, reels and eye-catching ads as well as leveraging micro influencers and considering TikTok for your business

Developing a content strategy for social media gets more complex every year. In 2022 alone there were many shifts that nobody could have predicted.

Some of the most notable changes and updates in the social sphere in 2022 include the continued popularity of TikTok and moves to monetise the platform, the reports of a revenue decline of 4% year over year hitting $27.7 billion for Meta and Twitter’s frequent appearance in the news headlines since Elon Musk took over. On top of these changes, there are many new trends and buzzwords such as the Metaverse and Web3 that are simmering in the background for digital marketers.

To help you navigate the changing landscape of social media marketing, we have identified the important algorithms and user behaviour shifts that will impact your strategy in 2023 and how you can be ready for them.

Use our guide to create a killer content strategy that will help you to connect with your audience and drive the best results.

Optimise your content strategy for the new Facebook algorithm

Facebook will be following in TikTok’s footsteps as Mark Zuckerberg himself has stated:

“Right now, about 15 percent of content in a person’s Facebook feed and a little more than that of their Instagram feed is recommended by our AI… We expect these numbers to more than double by the end of next year.”

Mark Zuckerberg

Facebook will be showing more and more recommended content in your feed, meaning you will begin to see less posts from your family and friends. The content that will show up will be from pages and creators recommended by AI, based on your profile interactions and engagements. 

This poses huge opportunities for brands to reach new audiences as the algorithm will be looking to show your best performing posts to even more people & potential customers. Taking all of this into account, our suggestion would be to focus on creating content that is going to generate more engagement such as memes, engaging videos, polls etc.

This will boost your brand awareness resulting in more interactions which may land you a better spot on Facebook’s algorithm.

Focus your content strategy on Instagram reels

Instagram is a huge platform to focus on for your 2023 content strategy. It has recently been reported that Instagram now has up to 2 billion monthly active users. 

Similar to Facebook, Instagram is also playing the ‘keep up with TikTok’ game, meaning there will be even more emphasis on reels creation in 2023. This was confirmed by Instagram’s announcement that reels are their fastest growing content format, so it will be a big one to include in your strategy. 

Here are some tips on how to get started on taking advantage of reels:

Start by selecting your topic

Make sure this is something your current audience will be likely to engage with such as:

• Behind the scenes video of your store
• Meet the owner
• Announcing a new product launch 
• Answering common questions from your audience
• How to content such as styling day-to night outfits, recipes, etc.
• ‘Try on haul’ 
• Product explainer

Don’t dwell on the equipment

A smartphone that can produce a high quality video is all you need. Try to combine with a suitable background, good lighting and proper spacing. 

Make sure you are shooting your video content in the correct format for the platform you intend to post it on. For example always shoot in the vertical if you are posting the video to your Instagram story.

Write a script before shooting

Ensure the best outcome for your work with a little forward planning by writing a script for your video before shooting.
Remember to use your brand’s tone of voice and don’t be afraid to inject a bit of humour. Always make sure your videos are on-brand and instantly recognizable as being you. You can do this by using brand colours, including your logo on the video, or including a prominent brand personality.

Don’t forget the music

Use music that is on trend and still suitable to the brand to make it engaging. Look around at other popular videos for inspiration.

Include a call to action

Consider your goal for doing this content. Do you want them to find out more about the brand? Do you want them to view a certain product on your website? Make sure you are directing the user to where you want them to go.

Grab attention

Finally put your most important information at the start of the video to ensure you don’t lose attention.

Consider how TikTok might fit into your content strategy

Our recommendation for businesses when it comes to TikTok is not to discount it. 

The platform has had a meteoric rise to fame as the most popular app of 2019 and 2020. Statista reported in 2022 that the app had approximately 29.7 million daily active users, this number is growing more and more making it tantalising for brands of all sizes. In 2023 you can expect plenty of brands to attempt to make their stamp on the platform. 

TikTok has reversed the thinking of other social media content strategies as you have to think entertainment first, advertising second. It is important to remember when creating content for TikTok that you cannot simply copy and paste the content that you use in your Instagram or Facebook strategy over and expect it to work. TikTok prides itself on being an entertainment platform, so it will be important to analyse what’s happening on the platform and keep up with current trends when creating your content. 

However it is still important to think of your target audience and whether to spend your valuable time investing in an additional platform. Consider also that older users have started to engage with the platform and many of TikTok’s younger users will transition into financial independence giving it interesting potential for long term strategies.

Recycle your content

Consider how you could experiment with different formats and recycle your content in different ways.
This might mean breaking down content such as a long form blog post into a 200 word informative email with a link to ‘learn more’ directing them to your page. Or for example taking a few important snippets of information from the blog and placing them on appealing graphics to post as a social media carousel. You could also create a video explaining the blog.

These are some of the many different ways of taking one piece of content and recycling it into many different engaging formats, creating more value for you and your customer.

People have various preferences in how they consume content, by repurposing your content and taking advantage of multiple platforms you are maximising your reach. There is no specific formula for repurposing your content, just look at your library and imagine how any piece of content might be reused in a different format.

Authenticity and user generated content strategy

Users craving authenticity has started to dominate as we approach two decades since Facebook was founded. Users have become increasingly savvy during this time and want to see more authentic content, a trend which is expected to continue in 2023. 

According to a 2021 Stackla study 88% of consumers say relatability and authenticity are important factors in their decision to engage with companies and make in-app purchases. With the rise of apps such as BeReal, users are showing their thirst for content that is more in-the moment, behind the scenes, live, and realistic content without filters.

User generated content should also be at the forefront of your mind when creating your strategy. There are plenty of ways that you can take advantage of this such as going live on Instagram to showcase new products in store or to answer a real time Q&A. It can help if you notify your users that you are going live at a scheduled time to maximise the opportunity for engagement. 

Reviews, unboxings and product tutorials has now given customers ‘influencer status’. People will be more likely to buy when they see the brand has been trusted by real customers, so whenever a user takes the time to share a post or story about your page/product, make sure to leverage this by sharing it to your own followers.

Micro influencers

Influencer marketing is a trend that will be even more significant in 2023.

A lot of the smaller businesses and boutiques will be reviewing their marketing budgets in the midst of speculation about economic difficulties. While influencer marketing is a well-known effective strategy for increasing brand awareness, it can be costly. 

This is why reaching out to smaller influencers in your product niche or geographic location will be a more valuable way to spend your budget. Micro influencers have a smaller audience but generally a higher engagement rate, they are trusted by their followers and are more likely to generate results for your campaign especially when you have selected someone who aligns with your brand and values. 

Ways to make the most of this partnership would be to collaborate on a competition post, to get them to review your products, or to participate in a sponsored post. 

Remember to ask them for results insights, metrics such as story views, post likes, engagement rates such as comments etc. This will help you to analyse if the use of your micro influencer works for your content strategy going forward. 

Create quality content for personalised ads on social media

Paid ads do work. One survey featured on Statista shared that 39% of Irish consumers said they bought something after spotting it on social networks. It’s no wonder then that 55.2% of businesses were reported to have made paid ads a priority for their brand in 2022, a trend likely to continue.

Because of the effectiveness of social media ads, the competition is growing. To ensure continued success in your paid ads content strategy, you will need to get creative at forming content that will resonate and stick out from the crowd, this will boost your overall visibility and contribute to a higher conversion rate. 

Make sure you have your Facebook pixel active on-site. This will collect the valuable data that will enable you to create custom warm audiences and retarget your customers with items that they are most interested in and most likely to buy. 

Another tactic would be to create ephemeral content, meaning that the content has a limited timeline and will disappear eg. ‘Shop for this product now, available for two weeks only’ as it creates a sense of FOMO and urgency to engage/buy.

Step up your email content strategy

According to a recent report released by Hubspot, email is a platform you should not skip out on in 2023. Some of their most interesting findings for 2022 show that there are currently 4 billion daily email users, with 77% of brands seeing an increase in their email engagement in the last 12 months.

With social and email platforms getting more and more integrated, it is important to create an omnichannel strategy including both. You can use these platforms to gather as much data on your customers as possible. Social media is mainly focused on brand awareness whereas email is more focused on conversions.

An example of how to integrate the two together to achieve maximum results could be running a competition on social media asking your customers to sign up to email. You will then be able to push new marketing via your newsletter.

Once you have their details in your email channel, you will be able to use this information further to enhance your targeting for paid ads by creating custom and lookalike Facebook audiences.

Create a video content strategy

Amidst all the changes for social media this year, we are predicting that one of the most effective content marketing strategies in 2023 will be video. 
Wyzowl published a survey of marketing professionals and online consumers sharing the following insights:

• 86% of businesses use video as a marketing tool
• 81% of marketers say video has helped them directly increase sales
• 93% of marketers say video has helped them increase brand awareness
• 88% of people say that they’ve been convinced to buy a product or service by watching a brand’s video
• People are twice as likely to share video content with their friends than any other type of content, including social media posts, blog posts/articles and product pages

Video is a highly useful format particularly for brand awareness. Some of the ways in which you can include video in your content strategy are:

• Explainer videos
• Behind the scenes
• Product demo
• Event videos
• In-store updates

Enhance your content strategy with the help of specialists

We understand that ecommerce and marketing teams are busy keeping up with all the different facets of their marketing strategy and as a result, resourcing specialists across all these different areas is just not possible. Our Performance Marketing team at StudioForty9 are here to offer the deep sector expertise you need to optimise your performance across each channel. 

Talk to us about enhancing your business’ performance across email marketing, social media and PPC. Contact info@studioforty9.com for more information.

Images by Brett Jordan | Olivier Bergeron | Disruptivo | Gaining Visuals on Unsplash

The post How to create a killer content strategy in 2023 appeared first on StudioForty9.

A new law was signed into effect on the 28th of November 2022 around product pricing that retailers in Ireland need to be keenly aware of. The law, known as the ‘Price Indication Directive’ was an amendment to the European Union Requirements to Indicate Product Prices Regulations 2022. It is being enforced in Ireland by the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC).

What change will the new EU price indication directive bring?

The key change of the EU price indication directive is in relation to price reductions. The new legislation requires businesses to increase transparency around reduced prices. This change comes amid growing skepticism among consumers over promotions such as Black Friday. A recent survey by the CCPC reported in the Irish Examiner found that over half of those surveyed in Ireland do not trust retailers on whether the discounts displayed in stores and on websites are real.

The key elements of the new legislations are outlined by the CCPC as follows:

• Businesses selling to EU customers will have to show the prior price of a good in the price reduction announcement.
• The prior price is defined as the lowest price applied in the previous 30 days before the price reduction was applied.
• Retailers will need to base any reduction amount on the prior price.
• The announcement must be easily identifiable as referring to the relevant goods, be clearly visible and easy for consumers to read.
• In the case of a sales campaign where there are successive reductions in the price, the prior price you show should be the lowest price before the first of the price reductions was applied.

How does the EU price indication directive apply to general reductions?

The above guidelines refer to specific product price reductions, general price reduction statements carry slightly different obligations. In a general statement such as “20% off everything” the prior price does not have to be included in the announcement itself. However, you must show the prior price for the individual goods on price tags in shops or online. This can be applied to categories too for example “20% all coats”.

Prior prices and sales campaigns

If you apply successive reductions one after the other as part of a sales campaign, you must use the lowest price in the 30 days before the first reduction as the prior price.

• You must gradually reduce the price without interruption.
• It must be part of the same sales campaign.
• The prior price is the same for all price reduction announcements during the campaign.

Example of the new price indication directive in action

The following example taken from Zalando clearly displays the original price of the product.

You’ll find more examples and information on the legislation in the CCPC’s guidelines on the price indication directive.

What happens if a business does not comply with the new price indication directive?

The CCPC strongly encourages businesses to keep records of information relating to price promotions. Businesses who do not comply with the new legislation may be subject to criminal prosecution or a fixed payment notice. Failure to comply can result in a Class A fine.

Where can I find more information about the new directive?

A full outline of the updated legislation has been added to the CCPC website here.

You can also read this statement by the CCPC on the new directive.

Ensuring compliance on your online store and marketing campaigns

We recommend that our clients review their planned promotional campaigns to ensure compliance with the new EU price indication directive. Please reach out to your point of contact at StudioForty9 if changes are required.

Online stores will need to incorporate this prior pricing information to their products if they don’t already have this capability. Please reach out to your point of contact if updates are required.

To learn more about partnering with StudioForty9 for your ecommerce and performance marketing needs, please contact info@studioforty9.com.

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Love it or loathe it, Facebook is the undisputed leader of social advertising. With 2.91 billion users the platform has the potential to reach 36.8% of the entire population of the world and Facebook claim that 72.5% of their total 2.91 billion are active users.

As an ecommerce business, advertising on the platform is vital. However there are many challenges and frustrations with Facebook advertising.

To help you navigate the ins and outs of the platform, our team of Performance Marketing experts have created a Facebook resilience guide with the best advice for solving your problems fast and effectively.

In this blog we will cover the topic of rejected ads on Facebook. Rejected ads are a drain on time and resources and let’s face it, a total pain! In order to save you time and prevent future rejections of your ads, we’re going to cover the most common reasons why they happen, what you can do about it, and how to avoid it in the future.

How do Facebook ads work?

The first thing to highlight is how the review process actually works. 

Typically, an automatic system will evaluate your advertisement. This system checks to see if your advertisement complies with Facebook’s advertising guidelines. The content of your advertisement, including the wording and creative, as well as your targeting and the landing page to which you are sending traffic, are then taken into consideration. 

In the rare event that the technology is unable to detect the status of your ad, it might occasionally be forwarded for manual review. Your audience will see your advertisement on the day you’ve chosen for it to appear if it passes this review process and enters the delivery system. However, you can still complete the steps listed below if it is rejected.

The average turnaround time for this process is around 24 hours, however there are a few things to consider that could affect your schedule. For instance, it could take a lot longer if an advertisement needs to be manually approved.  We suggest complying as closely as you can to the advertising policies in terms of copy, content, graphics, and video in order to avoid this.

The time of year and the account history are two additional variables that may affect the approval time. If you are running advertisements for the first time, we advise sending the ad for review a few days before you intend for it to go live to allow for the extra time.

Accounts that have run campaigns in the past without rejections tend to have a faster review time than new accounts. Finally, even though the system is automated, Black Friday and Christmas tend to increase app use during Q4, so you should allow extra time in case the system becomes overloaded and the review process becomes delayed.

Why do Facebook ads get rejected?

Unfortunately the answer to this is not simple. There are a long list of possibilities why Facebook ads get rejected.

We have put together a list of the most common reasons that we have seen ads get rejected. It’s important to be aware of these reasons so that you will be able to prevent these problems from affecting your future ads. The good news is that most of these issues are relatively simple fixes.

The most common reasons for ads getting rejected are:

Prohibited content:

This following list is never allowed to be advertised on the platform. If your ad includes any of the items from this list, there is nothing you can do to stop it from being rejected: 

Illegal products or services

Tobacco, E-Cigarettes,Vapes

Discriminatory practices against race, religion, sexual orientation, ethnicity

Weapons, ammunition or explosives

Adult products or services 

Some financial services like cryptocurrencies 

Profanity and bad grammar 

Restricted content:

The following topics are allowed to be advertised on Facebook. However there are additional policies you must follow in order for them to run successfully:

Alcohol

Online gambling or gaming

Online pharmacies and prescription drugs

Dating services

Subscription services

Cosmetic procedures

Financial and insurance products or services

Ads with content on politics, social issues or elections

To comply with the policy and pass review, you must adhere to each of these issues’ unique rules, which you should read up on in more detail. To advertise alcohol, for instance, you must make sure the audience is over the local legal drinking age. 

Some additional factors to consider:

Personal attributes:

Ads may not state or imply anything on a person’s race, ethnicity, religion, beliefs, age, sexual orientation or practices, gender identity, physical or mental health condition, financial situation, union membership, criminal history, or other personal characteristics. You cannot identify a user directly in your ad, for example by saying: ‘Shop mobility care items that other customers in their 70’s are using today!’.

Non-existent functionality policy:

Ads cannot feature images of unusable functionality. This includes advertising with features that don’t function, like multiple choice options in the ad creative itself, as well as graphics that mimics play buttons, notifications, or checkboxes.

How to fix rejected Facebook ads?

You have two options to fix rejected Facebook ads. You can edit your advertising to comply with the guideline you broke, or submit an appeal to have the decision reconsidered and have your ads submitted for manual review.

How to request a review of your rejected Facebook ad?

Start by visiting your ‘Account Quality Page’, select the ad account that you would like to review, and within this section you will see the ad/ads that have been rejected along with the various stages of the review process. 

Simply check the box next to the advertisement and click the “request review” button. It will go through the manual review procedure after being submitted to Facebook. You will then have to wait for your ad to be reviewed, and there is no specific timeline as to how long this process will take, but you will be able to continuously check on its progress from inside this same location. 

If the ad passes the review, you will see it pop up in the ‘reversed’ tab, but if the process was unsuccessful, the ad will appear in the ‘unchanged’ tab.

An important point to note is that Facebook claims that requesting reviews will not damage the reputation of your account, and that both the automated system and the manual reviews are subject to error.

If your ad is rejected after this process, there is nothing you can do to set it live again. We would advise you to create a copy of the ad and analyse all factors outlined above, make sure you are adhering to the various policies and try the process again with a new and improved version of your ad.

Mastering Facebook ads for your store

We understand that ecommerce and marketing teams are busy keeping up with all the different facets of their marketing strategy and as a result resourcing specialists across all these different areas is just not possible. Our Performance Marketing team at StudioForty9 are here to offer the deep sector expertise you need to optimise your performance across each channel. 

Talk to us about enhancing your business’ performance across email marketing, social media and PPC. Contact info@studioforty9.com for more information.

Photos by Brett Jordan | JESHOOTS.COM on Unsplash

The post Facebook Resilience: What to do about rejected ads appeared first on StudioForty9.

Shopify Unite is a yearly event where developers get together in London for two days of learning about the latest trends and technologies in ecommerce. StudioForty9 attended with the goal of learning from other developers and bringing home insights that will be useful for our team and clients.

Shopify is constantly working towards making the experience better for the customer and the merchant. With Shopify Plus, it’s possible to create an entire ecommerce business with all the tools you need in one place. However, the world of commerce is constantly changing and it can be hard to keep on top of it all. Shopify Unite offers the chance to see what updates and trends are going to dominate the future. 

Get the heads up below from our team on some key updates learned from the event that will be important over the coming year.

Content Platform

Content Platform on Shopify is the next step in making Shopify an all-in-one solution for ecommerce. It will significantly improve Shopify’s ability to handle non-standard ecommerce data (e.g., FAQs, Recipes, etc.)

The Content Platform will allow merchants to:

• Define custom data types (e.g. a Recipe)
• Define multiple custom data inputs (e.g. Ingredient, Method Step, Calories) for each data type
• Link these custom entities to Products / Collections / etc.

StudioForty9 have signed up for the Content Platform beta so we can be among the first to know and understand how it works and provide early feedback to Shopify.

Making checkout better for merchants and customers

Shopify is working to make checkout easier for merchants and customers. New checkout UI extensions are available to Shopify Plus merchants as of October 3, 2022.

• In the Shopify admin, merchants can now use the checkout editor to place a checkout UI extension in the checkout experience.
• Being able to customize the Shopify checkout, including accelerated checkouts such as ShopPay, without having to manually edit the checkout liquid file will provide a more reliable, consistent and more seamless experience for checkout customisation.
• Merchants can use the extensions to capture additional input from customers and show a product offer before customers check out.
• The updates are expected to enable Click&Collect using ShopPay or other express payment methods.
• The updates could present a more seamless and intuitive approach to Customer Loyalty and post purchase offers.

StudioForty9 are leading Shopify experts as the first agency to become a Shopify Plus Partner in Ireland.

Helping you to evolve your ecommerce strategy is at the core of what we do. We understand that businesses need to keep up with the constantly changing world of online retail and we can help you to deliver the best possible online experience for your customers.

We’re proud to be one of a leading Shopify partner and hope that this article has given you a glimpse into what’s coming next for your store. 

If you want to know more about how StudioForty9 can help your business grow, reach out today via email on info@studioforty9.com.

The post Shopify Unite Insights: What’s coming next for your Shopify store? appeared first on StudioForty9.