The 3 “Pre-Sells” Required to Make Every Ecommerce Sale
Eager to increase your ecommerce sales but unsure where to start? The secret lies in understanding the psychology of your customers.
Many ecommerce brands forget to consider the importance of cultivating customer interaction and building rapport with site visitors. They simply set up generic websites to show off their products and hope for purchases.
But the key to increasing conversion rates and maximizing traffic is to dig deeper into the psychological factors that influence your customers’ purchasing decisions.
Three psychological factors impact every buyer’s decision. By identifying and addressing each, you accomplish crucial “pre-sells” that win you the actual sale.
For more tips on understanding your customers, check out Tips to Keep Your Customers Coming Back and Not All Customers Are Created Equal.
In this post, we outline what these three “pre-sells” are and provide practical strategies to increase your ecommerce sales successfully.
Leverage Your Customer’s Psychology With 3 Ecommerce Pre-Sells
Marketing is tapping into behavioral psychology to influence business success. Understanding what makes your customers tick and knowing their mindset is crucial for unlocking massive opportunities.
Sure, a beautiful website with catchy emails and trendy ads helps, but getting customers to buy requires hitting specific ecommerce “pre-sells.” Align these elements properly, and you’ll see sales improve.
Ecommerce Pre-Sell #1: Emotional — Sell the Heart
The Emotional Sell
We know emotions drive actions. Just think about all the irrational things people buy in the heat of the moment and regret later. Emotion is the fuel for these purchases. If you elicit a strong emotion, you give the customer the energy they need to make a purchase.
Now, about that buyer’s remorse. A strong emotional response can grab a sale on its own, but you don’t want your customers to regret their interaction with your company. So, while the emotional sell is important, it isn’t the only pre-sell you need.
Some customer types are more emotional than others. Always be sure to dig into your customer avatars and understand their values to sell effectively.
How to Create an Emotional Sell
Your brand’s story and purpose are the groundwork for creating an emotional pre-sell. They’re the ingredients used to build your company’s brand, which you leverage in your individual products to elicit strong customer emotions.
Branding can be purpose-driven (for example, some companies are created based on a give-back model), but it doesn’t have to be. The best brands decide what emotions they want to create in their customers and then intentionally craft their website experience and marketing to create those feelings.
Whether it’s excitement, confidence, adventure, inspiration, or something else, decide on the feeling you want to elicit and build your brand and marketing around it.
When it comes to your product, make sure the emotional sell continues to shine through. Remind customers of your brand’s “why.” Paint a picture for them of how your product will change their lives.
Ecommerce Pre-Sell #2: Logical — Sell the Mind
The Logical Sell
Emotion may drive action, but logic drives decisions. It backs up the action someone wants to take.
We’re all familiar with the feeling of wanting something and then analyzing product details and customer reviews to rationalize the desire to make a purchase. The logical sell brings that information forward to ease this step for the customer.
How to Create a Logical Sell
This is where product features and benefits, trust-building factors (customer reviews, warranties, guarantees), and irresistible offers (your value stack) come into play. These all sell to the logical side of your customers’ minds.
The way you lay out this information is important. For example, your product detail page design should be intuitive, not distracting or overwhelming.
For specific guidance, check out our guide, The Perfect Product Detail Page.
Ecommerce Pre-Sell #3: Time-Based — Create Urgency
The Time-Based Sell
You already know that most visitors won’t hit “add to cart.” Customers’ lives are full of distractions, and most humans are procrastinators. So even if you nail the emotional and logical sell, you still lose people.
This is where the time-based sell comes into play. You set deadlines that create a sense of urgency and motivate customers to make their purchase promptly.
The time-based sell doesn’t mean being dishonest; it means being transparent. Ask yourself, “If I believe this product is important to a customer who needs it, how can I help them get past procrastination and click purchase?”
How to Create a Time-Based Sell
Timed offers, such as limited-time discounts, sales, or promotions, certainly create urgency. However, you don’t always have to use discounts. Other time-based strategies include countdown timers, deadlines, and banners like “Limited Quantities” or “Going Fast.”
Try creative and persuasive messaging to communicate an urgency that evokes emotions. For example, for a skincare product, say, “Don’t spend another day wishing for a clearer complexion.” For amazing drink ware, remind customers, “Life’s too short to drink your coffee cold.”
Boost Your Ecommerce Sales With Pre-Sells
To implement the three ecommerce pre-sells, consider what customers are thinking as they consider whether to purchase your product. By understanding these factors and addressing each effectively, you’ll be able to implement a strong pre-sell strategy that works for your unique business.
To ensure each ecommerce pre-sell is presented well and in the proper balance on your site, don’t miss our limited-time free guides: The Perfect Ecommerce Website Series. We’ve taken over a decade of experience building high-converting ecommerce stores and developed strategic templates for the most important pages on your site.
Other related articles to help increase your ecommerce revenue include Design Your Website for These Types of Online Shoppers and Start Selling Value.
