🔥 $100 million in 2 years

It’s Wednesday and that means it’s time for Morning Commerce.

Grab a coffee and settle in because here’s what’s coming up:

• $100 million in 2 years: A conversion deep-dive on a highly optimised Shopify store

• Where ecommerce brands are investing marketing budgets in 2023

• How trust is still evolving in e-commerce (three main challenges to provide trustworthy online shopping experiences)

• Shopify’s new marketing reports

• And 5 major trends in retail and ecommerce

Today’s issue is brought to you by Nerdify.

Hot Links

Acquisition

• Is it time to recalibrate your marketing budget? Here’s where ecomm leaders are investing the most—and least—in 2023 (article)

• At Shoptalk, brands were cautiously optimistic about AI (article)

• 5 major trends in retail and ecommerce (report)

Conversion

• How trust is still evolving in e-commerce (article)

• Defining Tone: Examples and how brands convey tone (article)

• Over 50% of US consumers cannot name a brand that is making a difference when it comes to the environment or diversity (article)

Email Marketing

• Saleing into summer: most consumers want email offers now (article)

Shopify News

• Chaos Monkey: We look at Shopify’s new ‘culture of focus’ (article)

• Supercharge your decision-making power with Shopify’s marketing insights (article)

Inspo of the Week

Native is the subject of our “$100 million in 2 years” conversion deep dive so it’s only fitting they also get the nod for inspo of the week. Great product photos, bold colours contrasted with stark white, and dozens of little conversion-boosting elements make it a site worth studying.

$100 million in 2 years

Native deodorant was launched in 2015.

On day one, they sold just a single product.

Two years later, they sold to Procter & Gamble for $100 million cash.

At that time they were making $1 million in profit per month from their online store and hadn’t sold a single stick of deodorant outside of DTC.

Moiz Ali, the founder, stresses the importance of a customer feedback loop and constant iteration making your product and marketing better and better over time.

For example, he admits their product was mediocre when it launched.

But he emailed every single customer and said:

“You got a stick of Native deodorant. Love to know what you think about it. If you love the product, please leave a review on our site. If you don’t, reply to this email and tell us what you don’t like, and we’ll try to fix it.”

And fix it they did.

Within 18 months of launching, they were on version 24 of the product. They listened to their customers, improved the product based on real-world feedback, and changed their marketing to focus on what customers cared about.

This iteration process extended from product development to the website.

Meng Li, VP of Marketing at Native, said this about their approach:

“The site was very much performance-based. Because the site was conversion focused, we updated it frequently and the site was very dynamic. We ran lots of CRO tests.“

I recently did a deep dive on the Native mobile site and discovered a number of subtle conversion optimisation strategies I’ve not seen on other sites.

Here are my notes…

Home

• Announcement bars work great on desktop but often get cut off on mobile. The normal solution is either to let the text break over multiple lines or turn it into a little slider and scroll through the messages. Neither is ideal. Native solves this with a “See All Offers“ link which pops up a full-screen modal showing each offer in all its glory.

• Copy is on point. The main headline offers a positive outcome while the subhead calls out their ideal client and gives both a positive/towards and negative/away benefit.

• Benefit icons above the fold and focus on the three core things people care about when shopping. Shipping, discounts, and returns.

• “Give 20% Get 20%“ floating button is the right combination of tantalizing and vague to get you to click. This sends you to a dedicated opt-in page with an offer to share with your friends. They collect your email and your friend’s email and send them a 20% off coupon. When they purchase you also get 20% off.

• Mind reading. The home page layout does a fantastic job of reading the mind of the shopper and presenting the right information at the right time.

  • The hero offer is balanced with info on free shipping, signup discount, and free returns.

  • The “our picks” section is immediately followed by product USP info; “naturally derived ingredients“, “cruelty free & vegan“, “over 50,000 5-star reviews“, “born in the USA“.

  • The best sellers section is backed up with reviews.

  • And the subscription section is followed by a beautifully curated Instagram feed showing the product in the real world.

• New products are highlighted in the menu. People like new so bring them front and centre!

Collection

• The collection description is simple but gets the job done. Backed up immediately with a reminder about free shipping and easy returns.

• Products are split up into sections based on the customer’s goals.

• Every product section has a drop-down selector to easily move directly to the category you’re interested in.

• Product images change based on the variant selected.

• Travel-size products are highlighted via a dark blue banner.

• It’s a simple product, and all the info you need is right here on the collection page, so adding to cart directly saves a click.

Product

• Reviews are the very first thing you see. All the hard work of emailing every single customer asking for a review has clearly paid off.

• Free shipping and easy returns notices are once again prominently displayed right under the add to cart button.

• Product description starts with big-picture benefit icons — “simple ingredients”, “made without sulphates”, “paraben free”, “vegan & cruelty free“.

• “Tell me more” section uses accordions to show more info only to those who need it while keeping the rest of the page streamlined.

• Ingredients are spelled out and scary chemical-sounding words are demystified with simple explanations.

• “You’re gonna like these too“ product recommendations use a direct add-to-cart button which makes bumping up your average cart value a super simple affair.

• Ask us anything section at the end of the page acts as a catch-all for misc questions that perhaps don’t deserve mentioning in the main copy but you want to address.

Cart

• Cart tells me either how far away I am from free shipping, or that I qualify for free shipping.

• Another reminder about free & easy returns. (How many times have they mentioned free shipping and free & easy returns? 😉 )

• The ability to enter a discount code before going through checkout helps ease confusion and lets me see my total right away.

• In-cart upsell for $3 is a no-brainer and an easy AOV bump.

See something I missed on the Native site? Hit reply and let me know.

And if you enjoyed this issue please share it with a friend.

Together we rise!

How we can help…

🔥 Looking for an experienced Shopify Partner to work with? 
Smart ecommerce brands rely on us for innovative design, development, optimisation, and growth strategies to create highly profitable Shopify websites. Work with our consultancy.

🎯 Want to reach our audience? Hit reply to discuss advertising.