Cracking the E-commerce Code with CPG

50% of CPG industry growth is projected to come from e-commerce in 2020.

This rapid increase has caused many CPG brands to want their share of the e-commerce pie.

Some organizations have jumped feet first into the pool and built out full e-commerce teams. However, most organizations task one or two “fortunate” individuals to crack the e-commerce code on top of their daily workload as marketers. This can be a daunting task to take on, especially if it’s the brand's first experience with e-commerce. So where do you start?

Here are five steps to take when trying to crack the e-commerce code.

1. Assess your resources

This includes assets and internal talent. It’s likely that company-wide you have access to most of, if not all of the assets you need to get started. For example, that great recipe post on Instagram from your brand team can be used in your arsenal of e-commerce greatness (more on that later). Reach across departments to see what is available for you to repurpose.

Additionally, tap into your internal talent and expertise. While you dream of assembling a dream team of experts, it’s likely you have to prove out e-commerce before the additional investment can be made. That doesn’t mean that you can’t tap into someone on your sales team for perspective or vice versa for shopper marketing.

2. Prioritize your retailers

You may feel pressured to try to cover as many retailers as possible, but start with your top two or three. These can be retailers who are driving the most volume as a percentage of total sales; retailers you know you need to win with from an omnichannel perspective; or retailers with whom you already have a great relationship, who may be open to collaboration to share data and crack the code together.

3. Get your house in order

If you put a house up for sale, you want to make sure it’s staged perfectly (or clean, at the very least) before bringing in new buyers. The same goes for your product pages. Ensure your shopper has all the pertinent information they need to convert. This includes clearly visible nutrition and ingredient labels, informative

product descriptions like pack size, weight, etc. and product photos. Remember, the online shopper doesn’t have the benefit of picking it up and examining it or seeing the scale next to other products. Fluffy ad copy won’t work here. This is all sales. One of the most common mistakes on product pages is not utilizing the full amount of copy available. This page is your package, your signage, your billboard. Make the most of it.

If you do outsource, any SEM/SEO company can guide you. If you’re going at it alone, Profitero has great free tools and resources for building the perfect page. Once you’ve mastered the fundamentals, look at other content to really help you sell. Remember that social recipe content? It can be used here to inspire!

4. Implement a discoverability strategy

Now that your page is optimized for conversion, you need to make sure you can be found by those who are looking for you. Gone are the days where strategic “keyword stuffing” propelled you to the top of search listings. This is where most organizations look for outside guidance to navigate bidding on branded, category, contextual terms.

Depending on how competitive your category is, this is easier for some than others. First, ensure you show up for your branded and category keywords at the very least. Next, in the face of competition—doors can be opened to creativity. One of the benefits of e-commerce is that it allows for more moments of discoverability than in store. Does your product X pair perfectly with product Y to make the perfect summer dessert? Place your ads in the pairing category. (Bonus points if you can do a retailer-specific cross-basket analysis to place your ads alongside the baskets/categories that have the highest affinity).

5. Implement a media campaign

Utilize a paid media campaign to drive on and off-site traffic to your products. Depending on your category, this can include everything from influencers and social commerce to tried-and-true paid search. The good news is with digital, every conversion is measurable, and you’ll quickly discover what is moving the needle and what isn’t.

E-commerce for CPG is the code everyone is trying to crack. Build with the fundamentals and keep in mind, this landscape is always changing so one of the most important things you can do is be flexible. What worked today may not work tomorrow. What works for one category may be drastically different from another. Test, learn, optimize and apply. Keep looking for new, creative ways to get in front of your shopper.