My client will kill me for revealing these secrets. Lol
In this case study, I’d like to share how Nichee Digital was able to help two eco-friendly eCommerce brands dominate their niche. I worked with this client for almost two years before the pandemic hit. And our sustainable campaigns are an eye-opener for me.
Here’s what you will find here:
- Digital Marketing Strategies
- All-in SEO strategies
- Proof of Business Growth
Yes, your welcome.
I’m not spilling ALL the beans, though!
So chill, sit tight and relax. It’ll be a long ride.
Here's what you will learn:
Client Background:
Last September 2018, I found this client on an online freelance platform. He’s a solopreneur running his start-up digital marketing agency. He founded a small team all from my country, the Philippines. From then on, our team helped Amazon and Shopify clients in their business needs.
We’re a small but mighty team of 5. So we’re juggling 4-5 brands – two eCommerce eco brands are personally owned by my client, and the rest are outsourced.
- Client – Owner, CEO, Founder. He’s the brain of us all!
- Admin – Do all the HR works, payroll, bonus, tracking, project management etc.
- Creative – Do all the graphics and videos for the shop, website and social media.
- Content – Do all the copywriting, blogs, social media captions, ebook and more.
- Digital Marketing (me) – Do all the SEO, customer support, basic canva graphics, social media post scheduling, affiliate outreach, Amazon inventory, run discount coupons, shop management and so much more.
I do most of the organic campaigns while my client does the paid ones.
Yes, I know. We’re all the jack of all trades. Especially for me, I kind of test all the waters of digital marketing. That’s what I’m genuinely grateful for; because of him, I was able to develop A LOT of skills. Unfortunately, when, pandemic hit, he decided to lay us off.
But up to this date, I still carry his leadership and values along with me. Thank you, boss!
Digital Marketing Strategies
SEO is part of the company’s organic digital marketing strategy, but I created a separate section because it’s my fave. Lol. Okay, seriously, here are some of the digital marketing strategies that give us massive sales.
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Branding
Pro tip: Your branding should be clear as the summer daylight.
Before global warming, ofc, kidding!
Branding is not only a logo and mood board. It is having a clear customer persona, on-point problem-solving product, and exceptional brand feel. If these are all over the place, then you’re wasting your money and time. My client reminds us to always stick to our brand persona. The content creation, packaging, designs, marketing strategies, niche site, competitors, and more aligns with our brand.
If you’re unsure who your target audience is, try to check your Facebook page’s analytics on People Reached and People Engaged data. Here are our audience insights:
Our audience’s gender, age demographics, country, city, and language are all there.
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Influencer marketing
Influencer marketing is a booming industry today. Influencers are the new celebrities of the digital world. Include this technique in boosting your brand. If your brand ambassador or ambassadress targets your audience, you’ll get brand awareness on a larger scale. More than the numbers, make sure that your brand and your ambassador’s value are aligned.
Pro tip: Hire an influencer who is fair and not too salesy.
Another tricky thing in influencer marketing is the platform. Make sure the celebs are dominant on the social media platform where your prospect is hanging out. Like fashion works on Instagram, and DIY works on YouTube.
Here are some of our YouTube influencer unboxing videos:
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Paid and Organic Marketing
In digital marketing, you need to invest in witnessing business growth. May it be an investment for tools, skills, ads, placement, and others. Paid and organic marketing strategies work hand in hand. Sure, you can focus on one, but having a balance can make so much difference.
We use Pay-per-click or PPC campaigns as our paid marketing plan. We run Amazon ads to boost our Amazon listing; Social Media ads for brand awareness and engagement, and Google ads to skyrocket our website.
But digital buyers are now skeptical of paid ads.
They know how algorithms work. Buyers understand that we’re tracking their purchases and searches. We can’t fool them anymore. And did I mention there’s a massive ad account suspension because marketers are not following these (nonsense) TOC?
Yes, I feel ya.
Here’s where organic marketing (like SEO, content creation, branding, networking) comes in. To balance your eCommerce marketing and save you from spending too much money on paid ads. Unlike paid ads, organic strategies’ growth is slow yet sustainable. It requires consistency and time.
If done right, search engine optimization or SEO can help you dominate your niche. You can build a solid following, so you don’t have to pay for ads to promote your product and services.
Customers will search for you.
Here’s what I mean with the balance between paid and organic marketing. Clients are coming from the different digital platforms:
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Customer Experience
Do you know why Google and Amazon are successful? It is because they always put their users and customers FIRST. They always provide exceptional processes and software updates to meet our needs. Amazon offers an A-to-Z guarantee to protect its customers. On the other hand, Google emphasizes search intent and searcher’s website experience.
As for us, we treat our customers like VIPs. We replied to all customer reviews and comments because we want them to feel heard. We processed the return and refund fairly. We optimize our website for excellent user experience (UX) and navigation. We also do after-sales support and marketing, like tips, referrals, loyalty discounts, and coupons.
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Mission
The mission is part of branding. But in this section, I’d like to point out why my client’s brand is the best. The two e-commerce brand mission is sustainability. Using a straight razor in shaving can save you from buying a cheap plastic razor. My client is a surfboard enthusiast, so he manufactures sustainable surfboards to be one with nature.
Others abuse this mission by greenwashing. Greenwashing is a deceitful gimmick in promoting one’s business and posting and producing false product information about sustainability to boost their business morale.
If you’re not true to your mission, you’ll fail.
All-in SEO Strategies
Alright! Let’s start with our search engine optimization (SEO) strategies.
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Technical SEO
Technical optimization is making sure your files, codes, and overall back-end are in excellent health. For an eCommerce website with categories and blogs, it is essential to make sure it’s crawlable to search engine robots. The client already set up all the indexation, so I focused on fixing the meta tags, H1, 404 errors, missing files, and creating healthy internal linking across the store. Page speed is also a priority.
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On-page SEO
On-page optimization, on the other hand, refers to frontend optimization. Keyword research is a must for on-site SEO. We nailed down the search intent of our users, the reason why we provide a well-optimized product page, images, and blog post. Aside from user experience, on-page SEO also emphasizes crawlers. On-site keywords help search engine spiders understand what your website is all about.
Here’s a screenshot of our blog tracker; crazy how we got the TOP ARTICLE spot in less than a month of optimization. The yellow ones are well-optimized and are ranking 1st page.
And here’s the actual screenshot of the 1st page ranking on Google with optimized image and snippet. Note that page rankings are subject to change. I was feeling lucky to capture this moment.
Date: May 2, 2020
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Off-page SEO
Off-page optimization is any SEO effort outside of your eCommerce website. It includes social media SEO, partnership, affiliate, guest posting, press release, and so much more. I remember I also optimized the Amazon keyword using Helium and Jungle Scout tools. We’re getting great sales both from our Amazon account and Shopify store.
Check out the screenshot below, how our website blog and Pinterest dominate an evergreen money keyword. It is not keyword cannibalization because it’s not coming from the same page. The proof or ranking below is what I called “DOMINATION.” (wink)
Here’s our social media growth and website clicks according to later.com:
Proof of Business Growth
Client Feedback
