6 Key Success Factors for Your Online Shop
What are the key issues that online retailers should resolve to prosper? We identified five key areas that will help you to enhance your profits.
Think with Google is a great resource for online shops that are looking to grow. There’s no doubt the search engine giant that is the "backbone" of the entire internet can provide great insights to shop owners. Let’s dive deeper into one of their most recent learning platforms: Think with Google.
What is Think with Google?
So, let’s start at the beginning: What exactly is Think with Google?
According to the “About Think with Google” page, this site is all about:
- Compelling data
- Big ideas
- Creative juice
With a focus on marketing, Think with Google shares all kinds of interesting data, analysis, and insights for online marketers and DIY shop owners in the e-commerce industry.
You can think of Think with Google as the spiritual successor to Google’s “Grow My Store” site, which no longer exists.
If you’re a small shop focused on your local market, you can explore insights for certain countries/regions. For example, for those interested in the UK market, you can explore their dedicated page for the United Kingdom.
Otherwise, you can explore different regions. This is perfect for growing businesses that are planning to expand into new markets (there's also a tool for that, which we'll discuss below). Simply click on the globe in the navigation and choose the region that applies to your situation:
The different sections of Think with Google
At the top of the page, you’ll be greeted with a featured article, usually a “feature of the week”.
Once you scroll down, you’ll be greeted by four sections:
- Consumer Insights
- Marketing Strategies & Innovations
- In-Depth Reading
- Tools
However, in the navigation, “In-Depth Reading” is replaced by “Future of Marketing”, which can also be found in the footer. We’ll cover both of these sections below.
As you can see in the image above, each of these sections can be broken down into sub-categories. Google has done their best to cover a wide range of marketing topics.
Consumer Insights
On the homepage, we see a preview of Consumer Insights articles. These articles cover consumer-based topics from around the world. Some of these are classic articles, some are case studies, while others can be simple infographics.
The sub-category “Consumer Journey” explores data and other insights into consumer behaviour throughout the purchase journey. Considering many product searches begin on Google, we can be sure these articles are unique and insightful.
Similarly, the other sub-category, “Consumer Trends” dives deeper into search behaviour and other popular topics concerning popular trends.
Marketing Strategies
A mix of case studies, interviews, articles, and reports, this section dives deeply into marketing strategies for online and offline businesses. It provides new tools, expert opinions, and other insights.
The sub-categories here are broken down into quite a few different sections.
AI (artificial intelligence) is at the top of the list for obvious reasons. Here, readers can read about new advancements in AI, particularly as it pertains to online marketing.
Next on the list is App & Mobile. Google has acknowledged the importance of mobile devices for a while now. With consumers around the globe shifting to mobile purchases when shopping online, Google has even prioritised mobile sites over their desktop counterparts when it comes to ranking factors.
Recommended reading:
5 Reasons to Make Sure Your Website Is Mobile-responsive
If you’re big on numbers, statistics, and analytics, then the sub-category “Data & Measurement” is for you.
The sub-category “Retail” should be interesting to anyone reading this article (i.e. shop owners). With a focus on both online and offline, omni-channel strategies are a big highlight here.
What made Google famous? Their search engine of course. It is still their most important product and where they make billions of dollars in advertising with Google Ads. The “Search” sub-category focuses on insights into the Google search engine.
Following “Search” is another crown jewel in the Google product line: YouTube. In this sub-category, you’ll get insights into the latest trends and creative strategies of the world's most famous video platform.
Recommended reading:
How to Use YouTube for Your Online Shop
Future of Marketing
As you might have guessed, the "Future of Marketing" category deals with the latest innovations in the world of online marketing.
Shutterstock/StockLite
What better place to start than with the “Creativity” sub-category? It takes creativity to inspire shoppers. Find that inspiration with case studies, articles, reports and other stories.
The digital transformation is not yet complete. In this sub-category, Think with Google explores some of the latest advances in digital marketing, ranging from AI and machine learning to data analysis.
“Diversity & Inclusion” is the sub-category filled with articles, case studies, and perspectives on everything related to diversity and equity.
The “Emerging Technology” sub-category covers exactly what it describes. While “Management & Culture” dives deeper into the inner workings of businesses, allowing retailers to get introspective.
“Privacy & Trust” is a sub-category that dives into the topics of data privacy and how important trust is when it comes to such topics.
As useful as Think with Google is, remember that Trusted Shops creates content that covers everything to do with trust in e-commerce (and more!). Explore our blog and check out our library of whitepapers, checklists and other downloadable content by clicking below:
In-Depth Reading
This is the section found on the homepage, but it is not in the main menu (remember?). "In-Depth Reading" provides links to “collections” of content about the same topic. For example, you might find country guides here with a collection of 5 or 6 articles (e.g. “Focus on Canada”), but also general topics and other collections (e.g. “Back to Basics”, a collection of articles covering the fundamentals of marketing).
Tools
The last section in the menu (and homepage) is the “Tools” category. Here, you’ll have access to three main tools:
Insights Finder
With this tool, you’ll be able to understand your audience’s interests and learn about new search trends.
Google Trends
This popular tool works very easily. Enter a search term along with a few other filters and then get a graphic that displays the search volume for that term over a period of time that you specify. This can, for example, help you pick up on search trends for certain products and their interest throughout the year. This could then impact inventory and marketing decisions.
Market Finder
This tool helps growing companies decide on which markets they want to explore next. Simply enter some basic information about your business into the tool and watch it do its magic:
Conclusion
Google is always developing new systems and new resources for its users to make use of. These days, it is “Think with Google”. Make sure to check it out. There will certainly be something interesting there for you to learn about and improve the performance of your online (and offline) shop.
