Walmart vs Amazon: 8 Ways To Get Customers First

Don’t Compete In The Walmart vs Amazon Arena, Use Them To Your Advantage To Get Customers!

Being an online seller also means competing in the global arena with Walmart vs Amazon, which sell for a fraction of the cost.

Walmart vs Amazon means either giant offers faster shipping, but take a large cut of seller’s profits, too.

These business practices are not often sustainable for small businesses.

So, how can you get customers to buy directly from you instead of vying with Walmart vs Amazon?

There are eight ways to get customers to purchase from you instead of them because the Internet has become an incredible tool to help the small business.

You can build customer bases and sell to nearly anyone in the world by using these giant marketplaces without worrying about their global distribution hassles.

8 Ways To Get Customers To Purchase From You Instead Of Them

1. Use Walmart Vs Amazon To Your Advantage

While selling on your own site is preferred, selling some or all of your items on Walmart and Amazon is the best of three worlds.

Don’t hate the retail giants or the game; use their sales marketplace to your advantage.

While Walmart vs Amazon does not allow you to directly send customers to your website for the purpose of making a purchase, you can send them to your site for things like instructional videos or more information about the product they’ve purchased.

Some small companies only sell a limited part of their inventory on Walmart and/or Amazon, relying on those instructional videos to send customers to their site or store to find the rest of what they might be looking for.

2. Invest In Blog Collaboration, Sponsored Posts And Advertising

As consumers, we have all become accustomed to Amazon’s targeted advertising.

And, it’s undeniably effective.

Unlike Walmart, Amazon uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning to target people based on their Internet searches.

Small business owners may not have the funds to compete with that sort of advertising, but word of mouth will only carry you so far on the Internet, especially when you’re competing with giants like Amazon and Walmart.

However, you don’t need to go in the red, but investing in blog collaboration, sponsored posts and lifestyle blog advertising can help make all the difference.

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3. Engage Your Customers

It’s impossible for a business, regardless of its size, to grow and thrive in today’s marketplace without a website and social media presence.

For example, Amazon’s site was responsible for more than 60% of the 2020 spike in online sales and the company accounted for more than 50% of the U.S’s total digital sales in the past year alone.

As a small business, use this to your advantage.

Engage with your customers on various social media platforms and encourage them to use your site–even if you list items on Amazon, too.

Send them to your website first.

If they decide to switch to Amazon from there, there isn’t much you can do about it.

But, you can give them the opportunity to work with you first.

Don’t have a website?

4. Offer First-Purchase Incentives On Your Website

Have you ever opened a website, only to be confronted by a wheel of fortune that you can spin for discounts or even free stuff, in exchange for entering your email address or signing up for a mailing list?

These first-purchase incentives are a great way to entice people to buy with you because it’s not something that you find on sites like Walmart and Amazon.

5. Create A Blog Collaboration Referral Program

Blog collaboration referral programs are a fantastic way to encourage lifestyle bloggers to shop with you and reward them for suggesting your site to their audience as well.

In recent years, blog collaboration referral programs have been called the most valuable form of marketing.

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Blog collaboration referral programs can cost almost to nothing, compared to commercial blogs, if you do them right, but they bring all sorts of leads that may translate to sales.

6. Use Lifestyle Blogs And Mailing Lists

Lifestyle blogs and mailing lists are as much an art as a science.

But for online sellers, collaborating with lifestyle bloggers and maintaining a mailing list are invaluable tools.

These give you what you need to communicate with your audience without expecting them to come to your website everyday looking for information.

Having a sale?

Launching a new product or product line?

Work with a lifestyle blogger to post your sponsored content!

They will send out an email to their subscriber list announcing your post so you don’t have to.

Having this open line of communication with sitelinks on their blog can help you bring customers to your site because it gives you the ability to stay in touch with anyone who might be interested in your products.

7. Have A Sale

One of the best ways to get a customer’s attention is to have a sale.

Having perpetual sales isn’t a sustainable business model, but having them on a regular basis, and making a point to inform your customers about it, can help encourage them to make a purchase on your site instead of going to the Walmart vs Amazon arenas.

You may have something a customer is interested in, but it’s a little out their price range.

So, they’ll follow you on social media and wait for a sale.

That’s your opportunity to convert them from an Amazon and/or Walmart shopper.

8. Offer Free Samples

The pandemic has killed free samples in places like Costco, but everyone loves getting stuff for free!

Not all types of online sales are conducive to free samples.

However, if you have the ability to do so, free samples can be a great way to let people try your product before they decide to buy.

See #8: Offer Purchase Incentives On Your Website

This is particularly useful for online stores selling things like soaps, candles, or perfume.

“Try before you buy” has become a popular tool for online sellers, and you may find it brings in a lot of conversions simply because free samples aren’t a thing on Walmart and Amazon sites.

Wrapping It Up

Walmart vs Amazon is a huge tug of war over which retail giant will get the lions share of the eCommerce market.

Nevertheless, there is an overlap of consumer loyalty because customers can comparison shop for the best price, free shipping and hassle-free returns.

Basically, those are the same three things you must adapt to because these giants are the first stops for most Internet shoppers.

Thus, rerouting them to your website can be a giant feat if you don’t use these eight ways to get customers to purchase from you instead of them.

The best advice I can give you is: Get to the customer first!

You may always come in second, but if you Invest In Blog Collaboration, Sponsored Posts And Advertising, you will have the advantage of getting new customers.

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