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You may have seen ‘trending’ video and memes, but have you ever considered trending products and how these might be relevant for your business? From influencer marketing to competitor websites, jumping on these trends and understanding them is something every small business owner should consider in their marketing strategy.
Capitalising on this demand doesn’t just help your business stay relevant. It can also boost sales and promote your products. With Square Online you can start selling trending products with no monthly costs until you make a sale.
Research Trending Consumer Demand
To get ahead of the curve you might want to carry out product analytics to identify upcoming trends and consumer demand. By researching your target customer and demand trends, you can choose products which will satisfy the needs of your customers and encourage them to buy.
Selling products which align with current trends, including selling wholesale, is a recipe for success, whether that be seasonal themed products or items which are relevant to current affairs, such as face masks.
Look at historical consumer trends
A crucial element of analysing trends is performing keyword searches and using search engine optimisation (SEO) to guide your marketing strategy. New niches can be short-term so it’s important not to rely on them. Historical, long-term trends can better shape your business goals.
Use Google Trends to research keywords, brand names and topics and identify how they have performed over a period of time. You can also compare trends of competing products.
Evaluate best sellers across merchant platforms
Another way to decide which products to sell online is by looking at the best-selling items on merchant platforms such as eBay, Etsy, Amazon etc. If you can see an alignment of similar products across multiple platforms, this may indicate a trend you can capitalise on. Do you have any products which can compete by being cheaper or having faster delivery?
It’s also worth keeping an eye on B2B marketplaces that will show trending products.
Look to blogs and publications keeping track of trends
If researching product trends is too daunting, fear not. Check out different blogs and online publications which are doing the leg work for small businesses and start-ups. They offer quality information about consumer trends including free newsletters with trend data, worldwide contributions and online communities full of people who share trending products with each other.
You’ll still need to assess which of these products are most relevant for your target consumer, but these resources are a great start.
Pay attention to influencer product trends
Social media may not be part of your business strategy, but you may want to join the 67% of brands that use Instagram and influencer marketing as a powerful business asset. You’ll need to find an influencer that is right for your product and business – this is not product placement or celebrity endorsement.
If a particular product such as silver shampoo is trending amongst beauty influencers, you may be able to jump on this trend, providing your product is relevant.
Utilise video search engines like YouTube and TikTok for product insights
Video search engines help to build consumer interest and confidence in product purchases with product reviews and “unboxing” videos are very popular. By searching ‘trending products and adding the year, you’ll get a general idea of product trends in a matter of minutes.
The social media platform TikTok has quickly become one of the most popular video-based platforms globally, producing hashtag trends such as #tiktokmademebuyit which has had an unprecedented effect on the commercial sector.
Filter to view trending products on competitor websites
Once you have identified your competitors, head to their website in order to see which products are trending. This is particularly helpful for businesses which sell apparel, as many online retailers now include a filter function for trending products. Some eCommerce websites may even create a completely new category for trending items such as Christmas decorations or rooftop bars.
Pinpoint product trends and reviews on Reddit and other forums
Online forums such as Reddit and Twitter are widely used by consumers who want to be part of a community and discuss topics which are important to them. They are therefore a great resource for researching what people are saying about your brand and industry. Use Reddit to conduct market research by using social listening tools and observing user-generated content about trending products, such as reviews.
Evaluate Pinterest boards for trending products
A whopping 63% of millennials use Pinterest to discover new products and brands. Users can visually collate products or ideas they like and tag a category, with Pinterest showing the number of times a pin has been saved. By searching for a keyword or category, marketers will be able to see which items have been saved the most and therefore gather information on trending products.
Pinterest is particularly helpful for analysing consumer needs in home decor, DIY, food, travel, fashion and beauty categories.
Evaluate Product Performance to Make Changes if Necessary
Even if you’ve released products in line with a current trend, you’ll need to keep an eye on your product performance and evaluate if anything needs to be changed. Product insights can be pulled directly from ecommerce websites’ analytics tools to help pinpoint which products are performing well and which products are not producing consumer interest.
Consider KPIs that should be tracked to evaluate product performance such as conversion rate and stock turn.
Pay attention to Google Analytics Product Performance Reports
To help your product performance evaluation and discover shopping behaviours, use Google Analytics Product Performance Reports. Metrics available include product removes, cart-to-detail-rate and unique purchases, so you can begin to understand your customer needs. Once you have determined which insights you want to compile into a report, you will be able to customise it by date range and group products by category.
Your report can be sorted into quantity to enable you to see which products are your top sellers.
Stay on top of consumer reviews and customer communications
Every business should pay close attention to their customer reviews as 70% of shoppers often or always read reviews. Each positive review is an opportunity to draw in new customers and achieve higher SEO rankings, particularly for small businesses who are just starting out and need to build their reputation. Negative reviews can also deter potential customers and damage your reputation – you might consider having a line in your marketing strategy about how to reply to and handle negative reviews.
Additionally, customer feedback can help to identify and fix product or service issues which may arise and otherwise be missed.
Square Makes Tracking Product Performance Easy
With Square Online, your eCommerce business can get up and running with ease and you can track product performance early on with Square Developer.
Handle everything in one place from shipping orders to taking payments and inventory management. For smaller businesses starting out and looking to minimise their start-up costs, there are no set up fees or monthly charges. Only pay when you make a sale — 1.4% + 25p for transactions with UK cards or 2.5% + 25p for transactions with non-UK cards.
Our site builder will help you create an online or social media store that is device and desktop friendly with no coding experience necessary.
