You put in a lot of time and effort into your digital marketing efforts, but are you making sure your products are easy to buy? Shoppability is about transforming every potential customer interaction into an opportunity for purchase—yet, what exactly does it mean to make “everything” shoppable?

Unpacking Shoppability

At its core, making “everything” shoppable means ensuring that every digital touchpoint—whether on a brand’s website or across the vast expanse of the internet—can lead to a sale. This includes the brand’s own domain, including tools like store locators, product detail pages (PDPs), recipes, blogs, and promotional materials. It also extends to the broader digital ecosystem, including social media posts, advertisements, emails, text messages, and beyond. If a customer can interact with it, it’s within the realm of shoppability.

The Essence of “Shoppable”

So how do you reduce the number of steps it takes for a person to purchase? It’s about creating an intuitive and frictionless path that guides customers from interest to transaction. This journey involves connecting customers with products and ensuring those products are available at the moment of discovery. True shoppability hinges on three pivotal elements:

1. Let the Customer Choose:

Providing customers with options on where to purchase makes it easier for them to use their preferred method, whether direct, Amazon, or through a retailer.

2. Comprehensive Retail Partner Integration:

A shoppable ecosystem connects customers not just to a select few retailers but to all partners, ensuring wide accessibility.

3. Real-Time Inventory Visibility:

A shoppable experience guarantees that only available products are presented to customers, taking into account current inventory levels and geographical considerations.

The Challenges of Achieving True Shoppability

Creating a truly shoppable experience for customers is not without its hurdles. The ambition to make every clickable moment a potential purchase opportunity involves a complex web of digital touchpoints and backend logistics. Here are the primary challenges brands face in this endeavor:

Broad Reach Across All Retail Partners:

In an ideal world, a brand would have its products listed and linked directly from every digital touchpoint to the product detail pages (PDPs) of every retail partner. However, considering the diversity and number of retail partners a brand might have, from big box retailers to local shops, this is a daunting task. Ensuring that each link leads to an in-stock product requires a constant feed of inventory data from each retailer, a logistical puzzle that is challenging to solve manually.

Maintaining Accurate Inventory Data:

The customer experience can be significantly hampered by links leading to out-of-stock products. Maintaining up-to-the-minute inventory data across various retailers and geographies is essential to avoid frustration and lost sales. However, given the dynamic nature of retail inventories, keeping this data accurate and current across all platforms and retail partners is a significant challenge.

Solutions for Achieving Shoppability

Facing these challenges head-on, the solution lies in leveraging technology designed to navigate the complexities of retail e-commerce. Enter e-commerce platforms like Pear Commerce, which are revolutionizing the way brands achieve shoppability.

Leveraging Technology: The Role of E-commerce Platforms

E-commerce platforms are designed to address the challenges of making digital experiences shoppable. Here’s how platforms like Pear Commerce are making a difference:

1. Daily Inventory Scans:

By automatically scanning inventory across a network of 3,000+ retailers daily, these platforms ensure that the digital paths created from a brand’s digital touchpoints lead to in-stock products. This eliminates the guesswork and manual effort required to maintain accurate inventory data.

2. Creating Digital Paths to Purchase:

These platforms excel at connecting any product UPC to every available retailer’s digital shelf. This means that whether a customer clicks on a product link from a social media post, an email, or a brand’s own website, they are directed to a retailer where the product is available for purchase, tailored by their geographic location.

3. Integration with Retail Partners:

By integrating with a wide array of retail partners, e-commerce platforms ensure that brands can confidently promote their products, knowing that the customer experience will be seamless and frustration-free. This integration extends to local retailers, making it possible for brands to support and drive traffic to small businesses.

Embracing Shoppability: The Future of Retail E-Commerce

Today’s consumers expect not just convenience but also immediacy in their shopping experiences. Shoppability addresses these expectations by eliminating barriers to purchase, thereby enhancing customer satisfaction and loyalty. Moreover, in a marketplace crowded with options, the ability to seamlessly convert interest into sales can significantly differentiate a brand.

Shoppability is especially important for refrigerated, frozen, or beverage brands, who’s direct e-commerce costs can be very expensive. You’ll still be able to leverage digital marketing to drive sales, just using your retail partners that already have inventory near to your customers.

For brands looking to navigate the shoppability landscape successfully, actionable steps include auditing digital touchpoints for shoppability potential, partnering with retail e-commerce platforms, focusing on data-driven insights, and prioritizing customer experience to ensure seamless discovery to purchase journeys.

*Pear Commerce the retail ecommerce platform for omnichannel CPG brands, consolidates your where-to-buy experiences and shoppable media.