Back-to-school season is here, and to capitalize on big sales, retailers need to stay on top of rapidly changing digital buying trends. Did you know that 68% of parents will receive their child’s back-to-school supply list at least one month before school starts? Beyond simply understanding trend seasonality, relating to your audience is equally important. Buying has become more about storytelling, relating to shoppers — and that inspiration to purchase often starts with carefully cultivated publisher content. That’s why it’s critical for retailers to work closely with publishers to inform content that provides timely value to consumers.
Below, we’ll detail the hottest products to highlight this back-to-school season and how you can boost sales.
Trending Now: Back-To-School
By understanding purchasing insights and how consumers engage with published content, brands and retailers can boost sales and inform marketing and promotional efforts. But how do you know what shoppers really want? What are they reading? Clicking? Buying? Utilizing past user data helps inform predictions of popular products and future buying behavior. These top trending back-to-school products are based on data sourced from VigLink’s Trends Explorer, which offers information on such user behavior by compiling activity from more than 20 billion web pages and 500 million products.
Advertisement
-
Adidas Slim 3-stripes shorts, men’s
-
HP Ink Cartridges
-
Microsoft Office 365 lifetime account subscription, 5 users
-
A Friend in Death — a short read (psychic mystery)
-
Ralph Lauren Polo, men’s standard fit crew
-
Comfort Colors, pigment dyed short sleeve shirts, cotton, men’s
-
Rabbit Skins toddler 5.5 oz. short sleeve T-shirt
-
Self-adhesive stick on diamante rhinestone gems
-
Fidget Spinner LED/Bluetooth speaker finger spinner
-
Asics gel-respector men’s blue leather sneakers lace up shoes
Strategize For The Future: How Consumer Insights Can Boost Sales
Insight into these trending products helps retailers shape selling strategy around digital buying trends, as well as determine when and how to market to customers. Knowing the top trending products are what shoppers have engaged with the most, here are a few tips for cashing in this back-to-school season:
1. Effectively schedule discounts and promotions
Seasonal campaigns are an effective way of driving sales, and if you already know what products people will be lining up for, you can feature them before any other competitors. While it can be a tricky game to pick which promotions to highlight, utilizing data-based insights can help take the mystery out of it. Offer a time-sensitive back-to-school discount or a great BOGO sale on trending items for the season. This not only creates a monetary incentive, but also fosters a sense of urgency among consumers, making them less likely to search elsewhere for the same products. After all, 93% of shoppers will use a coupon code at least once during the year.
2. Share it on social
Consumers gather on social media, so sharing the latest deals or trending items through influential platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Instagram or Pinterest is a powerful way of reaching an audience. Get creative — use pictures, hashtags or videos to tell the story of the product you’re selling. Help people envision how that set of rhinestone gems could unleash their artistic potential, or how that Ralph Lauren polo could be part of their child’s first day of school outfit.
3. Ship it on time
It’s essential for students and parents to get all their back-to-school shopping done before that first day begins, so offering the best deals on express shipping can give you an edge over other retailers during a time-sensitive buying season. Retailers who fail to deliver (literally) can risk losing sales to other merchants, like Amazon or Walmart, that do. Alleviate potential concerns by incorporating “guaranteed delivery before” information into your site, and ensure your shipping logistics can achieve those guarantees.
Connect With Your Audience: Engaging Online Customers Through Publisher Networks
Being able to predict what products will be popular empowers publishers at authoring time. It’s all about providing quality content that gives consumers what they want, when they want it, because as we know, publishers are now equally focused on the integrity of their pieces and monetizing their content. By understanding digital buying trends, retailers can work with publishers to:
1. Offer increased affiliate commission rates for trending items
It’s a win-win — you’ll generate more sales and the publishers that link to you will benefit from additional commissions. By boosting your commission rates for high-performing products, publishers will be eager to include your links in their content. This is a risk-free way to sell through sources your customers know and trust. Offering great deals to publishers also forges strong relationships with your publisher network, making them more likely to link to your site in the future.
2. Get personal with sponsored content deals
Sometimes, the best way to secure conversions is to communicate about your brand through a specific publisher. With consumers bombarded by company after company trying to convince them their brand is best, it has become increasingly important for companies to differentiate themselves in an authentic, personalized way. As authorities trusted by loyal audiences, these publishers have the credibility to promote products with the clout and effectiveness some consumers need to be spurred to purchase. What better way to reach a community of consumers than by working with their favorite blogger?
You don’t need a crystal ball to predict how customers will behave. Allowing purchase insights to shape your selling strategy can significantly boost your sales this back-to-school season, but these tips aren’t unique to this annual shopping event. It’s a data-driven world, and the companies that follow digital buying trends will be the first to take advantage of the growing e-Commerce industry.
Hanna Fritzinger is the head of marketing at VigLink. Her passion for technology brought her to San Francisco from New York City in 2014. Working at VigLink marries two of her passions: editorial content and the retail industry. VigLink identifies commercial products mentioned within a publisher’s content, and transforms them into revenue generating hyperlinks whose destinations are determined in real-time, advertiser-bid auctions.
