The 5 Things Apparel Shoppers Want

Posted on December 4, 2023 by Stylaquin1

Knowing what your customers want makes marketing easy (er)

I ran into an interesting study by Bain & Company that focuses on what customers perceive as the elements of value. The group identified 30 separate elements and grouped them in a pyramid based on Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs. From the bottom up the groups are:

Functional:

Saves Time
Simplifies
Makes Money
Reduces Risk
Organizes
Integrates
Connects
Reduces Effort
Avoids Hassles
Reduces Cost
Quality
Variety
Sensory Appeal
Informs

Emotional

Reduces Anxiety
Rewards Me
Nostalgia
Design/Aesthetics
Badge Value
Wellness
Therapeutic Value
Fun/Entertainment
Attractiveness
Provides Access

Life Changing

Provides hope
Self-actualization
Motivation
Heirloom
Affiliation and Belonging

Social Impact

Self-transcendence

Does Your Site Do This?

It can with Stylaquin! Stylaquin is the easy to add Shopify app that transforms your website. Stylaquin makes shopping faster, more engaging, and more fun. Stylaquin shoppers stay longer, view over 85% more products, come back more often, and buy more when they do. Find us in the Shopify App Store.

Bain’s chart says that the five most important elements in the apparel industry are:

Quality
Variety
Avoids Hassles
Design/Aesthetics
Saves Time

When you read the list, you can see how important it is to really understand your target customer. Quality may not be as valued with younger shoppers looking for fast fashion. Variety may not be important to someone who likes wearing a personal uniform (Think Steve Jobs). Avoids Hassles is less true for real bargain hunters. Though site issues are universally despised. Design/Aesthetics won’t appeal to those who hate shopping and only buy clothes so they aren’t naked and cold. You see where I’m going here.

Understanding what motivates your customers is a cornerstone of marketing. Relying on big data for most customers will actually send you down a path that has broad appeal, but no specific appeal. In other words, it will work well for Walmart, but not for a boutique.

I think some of the most important elements for smaller businesses are in the Emotional and Life Changing groups. We don’t think about clothing as being heirloom but buying a jean jacket your daughter will want to wear in 20 years is an interesting angle.

Nostalgia has appeal to everyone, and if you are selling to a niche that has a time period, you can always hit that note and it will resonate. Steam Punk, Cottage Core, 50’s – 90’s and so on all have a nostalgia element to them.

Fun and entertaining is another element that will resonate with power shoppers. Make shopping more fun and engaging and shoppers will come back. (That’s what Stylaquin does!)

Women often joke about needing some retail therapy, but it’s real, and having a great shopping experience is something those who like to shop genuinely value. When the mood strikes, there is something oddly relaxing about looking at lots of beautiful things, even if you don’t buy them. There’s also a rush when you find items that spark joy, whether it’s the prefect gift, or the perfect pair of shoes.

Social impact is another area that has trementous power. Tom’s shoes, Ivory Ella, Bert’s Bees and many more have social impact at the core of their business model. Younger customers have shown tremendous brand loyalty to companies that give back to causes they care about.

Add a Styling Board and a Wishlist!

The Stylaquin Idea Board keeps customers engaged in two ways: it’s an interactive styling board where shoppers can collect and curate all the things that interest them; and it also acts as a wishlist that shoppers can return to. Find us in the Shopify App Store.

Creating connection with your customers takes time. Use the elements as a guide to spark ideas for everything from sales to social media posts. Think about the ones you can align with easily and focus on them. Good luck!

Nail the Sale Before the Cart – Browse Baby!

Posted on November 6, 2023 by Stylaquin1

Before the Cart: Using Stylaquin's Idea Board to Curate Your Customer's Journey

We all know where a purchase begins, or do we? The cart is actually the midway point, not the beginning and not the end of a customer’s purchase journey. The decision to buy comes before the cart, not after. So we need to think about how we can help shoppers have a better purchase journey from start to finish.

Mapping the journey

Shoppers come to your store because they are looking for something. It may be a specific thing, so they use the search bar, the nav bar, or the filters to find it. But if they’re just browsing, they may not know what they want, but they’re interested enough to poke around. Most sites aren’t offering the shoppers who are just browsing a great experience. Browsing shoppers want to consider their options. Most women fall into the browsing category. Women will often open a different tab for every item they’re considering. They don’t want to lose track of things they like, but they aren’t ready to put them in the cart. That’s where Stylaquin is a game changer.

The Idea Board Revolution: A New Way to Shop

This browsing behavior, which we can easily do in any brick and mortar store, gave birth to the Stylaquin Idea Board, it allows shoppers to collect all the things that interest them, rearrange them, change colors and sizes and visualize them in different combinations, all before committing anything to the cart. Shoppers who use the Idea Board when they shop will view more items and come back more often than those who don’t. When they come back, they’ll see all the things that interested them the first time, so they can start shopping right where they left off. When you think about why Stylaquin shoppers buy more on return visits, it just makes sense, they had an engaging experience that they enjoyed, and when they returned, they didn’t have to remember, and then search for, all the things they liked on their previous visit.

Does Your Site Do This?

An Interactive Styling Board or a Wishlist?

There’s nothing like Stylaquin. In fact it’s so unique it’s patented. Stylaquin totally transforms the current shopping experience into something fun and engaging. Stylaquin shoppers stay longer, view more products, come back more often, and buy more when they do.

Think about how different the two shopping experiences are. In the experience we have now, shoppers have to click on each product and the click through each product picture. If they like something, but aren’t ready to add it to the cart they have to save what interests them in tabs, and then toggle through different tabs trying to figure out which is the best choice. If they have to leave and close the browser window they will have to start from scratch when they return. Maybe they’ll find what they liked, or maybe they won’t. Now let’s compare that with Stylaquin. Stylaquin shoppers can flip through a site like a magazine, collect all the things they like in one place, and then edit them till they have exactly what they want. When they come back to the site, all the things they were interested in are right there, so they can pick up where they left off. It’s a better journey, a more engaging experience, and a whole lot easier.

Add a Styling Board and a Wishlist!

Once you look at the shopping experience as a whole, from the moment of need or curiosity, through the consideration phase, the purchase decision, the actual product experience, and finally to embracing the brand, it’s clear that the cart isn’t last step in a journey of discovery and consideration. Meeting your customer at each phase of their journey and finding ways to delight and engage them throughout is what creates a passion for your brand.

Crazy Better than a Shopify Wishlist!

Posted on October 4, 2023 by Stylaquin1

Crazy Better Than a Shopify Wishlist!

Wishlists are so old fashioned, and yet they work. Before you sigh and think “Well it’s just something we need to add…” Take a moment to consider something infinitely better. The traditional Shopify wishlist has been transformed into a dynamic, engaging, and revenue-multiplying adventure by Stylaquin.

The Silent Workings of a Traditional Wishlist

The conventional wishlist just sits there. At best it acts as a subtle reminder of coveted items, a silent nudge towards conversion that lingers in the corner of a shopper’s digital experience. For the store owner, it silently accumulates data, reflecting potential future sales that live somewhere between desire and action. While beneficial, driving both engagement and potential revenue, it prompts the question: Is there something better?

Does Your Site Do This?

Unlocking the E-Commerce Potential with Stylaquin

The better answer is Stylaquin, an innovative and patented tool that doesn’t merely catalogue desires like the traditional wishlist but elevates them, turning passive interest into an active, engaging, and conversion-driving experience.

A Fun and Engaging Visual Journey

For your shoppers it’s a page-flipping experience that turns browsing into an adventure, inviting exploration, and prolonged interaction with your products.

For you, the retailer Stylaquin creates a mesmerizing first impression that lingers, driving engagement, which not only boosts SEO, but also promotes deeper exploration into your product catalog, increasing the likelihood of added cart items.

Beyond the Wishlist

Shoppers, especially women shoppers, want a digital playground where they can not only save but play with all the things that caught their eye. Power-shoppers often open separate windows for each product they like and then click through the tabs to see them. With Stylaquin, they don’t have to because everything is in one place.

Stylaquin creates a treasure trove of data revealing not just what your customers want, but a deeper insight into their preferences and shopping behaviors, enabling more targeted marketing and better stock decision-making.

Data Analytics: Actionable insights

Stylaquin gives you an in-depth view into your customer’s journey. The Insights Panel shares insights that go beyond just what customers bought or left in their cart, but also shares what they liked and almost bought. enabling you to harness product marketing strategies that can elevate engagement, retention, and ultimately, revenue.

Add a Styling Board and a Wishlist!

Traditional Wishlist vs. Stylaquin

While a traditional wishlist captures desires, Stylaquin’s Look Book and Idea Board weave them into a narrative, actively engaging customers, prolonging their journey on your site, and incrementally increasing the chance of conversion and average cart value. The traditional wishlist silently holds potential purchases; Stylaquin dynamically showcases them, transforming save it for later desire into active engagement, creating a shopping environment that doesn’t just encourage browsing but invites customers to revel in it.

Driving Profits Through Enriched Customer Engagement

With Stylaquin, you’re not just implementing a tool; you’re embedding a truly unique experience into your Shopify store, one that seductively whispers to your customers to stay, explore, play, and yes, purchase.

The Easy to add Shopify Wishlist that sets you apart!

It’s easy to add Stylaquin to your Shopify site. Just look for us in the Shopify App Store. You can set up Stylaquin in less than 15 minutes and then just sit back and watch your customers play, driving not just sales, but developing a relationship that ensures they return, time and time again, to continue their journey.

Understanding customer intention translates to more sales

Posted on August 16, 2023 by Stylaquin1

Intention is key to understanding your customer's journey

There’s a marketing strategy called Jobs to be Done that goes beyond personas. A quick understanding of Jobs to be Done is that the same person may have different needs depending on what job they are trying to get done. An example is a person who chooses a fancy pizza restaurant for a date night with a spouse but chooses a quick-serve pizza restaurant when they need to get a meal for their kid’s team. Though in both instances they chose pizza, they didn’t buy it from the same place.

Personas are a general idea of the person most likely to buy your product. Usually, the more niche your product is, the better personas will work. Except… yeah, all those exceptions. Starting with personas is just good marketing, but understanding your customers’ intentions will get you much closer to creating an experience they will return for.

Why did they come to your site?

It’s easy to fall into the mindset of “I sell shirts. They wanted a shirt. That’s why they came to my site.” While true, it doesn’t get to any nuance that will reinforce branding or encourage a return visit. Why customers come to your site is a profound question. Did they experience your brand previously and are looking forward to continuing the relationship? Are they new and just taking a peek? Are they killing time, but would make a purchase if something caught their eye? Do they have something special in mind? Did a friend send them? Did an ad send them? Are they looking for a gift? Are they shopping for themselves?

Does Your Site Do This?

How do you determine intention?

When I first came up with the idea for Stylaquin, I saw it as a way to improve the online shopping experience, which was perfect for customers who already knew what they wanted, but not for customers who were interested in browsing and discovery. That basic structure hasn’t changed in 20 years. As I reviewed the data from shoppers engaging with Stylaquin, I realized that browsing and exploring were super helpful in unlocking intention. The insights panel in Stylaquin shows the most purchased items and the most abandoned items for all purchases, but for shoppers who use Stylaquin, it also shows the most viewed items and the most saved items. That’s where you start to see a more nuanced look at intention. Are your customers browsing or buying? Are they looking at two items, or twenty? Did they add something to the cart and keep shopping, or did they leave?

Back when I worked for L.L. Bean, the catalog started the purchase journey. Now it could also be a Facebook ad, Instagram post, TikTok challenge, YouTube video, Pinterest board, or a slew of online mentions and touch points. Online shopping has transformed from an online order-taking experience to part of a much larger ecosystem of online experiences and offerings. The question we should be asking is: if a customer sees something that they like enough to explore, why do websites focus on navigation, but never on browsing and exploration? When we see the delight and discovery social media brings to online shopping, why aren’t we working to incorporate it into the structure of our websites?

Customer journeys of discovery

How many times have you gone to a website with the intention of buying a specific item, say a gift, and ended up finding something for yourself? Happens all the time. The more items customers look at, the more likely they are to make a purchase. One of the reasons Stylaquin gets such great results is shoppers view 180% more items than non-Stylaquin shoppers. Discovery leads to sales. Engagement leads to sales. Browsing leads to sales. Companies are spending staggering amounts of money on creating fun and engaging experiences outside their websites. It’s time to start looking at the actual shopping experience as a source of engagement. A customer’s intention might be to buy a specific item when they arrive, but they’ll come back if they have a good experience. Stylaquin shoppers come back 25% more often, and buy more when they do because they had a fun experience shopping.

New versus Best Sellers

Posted on July 6, 2023 by Stylaquin1

New versus Best Sellers and how best to leverage them both

Highlighting new items and best-selling items is just good marketing. They are both great way’s to get customer’s attention, but they function differently in marketing, though there is overlap in the type of customer they will appeal to. Let’s start with best sellers.

Best Sellers

These are the most popular products and the backbone of your store’s sales. Never underestimate the awesome power of best sellers. Merchants have something called the 80/20 rule where 80% of sales come from 20% of products. Where stores get into trouble is that they get bored. I remember when I was an Art Director at L.L. Bean everyone was sick to death of telling the bean boot story. That’s the story about how L.L. sold his first batch of bean boots but most of them fell apart. He took back every broken pair and replaced them with the now famous bean boot and the rest is history. It’s a great story. Every time we ran it, sales went up. Especially with new customers. But everyone in the company had heard it a thousand times so they rolled their eyes when it came up. Best sellers are like that. They are often the tried and true, boring products, that just keep selling. Not the shiny new products that everyone is excited about. Do you have a best seller collection? You should, it’s easy and it works. Customers who are new to your brand will be looking to see if you have anything that interests them. Best sellers are best sellers for a reason, make sure they’re featured on your home page. Use them on landing pages for ads and promotions. Think of them as both a gateway drug to your brand and a favorite bedtime story you can tell often.

Does Your Site Do This?

New

New is also powerful, but serves a different purpose and a different customer. New is a magic word, customers never get tired of it. (There’s a Bar Hop on magic words that may be of interest.) Your existing customers will already be familiar with your best sellers so new items are the best way to get their attention. On a Shopify website it’s easy to create a collection of new items that keeps itself automatically updated. Having an automated NEW collection is an easy set it, and forget it strategy. You can also make sure your home page shows some new items, so that returning customers have a reason to stop by. There’s an important truth in marketing that it’s easier to get more customers to buy, than it is to get customers to buy more. Best sellers are more likely to get customers to buy than new items. It goes back to the 80/20 rule. If you don’t know if you should feature a best seller or a new item, go with the best seller. Most of you traffic will be new visitors and best sellers are your best bet.

Is that all there is?

So is that all there is to NEW and Best sellers? Nope. You can use this strategy in your ads and customer emails. In ads, focus on best sellers. They are already proven winners. In existing customer emails, focus on New with a dash of best seller. Think of it as you get new customers in the door with best sellers and then keep them interested with new items. Best sellers are also a treasure trove of goodness for emails that don’t offer discounts. Your customers love these items so talk about where they came from, what makes them amazing, all their benefits, and finish with other items that are similar, complimentary, or also best sellers. If you only send out discount emails you are going away free money and training your customers that they shouldn’t pay full price.

If you enjoyed this video, and got some good info, please join our mailing list. If you’d like to see a Shopify app that increases the number of items viewed by 180%, increases time on site by 70% and just makes online shopping more fun and engaging, here’s a link to the Stylaquin Video in the Shopify App Store.

Don’t get mad at Google, outsmart it! Having trouble getting your site to rank well? Wondering how to get to the top positions without paying for placement? Google is just an algorithm, once you understand how it works, you can learn how to outsmart it. Download your copy today!

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How to get customers to stay on your site longer

Posted on June 2, 2023 by Stylaquin1

How to get customers to stay on your site longer

Time on site is the term used to measure how long a visitor stays on a website. Why is time on site important? It’s the often overlooked metric that measures how engaged and interested visitors are with your website. The longer a visitor spends on a website, the more likely they are to interact with the content, explore different products, and ultimately make a purchase.

Time on site does a lot of good things for your site. Let’s break that down into 4 components.

Increased engagement: The longer a visitor spends on a website, the more engaged they’re likely to be with your content. We spend time with stores we like, so increasing time on site also leads to increased brand awareness, product interest, and ultimately, sales.
Improved user experience: If visitors are spending a lot of time on a website, it’s a good indication that they’re finding the site easy to navigate and the content valuable. This kind of positive user experience increases customer loyalty.
Better search engine rankings: Time on site is one of the metrics that search engines use to determine the quality and relevance of a website. If visitors are spending a lot of time on a site, search engines see this as a sign that the site is providing high-quality content and improve its ranking accordingly.
Higher conversion rates: When visitors spend more time on a website, they learn more about the brand and products, which leads to trust, which, as I mentioned in the Hump Day Bar Hop on SEO Metrics, leads to higher conversion rates. In addition, longer time on site is often an indicator that a customer is closer to making a purchase.
Okay, you’re sold, but how do you get customers to stay longer? Here are some thing to consider:

Does Your Site Do This?

Improve the user experience: A good user experience is crucial for keeping visitors on a site for longer periods of time. This includes factors such as site speed, easy navigation, and clear product descriptions.
Offer engaging content: Providing high-quality, relevant content can help to keep visitors engaged and interested. This can include product videos, blog posts, customer reviews.
Eye Candy: Making sure your site visually appeals to your target customer is crucial for extending time on site. High-end customers want to see beautiful photography and lifestyle images. Everyone wants to see photography that clearly shows the products. Clear photos that show features also reduces returns.
Personalization: Personalizing the user experience based on a visitor’s behavior and preferences can help to increase engagement and time on site. This can include personalized product recommendations, and customized landing pages for customers who are coming from an ad, blog, or other trigger.
Incentives and rewards: Offering incentives such as free shipping, discounts, and loyalty programs can help to keep visitors on a site for longer periods of time and increase the likelihood of making a purchase.
Optimize for mobile: As more and more consumers shop on their mobile devices, optimizing for mobile is crucial for increasing time on site. This includes using a mobile-responsive design and optimizing for mobile search. This is especially important if you have a younger customer, but granny is on her phone now and girl likes to shop.
Utilize social media: Social media can be a powerful tool for driving traffic to an online store and increasing time on site. Make sure your social media content links back to your website and also encourage social sharing.
Making it fun to shop: This is my favorite. We all do more of the things we enjoy and shopping is more fun with Stylaquin. How much fun? Data shows that Stylaquin shoppers stay on site a whopping 70% longer and view 185% more items. Here’s a link to the Stylaquin video.

So to wrap all this up, time on site is an often overlooked metric that absolutely impacts your site rank with search engines. Making your site more attractive, more personal, more interesting and more fun to shop will entice your customers to stay longer, buy more and come back more often.

If you’d like to watch this as a video here’s the link.

Hump Day Bar Hopping with Stylaquin

Hump Day Bar Hopping!

Hump Days are the perfect time to learn a little something new. Hump Day Bar Hopping videos are designed to give you tips and tricks about marketing, SEO and design. They are between 5 and 10 minutes long so that you can learn something useful and then get on with your day. Remember you only have to be a little bit better than your competition to see big gains, so take a short break, learn something actionable, and then implement it each week.

Increase engagement on your Shopify store without spending a fortune

Posted on December 9, 2022 by Stylaquin1

Increasing customer engagement on your Shopify store is easier and less expensive than you think

Are you looking for ways to increase your online sales, but don’t have the budget to pay for costly marketing campaigns. What if you could just make shopping at your store more fun and engaging?

Does Your Site Do This?

Not everyone who visits your store knows what they want and just needs to get in and out fast, but that’s the kind of shopper websites are designed for.

There are people who love to shop—power shoppers. Sure, they shop when they need things, but they also shop because they enjoy it. What if, when they went to your store, the shopping experience was just a whole lot more fun and engaging? What if they could flip through your website like it was a magazine or catalog? What if they could save all the things that interested them in one place and then play with them, change colors and sizes, and move things around till they had exactly what they wanted BEFORE they had to commit to the cart? What if everything that interested them stayed put, so when they came back they could start shopping right where they left off?

Sounds like a lot of work? Actually, there’s an app that does all this, and you can add to your site in about four clicks. Sounds expensive? Plans start at $10. Sounds hard to manage? Everything happens automatically using a proprietary algorithm. Sound like something you want to learn more about? Check out Stylaquin in the Shopify App Store!

Why time on site is a key to outsmarting Google

Posted on September 22, 2022 by Stylaquin1

Wondering why time on site is so important?

Time on Site is one of Google’s most important data points

If Google sends a searcher to a site and they leave quickly clearly it wasn’t a good fit for the searcher. That‘s bad for Google. The longer a searcher stays on a site, the more Google ranks it as a good site to send searchers to. Pretty simple math for an algorithm to understand. Good design, best sellers, engaging copy are all great ways to get visitors to spend more time on site. Your home page needs to be really compelling and what to click needs to be clear and easy to find; but most searchers won’t come to your site through your home page, they come through a Google link or an ad.

P.S. It’s free and we will never share your name. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Marketing to a targeted customer profile will help you create a site that appeals to a specific demographic, which is also something Google’s algorithm can understand and leverage.

Spin-to-win apps that seemed to be everywhere for a while added time on site but gave out 5% -20% discounts that killed margin. Fun once or twice, but not for everyone, and they may actually turn off some visitors since not all shoppers are motivated by price.

The Stylaquin Shopify app increases time on site by offering a new way to shop that is more visually interesting, faster, and fun to use. As shoppers flip through a site, like they flip through a magazine, they view more items and stay longer. Not all shoppers use Stylaquin when they shop, but those who do move the needle significantly, about 70% more time on site, and Stylaquin isn’t giving up margin by offering discounts.

To learn more about how Google sees your site so you can learn to outsmart it, grab a copy of “How to Outsmart Google”. It demystifies the process and even comes with a handy planner to get you started.

Why innovation matters to online shopping

Posted on July 12, 2022 by Stylaquin1

Innovation is the spark that sets you apart

When you are trying to compete in a crowded marketplace, you need to stand out. There are several ways to do that: The lowest prices, the best service, unique products, interesting promotions, creative social media, and so on. Several of those are problematic from an ROI perspective. All require time, money and attention. The thing that is not on everyone’s list is innovation. Innovation is easy compared to trying to discount you way to the top.

How do you become innovative?

Try new things, use new tools, be the first kid on the block to have something cool. Tech innovation does have the occasional hiccup, but the tradeoff is being at the forefront, standing out, being a leader. Is that important to your customers? If they are younger it is very important, if you want younger customers it is very important.

Check out this video to see something that can totally transform any Shopify website in about 10 minutes.

Stylaquin is available in the Shopify App Store and it’s FREE for the first month. Innovation doesn’t get much easier that that!

Knowing what your customers want makes marketing easy (er)

Does Your Site Do This?

Add a Styling Board and a Wishlist!

Before the Cart: Using Stylaquin's Idea Board to Curate Your Customer's Journey

Mapping the journey

The Idea Board Revolution: A New Way to Shop

Does Your Site Do This?

Add a Styling Board and a Wishlist!

Crazy Better Than a Shopify Wishlist!

Does Your Site Do This?

Add a Styling Board and a Wishlist!

Intention is key to understanding your customer's journey

Why did they come to your site?

Does Your Site Do This?

How do you determine intention?

Customer journeys of discovery

New versus Best Sellers and how best to leverage them both

Best Sellers

Does Your Site Do This?

New

Is that all there is?

How to get customers to stay on your site longer

Does Your Site Do This?

Hump Day Bar Hopping!

Increasing customer engagement on your Shopify store is easier and less expensive than you think

Does Your Site Do This?

Wondering why time on site is so important?

Time on Site is one of Google’s most important data points

Innovation is the spark that sets you apart

How do you become innovative?

Book a Quick Demo!