Uncover Key Insight with Ecommerce Market Research

Ecommerce marketplace probe tin assistance you reply questions like:

1. Is this a viable concern idea?
2. Which caller products should we launch?
3. How bash we scope our people market?

And more.

Today, we’re breaking down marketplace probe for ecommerce businesses. So you cognize what to bash and wherever to start.

What Is Market Research for Ecommerce?

Ecommerce marketplace probe involves collecting and analyzing insights astir an online market, focusing connected products, integer trends, competitors, and consumers. 

It specifically targets the online environment, whereas accepted market research applies to some online and offline businesses. Like a brick-and-mortar store. 

Insight from ecommerce marketplace probe helps you recognize things similar which products your marketplace wants. And however competitory (and profitable) the marketplace is. So you tin start a caller ecommerce business oregon refine your existent offers.

Why Is Ecommerce Market Research Important?

Market probe for ecommerce businesses gives you penetration into your customers, competitors, and trends. 

Here are 4 ways that penetration tin signifier your business.

Identify New Market Trends

A heavy knowing of your marketplace tin hint you into antithetic ecommerce trends. Like marketplace shifts, caller technology, and evolving lawsuit preferences. 

Knowing these trends tin assistance you capitalize connected emerging opportunities. And perchance enactment up of your competitors. 

For example, done probe you find retired your customers similar to bargain present and wage later.

Knowing this, you mightiness adhd the enactment to wage astatine a aboriginal date. Which could promote radical to bargain from you implicit your competitors 

Build Buyer Profiles

Ecommerce marketplace probe lets you recognize your people market. And physique elaborate customer profiles—a statement of your perfect customer.

Here’s an illustration of a purchaser profile:

These elaborate profiles tin assistance you:

• Develop messaging that speaks to your audience’s wants and preferences truthful they’re much apt to link with your brand
• Create products your perfect purchaser is funny successful using
• Improve lawsuit restitution by tailoring your lawsuit acquisition to purchaser needs

Spot Opportunities for Differentiation

Product differentiation is erstwhile you separate your merchandise from your contention and marque it much appealing to your market. To pull much buyers.

Thorough probe tin springiness you penetration into your competitors’ strategies. Including what they bash good and wherever they autumn short. 

Pair this with different types of probe (like audience research) and you’ll person a beardown consciousness of however to basal retired successful your market.

Make Strategic Decisions

Market probe gives you the penetration you request to marque concern decisions connected information alternatively than guesses.

Which means determination whitethorn beryllium little hazard progressive erstwhile making decisions.

For example, accidental you merchantability location decor items. Through marketplace research, you larn that customers similar seeing items successful their homes earlier buying. Knowing this, you mightiness determine to put successful an app that lets customers digitally presumption items successful their home.

Without this insight, creating specified an app could beryllium risky. And mightiness not effect successful higher sales. 

Types of Ecommerce Market Research

There are 2 types of probe you tin perform: 

• Primary: Research you behaviour yourself typically done surveys, interviews, and absorption groups. You cod this information firsthand from sources—like your market.
• Secondary: Research you cod from reputable third-party sources similar authorities databases, manufacture stats, institution reports, and marketplace probe tools. 

Primary probe whitethorn beryllium much costly and hard to scale. However, it provides invaluable penetration straight from your people market. Which tin beryllium hard to find done secondary sources specified arsenic antecedently published insight. As that penetration mightiness not beryllium from your people market. 

On the different hand, secondary probe is often much affordable and easier to access. But it whitethorn not beryllium arsenic circumstantial to your peculiar needs.

So, effort to get arsenic overmuch probe arsenic you tin done secondary sources. Then, usage superior probe to capable successful cognition gaps and reply immoderate remaining questions you have.

Types of Market Research Data

You tin besides cod 2 types of information from superior and secondary research. Those types are: 

• Quantitative data: Numerical information (e.g., your customers’ property range, your mean merchandise prima rating, oregon the fig of your competitor’s societal media followers)
• Qualitative data: Non-numerical information usually from interviews and discussions (e.g., lawsuit preferences, feelings, and attitudes)

Quantitative information is typically casual to collect, sort, and interpret. As you tin crook quantitative information into visuals similar charts and graphs. But qualitative data, portion harder to analyze, tin springiness you deeper insight.

For example, you mightiness observe that your competitor’s products mean a 2.5/5 prima rating.

But you won’t cognize wherefore without qualitative information (like lawsuit reviews).

So, if you find yourself questioning wherefore definite quantitative information is the mode it is, question retired qualitative information to uncover the underlying reason.

How to Do Market Research for Ecommerce Businesses

Perform Competitor Analysis

Competitor analysis is erstwhile you cod insights for your competitors’ products, audience, and strategies. 

This penetration tin assistance you recognize your competition’s strengths and weaknesses. So you tin fig retired however to presumption your business. And however to amended service your audience.

First, you’ll request a database of competitors. Open Semrush’s Market Explorer and click “Find Competitors.” Enter your domain and click “Research a market.”

Scroll to the “Growth Quadrant.” You’ll spot a matrix of you and your competitors. Categories include:

• Game Changers: Emerging sites with a precocious maturation potential
• Niche Players: Small sites with a debased maturation rate
• Leaders: Sites with accelerated growth
• Established Players: Sites with an established audience 

Knowing this tin assistance you place which sites you whitethorn privation to wage attraction to. For example, it mightiness beryllium worthwhile to reappraisal the marketplace strategies of crippled changers. Who person accelerated growth. 

So, jot down 4 competitors you’d similar to dive into. 

Next, cod accusation for these competitors connected their:

• Audience
• Marketing strategies
• Products

Here’s how.

Audience

Open Semrush’s Traffic Analytics. Enter your domain and up to 4 rival URLs and click “Analyze.”

Click the “Audience Overview” tab. You’ll spot accusation for yourself and your competitors. Including assemblage demographics, socioeconomics, and behavior.

Then scroll to the “Audience Overlap for” widget and marque definite your website is selected. Review the accusation to spot however your assemblage overlaps with your competition.

Larger overlaps bespeak higher competition. As you’re apt to marketplace to the aforesaid people. You’ll privation to wage person attraction to these competitors and what strategies they use.

Marketing Strategies

Use Advertising Research to reappraisal competitors’ paid ads. Open the tool, participate your domain, and click “Search.”

Click the “Competitors” tab. This shows which of your competitors usage Google paid hunt ads. Including an estimation of their advertisement spend. This tin assistance you find however overmuch you whitethorn privation to allocate to paid hunt ads.

Next reappraisal your competitors’ organic content strategies (non-paid selling techniques) like:

• Social media marketing: Determine which channels they use, however often they post, and which types of contented they publish
• Email marketing: Sign up for their email database to spot which types of contented they nonstop to their email database (i.e., coupons, promotional emails, educations emails, etc.) and however often they nonstop emails
• Content marketing: Determine which different contented assets they person (i.e., blog posts, podcasts, ebooks, webinars, etc.)

Reviewing these strategies tin assistance you recognize your audience’s connection preferences. So you cognize wherever to absorption your efforts. 

Products

Finally, caput to your competitors’ online shops and reappraisal their products. Including prices and notable features. 

Read done lawsuit reviews for each merchandise to spot which aspects customers liked. And which ones they didn’t.

This tin hint you into lawsuit preferences. And assistance you make and refine your ain offers.

Further reading: Check retired our usher connected how to execute in-depth rival analysis.

Understand Your Target Audience

Audience research helps you recognize what makes your assemblage tick. So you tin efficaciously marketplace to them, make products and offers they’ll beryllium excited to buy, and clasp them arsenic long-time customers.

You’ll privation to get to cognize your assemblage successful 4 halfway areas:

1. Demographics (age, gender, location, etc.)
2. Socioeconomics (income, employment status, etc.)
3. Online behavior (purchasing habits, decision-making process, societal media usage, etc.)
4. Psychographics (attitudes, lifestyles, aspirations, etc.)

Semrush’s Audience Intelligence app tin get you each the info you need. Open the app and click “Let’s start.”

Click “+ Buy reports” and travel the prompts. 

After purchasing a study you tin make a caller report. Give your study a name, adhd an X (formerly Twitter) grip for the assemblage you privation accusation on, and click “Create caller report.”

You’ll spot a high-level report. For much circumstantial details, click “See each clusters.”

Then click “View much details.”

Click into the antithetic tabs on the apical (“Demographics,” “Socioeconomics,” “Influencers & brands,” etc.) to larn much astir your audience. 

For example, the “Personality” tab has psychographic information. 

You tin besides cod assemblage accusation through:

• Surveys: Add surveys to your website that inquire visitors questions astir their preferences and buying habits (e.g., “what stopped you from buying today?”)
• Customer interviews: Host one-on-one interviews with radical who person the highest lawsuit beingness worth (people who walk the astir magnitude of wealth with your customer) to uncover wherefore they support coming back. And however you tin replicate that for different customers. 
• Interviews with customer-facing teams: Speak to income and enactment unit to spot what further penetration they person astir your audience. Like symptom points and areas of frustration.
• Product reviews: Read done online reviews to recognize what your marketplace wants from your products

Finally, propulsion each your accusation unneurotic and make purchaser profiles of your antithetic purchaser personas. Let these personas usher efforts similar merchandise instauration and marketing. 

Further reading: How to Create Your Buyer Personas 

Identify Trends Within Your Market

Digging into trends tin assistance you spot areas of opportunity—like caller viable products. Or shifting marketplace interests. 

A fewer ecommerce marketplace probe tools tin help:

• Google Trends: Shows a keyword’s involvement overtime positive related searches

• Ecommerce Keyword Analytics: Shows keyword information specifically for ecommerce businesses. See however definite keywords person implicit clip and place seasonal trends and increasing merchandise verticals. 

• Market Explorer: Review trends successful rival maturation and spot which keywords are trending with your audience

Use these tools to hunt names of products and related keywords. Then, spot if involvement for each keyword is increasing oregon shrinking. 

Consider pairing this penetration with superior probe to amended recognize wherefore your marketplace whitethorn beryllium shifting their behavior. 

For example, accidental you merchantability computers. And you announcement that income for a circumstantial laptop are spiking. But you don’t cognize why. 

Consider speaking to your assemblage to uncover wherefore they’re buying this circumstantial model. 

Maybe a TikTok video featuring the merchandise went viral. Which could bespeak a short-term trend. And mightiness not beryllium a worthwhile investment. But possibly this laptop has caller exertion that excites your market. And you privation to put successful this caller exertion to pull much customers. 

You tin besides enactment connected apical of trends by subscribing to (or buying) industry-relevant reports from places like:

• Euromonitor
• IBISWorld
• Gartner
• Nielsen
• Forrester

Find Your Target Keywords

Finding people keywords helps you recognize however overmuch organic—unpaid—traffic you tin thrust to your site. And however overmuch fund you whitethorn request to allocate towards the instauration of integrated contented (like blog posts).

To start, unfastened a keyword probe instrumentality similar the Keyword Magic Tool. Enter a effect keyword—a wide keyword related to your niche—and your domain. Select your state and click “Search.”

The instrumentality volition springiness you thousands of keyword ideas. Filter these keywords by utilizing the near manus widget oregon immoderate of the filters on the top. 

Note the file titled “PKD %.” This stands for Personal Keyword Difficulty—the level of trouble Semrush estimates your tract volition person ranking for circumstantial keywords. 

Keywords with a precocious trouble whitethorn necessitate much budget. As you’ll apt request to physique backlinks—links from outer websites that constituent to your site—to physique your authorization to fertile higher.

However, if you person galore keywords with debased difficulty, you whitethorn not request to allocate arsenic overmuch to nexus gathering efforts. And whitethorn conscionable request to origin contented instauration into your budget.

Another file to enactment is “Intent.” Intent tells you wherefore radical hunt for a term. 

There are 4 superior hunt intents: 

1. Informational: The idiosyncratic wants an reply to a circumstantial query
2. Navigational: The idiosyncratic wants to find a circumstantial page
3. Commercial: The idiosyncratic wants accusation connected circumstantial products oregon services 
4. Transactional: The idiosyncratic wants to implicit an enactment (like bargain a product)

This accusation tin assistance you recognize however profitable circumstantial keywords whitethorn be. It tin besides springiness you deeper assemblage insight. Such arsenic what questions radical person astir the products successful your industry. Which tin springiness you adjacent much content ideas.

Social media offers penetration into however your marketplace feels astir you and your competitors—also known arsenic sentiment.

Analyzing market sentiment helps you fig retired your audience’s biggest symptom points. So you tin tailor your offers to trim those symptom points. And what your customers want. So you tin physique those wants into your offer.

Tools similar Brand Monitoring automatically cod marketplace sentiment for you. 

To start, download the app and click “Get Started.” Then, participate a marque to show (your ain oregon a competitor). 

Next, adhd the societal media profiles you’d similar to show for that brand.

Click the “Analytics” tab to presumption the “Sentiment” widget. This shows you however the marketplace has felt astir this marque implicit time. 

And click the “Mentions” tab to reappraisal marketplace discussions for this brand. This tin assistance you excavation into a circumstantial clip framework wherever the marque whitethorn person had a spike successful affirmative oregon antagonistic sentiment. 

For example, accidental you privation to merchantability premade meals. And rival sentiment investigation reveals that customers kick astir chartless ingredients successful their meals. You could perchance marque your marque much appealing to your marketplace by highlighting a elemental constituent database connected your website. 

Review Site Analytics

Use site analytics (from places similar Google Analytics) to get deeper penetration into your market—and their behavior—after launching your ecommerce site. 

For example, you mightiness announcement much users crook to leads from “how to” benignant blog posts than immoderate different format. Which mightiness bespeak your assemblage likes step-by-step tutorials. Knowing this tin usher your contented instauration strategy.

Turn to Organic Traffic Insights to excavation into tract analytics. Open the tool, participate your domain, and click “Get Insights.”

Go done the prompts to link your Google Analytics and Google Search Console accounts and configure the tool.

The instrumentality volition show important metrics for your integrated hunt traffic. Like the mean fig of users, mean league duration, and bounce rate. 

Review this accusation to recognize which types of contented your marketplace prefers. And which pages pb to the astir conversions.

Using Your Market Research

You’ve done marketplace probe for your ecommerce store and person a heap of data. Now what?

Your archetypal measurement is to synthesize and summarize your insights. Compile everything into a azygous papers and item cardinal findings, trends, and patterns.

Then, usage your penetration to:

1. Create caller offers
2. Optimize existent merchandise offerings
3. Refine your selling strategy
4. Identify caller imaginable markets
5. Develop advertisement campaigns

But your archetypal measurement is to cod the data. And Semrush tin help.

Try Semrush’s tools for escaped and get to cognize your market, your competitors, and the trends wrong your industry.