Niche Channels for WooCommerce
Carving out an E-Commerce niche
Carving out your e-commerce niche for your WooCommerce store requires a good understanding of your audience and niche marketing channels. ‘Niche’ in business refers to a segment of a larger market that features its own unique identities, likes, dislikes, demographics and psychographics. An example of a niche business would be a vegan cactus leather company which sells to a unique ‘niche’ audience.
Cactus leather is likely to appeal to vegan audience niche, who turn to environmentally impactful, sustainable fashion for their consumer needs.
Niche channels in e-commerce refer to those spaces in which your niche audience shops. These include various marketing channels where your niche audience spends time, depending on location, product variety, and, of course, a loyal audience. What makes a marketing channel niche does not depend on how big or small the channel is, rather it depends on aspects like display, type, category, and affiliates, which leads niche audiences propensity to convert.
So how do merchants carve out a niche? You don’t have to sell niche products in order to sell on niche channels. Rather, store owners need to have an understanding of where their audiences hang out.
What’s at stake here, is how to capture the hearts and carts of your niche audience. The following channels, both large and small, are excellent for getting your return on ad-spend as they target very specific interests, or niches. We would recommend complimenting one or more niche channels with larger channels for your WooCommerce store, for example, Google Ads and Pinterest feed, or using a combination of a few Niche channels, like Microsoft Bing Ads and Awin.
Pinterest Marketing
Pinterest is the world-leading visual search engine. Here are some fun-facts about why you should sell on Pinterest:
- Pinterest’s founder, Ben Silbermann, worked in Google’s advertising group before joining the world’s leading visual search engine.
- Pinterest has over 443 million users per month, many of whom use this channel to determine whether they want to buy something.
- 75% of Pinterest users say they are always shopping
- Pinterest has it’s own analytics API
- June 2022 marked Pinterest’s acquisition of The Yes, an AI-driven fashion shopping platform
Promoted Pins formats:
Because Pinterest is a visual platform, high quality and engaging content will rank higher. You can pin images, videos, collections and carousel posts. In some areas, AR filter pins are available where users can virtually try on products.
Your Pinterest Strategy:
Let’s take a look at some niche audience demographics:
- Millennials use Pinterest more than TikTok
- Most users are women
- People use the platform to feel positive
- Users plan ideas on Pinterest, and thus are likely to use it to shop and therefore are more certain
How to get selling on Pinterest:
- Plan your strategy (using Smart Goals)
- Plan your boards
- Optimize your pins with SEO
- Test out different ad types
- Track your analytics
ShareASale Marketplace
ShareASale Affiliate Network is a commission-based marketing platform with trust at its core. The ShareASale affiliate marketing niche falls within its network. Sellers can focus on one precise segment of their audience and is based on age, price range, and audience needs and interests. For example, sustainable fashion.
Here are some facts about ShareASale:
- ShareASale is free to sign up
- ShareASale is home to over 16 500 merchants who deliver both products and services
- It adheres to 3 marketing tiers: Pay-per-lead, Pay-per-click and Pay-Per-Sale
- ShareASale is the 10th most popular affiliate program on the entire internet
- It is hugely popular amongst the US, Canada, UK, India, and China and is therefore a top choice for cross-border and global sales
Your ShareASale Strategy
Let’s take a look at ShareASale user demographics:
- Fashion and apparel is the highest affiliate category, with electronics in second
- Health is one of the most profitable niches
- Gen-Z and Millennials are very active on ShareASale
- Users are 54.05% male and 45.95% female
- ShareASale relies heavily on audience interest, making it easy for merchants to customize their niche segments’ interests.
ShareASale’s affiliate network strategy:
- Identify your audience interest
- Set up tracking (that’s the only way you can test which strategy works)
- Optimize keywords
- Create your content
Awin Global Affiliate Network
Awin is an affiliate marketing network that assists in business growth. Awin hosts a diverse range of partners and uses data tracking to reward your WooCommerce stores with leads, clicks, downloads, and sales. One of Awin’s major USPs is their stance on “ethical e-commerce”, alongside it being a channel with its own channels like Idealo and Microsoft Bing Shopping.
Awin for WooCommerce
Fun Facts about Awin:
- Awin has access to audiences around the world
- Awin takes Influencer Marketing to the next level
- Users visit 6.58 pages each time they visit Awin
- Germany comes first in terms of user location, followed by Germany, UK, US and Brazil
- There is almost a 50/50 split in terms of gender demographics
- Millennials mostly use Awin, with the most leads falling under the Fashion category.
Your Awin Marketing Strategy for your WooCommerce store
- Integrate your WooCommerce store with Awin to make sure tracking has been set up successfully.
- Plan your strategy
- Work with super-affiliates and influencers
- Ensure that you’re using coupons and promotions
- Optimize keywords and your landing page
- Make sure you have strong CTAs
Conclusion
By now, you should know the difference between niche marketing, niche products, and a niche audience segment. We outlined the three important niche channels and affiliate networks that compliment each other, and bigger channels very well in order for your store to monetize and reach those conversion goals.
If you’re considering adding another channel to your marketing network, or wanting to use ShoppingFeeder to integrate and optimize your product feed for any given niche channel, contact us here.
