– Contextual marketing is important in online shopping because it helps users determine if a product is a good fit for them.
– Online shopping lacks the ability to physically touch and feel products, making it harder for users to understand their features and benefits.
– Providing context in ads, product pages, and landing pages helps consumers relate to and envision themselves using the products, leading to more sales.Provide context in your marketing materials to help customers relate to and see themselves in the products being presented.Contextual marketing – not the ad-related kind. Don’t know what it is? Here’s a primer – When you’re on a website, the user is always trying to figure out if the product is a good fit for them. This could be a color for makeup, this could be sizing for a shirt or pants, this could be a pillow for their head. Unlike traditional shopping where we could go into a mall and look at, touch, and feel products, online it becomes a lot harder. Things get even tougher when you have screens that are configured differently for different colors, items that are hard to understand the difference of with shades, or reviews that don’t really have any context around them. Reviews are probably the easiest to spot these issues with. “These shorts fit great, they were lightweight, breathable, and made for a great travel companion.” So you’re thinking this is a good review that highlights the benefits of the product and will help out a customer. Not so fast. Now read this one. “These shorts fit great, the waist is comfortable, they don’t ride up when I run, the lightweight material is stretchy and allows for extra flex when moving around but sits well when I’m sitting still as well. I had previously been running in more baggy shorts, but I’m glad I made the change. For context, I’m 5’7″ and weigh around 160, and bought a size medium, they fit great. I was looking for a good pair of shorts I could bring with me on vacation and these take up no room and don’t smell bad after a long workout, you can take them with you everywhere. I replaced my existing outdated workout shorts with these. After more than 100 miles of running and a few washes, they are holding up great.” Big difference, right? Yet if you go to any product page, you’re going to read features and benefits that lack all context. Empty bullet lists explaining materials that people have never heard of. The problem that brands and companies have is one of a lack of context and it’s everywhere online. Go read your website right now, go read your ads, odds are there is no context to them. The best ads, product pages, landing pages, all provide context to the consumer so they can relate to and see themselves in the items being presented. This is the difference between making a sale and presenting a product. It takes longer, but the dividends are compounding.https://www.linkedin.com/in/jivanco