Approaching e-commerce without giving consideration to Amazon is paramount to eating your lunch in the tiger cage at the local zoo. That’s not to say it can’t be done—because it can. You just need to be very clear about your strategic planning and what creates your competitive advantage—lest Amazon will eat you for lunch. Read more here: https://modeeffect.com/how-your-woocommerce-store-can-compete-with-amazon/

1. How Your WooCommerce
Store Can Compete with
Amazon
…and win!

2. Why WooCommerce?

3. WooCommerce Adoption
…and climbing!

4. Cody Landefeld
Senior web strategist and founder
at @modeeffect. We provide
WordPress and WooCommerce for
enterprise companies, technology
innovators & non-profit
organizations.
modeeffect.com
@codyL
About Me

5. Learn from our competitor(s)

6. Learn from our competitor(s)
If we’re aware of the competition in our
product or service space.
It’s important to mine as much possible
information to know how you can exist and
bring value to the customers you’re looking to
serve.

7. Learn from our competitor(s)

8. 107 Billion USD in 2015

9. Is Amazon our competition?
Maybe not direct competition. But Amazon is a wealth
of insight and research to understand buyer behavior.
Amazon provides a wealth of data that we can easily
find within a few minutes of searching.
Learn from our competitor(s)

10. Learn from our competitor(s)

11. Learn from our competitor(s)
Things to learn from Amazon
• What are consumers buying?
• What are they complaining about?
• What features do they wish a product had?
• At what price point is a product selling?

12. Create a strategy

13. Whether we’ve completed a written strategy before
launching our store, there should be a high-level
strategy we have for our online store.
It’s also not too late to write down a specific strategy on
how to accomplish your goals.
Create a strategy

14. Key things to consider when creating our online store strategy.
• Are the decisions you’re making in alignment with your vision and
brand?
• Make sure our store does one thing really well before adding to the
product/service line.
• Share the strategy with key people on our team.
Create a strategy

15. Build a brand

16. The difference between Amazon
and our online store is that we are
able to create a specific brand that
specializes in a certain niche that
Amazon can’t effectively serve.
Build a brand

17. The best way to define our brand is to ask one
important question:
When a customer thinks about our store or purchases
one of our products, what are the feelings and
emotions that arise as a result of that interaction?
Build a brand

18. The process works like this:
Your Actions + Your Customers Emotions and
Feelings = Your Brand.
Build a brand

19. Running a small store gives us a competitive advantage
over a giant like Amazon. While Amazon must appeal to
everyone, we only need to appeal to your target audience
and customers.
The same thing applies to the design of our store.
The layout, color choices, and overall feel all contribute to a
single purpose and the building of your brand.
Build a brand

20. Storytelling

21. Another way to compete with Amazon is to leverage
the ability to tell a story.
As a small store and brand, we can use our size to
an advantage.
Craft a compelling story that spurs customers to
want to be associated with your brand and products.
Storytelling

23. Saddleback Leather sells high-quality leather products.
But they’re much more that that. They are a company
that exudes quality, adventure, charity, and family values.
They invite you to play a part in what they’re building.
Add in the customer service and a 100 year warranty,
and you’ll have a hard time convincing anyone why
buying from Amazon might be a better idea.
Storytelling

25. Warby Parker also tells a great story and sells a
great product. Eyeglasses are a commodity, but
Warby Parker does things differently.
While reading their story, take note of their
minimalist design, great typography, and beautiful
product photos. They help to tell their story about
who they serve and provide eyeglasses for.
Storytelling

26. Building Relationships

27. Make sure you take the time to listen and communicate with some
of the customers who purchase products from your store.
Amazon offers great service, but can’t reach out to individual
customers. Individual customer reactions can be time-consuming,
but when you’re small, you can reach out to customers consistently.
Thank customers for their business, ask how you can improve, and
then act upon the information they provide.
Building Relationships

28. Taking the time to interact one-on-one with some of
your customers is a great way to spread the word
about your store, even if it’s done on a small scale.
People love to share stories and you have an
opportunity to control the characters, settings, plot,
and resolution.
Building Relationships

29. Conclusion

30. As a small store, you might find yourself worrying about the
giants like Amazon, but it’s not necessary. They’re big, but that
doesn’t mean you can’t survive and thrive in their presence.
Change within a small online store business can happen with
greater speed. We also have the ability to target a specific
group of customers and to tell a compelling story that inspires
them to be part of your brand.
Conclusion

31. Thanks.