The basic elements of a commerce content program are clear: affiliation, traffic, and—of course—the content itself. After putting those foundational pieces in place, performance optimization can help to establish commerce content as a cornerstone of your monetization strategy.
The final stage in the commerce content journey is focused on advanced approaches that will take your commerce content to the next level.
Five next-level ideas for commerce content
As a commerce content publisher, there are countless steps you can take to enhance your program —things like improving content quality, optimizing merchant selection, and A/B testing various content elements.
But when you’re ready to take it up a notch, you may want to consider some innovative approaches to content — many of which are being embraced by top commerce publishers. These advanced commerce implementations can help to improve reader engagement, build greater audience trust, and increase clicks, conversions, and revenue.
Here are a few ideas to get you started:
- Curated storefronts and “Buy Now” buttons
Creating a curated shopping experience gives you the opportunity to promote affiliated products and offers readers an easy way to buy those products without the hassle and expense of running an online store. Curated storefronts can neatly separate editorial content from buying opportunities for publishers who want to maintain that distinction. Readers who simply want information can consume your content without a sales pitch, while those who want to shop can visit your “store” to explore buying opportunities. Common elements to enhance your curated storefront include “Buy Now” buttons, product metadata, images and descriptions, product reviews, and more.
- Shopping galleries
What if you could create a unique shopping experience that drives revenue and delivers value to your readers, all in a matter of minutes? With Commerce Shopping Galleries, you can easily build a personalized shopping carousel that allows your audience to shop for a variety of products, all in one place. Showcase a range of products from a single merchant or curate products from a variety of merchants, organized by theme or product type. The more products you offer, the better the opportunity to increase both dwell time and revenue.
- Price comparisons
People love the convenience of online shopping, but it’s not always easy to find the best deal. Price comparison tools — like Commerce Comparisons — let you simplify the comparison shopping process for your audience and help them find the best available price without leaving your site. And because Google’s recent commerce algorithm update gives favor to content with multiple purchase options, on-site price comparisons are even more attractive for publishers. Our price comparison solution lets you automatically display pricing for multiple retailers selling the same product, update availability and price data in real time, and replace out-of-stock products with alternate offers. (Watch our recent webinar on Sovrn Commerce Shopping Galleries and Price Comparisons)
- Buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) integrations
Incorporating buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) into your commerce strategy can turn your content into a product discovery engine. This powerful technology gives your audience access to a vast number of merchants — as well as trending deals, discounts, and coupons — to create a frictionless shopping experience and drive more affiliate revenue. - Branded merchandise
Some publishers are taking commerce in an innovative direction by offering branded merchandise and proprietary products, including mugs, T-shirts, and more. Rather than sending buyers to a third party for fulfillment, larger publishers are building out commerce infrastructure to complete purchase transactions on-site.
Congratulations 👏 You’ve Made It!
That’s the end of our tour through the stages of commerce, and we hope it helped inspire the next step, or even the first step in your commerce journey. At Sovrn we believe in the power of commerce content’s singular nature as a reader-service revenue stream, and wherever you are with your commerce strategy, we’d love to partner with you.
Missed our previous Commerce Content Journey blogs?
Ready to start driving more affiliate revenue?
Ready to start optimizing your affiliate marketing program? If you’re not already earning with Sovrn Commerce, sign up now! It only takes a few minutes, and once you’re approved you can start earning right away. Here’s a handy checklist on how to get started.
If you’re currently a Sovrn Commerce affiliate partner, feel free to reach out with questions. Our support team is standing by to help you reach your audience — and your revenue goals.
