Top Tools for eCommerce Store Optimization: Boosting Sales and Enhancing CX

The eCommerce industry is growing by leaps and bounds. It’s expected that the global eCommerce industry will be worth $6.3 trillion by the end of this year (2023). The same statistics report also shows that in 2023, 20.8% of all global retail purchases will take place online.

These statistics show that the competition in the eCommerce space has become increasingly fierce. In such a competitive landscape, you can’t expect an unoptimized (or poorly optimized) eCommerce store to perform well.

It’ll lead to slow page loading times, a negative user experience, high bounce rates, and ultimately lost sales opportunities. Therefore, it’s important to optimize your eCommerce store using the right set of tools.

That’s where this guide comes in. It contains the top tools for eCommerce store optimization that will help you enhance the customer experience and boost sales.

Website and Process Optimization Tools

Website and process optimization tools are essential because they allow you to improve the performance and functionality of your eCommerce store. They can also help you enhance your productivity to save time and resources and spend them on more important tasks.

Here are the best website and process optimization tools that you can use for your eCommerce store.

Google PageSpeed Insights

Google PageSpeed Insights is a free website optimization tool offered by Google. It helps you identify issues that affect page loading times to improve the speed and performance of your store.

Statistics show that the bounce rate of a website reaches 38% if it takes 5 seconds to load. So, you don’t want to have an eCommerce store that takes a lot of time to load as it can decrease your sales greatly.

The tool also provides detailed reports on the site’s performance and offers comprehensive insights into areas of improvement. It’s an essential tool for eCommerce businesses to enhance user experience and increase sales.

Features

• Comprehensive insights
• Detailed reports
• Free to use

Google Mobile-Friendly Test

Google Mobile-Friendly Test is another free tool by Google that helps you determine the mobile-friendliness of your eCommerce store. According to Statista, the number of people using mobile phones to access the internet is 5 billion, which is more than 60% of all global internet users.

So you want to make sure that your store works optimally on smartphones, and Google Mobile-Friendly Test can help you with that. You only need to provide this tool with your site’s URL, and it’ll assess the mobile responsiveness and identify any issues that are degrading the user experience.

The tool provides suggestions on how to improve the mobile-friendliness of the website, including recommendations for text size and clickable element spacing.

Features

• Suggestions on how to improve mobile-friendliness
• Quick assessment
• Free

Google Search Console

Google Search Console allows you to monitor your online store’s performance on Google. It offers a variety of free tools to help you understand how to improve your search engine ranking. You can use this tool to find indexing issues, request re-indexing of updated pages, and monitor your website’s organic performance through metrics such as impressions, keywords, and clicks.

Additionally, you can audit your website’s internal linking strategy, find external websites linking back to your site, and monitor server, performance and security issues. The platform also allows you to troubleshoot issues related to AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages) and mobile-friendliness.

Features

• Monitor site rankings on Google
• Identify indexing issues
• Track organic performance metrics
• Perform link analysis and troubleshooting
• Monitor performance, security, and server issues

ShipStation

ShipStation is a shipping solution that helps businesses of all sizes streamline their order fulfillment process. It integrates with major eCommerce platforms, including Magento Commerce, Shopware, and Shopify, to import and sort orders automatically. It allows you to set different rules for specific orders with pre-filled information.

This automation feature minimizes errors and saves time, making it easy to print shipping labels and ship orders quickly.

Features

• Imports orders from eCommerce websites and marketplaces
• Integration with all major eCommerce platforms seamlessly
• Sorts orders by priority and sets rules for specific orders
• Simplified shipping workflows
• Inventory management features
• Post-purchase branded shipping

CartHook

According to recent statistics, the average cart abandonment rate is around 70%. It’s one of the biggest problems that eCommerce store owners face, and CartHook can help you address that.

It collects the email address and cart content of each user who abandons their cart and triggers an email automatically if the order is not completed within an hour. Using this tool can help you increase your recovery rate and revenue greatly.

Features

• Automatic email series to recapture abandoned carts
• Customizable email templates and rules
• Data analytics and insights
• Post-purchase revenue analysis
• A/B testing for upsell optimization
• Live chat support

Optimizely

Optimizely is an experimentation platform that allows you to test the impact of changes on your eCommerce website through A/B testing.

Its main functions include behavioral targeting, multivariate testing, visual editing, and full integration with popular analytics tools like Google Analytics.

It’s considered the world’s most powerful solution for A/B and multi-page front-end experimentation.

Features

• Multivariate A/B testing
• Streamlined workflows
• Inventory and order management
• Built-in calendar for time tracking
• Seamless collaboration and commenting

Nosto

Nosto is a powerful eCommerce tool that specializes in personalization. Its main feature is the ability to provide personalized product recommendations to customers, but it also offers customer insights, pop-ups, email product recommendations, and content personalization.

The tool is designed to predict and deliver tailored shopping experiences to individual customers to increase user engagement and maximize revenue.

Features

• Target audience segmentation
• Interactive dashboard with analytics and reports
• Product recommendations and email/content personalization
• Category merchandising
• Pop-ups and reminders

Yotpo

According to recent statistics, 93% of customers read online reviews before they make a purchase. It’s a huge number that shows the importance of having reviews on your eCommerce store, and that’s where Yotpo comes in.

It allows you to find, create, respond to, and manage online user-generated content, specifically reviews, related to your brand. It helps you build social proof and trust among potential customers to boost sales.

Features

• Integrates with major online platforms like Shopify, Google, Facebook
• Collects positive reviews
• Powerful reporting and analytics tool
• Support for multiple languages
• Coupon and loyalty programs
• Product recommendations

SEO Tools

According to statistics, 92% of online users select a business that ranks on the first page of search engines and the only way to achieve that is to utilize the power of SEO (Search Engine Optimization.

Here is the best tool to use to optimize your eCommerce store for search engines.

Google Keyword Planner

Google Keyword Planner is a free online tool for keyword research. It helps you discover the best keywords to use in your content to improve your store’s ranking on search engines.

Features

• Helps with keyword selection for content optimization
• Provides search volumes and related keywords
• Free to use

Semrush

Semrush is a comprehensive digital marketing platform that offers a variety of features for eCommerce SEO. It comes with more than 25 SEO tools that cater to different tasks, such as link building, rank tracking, competitor analysis, and keyword research.

You can use this app to gain detailed insights into your competitors’ sites, find keyword ideas and opportunities, and bridge content gaps. It helps you develop a solid SEO strategy to improve your store’s ranking and generate more sales.

Features

• Identify and fix SEO issues on your online store
• Discover the right keywords by analyzing your competitors
• Monitor and improve your website performance
• Analyze your backlink profile and improve it

Ahrefs

Ahrefs is an excellent SEO and competitor research tool that provides an extensive backlink index. You can use this tool to analyze your competitors’ SEO strategies, backlinks, and keywords to step up your SEO game.

It allows you to improve your blog content and optimize product descriptions to boost organic website traffic. Additionally, it can also help you create brand awareness and attract, engage, and retain customers through content on your site.

Features

• Extensive backlink index for competitor research
• SEO analysis and optimization for website content
• Keyword research to identify profitable search terms
• Content analysis to improve on-page SEO
• Site auditing to identify and fix technical issues
• Rank tracking to monitor your website’s search engine performance

Moz Pro

Moz Pro is a popular SEO application trusted by thousands of customers around the world. It offers a range of paid and free SEO tools for eCommerce, including backlink analysis, rank tracking, site audits, and keyword research.

With Moz Pro, you can easily find crawling and indexing-related issues with your site to improve its SEO. It also offers a Chrome extension that provides key SEO metrics such as domain and page authority for any web page.

Features

• Site audits for finding new and recurring issues
• Keyword research for better keyword strategy
• Rank tracking to monitor SERP ranking performance
• Backlink analysis for monitoring and finding opportunities

Best Content and Social Media Management Tools

Publishing high-quality content on your website and social media channels is one of the best ways to grow your eCommerce business. The following is the list of the best content and social media tools to use.

SocialBee

SocialBee is a social media management tool that allows users to add, organize, and share content across different platforms, including Instagram, Facebook, Google My Business, Twitter, TikTok, and Pinterest.

It allows you to customize your posts for each platform, set a posting schedule in a content calendar, and recycle evergreen posts.

Features

• Social media content management across multiple platforms
• Customizable posts scheduling and content calendar
• Ability to recycle evergreen posts and expire time-sensitive content
• A range of integrations available in the app

BuzzSumo

BuzzSumo is a cloud-based platform that allows you to discover the most popular (and relevant based on your brand) content, including customer queries, trending stories, and keywords, on the web.

You can use it to find the best outreach opportunities on search engines and social media platforms to increase your website traffic.

Features

• Discover popular content across various social media platforms
• Monitor brand performance and customer questions
• Find new keywords and content ideas
• Analyze competitors’ content performance
• Get alerts on industry trends and viral content.

Buffer

Buffer is a social media management tool that helps businesses plan, schedule, and publish content on various social media platforms. It allows you to manage multiple social media accounts from a single dashboard and provides real-time analytics to monitor the performance of your posts.

The tool offers a feature to create eye-catching visuals, and you can use it to assign tasks to your team members as well.

Features

• Schedule and publish posts across multiple social media channels
• Create attractive visuals to accompany your posts
• Real-time analytics to track the performance of posts
• Assign tasks to team members
• Integration with other social apps, including Zapier, Pocket, and Feedly.

Marketing Optimization Tools

Using marketing optimization tools allows you to adjust different elements of your marketing efforts to target the right people at the right time. It also helps you save time and resources and deliver the best customer experience.

Here are the best marketing optimization tools for eCommerce stores.

Mailchimp

Mailchimp is an email marketing platform that allows you to create and send campaigns using built-in templates or custom designs. It offers pre-scheduling options for easy email and newsletter management, targeted ad campaigns, and landing page creation.

It also provides you with insights into your marketing campaign performance to find areas for improvement.

Features

• Built-in email templates
• Custom template creation
• Pre-scheduling options
• Targeted ad campaigns
• Landing page creation
• Performance insights

Adobe Experience Manager

Adobe Experience Manager is a powerful tool that combines digital asset management with content management capabilities. It allows you to create, manage, deliver, and optimize personalized content to deliver exceptional customer experience.

Another great feature of Adobe Experience Manager is that it’s equipped with AI and machine-learning capabilities. This feature allows it to offer valuable insights about your customers to make informed decisions. You can also integrate it with Magento eCommerce and Adobe Creative Cloud apps and services.

Features

• Digital asset management
• Content management system
• AI and machine-learning capabilities
• Responsive web design

Gorgias

Gorgias is a customer support help desk that streamlines customer communication for eCommerce businesses. It allows you to automate basic customer questions and manage all customer interactions from a single dashboard.

The platform also provides analytics to help you measure the impact of your customer service efforts and learn how to improve them.

Features

• Automated responses to basic customer questions
• Single dashboard for managing all customer communications
• Integration with multiple channels such as email, chat, social media, and phone
• Analytics to measure the impact of customer service on revenue and productivity

Omnisend

Omnisend is an all-in-one omnichannel marketing automation platform that allows businesses to connect and automate email, SMS, social media, and other channels. The platform provides an easy-to-use email editor, eCommerce-specific templates, and various email capture options to build email lists.

The automation features include a welcome series, special offer emails, birthday series, and cart abandonment workflows. All of these features are designed to save time and streamline the process of sending campaigns.

Features

• Omnichannel marketing automation
• Email editor and eCommerce-specific templates
• Email capture options like landing pages, pop-ups, and lead-generation forms
• Automated workflows for improved customer experience

Analytics and Reporting Tools

Using the tools discussed above will help you run your eCommerce store smoothly with optimized marketing efforts. But to maximize the full potential of your store, you’ll need to find out what’s working best for you and what needs improvement.

That’s where the following analytics and reporting tools come into place.

Google Analytics

Google Analytics is a free web analytics tool that helps you track and analyze website traffic and user behavior. It provides valuable insights into your website’s performance, including user demographics, session duration, bounce rates, and conversion rates.

With Google Analytics, you can create customized reports and dashboards to visualize data and track goals and campaigns to measure the success of your marketing efforts. It also offers integration with other Google tools, such as Google Ads and Google Search Console, to provide a comprehensive view of your online presence.

Features

• Real-time reporting
• Audience demographics
• User behavior tracking
• Conversion tracking
• Customizable reports and dashboards
• Integration with Google Ads and Search Console.

Hotjar

Hotjar is an analytics and feedback tool that provides a visual representation of user behavior on your website through interactive heatmaps. It allows you to monitor website performance, make changes, generate reports, and compare site visits to improve user experience.

It also comes with a pop-over survey tool that allows you to collect feedback from site visitors to further optimize your website.

Features

• Interactive heatmaps
• Visitor behavior tracking
• Real-time monitoring
• Pop-over survey tool
• Feedback collection and analysis
• Site performance comparison and analysis

Best Security Tools

Using security tools is critical for all eCommerce stores to ensure eCommerce fraud prevention. They’ll allow you to protect the data of your customers, which is essential to comply with regulations such as GDPR, HIPAA, and FERPA.

• Antivirus Software: Anti-virus tools, such as Bitdefender and McAfee, scan your system for malicious software and block any threats. It’s important to have antivirus software installed on all devices that you use to manage your eCommerce store operations to protect them against potential risks.
• Firewalls: A firewall, as the name implies, is a barrier between your business network and the internet. Its main purpose is to block malicious traffic from entering your system. Ideally, you should use both hardware and software firewalls for maximum protection. Almost all popular antivirus solutions come with software firewalls.
• SSL Certification: An SSL certificate encrypts the communication between your website and the user, making it difficult for third parties to intercept and steal information. Nowadays, it’s mandatory for websites to attain an SSL certificate and operate in an HTTPS environment.
• Access Management System: An access management system assigns roles and privileges to each user to control who can view, modify, or delete data. Implementing this system allows you to make sure that each user can access only the resources they need to perform their job to prevent data leaks.
• Encryption Software: Encryption software like Trend Micro, FileVault, and BitLocker scramble sensitive data. It prevents anyone who doesn’t have the decryption key from accessing and reading sensitive business data to protect it from cybercriminals.

Final Words

Optimizing your eCommerce store is essential for increasing sales and providing a positive customer experience.

The tools discussed in this guide will help you analyze your website’s performance, optimize your marketing strategies, enhance your website’s design, improve user experience, and ensure the security of your customers’ data.

It’s important to note that eCommerce store optimization is an ongoing process and requires constant monitoring and adjustment. So, make sure that you keep up with the latest trends and technologies and test and refine your strategies regularly to stay ahead of the competition.