Stress-Free Marketing Strategies for Female Ecommerce Owners: A Sustainable Approach
Discover stress-free marketing strategies tailored for female eCommerce owners. Overcome the overwhelm of complex tactics and learn sustainable approaches that align with your capacity, helping you grow your business without the burnout.
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Does it feel like every social media and marketing expert is pushing a complex, time-consuming, and stressful marketing strategy on you lately? Are all these strategies truly the golden ticket to getting the sales you want in your store?
Where Sustainable Marketing Starts
When I teach my clients about Sustainable Marketing, one of the first things I ask is what type of marketing they enjoy. What lights you up? Do you love writing? Do you enjoy connecting with customers on Instagram, writing blog posts, or do you find ads to be fun?
We can't create a strategy that you'll follow until we identify where your comfort zone lies and where you’re willing to experiment and try new things without falling into a place of complete overwhelm, fear, and anxiety.
A Customer Case Study
I recently had a call with a new client who shared that she was completely burnt out on marketing. She is a solopreneur, selling products she makes 100% herself. Capacity is a big issue for her—making, shipping, going to shows, managing Etsy, handling customer service, and doing all the work for the business left her with nothing in terms of time, energy, or funds to focus on marketing her Shopify site.
This is the story of one client, but in reality, it's a story I hear variations of every single day. It’s not unique and is very common among makers and in-person sellers.
This client asked me what she should do to ensure she had some visibility and small year-over-year sales growth from her online shop, knowing that it was realistically a very low-priority goal, but something that could change in a few years.
After I understood what her marketing boundaries were, we dove into her priorities. This took a bit of conversation, as she hadn’t ever thought about them in such specific terms.
Priority #1 Etsy
This marketplace is where she makes the bulk of her sales with no marketing effort, due to a long history on the platform, a unique niche, and hundreds of 5-star reviews.
Priority #2 In-Person Events
In-person festivals and shows are a big chunk of her income, but they are very seasonal and highly draining due to the time, energy, and travel required. In 3-5 years, she expects this to be less of her business, but for now, it is very important financially.
Priority #3 Wholesale
Wholesale is an easy part of the business due to long-standing relationships and re-orders that flow in. Very little marketing is required because new accounts reach out via Faire or Etsy. The challenge with wholesale is production—due to the handmade aspect of her products, wholesale orders take up a lot of production time to fulfill.
Priority #4 Shopify Site
Now we get to the part where she wanted my help figuring out how she can grow the Shopify site with almost no time and effort. This client has zero energy or motivation to engage with busy marketing strategies. She hates social media and refuses to do video content.
My Recommendations
My recommendation was to lean into a few areas where we can automate her marketing for the Shopify site. A few hours a month of checking in and optimizing specific channels is much different than spending hours on social media and creating reels and video content.
This is the most sustainable way forward. She isn’t likely to see explosive growth, but these are things she can do while this part of the business remains a low priority.
Start with Shopify channels that provide free traffic (Google/YouTube Channel, Pinterest Channel).
Run low-budget ads to have a steady stream of traffic and awareness.
Check SEO rankings monthly and optimize for important keywords.
Set up SEO via Pinterest.
Send regular emails to her list with a simple layout (my product email formula)!
She was really surprised that I recommended she work on her Shopify marketing no more than 1-2 hours per week, just to check one platform, do a bit of optimization, and then close it again.
I set up the back-end ads, systems, and provided actionable coaching on how to do the things that would make an impact on her Shopify site goals.
She was really surprised that I recommended she work on her Shopify marketing no more than 1-2 hours per week, just to check one platform, do a bit of optimization, and then close it again.
I set up the back-end ads, systems, and provided actionable coaching on how to do the things that would make an impact on her Shopify site goals.
The Role Of A Strategy Coach
It’s one thing to know you should be running ads, but knowing what kind, how much to spend, and what normal looks like is something an expert coach should be helping you with.
If a fully personalized sustainable marketing strategy is something you need help developing for your business, reach out for a consultation.
Setting up your marketing systems and content is the work I LOVE doing, and it is fully customized to your personal goals, capacity, and YOUR unique business model.
Written by Tina Bar
eCommerce Strategist and Mindset Coach
Find all my offerings on my Everything Page