Petra Reghian, Content Marketer at Videowise

18–23 minutes

We all know the eCommerce landscape is constantly evolving.

Gone are the days of static product pages and clunky checkout processes.

Today’s online shoppers crave an engaging experience, and that’s where visual commerce comes in.

Think of it as the power couple of high-quality visuals and interactive content.

It’s all about using eye-catching images, videos, and other features to grab your customers’ attention, inform them about your products, and ultimately convince them to hit that “buy” button.

The rise of visual commerce

eCommerce has transformed over the years, shifting to more visually-driven platforms.

Why the shift?

It’s all about consumer behavior.

Consumers want visuals because our brains process images and videos much faster than text.

High-quality photos and videos allow customers to truly understand what they’re buying, creating a sense of connection and trust that plain text descriptions just can’t match.

The stats back it up: online shopping is booming, with 20.1% of all retail purchases expected to happen online in 2024, according to Forbes. That’s a massive chunk of the market; visual commerce is a key growth driver.

And it’s not just about professional photos—UGC reigns supreme. 79% of consumers say UGC, like customer photos and reviews, significantly impacts their purchasing decisions.

Visual commerce platforms seamlessly integrate UGC and tap into a powerful wellspring of trust and social proof.

Image source

The future of visual commerce is infused with cutting-edge technology.

The global AI-powered eCommerce market is expected to reach a staggering $16.8 billion by 2030, indicating the growing importance of advanced visual technologies in creating immersive and interactive shopping experiences.

Also, visual content receives 94% more views than text-only content, highlighting its effectiveness in capturing audience attention.

Vibrant, high-quality visuals that showcase your products in the best light are crucial elements for success in the visual age of eCommerce.

The bottom line? Visual commerce is the future.

By embracing the power of visuals, you can create an online shopping experience as captivating and engaging as a physical store, ultimately leading to happier customers and a thriving business.

Why visual commerce matters

People are visual creatures, and studies show that consumers are 85% more likely to buy a product after seeing a high-quality image of it.

Visual commerce isn’t a fad; it’s a strategic approach that can:

• Boost engagement and conversions: Captivating visuals keeps customers on your site longer, which means more time to explore your products and add them to their cart.
• Build trust and brand loyalty: Authentic UGC, like customer photos and reviews featuring your products in real-world settings, is a powerful tool for building trust and brand loyalty. Showcasing UGC on your website and social media channels demonstrates social proof, letting potential customers see how real people use and love your products.
• Reduce return rates: Clear and detailed visuals set realistic expectations for customers. High-quality product photos and informative videos that accurately depict size, color, and functionality can minimize the chance of customers receiving something different from what they envisioned. This not only reduces returns but also improves customer satisfaction.
• Stand out from the crowd: Visual commerce lets you create a unique and memorable shopping experience that differentiates your brand. Customers are likelier to remember and engage with a brand that offers a visually stimulating and engaging shopping journey.

What are the challenges of visual commerce

While visual commerce offers a treasure trove of benefits, it’s not without its challenges.

Here are some hurdles to keep in mind when implementing visual commerce:

• Creating High-Quality Visuals: Grainy, unprofessional photos simply won’t cut it in today’s visually-driven landscape. Investing in high-quality product photography and interactive experiences is crucial for showcasing your products in the best light. Remember, high-quality, engaging visuals are the foundation of visual commerce.
• Maintaining Consistency Across Platforms: A cohesive brand image is essential for building trust and recognition. This means ensuring consistent visual elements like colors, fonts, and overall style across all your platforms, including your website, social media channels, and marketing materials.
• Cost and Resource Investment: Creating top-notch visual content and implementing new technologies require significant investment. Costs include hiring professional photographers and acquiring the latest software.
• The Power UGC: Don’t underestimate the power of UGC! Customer photos, reviews, and testimonials build trust, establish social proof, and can significantly impact purchase decisions. Failing to incorporate UGC means missing out on a valuable tool for building brand authenticity and credibility.
• Mobile Optimization is Key: 59.8% of online purchases were made via mobile in 2022, so optimizing your visual commerce experience for smaller screens is crucial. This means using responsive design, conducting user testing to ensure a smooth experience, and prioritizing fast page loading speeds to avoid frustrating customers on the go.
• Don’t Forget Page Speed: Slow-loading pages, especially on mobile, can be a major turn-off for customers and hurt conversions. Utilize tools like Google PageSpeed Insights to identify and fix performance bottlenecks.

How can visual commerce be used to improve product discovery in eCommerce

It’s all about creating an engaging, interactive, and personalized experience that helps customers find the products they love.

Here’s how visual commerce takes product discovery to the next level:

• Shoppable & Interactive Content: Visual commerce lets brands create dynamic experiences. Think shoppable lookbooks, engaging catalogs, and interactive social media content. This shopping experience allows customers to discover and purchase what they see, all in one flow.
• Personalized Recommendations: AI-powered engines analyze browsing and purchase history, surfacing visually similar and complementary products you’ll love, leading to higher-order values and increased consumer satisfaction.
• The Power of UGC: Forget staged studio shoots and deliver authenticity with UGC. Just think about real customers rocking your latest fashions, showcasing your products in everyday settings. Build trust and social proof that resonates with all your potential customers.
• Bringing the Fun to Your Store: Let’s face it, social media platforms are hotbeds for product discovery. Visual commerce bridges the gap by directly integrating those engaging social experiences into your online store. Imagine browsing your website and being inspired by a funny TikTok showcasing your product in action. Social shopping creates excitement, making product discovery more interactive and engaging.
• Interactive Content: Think playful video quizzes that help customers discover perfect products based on their style, interactive video forms for gathering valuable customer data while keeping them entertained, and shoppable videos that allow instant purchases from the video to streamline the buying journey further. So, grab attention, keep customers engaged, and ultimately convert them into loyal fans.

Visual commerce goes beyond shoppable videos: Introducing the next evolution of Videowise

As you have now reviewed all the benefits and challenges, it’s time to acknowledge that in the eCommerce industry, visually presenting products is crucial for driving engagement, building trust, and ultimately converting browsers into buyers.

Shoppable videos are a popular tool, but modern consumers want even more depth and interactivity.

Videowise, a complex visual commerce platform, goes beyond simple shoppable videos by offering a comprehensive suite of tools that enhance the shopping experience.

Videowise allows for detailed product displays, interactive content, AI-powered optimizations, and Netflix-style Video Channels, creating a more immersive and engaging user experience.

This approach effectively engages visitors with your products and integrates seamlessly with various marketing strategies, providing valuable analytics and insights that help optimize performance and drive sales.

By leveraging a platform like Videowise, eCommerce businesses can stay ahead of the competition and meet their customers’ evolving demands.

Key components of Videowise

1. Media Infrastructure

At the core of Videowise is a robust infrastructure that guarantees a seamless and engaging user experience. This includes a comprehensive video CRM and high-performance video embedding for ultra-fast loading times. This ensures that product videos are captivating and immediately grab customers’ attention, keeping them deeply engaged with your brand story.

Videowise allows you to connect multiple stores in one account, facilitating faster and more consistent integrations. You can share videos, images, widgets, interactions, and customizations between these connected stores.

Additionally, AI-powered optimization significantly reduces file sizes of videos and images by up to 97%, while maintaining 99% of the original quality. You can easily import videos and images from platforms like Shopify, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube, and organize your media library with labels, categories, and folders.

Videowise also enables you to tag products in videos and images, making them shoppable and generates SEO meta data from transcripts and tagged products, with the option for custom meta data. The platform supports team management, allowing you to invite team members and assign permissions for collaborative work.

2. Video Commerce

Seamlessly integrate shopping with viewing, creating a frictionless experience for customers. Imagine a fashion brand producing interactive shoppable videos where viewers can click on clothing items and purchase them instantly. This streamlined process enhances customer engagement and makes products stand out more effectively.

With Videowise, you can choose from over 20 fully customizable video and image widget themes. You can set specific rules and triggers for widget displays and create automated widgets that update your site based on predefined rules.

The platform allows at-scale embedding, enabling one widget to display different content on various pages and simplifying your code base. Bulk actions let you efficiently manage videos and images across widgets and pages.

Videowise supports adding autoplay video to product galleries and collection pages, ensuring your product previews are dynamic and engaging. The platform also integrates videos into the Shopify Shop App and other mobile apps. Additionally, Videowise ensures that all video embeddings are fully ADA-compliant, providing an accessible experience for all users.

3. Video Channels

Videowise allows you to curate a Netflix-style video experience, perfect for creating dedicated channels that showcase tutorials and design tips. Imagine a home decor store using this feature to inspire viewers with interior design ideas. It will educate customers and spark their desire to purchase the products and concepts featured in the videos.

With Netflix-style video channels, you can create an engaging video learning and shopping experience embedded directly on your site.

Each video in these channels is SEO optimized and indexed separately by search engines, enhancing visibility. You can customize your video channel’s theme, colors, and fonts to align with your brand’s style, ensuring a cohesive look.

Additionally, Videowise enables seamless embedding of these video channels as new pages within your online store, integrating them smoothly into your existing site structure. This feature enhances user engagement and promotes a more immersive shopping experience.

4. Shoppable Hotspots

Videowise’s shoppable hotspots feature revolutionizes the buying process with interactive elements. Imagine a beauty retailer using shoppable hotspots in makeup tutorial videos, allowing viewers to click on the products used and add them directly to their cart. It streamlines the consumer’s purchasing journey, making it seamless and engaging.

You can tag products in images and highlight them with interactive, shoppable hotspots, enhancing the shopping experience. Additionally, you can create image galleries with shoppable hotspots, increasing product discovery and providing a more interactive and enjoyable way for customers to explore your offerings. Transform static images into dynamic, shoppable content, driving higher engagement and sales.

5. User-Generated Content (UGC)

Videowise’s User-Generated Content (UGC) feature helps build trust and authenticity by showcasing real customer experiences from TikTok, Instagram and YouTube.

Imagine a furniture company displaying customer photos and videos of their products in actual homes, creating powerful social proof and connecting with potential buyers on a personal level.

Videowise enables you to detect and save all Instagram posts, reels, or stories where your hashtags are mentioned or commented on, as well as TikTok videos featuring your hashtags.

You can request and manage usage rights from Instagram and TikTok creators to use this UGC in your campaigns.

Additionally, you can collect video UGC with an easy drag-and-drop area that can be embedded on your site. Performance reports on social listening provide insights into how well content mentioning your hashtags is performing on Instagram and TikTok, helping you refine your strategies and maximize engagement.

6. Social Shopping

Videowise brings the addictive energy of TikTok and Instagram Reels to your website.

Customers can swipe through shoppable videos that showcase your products in action, making it easy for them to transition from discovery to purchase with a single tap. This engaging social shopping experience boosts engagement and captivates customers, turning website visits into lasting brand loyalty.

With Videowise, you can create a synced or moderated shoppable Instagram feed featuring your posts, reels, and stories. Similarly, you can set up a shoppable TikTok video feed and a shoppable YouTube video feed.

These feeds allow customers to explore and purchase products directly from your social media content, enhancing their shopping experience and driving sales through a seamless, frictionless journey.

7. Performance Analytics

Our improved Performance Analytics allows you to fine-tune your visual content strategy by providing detailed insights into what resonates most with your audience. For example, an online bookstore can use these analytics to track which video content leads to the highest conversions and adjust their future content strategies accordingly.

The performance dashboard comprehensively overviews your account’s engagement and conversion metrics. Conversion funnel reports show the complete conversion journey of audiences interacting with Videowise widgets, while engagement reports provide detailed metrics on audience interactions.

Device segmentation reports allow you to segment metrics by device, giving you a clearer picture of your audience’s behavior.

Additionally, you can select a custom attribution period for Videowise audience conversion metrics, and the action change log lets you mark changes in your widgets or content and track their impact on performance trends.

Custom event triggers enable you to input analytics triggers into custom platforms to generate your reports.

Detailed reports offer even deeper insights into your conversion and engagement metrics, helping you optimize your content strategy effectively.

Why it’s important to have all your visual assets in the same place

Imagine trying to create a dynamic social shopping experience on your website, but your product photos, videos, and customer content are scattered across different platforms.

Videowise eliminates this hassle by providing a central hub for all your visual assets.

This saves you time and effort and unlocks a treasure trove of benefits that elevate your eCommerce game.

But Videowise also streamlines the customer journey.

Think of it as having everything at your fingertips. Product photos, shoppable videos, and even user-generated content can seamlessly be integrated.

Customers can effortlessly discover products, see them in action through real-life UGC, and purchase instantly – all within the Videowise platform.

No more hunting across different locations – it’s a one-stop shop for a captivating shopping experience.

Plus, Videowise personalizes each visitor’s experience by leveraging customer data to power its AI engine and centralizing all visual assets so the engine has access to all of them.

This comprehensive data pool allows Videowise to deliver the most relevant recommendations and content, showcasing products that perfectly align with individual preferences.

Besides, keeping all your visual assets in one place helps you maintain a cohesive brand image. Consistency across elements like shoppable videos, social media posts, and product pages becomes effortless.

So, customers experience a unified brand identity throughout their shopping journey, creating trust and a stronger connection with your brand.

How can a visual commerce platform be integrated with existing eCommerce platforms

Visual commerce platforms are all about creating a dynamic shopping experience, but they work best when complementing your eCommerce existing platforms, such as:

• Social media platforms: Instagram and TikTok are where trends are born, and audiences are captivated. A good visual commerce platform should let you import and export content effortlessly, ensuring your stunning visuals are the life of the party across all your social media channels.
• eCommerce integrations: Shopify, WooCommerce, Magento – these platforms are the backbone of your online store. Choose a visual platform that helps you seamlessly integrate visual content into your online stores.
• Review apps: Look for a visual commerce platform that integrates seamlessly with review platforms like Yotpo or Opinew. Imagine showcasing real customer reviews alongside your eye-catching visuals. This social proof will convince consumers they’re making the right call with a click.
• Influencer agencies: Partnering with influencers is a game-changer; your visual commerce platform should help you tap into that magic. Look for integration with influencer agencies like Insense to streamline collaborations and create shoppable content that leverages the power of these trendsetters.
• Lead generation tools: The ultimate goal is to turn website visitors into loyal fans. Tools like Klaviyo help capture leads through captivating visuals and nurture them with targeted marketing campaigns.

It’s time to power up your website with visual commerce

The (re)launch of Videowise marks a new era in visual commerce, offering eCommerce businesses the tools they need to create immersive and impactful online shopping experiences.

Leverage the advanced features and benefits of Videowise to significantly enhance customer engagement, drive conversions, and build lasting brand loyalty.

Embrace the future of eCommerce and transform your online presence today. Contact us to learn how Videowise can elevate your business to new heights!