Running an online store today means constantly juggling priorities—marketing campaigns, customer service, inventory headaches, and never-ending platform updates. Most e-commerce owners are already stretched thin, and while the internet is full of “best practices,” many of them require significant effort before delivering any real results.

That’s why I’ve put together this list of practical, low-lift strategies designed to drive quick revenue improvements. I believe most of them can be implemented fairly quickly, even with limited resources. If you’re looking to move the needle fast, start here.

1. Stretching Your Marketing Dollars? Invest Them in Retargeting First

Are you sending enough emails to your email subscribers? Sending emails costs almost nothing (considering you have an email software set up), and as long as you can maintain good open rates and email deliverability scores, you should try to send out as many broadcasts as possible.

How many emails are too many? There are many studies done on this matter, citing 10 to 15, and as many as 20 as ‘acceptable’. A majority of brands reported sending out ‘2-3 emails per week’ in multiple surveys.

In parallel, make sure you are running retargeting ads on at least one platform, Meta. Having a store at an earlier stage with limited traffic means that you can potentially remarket to your audience for low costs. 

Beyond Meta, Pinterest and Tiktok are two other platforms where you can find even more of your customers for low cost.  Running multiple retargeting campaigns across different ad platforms helps maximize reach and ensures better audience mapping.

2.  Supercharge Remarketing with Identity Resolution Software

Most e-commerce websites have valuable traffic that never converts—largely because those visitors remain anonymous. Identity resolution tools like Retention.com, Opensend.com, and Customers.ai help you uncover these visitors and re-engage them through personalized email capture and messaging.

These platforms can dramatically expand your retargeting reach and allow for deeper marketing, especially when used in tandem with your email marketing strategy. Send personalised emails at critical touch-points for high impact.

You can use data from these platforms to create remarketing audiences too. Upload these contacts as custom audiences on your ad platforms to maximize remarketing efforts.

If you're not using identity resolution yet, this could be a quick, efficient way to improve your customer acquisition funnel.

3. Turn Happy Customers Into a Strong Sales Channel with Referral Program

Referral programs are one of the fastest and most cost-effective ways to bring in new customers. They’re easy to set up, require minimal resources, and often run on autopilot once launched. Best of all, they typically produce some of the lowest customer acquisition costs of any channel.

Many platforms offer free tiers or pricing under $50/month. Look for tools that make sharing simple for your customers and allow you to customize the rewards. Get creative—offer discounts, exclusive access, or credit toward future purchases.

4. Enable Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) Options to Improve Cart Conversion Rates

Adding a BNPL option to your checkout flow can significantly improve conversion rates, especially for higher-priced products. Stripe reported a 14% increase in revenue, and conversion rate uplift of between 10 to 30% when businesses offered a Buy Now Pay Later solution. According to a Harvard Business Review article, customers are 17 to 26% more likely to buy when BNPL is offered.

Services like Affirm, Afterpay, Klarna, and PayPal’s built-in BNPL allow customers to split payments into interest-free installments.

BNPL options reduce cart abandonment, increase average order value, and help you compete with stores that already offer flexible payment methods. It’s a relatively quick win with long-term benefits.

5. Go Beyond Your Website and Expand into Third-Party Marketplaces

Marketplaces like eBay, Etsy, Kijiji, Craigslist, and Facebook Marketplace have strong user bases of their own and also enjoy preferred placements on many channels, including search engines.

Start by listing a few of your best products on select platforms to test the waters. Treat these marketplaces as a new acquisition channel, and proactively develop strategies for success on each of them. To further streamline your process, integrating Sales Automation tools can help you manage multiple platforms and ensure consistency in inventory and pricing.

To streamline operations, consider automating inventory syncing across platforms—this can help avoid overselling and stock misalignment, and many hours of work required to update inventory and pricing on each marketplace.

Keep in mind that this approach might not suit every brand, especially those with strict control over pricing or premium positioning. 

6. Prioritize Real-time Buyer Intent by Activating Live Support for Your Website

Providing live support, whether through live chat or phone, can significantly enhance customer trust and authority. Stores that offer live support often enjoy higher customer satisfaction, faster resolution of issues, and improved conversion rates.

While live support may be more expensive, recent advancements in AI have made it easier to deploy chatbots capable of handling common customer queries, such as order status, refunds, and replacements.

For more affordable live support, businesses can consider hiring remote customer support representatives. In many offshore countries, it’s possible to hire full-time support staff for around $1,000 a month. This can provide a competent, round-the-clock support channel for customers.

Implementing live support, whether through AI chatbots or affordable offshore teams, can give your store a competitive edge and foster customer loyalty.