Laughing Cheese e-commerce Strategies

Best Idea for E-Commerce

sperdie — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 23:38:24 +0000

Through the years, I have seen many small businesses try their hand at selling online. Some have had success but most have failed without ever getting a single order. What I want to talk about today is what has been the single best idea that helped start the successful online sales process ? Its a question that I get frequently, and I’m going to give you some useful (yea- I mean that) answers right here, right now (be patient Sparky) Just for clarification, this blog will, for the most part, discuss e-commerce as it relates to small businesses. Big businesses have big e-commerce budgets and project managers and probably don’t care too much about anything that I have to say (Meeester Big- you can leave now – bye)
Successful E-Commerce or “SEC” as I will be referring to it from here on in, can be achieved in a number of ways. I am going to give you some real good advise. Are you still listening? Good- Here we go. First and most important thing that I would recommend for the small business to achieve SEC is to BUILD A LIST. This can be a list of people that already buy from you. You must start collecting their e-mail addresses. If you don’t have any customers, you can start with a list of your friends and family (providing that they may buy stuff from you OR they know someone that may buy from you)
I made this recommendation recently to a food purveyor who put out a sign and a pad that asked for an e-mail address for free shipping with their first online order. She was able to collect 58 names the first month and this did not cost a dime.
The list should continue to build as you add online customers and also work on some process to ask people on your list to refer others. I usually recommend some sort of incentive to get the wheels greased. Wheel grease may be a free shipping coupon or some sort of discount. If compiled correctly this list is a list of people that are most likely to purchase your stuff online. I always recommend marketing to this list by providing a newsletter that offers some value to the listees. (I know that’s not a real word – but its my blog and I can make up words if I want to) This may be in the form of a recipe if your product is food or info on the new bionic knee if you are selling prosthetics. (you get the idea) In the newsletter there should be some product links there and some sort of a special. Always remember to give as much value as you can when you communicate with your list. You want them to look forward to getting mail from you and if they like how you handle yourself and if you ask then nice- you WILL get them to refer others to you.
So there it is- SEC idea number 1: Develop and Build a list to market to.
Now there are many ways to market to this list and there are lots of tools out there to use to maintain that list and show products to that list.
I will be addressing these tools in future posts. (aaawwww) (If you can’t wait- just drop me a line)
So- don’t make me raise my voice- if you want SEC then start list building TODAY.

Bounce Rates 101

sperdie — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 23:35:41 +0000

When you look at the analytics of your web traffic, (you are looking at the analytics right?) one of the most important statistics is the “Bounce Rate” What is this and why is it important? (I’m glad you asked) In a nutshell, its the percentage of people that land on your site but don’t click on anything for 29 minutes (how long a session lasts) Why that’s important is that google and other search engines will consider your site more relevant when people click on stuff once they get to your site. Its also a good measure on how effective your main page is. If someone gets to your site they are considered “bounced” if they click on a link to a page on a different website, close an open window or tab, type a new URL (that means website Carl), click the “Back” button to leave the site or stay on site and do not click anything within 30 minutes.
So you have to be careful about what you have on your main page in terms of external links and you need to make sure that your site has some great content and a professional look.
To give an example; let’s say Moe is interested in buying a self-twirling spaghetti fork (actually available on stupid.com along with the Ice Cream Shower Cap and the Nose Futue!)
and he somehow lands on your site that sells antique shoe horns. As soon as he arrives he is gone or “bounced” as he hits the back button to go back to google.com.
Another thing that may cause someone to bounce is that your site may not have a professional look or feel leading the visitor to feel uncomfortable with making a purchase. Make sure that the organizational structure is such that you have a good directory and things are easy to find from the main page. You may want to consider putting a video link here- People love videos (unless you have an antique shoe horn video- I’m just sayin’)
So to help improve your “organic” search results, take a close look at the information being presented on your site on the main page. Try to grab the visitor with links, pictures, videos or any other content that you may think would be relevant to what you sell. Stay away from links directly to other sites from your main page.

AdWords – Google’s Pay per Click

sperdie — Thu, 06 Oct 2011 03:40:05 +0000

When coaching a new e-store, I generally like to focus on things that don’t cost anything, but produce results. (I have outlined many of these strategies in articles past.) Today I want to touch on the subject of Google’s pay per click advertising called AdWords.
Once a store begins to generate orders on a regular basis, it is rather easy to predict how many unique visitors it takes to produce a sale. (Total number sales/ Number of Visitors) Most store fall somewhere between 2 and 4 sales per 100 visitors. For now, let’s just assume for now you are getting 3 sales per 100 visitors. If you make $12. on the average sale then each visitor is worth $.36. (It took 33.33 visitors to make $12. so 12/33.33 = $.36) – I know its a lot of math, but stay with me on this…

We now know that if we pay .36 for a unique visitor, then we are breaking even. Actually its a little better than that because hopefully, you are getting some repeat business from that new subscriber. So if you can get someone to your site who you know is interested in what you are selling, for say $.10, that may be something that you can build a customer base with AND make a tidy profit. AdWords would be a great way to make that happen.
Essentially, AdWords are links that are presented when a Google search is performed, usually on the top or off to the right -always above the non paid for search results. (they have a little “Ad” in the corner-so you know that its a paid-for link)
So when you do a search on Google, the links that appear on the top or off to the right are actually links that were purchased by the target company of the link.
Actually you don’t pay for the ad to be there- you only pay if someone clicks on the ad. The price is determined by auction. You can bid on many different terms and the prices vary greatly depending on how popular the search words are. Usually I recommend going for search terms that may not be popular but will deliver results at a much lower price. If you were selling cameras for example, the phrase “digital camera” will cost a lot more than “Canon EOS Rebel T3″ You may not get many hits but the cost will be much lower. You can have active bids on many different word combinations. I generally suggest to not be the highest bidder but perhaps second or third on a particular search word or phrase. You have to see how many hits you are getting at different prices and adjust as you go. In my experience, the top bidders do change frequently and patience is rewarded. Sign up is free at google.com/adwords. You make a deposit to your account and once your balance is exhausted your link will stop displaying automatically. On the flip side, AdSense allows you to get paid by Google to display ads on your website. The revenue split is about 50/50. If you have a busy site, AdSense can be a nice steady source of income. I will be covering AdSense in more detail on a future post- so stay tuned and sign up with my RSS feed link.

Feedback Mojo

sperdie — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 01:31:32 +0000

Sometimes its hard to keep up your enthusiasm, even with things you love. You try to be fresh and keep it real, but sometimes it all seems like a grind. Believe me I know. Been there many times. Sometimes we lose sight on what its all for. I have long maintained that when you boil it all down, nothing’s more important than human relationships. Yep, that give and take, push and pull, yin and yang interaction that is what life is. If you feel like you are slipping a little and need to get a boost, reach out to people that you are helping. (If you are not helping anyone then get with the program!) Find out what you can do for them, how you can make their world better. Spend more time getting input from others than you do thinking about your own schtuff and your funk will not only be more tolerable, you will learn to shrug it off, as you know that you have a place in the world. Work on getting quality feedback from your peeps (customers, family and friends). Publish as much of that feedback as you can and ask others to comment. You will find that you become more engaged in the content and your ideas flow easier. It think its part of what we call good Karma. What goes around comes around. Feedback Mojo Yo.

Delegate or Love to be Miserable

sperdie — Sun, 20 Feb 2011 01:04:49 +0000

I was having a side chat with someone that contacted me through an online user forum that helps to support a PHP e-commerce solution very similar to my beloved ZenCart. She had spent literally days on a configuration problem that was driving her out of her mind. She wanted to place a particular object in her site and no matter what she did she could not get it to work. I gave her a chunk of code to put in her page that resolved the issue in 5 minutes flat. Mind you she was not a programmer or a consultant. She was the owner of an online store. She was proud of the fact that she was able to get her store online all by herself. I asked her if she enjoyed the process and was taken back by her response. “Hell NO!!!- It has made the last few weeks of my life a miserable, living hell!” My next question was: “Why didn’t you get help with the process?”. Her answer was too predicable, as I knew the answer before I asked the question “To save money” It was painful to me to point out the other deficiencies with her site that would deter visitor traffic and making sales. Our discussion further brought to the surface that her marketing plan was basically non existent. It would be understandable if she enjoyed the process but she actually made herself miserable. In her attempt to save money, she sabotaged her ability to make money with her site and got to be miserable in the process. Successful people learn to delegate. Successful on-line sellers spend their time in process of marketing and thinking about marketing. Its all to easy to get lost in the minutia of the technical process to selling online. Too often the most important part of the process, marketing, goes without attention. So make the choice to delegate the tech stuff to someone who loves doing that type of thing and you will live longer and be happier, (Pick Me!, Pick Me!) or learn to love being miserable. You will attract lots of other miserable people who love to share their misery with you.

Key Words and e-commerce

sperdie — Thu, 10 Feb 2011 23:36:40 +0000

Sometimes you have to begin with the end in mind. When you are creating content for your e-commerce website you need to think about what people may be searching for to arrive on your website. You can start with a product or a product feature and think about what information people would need to know about that thing. Think about what you would search for and what do you think you can tell people about that product that they may not know.
Think about questions that people may ask or
features around that product that may be confusing. Make your content useful and informative. To bring traffic, bring value. Time is a valuable commodity. If someone is investing his time on your site, your success depends on your ability to be engaging, informative and entertaining. The words you select to write around should be surrounded by content that answers lots of questions and gives the reader a complete enough answer so that there is no need to go to another website.
Give the reader what he came for and the traffic you generate will bring sales.

If they have to ask IF you have a website…

sperdie — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 14:20:48 +0000

During a recent visit to one of my new devoted followers (cough, cough), it came up in conversation that her customers were asking about a website available for online purchases. If your customers are asking this question, then you need to get busy fast. By fast, I mean right away. You are missing out on a free source of revenue and a way to provide better customer service for your existing customers. When I “coach” a store owner, (aka devoted follower) I make sure that this NEVER happens. First off, If you have a brick and mortar shop, a small display that tells your customers that you have a website is an absolute MUST. You should have e-mail sign up cards available and be offering some sort of incentive to add someone to your list. You can offer free shipping with the first online order or some percentage off or even a simple statement that you will be sending special discounts and offers to people on this list. Make sure that you follow up with this – and be sure to do what you say. Integrity is an important part of a successful business (and a successful life).
I maintain that the single most important interaction at your store with your customers is to get them to join your list. A growing quality list of people that buy your stuff will provide you with a steady growing income. Using “viral” strategies to grow this list can make the effort bring in even more results. (I will discuss this in another post in detail) Its real hard to do “viral” marketing face to face.
Your e-commerce website should be on every receipt you hand out. You can program most registers for this. Needless to say that your business cards, stationery, display adds should always have your e-commerce site in plain sight. Another way to spread the word that is overlooked is your e-mail addresses. Every e-mail that you send (I mean every e-mail you send) should have your name at the end, followed by your e-commerce url and contact information. That should be a live link that the receiver of the e-mail can click on to go to the site. This is not hard to set up. I also recommend that you send mail from the domain name of your e-commerce site. So if your e-commerce site is www.wonderfulcheapstuffforsale.com (I hope this is not a real site) then your e-mail should be george@wonderfulcheapstuffforsale.com not george@gmail.com. (please substitute your name instead of George, unless your name is George) You may not know this but you can receive mail sent to just about any e-mail address within your gmail account. Drop me a line and I will send you directions on how to do this.
If you use even some of these “Free” strategies your customers will NEVER ask if you have a website. It will be really obvious. There are many many more ways to get your e-commerce url out there for free. This post would be too long to list all but, you should spend some time and think about it. Put some of the strategies that I talked about here and you will be surprised by the result. Drop me a line and let me know if you find anything that I suggest helpful or if you have some really great ideas for me to share with everyone.

Passion (It’s Not Just a Type of Fruit)

sperdie — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 00:40:02 +0000

“Above all, be true to yourself, and if you cannot put your heart in it, take yourself out of it.” –Hardy D. Jackson~~

It’s interesting and fun to work with someone that has a passion about their business. They are their own best sales people and they can’t wait for a chance to share their product or idea. Yep- you can be passionate about an idea as well as something more tangible. The important thing is that you need something that drives you, something that’s not only going to help you through the day but drive you to excel, be excellent, go the extra mile (yadda yadda). As my ol’ pal Hardy says- “If you cannot put your heart in it, take yourself out of it” Are you passionate about what you do? If not why not take a good hard look at your life and try to understand why? Is it possible to create passion? I dunno but I do know that the question is one I have asked myself many times. It’s how I got into the online store business. I really have a passion for helping someone succeed and love the feeling that it gives me being part of that success. I didn’t realize that until I happened upon the question- Why? Why are we here- What’s this all about anyway? (life I mean) Its all about relationships. Nothing else matters. If you can make the case for anything else more important- you let me know. How are your relationships? (sorry to ask such hard questions- but its one that must be asked) What are you doing to make your relationships better? (when I say “you” I mean me too) I mean personal and business relationships. “So Steve” you say- “Are you getting off subject?” “Nah” says I- I’m going to tie it all up now. Passion about things and people and ideas leads to better and more successful relationships. That translates well to more business which means more money, which means having a more interesting life. So squeeze your sweetie (real hard) when you get up tomorrow. Look for passion in your life and Sell Like Hell.

Affiliate Marketing 101

sperdie — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 04:43:59 +0000

One of the strategies that you can use to get sales with very little effort is by making other website owners your salespeople or “affiliates”. The biggest and most successful affiliate marketer of them all is Amazon. You can become an affiliate of Amazon and sell their books and other stuff on your website and earn commissions. Amazon gives you a code to embed on your site complete with a unique identifier so they know who to give the credit to. Amazon grew to a ginormous size using this model. There is no reason a small store can’t do the same thing. ZenCart has a Mod called Snap Affiliates that adds this feature to your website. Potential affiliate partners can go to your site, sign up and get links to present on their own site. One cool suggestion (I’ll call it cool suggestion number 1) is to ask someone that has a sizable e-mail list to recommend one of your products (only if they really like it) in their monthly newsletter. You get some new customers and your friend gets some frogskins from you in return. Its a good way to “share” a list without really sharing all the names. You can then do the same for your friend. You don’t really need to be high tech either. A simple box that has a “referred by” on the order form can suffice and usually is effective if combined with some sort of incentive. (what???) OK let me lay it out for you- Your friend puts a link to your website in his newsletter that says something like “this guys website has good stuff and if you say Schlomo sent you at the checkout, he will give you free shipping!”
There are a lot of ways to promote your stuff online that cost little or nothing at all. You just have to spend some time thinking about it -or keep tuned into your friendly neighborhood Laughing Cheese.

Google Analytics

sperdie — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 23:32:51 +0000

The first thing that I do when setting up a new web store is to set it up with the code for Google’s Analytics. Its very important to know not only how much traffic you are getting, but equally important to know where its coming from. (geographically as well as internet-o-graphically). If you built a store with e-commerce functions built in like ZenCart or OS Commerce, Google will provide some great stats for you like your total sales, how much money an individual visitor is worth, conversion rates, bounce rates, etc. etc. Its very important that you know where your traffic is coming from so you can spend more effort on the activities that produce results. You can see what words folks are searching for that are getting them to land on your page. Very useful when adding content to attract visitors. Google will give you a map of the world and break down your traffic by State and Country. If you plan on starting an adword campaign, it is very useful to know how much you make for every visitor to your site. If you make .75 for every visitor then paying 1. for traffic will put you in the red. You just need one account for Google’s Analytics for multiple domains. If you have a gmail account then your user name/pass is the same. Sign up at www.google.com/analytics