Ask me anything about eCommerce (2012)

[andviv]

I just built sites for single products last week

Oh, you getting an IM from me right now....

 

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[Vigilante]

I think I might try it with a Website Tonight simple 5 page web site and a Paypal button. It will be clean, functional, and simple. We will see how it goes.

 

[AgonI]

Wow, I just finished reading the whole thread(all 20 pages!) and there is definitely a lot to learn from it.

I have a question for you Biophase.
I just started a store selling products from a very famous apparel brand. I am able to sell ALL the products that I've listed on my store for at least 20% cheaper than the official store of this brand, however all the keywords that I want to rank for have HIGH competition and seems like it's very hard to rank them on Google.
I am thinking of using the following strategy to get traffic, and it would be really helpful if you can tell me whether I could get some traffic or not, based on your experience:

-Make a youtube video for each one of the products with a short review, linking to the product listing on my store
-Create Facebook notes for each item
-Import all my product feed to Google Shopping and other such websites
-???

Each product gets at least 200+ searches per month based on the Google Keyword tool. There are about 300-400 products that I could list total.
Profit margin for me at the moment is 10% per each item sold which is OK because all the items sell a lot...
If you could suggest me something else to get traffic(PPC would work maybe but a free option would be better obviously).

Thanks

 

[ositaability]

wow!

wonderful thread although e commerce is still on the sidewalk in my country i can now see the future clearly after reading this,
Biophase thumps up.

 

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[Rawr]

I think I might try it with a Website Tonight simple 5 page web site and a Paypal button. It will be clean, functional, and simple. We will see how it goes.

Let us know how it goes, I was playing with WT this week for a site i started developing for my business... wasn't impressed. You can do a quick /clean one I suppose, but it will look outdated (at least business templates I've seen were) - definitely a stark difference between my and the leading guys' designs.

I am interested in how to design in photoshop and transfer it to godaddy, or maybe frontpage/something is easier, any input from IT guys?

 

[JamesS88]

Wow, I just finished reading the whole thread(all 20 pages!) and there is definitely a lot to learn from it.

I have a question for you Biophase.
I just started a store selling products from a very famous apparel brand. I am able to sell ALL the products that I've listed on my store for at least 20% cheaper than the official store of this brand, however all the keywords that I want to rank for have HIGH competition and seems like it's very hard to rank them on Google.
I am thinking of using the following strategy to get traffic, and it would be really helpful if you can tell me whether I could get some traffic or not, based on your experience:

-Make a youtube video for each one of the products with a short review, linking to the product listing on my store
-Create Facebook notes for each item
-Import all my product feed to Google Shopping and other such websites
-???

Each product gets at least 200+ searches per month based on the Google Keyword tool. There are about 300-400 products that I could list total.
Profit margin for me at the moment is 10% per each item sold which is OK because all the items sell a lot...
If you could suggest me something else to get traffic(PPC would work maybe but a free option would be better obviously).

Thanks

I'm in the same boat at the moment. My niche has a high margin but the competition looks intense.

 

[AgonI]

I'm in the same boat at the moment. My niche has a high margin but the competition looks intense.

Hopefully someone can give us some kind of strategy or tips on getting traffic in our situation. I just don't know how to get the traffic to the site, otherwise I'm sure people will be buying a lot of my stuff because my price is unbeatable, even when compared to the brands official store!

 

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[Johnathan Ta]

Bio,

My website is up and running, the drop shipping accounts are set up and I am also stocking custom manufactured inventory.
Now comes the SEO and Marketing question:

I am running an Open Cart theme,
what type of add-ons can I use to track traffic, video captures, and your reccomendation on a paid or unpaid SEO course?
I want to do the SEO myself, and just wanna see what the pro's reccommend to start learning

Thanks a bunch
Johnathan

 

[JasonR]

Hopefully someone can give us some kind of strategy or tips on getting traffic in our situation. I just don't know how to get the traffic to the site, otherwise I'm sure people will be buying a lot of my stuff because my price is unbeatable, even when compared to the brands official store!

Competing for organic rankings and high traffic, established competitors is a tough game. What's your value proposition? Price?

I read this article recently, and it has some good insight on how to compete in competitive PPC markets. I'd give that a shot to see if you could get the ball rolling.

 

[MakeItHappen]

Bio,

My website is up and running, the drop shipping accounts are set up and I am also stocking custom manufactured inventory.
Now comes the SEO and Marketing question:

I am running an Open Cart theme,
what type of add-ons can I use to track traffic, video captures, and your reccomendation on a paid or unpaid SEO course?
I want to do the SEO myself, and just wanna see what the pro's reccommend to start learning

Thanks a bunch
Johnathan

Hey Johnathan even though you didn't ask me i would still like to give you some advice.
You should check out SEO Blog | SEOmoz Blog Featuring Search Engine Marketing Tactics & Strategies they have tons of content there!
I can also recommend BlackHatWorld the home of internet marketing ... read all the stickis there.

 

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[MakeItHappen]

Hopefully someone can give us some kind of strategy or tips on getting traffic in our situation. I just don't know how to get the traffic to the site, otherwise I'm sure people will be buying a lot of my stuff because my price is unbeatable, even when compared to the brands official store!

Well you should learn about seo and internet marketing overall. With good seo you will be able to get free traffic (besides the time you put into seo which obv is also worth something ) and also pay pay click advertising is possible. Just read a lot about seo/ppc and try it out yourself. That pretty much all you can do to get targeted traffic online.

 

[snowbank]

Just read a lot about seo/ppc and try it out yourself. That pretty much all you can do to get targeted traffic online.

:Lies:

:coco:

 

[DollarArticles]

found this droppshipping forum and with it a wealth of information, like this post, Dropshipping Lists - A Review of the Best Dropship Sources - Dropship Forum - Dropshippers Reviews

 

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[MakeItHappen]

Biophase do you know how many of your sales are from word of mouth if any at all? I imagine that you could assume that new visitors which type you domain into the browser and don't come from se's or other websites will likly visit your site because of the word of mouth.

Just curious to here about your experience but i guess that word of mouth isn't a favorable marketing tool for very targeted single product niche sites??

ps: also one more question which i hope you didn't answer already... i read the thread 2 1/2 times but can't remember this.

What kind of a conversion rate can be expected with very targeted niche shops? I know that usually 1% is avg and if you are good at split testing you can get up to 3-4% (which i as a newbie obv couldn't aim for at the beginning) but this are mostly the avg numbers for big stores with big product ranges so there traffic is likly not that targeted as if you are only selling a singel product... what are the numbers you can expect with this highly targeted single product stores?
Right now i am doing my math with a 1% conversion rate but maybe i should/could calculate with higer numbers? What conversion rates are possible in your experience?

 

[biophase]

Do you guys have a process you use to nail down a viable product or niche to build a store around? I've got plenty of idea's but I want to be a little more confident I'm not investing loads of time and energy into a lackluster niche. I am fully confident I can handle just about everything else but the potential product ideas I have are keeping me awake at night. I don't trust them and would like to know how to dig deeper into a niche.

I've read through the entire thread, this is fantastic. I'd like to offer a big thank you for helping out all the little guys with questions.

Sorry, been away and still on vacation.

I don't have a process to select a niche. I don't think I'm as selection as I once was. I just give everything a shot and see what works. It just gets easier and easier to start stores after a while.

 

[biophase]

biophase... any recommendations for an eCommerce platform for a single product web site? I am using BigCommerce for a larger store effort, but just wondering if you have any efficient recommendations to build a site that includes a single product. I am thinking about just putting up a couple of pages with a paypal BUYITNOW button. Might do the trick... but wanted to see if you had any best practices recommendations for a focused site with a single product.

I'm a little late in replying to this, but I think that wordpress cart plugins look pretty good now. But you can even do just wordpress or straight HTML and a paypal buy it now button for a very clean 1-3 page store. I would do straight HTML and a buy it now button if I had a single product store.

What else would you need that would make it more complicated than that?

 

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[biophase]

Wow, I just finished reading the whole thread(all 20 pages!) and there is definitely a lot to learn from it.

I have a question for you Biophase.
I just started a store selling products from a very famous apparel brand. I am able to sell ALL the products that I've listed on my store for at least 20% cheaper than the official store of this brand, however all the keywords that I want to rank for have HIGH competition and seems like it's very hard to rank them on Google.
I am thinking of using the following strategy to get traffic, and it would be really helpful if you can tell me whether I could get some traffic or not, based on your experience:

-Make a youtube video for each one of the products with a short review, linking to the product listing on my store
-Create Facebook notes for each item
-Import all my product feed to Google Shopping and other such websites
-???

Each product gets at least 200+ searches per month based on the Google Keyword tool. There are about 300-400 products that I could list total.
Profit margin for me at the moment is 10% per each item sold which is OK because all the items sell a lot...
If you could suggest me something else to get traffic(PPC would work maybe but a free option would be better obviously).

Thanks

First, just because you can sell everything at 20% cheaper doesn't mean you should. Don't you think that the other stores you are competing against can sell their stuff at 20% cheaper? Why don't they?

Youtube videos sounds like a good plan.

I am not familiar with Facebook notes? What is it?

Google shopping would be good, but it is now paid advertising like Adwords.

On the actual products in your store, do you have good descriptions of each item? Do you have better than stock photos?

 

[Vigilante]

Most importantly, where did you vacation?

 

[biophase]

because my price is unbeatable, even when compared to the brands official store!

This is not the only factor in the buying decision. You can't keep concentrating on this unless you want to be known as the Dollar Store of that niche. What happens to your store when the $0.99 store of your niche comes along?

Let me ask you this. If I find your niche and I price all my products $1 below yours. What are you going to do?

 

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[biophase]

Bio,

My website is up and running, the drop shipping accounts are set up and I am also stocking custom manufactured inventory.
Now comes the SEO and Marketing question:

I am running an Open Cart theme,
what type of add-ons can I use to track traffic, video captures, and your reccomendation on a paid or unpaid SEO course?
I want to do the SEO myself, and just wanna see what the pro's reccommend to start learning

Thanks a bunch
Johnathan

Well, I used Google Analytics, but people are moving off of that because it is Google. So put on some type of tracking system.

I used to do video capture, but I never had time to look at everyone's mouse movements. I think I used clicktales when it was free.

I would read basic free SEO stuff so you get the gist of how it works. Then read forums so you are up to date on changes and what's currently going on. Then when you feel that everything you read is the same shit, take a paid advanced course.

 

[JasonR]

Biophase...I haven't found a reputable place to take an advanced cord. I'd gladly pay for it (as long as it's stuff I don't already know). Suggestions?

I follow SEOMoz's blogs, and have subscribed to their tools from time to time.

 

[biophase]

Biophase do you know how many of your sales are from word of mouth if any at all? I imagine that you could assume that new visitors which type you domain into the browser and don't come from se's or other websites will likly visit your site because of the word of mouth.

Just curious to here about your experience but i guess that word of mouth isn't a favorable marketing tool for very targeted single product niche sites??

ps: also one more question which i hope you didn't answer already... i read the thread 2 1/2 times but can't remember this.

What kind of a conversion rate can be expected with very targeted niche shops? I know that usually 1% is avg and if you are good at split testing you can get up to 3-4% (which i as a newbie obv couldn't aim for at the beginning) but this are mostly the avg numbers for big stores with big product ranges so there traffic is likly not that targeted as if you are only selling a singel product... what are the numbers you can expect with this highly targeted single product stores?
Right now i am doing my math with a 1% conversion rate but maybe i should/could calculate with higer numbers? What conversion rates are possible in your experience?

You can't track word of mouth sales online. I get alot of type in traffic and store name search traffic, but that can come from anywhere.

Someone typing in your store could just remember it from yesterday, and yesterday they clicked on your PPC ad. So that type in traffic is really PPC traffic. I just checked my analytics and 73% of my type in traffic was new visitors. So 27% found the site some way before. I have no idea where the other 73% found my site.

I think 1% is very good. My conversion rate is alot lower and to me that is actually good. Because my sites provide value, people come to it for information. My blog of my store gets alot of traffic and that makes my conversion rate of the store very low.

 

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[Ryko]

Been reading thru this thread all day long, on and off in between design and coding I was doing.

Few days ago, this dumb idea dawned on me. A shirt. I know it sounds plain, but it kept nagging me for few days until I finally decided to go for it, try it, just so I can say to myself "you tried" if I fail and need to move on.

It's a shirt shop with only one shirt in store, pretty specific, I'm using Storenvy since I find them to have the cleanest looking interface and they are very well socialized (facebook, tumblr, twitter etc) and that sort of caters to my target audience.

I launched the store minutes ago, placed 2 facebook ads with chump change just to test the waters, I don't expect too much but deep down I hope for some action. I've also looked for t-shirt fulfillment companies in the US over some t-shirt forums, since I'm literally 1000s of miles away. I found couple of very good ones, just need to sort the communication speed.

Question for biophase - have you ever tried single or low inventory stores, for pretty specific niches and did you have any success? Also, the shirt I'm trying to sell could be described as "niche" but its based around a very popular website, so that kinda sets me off in all my SEO plans, I don't see how I can compete with it, since the website is Top 10 in the US.

Also, when working with shops that do printing and drop shipping, should I expect they also handle return orders? Or should I disclose that all sales are final, since it's not a very expensive shirt, under 20 bucks.

Thanks to all

 

[biophase]

Most importantly, where did you vacation?

I went to Chicago for a week. Leaving for Hawaii on Wednesday!

 

[Bobby B.]

Hello Biophase! Thank you for doing this!

How do you suggest is the best way to handle customer calls if you still maintain a 9 to 5? If the phones are not answered by a live person, I think it will reveal the size of my company. Is there low cost or free solution for this problem?

Enjoy your vacation!

 

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[MakeItHappen]

Hello Biophase! Thank you for doing this!

How do you suggest is the best way to handle customer calls if you still maintain a 9 to 5? If the phones are not answered by a live person, I think it will reveal the size of my company. Is there low cost or free solution for this problem?

Enjoy your vacation!

In the book "the four hour week" it is suggested to outsource this to call centers. As much as i unterstand you have to give the call center a script with alls the possible questions and the answers to that question.
Maybe you should look into that a bit more. Also fullfilment companies offer this if i remeber right.
But no first hand knowledge on my part.

 

[biophase]

It's a shirt shop with only one shirt in store, pretty specific, I'm using Storenvy since I find them to have the cleanest looking interface and they are very well socialized (facebook, tumblr, twitter etc) and that sort of caters to my target audience.

I launched the store minutes ago, placed 2 facebook ads with chump change just to test the waters, I don't expect too much but deep down I hope for some action. I've also looked for t-shirt fulfillment companies in the US over some t-shirt forums, since I'm literally 1000s of miles away. I found couple of very good ones, just need to sort the communication speed.

Question for biophase - have you ever tried single or low inventory stores, for pretty specific niches and did you have any success? Also, the shirt I'm trying to sell could be described as "niche" but its based around a very popular website, so that kinda sets me off in all my SEO plans, I don't see how I can compete with it, since the website is Top 10 in the US.

Also, when working with shops that do printing and drop shipping, should I expect they also handle return orders? Or should I disclose that all sales are final, since it's not a very expensive shirt, under 20 bucks.

Thanks to all

I wouldn't recommend this niche because you are making $5 per sale and you have 1 product. It better be a damn good T-shirt. I doubt any t-shirt place would take returns on custom printed shirts. It probably costs more to ship it back. Plus what are they going to do with it?

 

[biophase]

Hello Biophase! Thank you for doing this!

How do you suggest is the best way to handle customer calls if you still maintain a 9 to 5? If the phones are not answered by a live person, I think it will reveal the size of my company. Is there low cost or free solution for this problem?

Enjoy your vacation!

The calls go to voicemail and if they leave a message I'll call them back. You'd be suprised these days how many people would rather buy from a small company that will call them back. They welcome the regular leave a message announcement versus hitting a bunch of buttons and then getting put on hold.

 

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[biophase]

In the book "the four hour week" it is suggested to outsource this to call centers. As much as i unterstand you have to give the call center a script with alls the possible questions and the answers to that question.
Maybe you should look into that a bit more. Also fullfilment companies offer this if i remeber right.
But no first hand knowledge on my part.

The problem with this is that your call center can't really answer any questions with real answers. Most people calling have real questions about the products. I would say only a 20% call to see if something is in stock or to ask about their order. The other 80% will be asking product specific questions. There is no chart that can answer those.

 

[JamesS88]

Hi Biophase,

I have another question. I'm getting close to taking the plunge and ordering some product. I have plans for a product for 3 of my 5 domains. I realize I should specialize in one product per domain to make it easier to target but I still would like to have a decent selection. My question is this, using your suits as an example. Did you start with just one type of suit?

Edit: one more quick question. I'm almost positive you've been asked this already but at 420 replies and counting, it's hard to find. Have you decided on which CMS you are going to use since interspire is discontinuing?