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2 ecommerce questions

kurtyordy

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Regarding my signature project.

1.) We are currently averaging around 50 visitors a day after almost three months in operation. About 80% of those are paid for. Is this good, bad, or neither? I trying to gauge whether or not my expectations are too high.

2.) Affiliates- some of you mentioned affiliates in your response my other thread regarding promoting the site. The current pricing leaves no room for this as we were trying to keep the price as low as possible. Taking Apple Butter for example, we have it priced at $3.15/jar. Our biggest competitor is at $3.75/jar and many are around $6/jar. Would a better strategy be to got to say $4.25/jar and offer affiliates 25%, or go premium at $5.75 a jar and offer affiliates 35%? Would either of these %'s be enough to attract quality affiliates?

Thanks for your continued help
 
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offroadaz

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Regarding my signature project.

1.) We are currently averaging around 50 visitors a day after almost three months in operation. About 80% of those are paid for. Is this good, bad, or neither? I trying to gauge whether or not my expectations are too high.

2.) Affiliates- some of you mentioned affiliates in your response my other thread regarding promoting the site. The current pricing leaves no room for this as we were trying to keep the price as low as possible. Taking Apple Butter for example, we have it priced at $3.15/jar. Our biggest competitor is at $3.75/jar and many are around $6/jar. Would a better strategy be to got to say $4.25/jar and offer affiliates 25%, or go premium at $5.75 a jar and offer affiliates 35%? Would either of these %'s be enough to attract quality affiliates?

Thanks for your continued help

Personally, Id try and target the higher cost = better quality mindset of most Americans

Go after the premium market, raise your prices and then pay out commission to affiliates
 

mtnman

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I'm assuming this is for the FYFFTW site, but I don't know if I'd immediately go after the premium market. Mind you, I'm NOT speaking from experience, but it would seem a premium product doesn't fit the theme. I don't usually see premium products promoted through charitable companies.

On the other hand, this is jam. Not expensive no matter how you look at it. I don't think a dollar difference would make me choose not to contribute.
 

biophase

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I would price it around $5/jar. Being the cheapest doesn't really work here since all products aren't really the same.
 
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MJ DeMarco

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To start, I'd suggest these things ....

1) Refine your SEO performance -- traffic from SEO is FREE. For example, I typed in "Raspberry Vinaigrette Salad Dressing" at Google and did not find your site listed. These keyword specific products need to appear on the SERPS (result pages) first page at best, 2nd page at worse.

2) Target those specific product keywords on keyword buys ... on the same search (Raspberry vinaigrette salad dressing...) there was only 1 person bidding on that exact term. This means your cost to advertise for the term will be cheap ... in the pennies. This is fertile ground. (As a comparison, my specific keywords for my industry were are all $1++)

3) Start joint-venturing with RECIPE sites! Get link exchanges, write content for them, get your site LISTED at these high PR recipe sites (IE: AllRecipes.com). Cross linking will improve your SEO rankings. Do searches on your keywords and discover WHO IS #1 -- these are sites you want to work with, at a minimum, mimic and MODEL them.

4) Add a field on your ordering page "Do you want to be recognized on the FYFFTW home page?". For every order received (and permissioned Opted-IN), PLASTER the person's name on the home page. PEOPLE LOVE to see their name in print.

FEED YOUR FAMILY FEED YOUR WORLD THANKS THESE PEOPLE!
"Joyce Medville in Colbeysville PA who contributed 4 days!"
"MJ Fastlane in Phoenix AZ who contributed 11 days!"


5) I think your pricing could be increased to accommodate affiliate inclusion. Your product is not a discount product -- its unique with a unique hook attached to it. I think this carries an implied acceptability of increased cost.

6) Think about reaching affluent target markets and housewives - they are charitable bunch and don't know the difference between JAMS that cost $4 and $8. You're pricing model should NOT be discount -- it should be premium.

All of the above isn't easy -- each will require research and execution.
 

Z5 FILMS

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Sounds maybe a tad low. You should be getting that within around 3 months in organic traffic at least.

Your site looks good. The blog has potential to bring traffic, but it's lacking IMO. It needs more postings. Two a month is not good enough. You need a couple good posts a week. I would say at least three. More is better. Fill the articles with keywords about your site. Talking about ANYTHING and EVERYTHING that's related to your site with lots of links to it, but so many that it starts looking spammy.. Rant and rave about about how great your Raspberry vinaigrette salad dressing is. "Raspberry vinaigrette salad dressing" is going to be your longtailed keyword. Mention that a few times, mention "vinaigrette salad dressing" and mention "salad dressing" a few times.

Blog about how great your new product is, blog about everything on your site. The more you blog, the more organic traffic you will get. Best of all, it's free. Takes some time, but in the end it's better than paying for traffic.
 

Yankees338

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Sounds maybe a tad low. You should be getting that within around 3 months in organic traffic at least.

Your site looks good. The blog has potential to bring traffic, but it's lacking IMO. It needs more postings. Two a month is not good enough. You need a couple good posts a week. I would say at least three. More is better. Fill the articles with keywords about your site. Talking about ANYTHING and EVERYTHING that's related to your site with lots of links to it, but so many that it starts looking spammy.. Rant and rave about about how great your Raspberry vinaigrette salad dressing is. "Raspberry vinaigrette salad dressing" is going to be your longtailed keyword. Mention that a few times, mention "vinaigrette salad dressing" and mention "salad dressing" a few times.

Blog about how great your new product is, blog about everything on your site. The more you blog, the more organic traffic you will get. Best of all, it's free. Takes some time, but in the end it's better than paying for traffic.
Instead of Kurt blogging and taking the time to write all of the articles, could he use testimonials to drive traffic there? Seems like the same idea: raving about the product and loading the site w/related content and the targeted keywords...I'm sure there would be a few people interested in helping out, considering the good cause and all...
 
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Z5 FILMS

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Instead of Kurt blogging and taking the time to write all of the articles, could he use testimonials to drive traffic there? Seems like the same idea: raving about the product and loading the site w/related content and the targeted keywords...I'm sure there would be a few people interested in helping out, considering the good cause and all...


Yeah, he could. But 300+ pages of testimonials would seem "strange" I think. The idea is to get as much content on the site as humanly possibly. The more the better. The blog makes that possible.
 

kurtyordy

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Thanks for all the great replys. Rep to MJ and Yankee for their insights. Still processing everything, many sleepless nights this week due to 2 year old who thinks sleep is a nuisance which can be avoided with conversations with parents. Hopefully after some sleep catch up this weekend, I will post so follow up questions.
 

kurtyordy

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Well the brain is now functioning again. I realized I overlooked Z5 for his feedback on my blog. Thanks for that, rep +

Here are my initial followup questions-

MJ-

1. Refine your SEO performance- How do I refine this beyond the metatags and the keywords on the page? Is this something that will come with time, or do I need to be doing something specific?

2. Target those specific product keywords on keyword buys- I am assuming that at the very least, every one of my products should have ads pointing back. I have limited my paid search to google, I figured go with the best for the best traffic. Any thoughts on needing to expand this?

3. Add a field on your ordering page- how intensive woud this be programming/design wise. We invested a good bit in the site, and are not currently able to expend too much more. Could we accomplish the same thing at the blog? The site is in I believe css scripts. Is this simple for me to edit this myself without breaking it, or not.

4. Pricing/ affiliates- at $8/jar, I could payout a 40% affilliate commision, and have a little extra to put towards marketing for affiliates. I this a large enough % to attract quality affiliates.

Still digesting the rest, and thanks for all of the advice.
 
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kurtyordy

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Talking about ANYTHING and EVERYTHING that's related to your site with lots of links to it, but so many that it starts looking spammy.. Rant and rave about about how great your Raspberry vinaigrette salad dressing is. "Raspberry vinaigrette salad dressing" is going to be your longtailed keyword. Mention that a few times, mention "vinaigrette salad dressing" and mention "salad dressing" a few times.

Blog about how great your new product is, blog about everything on your site. The more you blog, the more organic traffic you will get. Best of all, it's free. Takes some time, but in the end it's better than paying for traffic.

Besides utilizing both MJ's and Yanks idea here, I feel the blogging about the company will become a bit redundant. Any specific ideas to put, or should I 2-3 times a week, honor the purchasers for the week, and maybe every so often ad a recipe?
 

mtnman

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I would assume it would be redundant too, but the housewives and such others out there that are into that may not agree. If nothing else, the more you blog, the more you'd have to offer on the search engines. Something for everyone type of theory? Dunno, I know I'm not providing valuable info here, it just seems difficult to evaluate from different perspectives.
 
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Yankees338

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Besides utilizing both MJ's and Yanks idea here, I feel the blogging about the company will become a bit redundant. Any specific ideas to put, or should I 2-3 times a week, honor the purchasers for the week, and maybe every so often ad a recipe?
I like the idea of adding a recipe. I was thinking you could do something like what they do with a lot of products sold in stores: suggest some meals utilizing your specific products and share the recipes. You can eventually add them to your labels, too. Maybe, in order to get some community involvement, you could have people vote on their favorite recipes, or those that they'd want to see printed on the labels?
 

kurtyordy

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ok, working on MJ's suggestions. Took care of keywording all my products. Contacted our web developer about fixing the metatags on our site, missing some key words.

Some work needs done for our affiliate program, contacted the company regarding that as well. Any ideas for promoting this? Also, still waiting on feedback as to whether or not 40% will be a good figure for bringing in good affiliates.

At this point, rather than risking breaking my site by mee editing it, I will utilize the blog to honor purchasors. This will also help me fill much needed content on the blog.

Once these are fully implemented, will start pursuing the others.

Any other ideas, or answers to my followup questons are greatly appreciated.
 

THEKID105

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There is a service called brainstorm. It gives you keywords to improve your visits without paying advertisers. I don't have the site URL but you can google it. I guarantee you will thank me. Good luck!
 
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THEKID105

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There is a service called brainstorm. It helps you find keywords that raise your site ranking incredibly. You will be getting alot more traffic and the great thing about it is that you do not have to advertise! You can google brainstorm and if you use it I know you will be one happy camper. Good luck!
 

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