Uh Oh! 2 Months, 2K Site Visitors, 32k FB Ads Reach, Only TWO Sales

[AgainstAllOdds]

Your product pics are bad. They make your shoes look dumb (which they do when they're not being used for their primary purpose).

Change your product pics to look like this:

These shoes look pretty cool. The others don't.

Also: Don't put your product on sale. If you want to sell it for $45, sell it for $45 - not $60 on sale for $45. No one's shopping around for the best deal on light up shoes. They're asking two questions: 1) Are these shoes cool? 2) Is the price reasonable?

You're selling into a niche that is not focused on price, but focused on looking cool. Putting the shoes on sale suggests that no one wants to buy these shoes, hence you're creating negative social proof. Get rid of the sale.

 

[AllenCrawley]

Thanks to everyone's input on the product photos, I went ahead and uploaded new product photos for the listings.
They were taken months ago, but will serve as better place holders in the mean time.

I'll now wrestle with the slideshow images for the desktop site banners.

Thanks again for your suggestions!

Photos are way better. You're on the right track.

I love ChickenHawk's idea of different laces. They could be offered as an add-on/upsell. Plenty of ways to do that.

Reduce that header as it's taking up way too much room that could be used to showcase the shoes.

Were your FB ads going directly to the product page, shop page or homepage? Should be going to the product page.

Also, consider running ads that bring people into your email list vs trying to sell them right away. You then use your email to sell the shoes.

One way is to do a gift card giveaway. Everyone who signs up gets a $10 gift card. I've built my email list by offering this very thing. A $10 gift card has a much higher perceived value than a $10 off coupon code. It's basically the same thing. You just present it differently. I have an 8 email sequence that goes to new subs that ultimately converts at nearly 40%. Use the privy app to create your opt-in page that captures their email.

 

[ChickenHawk]

It might just be my computer, but when I pull up your site, the top banner (the part in black) takes up almost half of my computer screen. I know others have mentioned that the site could use some improvement, but when you tweak it, i'd consider making sure the top banner is thinner, so you can showcase the stuff the visitors really want to see, meaning the shoes.

A brainstorming idea: Any chance of getting some action shots of the shoes? I'm envisioning a video of hip-looking people dancing (or skateboarding or whatever) in them or something, even if you only showed the people from the knees down. I know that money is tight. Maybe you could shoot something yourself, making it look like something someone would've taken with their phone?

This is a weird/stupid question, but are the white shoes really white? They look beige to me?

A semi-outlandish idea: Maybe take one of the shoes and put in some crazy shoe-laces to make them more zany, and here's why: The top half of shoes are quite conservative. From the pix, they look like something older people would wear. I think you might need something to make them look younger, even if it's some photos of younger people wearing them with hip/crazy socks or weird shoelaces or something.

This is fascinating! Good luck, and I hope you'll keep us posted!

 

[Waspy]

Okay, my main takeaways here:

1: You spend 2 months of FB ads and got engagement but no sales, you spent 1 week "messing about" with google ads and got two sales. I think you need a shift of focus towards google ads.

2. I'm on mobile so only saw the mobile version, which I thought looked fine, I would have no issues buying from it. However, there were some key points that made me think "cheap!". The first one was referring to your product as "Light Up Shoes" - just sounds cheap. I also think your product pictures on the main product page are unflattering. But honestly can't think of a solution for that, you need someone more creative than me!

I think you are focusing on the wrong problem (the site itself isn't the problem)

Could you link the FB page? I'm thinking perhaps the content on the FB page doesn't marry up to your website content, so visitors from FB to the site will be put off

EDIT: Being picky now (but I wanted to mention just because I noticed). Your very first FAQ tells me how many competitors you have. Now I'm thinking "Are these guys really the best? I'm going to go and check the other guys out, their shoes might look better!". Don't tell me about your competitors, I get distracted by that. Not a main point, I just wanted to mention

 

[Scot]

Bouncing off @ChickenHawk's suggestion.. definitely need action shots and videos. When I see these shoes, I picture a dude covered in glow sticks and LED gloves jumping up and down at an EDM festival. The first picture you should see when logging onto the page is people having FUN in your shoes.

Go to a club or EDM festival and pass out samples to people and record video of them having fun. Put these videos everywhere. Video views are dirt cheap on FB right now.

And like @sparechange said, these are impulse buy items. If you're not going to every big EDM and rave selling these, you've already failed.

Good luck!

 

[AgainstAllOdds]

Also: Do you have samples of other colors (instead of just white or black shoes)?

If not, get some.

Then list those on the site as sold out. That will make people think that your shoes are being purchased, and make them more likely to sell.

 

[TheSunpirate]

Amazing advice already. I'll jump on the list as well.

Gifs of the shoes in action, changing color etc.
Possibly testaments, on the spot video.
Different shoe laces,
Your logo is awesome, why is it not on the shoe?
Must really improve site,

Just finished reading the "book", so the two things that scream out are benefits, and branding. What are the benefits of this shoe for your customers? And that needs to be shown in the webpage through the gif, pics, testaments.

Branding, your logo is so cool, but the name did not stick, no USP? Branding, branding, branding. It looks like a great product with the right marketing tweaks and some improvement on its design, you got a winner.

For the website a scrolling front pic section, also this is an led shoe, make that site pop color, black is the dominant color. Price slashing, they were $59.99, on sale now for $49,99. Free shipping, guaranteed satisfaction. etc. How about a free giveaway contest. "Like page and enter to win", type of thing. I would then target on the main page the three sub groups in separate links about 1/2 way on the page. Raves- Children- or whichever sub category you have.

Also I would name the shoes, like Mars, or Venus, or some fancy name not simply black multishine. How about Trix?

Awesome to see process in action.

 

[RahKnee]

Copy suggestion:

Whoever said above that "light up shoes" sounds like something for children is correct. Try a new term like "illuminated footwear".

 

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[Rinzler]

Amazing advice already. I'll jump on the list as well.

Gifs of the shoes in action, changing color etc.
Possibly testaments, on the spot video.
Different shoe laces,
Your logo is awesome, why is it not on the shoe?
Must really improve site,

Just finished reading the "book", so the two things that scream out are benefits, and branding. What are the benefits of this shoe for your customers? And that needs to be shown in the webpage through the gif, pics, testaments.

Branding, your logo is so cool, but the name did not stick, no USP? Branding, branding, branding. It looks like a great product with the right marketing tweaks and some improvement on its design, you got a winner.

For the website a scrolling front pic section, also this is an led shoe, make that site pop color, black is the dominant color. Price slashing, they were $59.99, on sale now for $49,99. Free shipping, guaranteed satisfaction. etc. How about a free giveaway contest. "Like page and enter to win", type of thing. I would then target on the main page the three sub groups in separate links about 1/2 way on the page. Raves- Children- or whichever sub category you have.

Also I would name the shoes, like Mars, or Venus, or some fancy name not simply black multishine. How about Trix?

Awesome to see process in action.

Thanks for the response man, and I appreciate the compliments!
I fought pretty hard to get my manufacturer to put the logo on the sides of the shoe, but they wouldn't budge unless I ordered hundreds more. For now it's on the insole, and the "tongue" of the shoe above the laces. Then it appears again on the metal tags I put on each lace.

Excellent points on the USP and the branding tweaks. I'm currently working on renaming (In fact I finished that today ) and retaking photos to completely redesign the site. I'll do my best with tweaking the site colors as well, as this isn't my strong suit haha!

I'm also working on a major giveaway for a major festival in 2017, it's called EDC. But with that, I have to improve the engagement on my social media pages to make it worth while. Another user had a brilliant idea for email sign ups, which I may implement with the giveaway idea as well.

I appreciate you taking the time to share!

 

[Rinzler]

@AllenCrawley Thank you!
Tomorrow night I will be taking completely new photos, including shots with alternating laces since I love the mentions of different laces as an upsell opportunity / "customization" option. As for the header, I'm going to wrestle with the site's HTML/CSS this weekend or end up buying a theme I've already customized, in order to really showcase the shoes on the home page.

At first, my FB ads were sending people to the homepage. Huge mistake. I caught this after 2 days and since then have been sending people to the product page. However, I realized I organized these pages incorrectly in Shopify, and was sending ad clicks to the wrong page. So I fixed this and dolled it up a bit more and will now send ad clicks to the updated product pages once I'm all done.

I really like the idea of giving sign ups the $10 Gift Card, thank you for that. (In Shopify would this technically be a discount code? I had to move down to the basic plan after my first month of no sales)

I'll also work on funding ads for sign ups and not sales. ( I just never liked that idea too much for this, but backed with the Gift Card idea, that may result in a lot more engagement) The conversion you have on that is amazing! Thank you for the app suggestion as well, I'll add that to my list.

Many thanks for all your help!

I will say that all the amazing feedback I've gotten from everyone has reignited the fire I first had when working on this project.

 

[Rinzler]

Preface: Let me start by saying I abandoned my brothers and sisters on this website for a year or so, and lurked a lot on the /entrepreneur/ subreddit instead. Normally, I wouldn't post asking for specific advice on these forums because I know we get enough clutter as is. I also don't mind sharing my product / website because while the product may not be unique, the relationship I have with my supplier is, so I'm not worried about copycats.

Condensed Backstory: I go on a magical vacation to Las Vegas for the highly coveted Electronic Daisy Carnival for the first time. The young, and possibly stupid wantrepreneur in me sees a major opportunity after talking with several attendees about their awesome light up shoes. I get home after vacation, put my initial product I was developing on hold and spend 5 months researching, designing, searching, communicating, and investing for this new "business" idea. $3k spent and many emails later, I finally have my initial order of the product, all customized and white-labeled to my liking. Product packaging, product design, social media, and Shopify all set up. 2 Week Trial of Shopify proves to be useless. I then start realizing in the 5 months it took me to get myself established, dozens of generic storefronts emerged selling the same general sh*t, except theirs are poorly made (but customers never find out until it's too late). I then resort to Facebook Ad Campaigns.

Present Day: As the title says, I have managed to attract 2,033 unique visitors to my website within two months of my Shopify storefront going live. I have reached 32,398 people from my Facebook Ads, I get constant traffic each day, but I've only managed to get TWO sales out of all of that. My bounce rate is a whopping 70.37%, but at least people spend a minute or two on average on the site before closing it out.

Now, I'm thinking people aren't converting because my website's design is rather poor. This is what happens when you use a basic Shopify theme that has a horrible mobile version. I've tweaked it as much as Shopify would let me, and I noticed it improved the mobile user bounce rate by a bit. I also recently dropped the price of the product by 30% and started running sales ad campaigns on FB (This resulted in a lot more traffic, but as you may have guessed, no new sales).

I know I'm not writing "quality content" on my Blog, but if that's really a solution I will consider that.

In one week, I started messing with Google Ads, and this is actually where my two sales came from. I'm bleeding cash left and right with these ads, but at least I know people are visiting the site (Yay!)

So I am here to ask for advice from you guys! I know I'm targeting my audience correctly, as I get a lot of engagement on my social media accounts and clicks on these ads. It just seems like the moment they see the site (mostly mobile) they lose interest. I kind of don't blame them. I just wanted to see what other people think (more experienced people specifically) before I spend another $100 plus on this damn site.

Posting my website URL so people can check out my site: www.orionsfootwear.com

I welcome any kind of constructive criticism.
I will also do my best to answer any questions anyone has, and maybe even share my targeting method I used to get so much FB engagement.

Update: Thank you to everyone who provided feedback. I'll be applying everything that was shared and will return with more data after improving the photos and design of the site!

Edit: I should also mention I'm leveraging my eBay sellers account to move some product as well. The few sales I'm making off eBay actually fund the marketing and miscellaneous fees for now. I've also applied for Amazon Brand Registry, but it's a long work in progress.

 

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[kkompoti]

have you thought that shoes with lights are a very very very specific niche? you are targeting a very specific audience.how many people wear this shoes? what are the prices of the competition for similar shoes?
what is your target audience for your ads? being more specific with your keywords may help.
my opinion is that the audience your ads target likes the design, then they go to your site, check that they are shoes with lights and then go.they even come for quriocity reasons as well.
also the photo of the product i saw and post below is below average to be sold at that price. it looks like very low quality.


p.s. use photoshop.can you spot the two things really wrong in the above pic?
p.s.2 learn from this and move on to this or to any other project of yours.
p.s.3 trying to help (try another project)

 

[Rinzler]

Congrats on your two sales via Google PPC so far- that's good progress for your first week. How much have you spent so far on Google ads, and what is your conversion rate so far?

Are you doing Google Search (text) ads only or have you tried Google Product Listing Ads yet (Google Shopping, the image/product based ads)?

Thank you! I've spent $68 on Google Ads (after the free $100 Shopify gives me)
So far I'm using Google Search ads, but now that I should take better product photos, I will use Google Product Listing Ads as well.

 

[DVU]

First impression, this dude tho, wtf, shoes look like something 2003 would wear with those light spots.

But when @AgainstAllOdds posted that pic, it changed the game. Looking at it I think there is a niche for that product for sure.

They look WAY better in that photo. And that is where I think you went wrong, you didn't present your product in the right "light"

Also, try to interact with your buyers on social media, that can be huge.

Just my 2cents, good luck.

 

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[Rinzler]

I want to thank all the new users who have tossed some input! A lot of great new ideas and I really appreciate the feedback.
I'll take the time to re-read and reply individually tomorrow. (Today now lol)

 

[Rinzler]

Copy suggestion:

Whoever said above that "light up shoes" sounds like something for children is correct. Try a new term like "illuminated footwear".

Rep transfered for the AMAZING term. I'm running with this! Thank you

 

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[Unknown]

If your focus is on raves why not include rave in the name. Rave by Ecstacy, the shoe that brings the party to life. Yes, I made a generalization with the brand name, but you know Ecstacy is a great brand name.

 

[JSM]

When I hear "light up shoes" I automatically think of the fake yeezys. Not sure if you put pictures in your ads but I would recommend that so that visitors know what to expect on the website. I expected more fake yeezys.

 

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[StevieB]

Lot's of good advice here.

Trust is the number one factor if they are going to buy from you or not (aside from if they can afford it). They've done research on internet shoppers, and one thing that helped tremendously with trusting the website they didn't know about, is pictures of people. If you only have a bunch of products it doesn't make it very relatable and looks like a typical sales website.

I know this has been suggested, but try throwing up some pictures of people wearing the shoes with some reviews of what they thought of them. There's a reason all those pharma ad's have people walking around smiling. Connect with the users in a relatable way and it should help with sales, not just show pictures of the product.

For pricing, i'd recommend reading through this post for some strategies.

http://www.nickkolenda.com/psychological-pricing-strategies/

 

[ddzc]

Preface: Let me start by saying I abandoned my brothers and sisters on this website for a year or so, and lurked a lot on the /entrepreneur/ subreddit instead. Normally, I wouldn't post asking for specific advice on these forums because I know we get enough clutter as is. I also don't mind sharing my product / website because while the product may not be unique, the relationship I have with my supplier is, so I'm not worried about copycats.

Condensed Backstory: I go on a magical vacation to Las Vegas for the highly coveted Electronic Daisy Carnival for the first time. The young, and possibly stupid wantrepreneur in me sees a major opportunity after talking with several attendees about their awesome light up shoes. I get home after vacation, put my initial product I was developing on hold and spend 5 months researching, designing, searching, communicating, and investing for this new "business" idea. $3k spent and many emails later, I finally have my initial order of the product, all customized and white-labeled to my liking. Product packaging, product design, social media, and Shopify all set up. 2 Week Trial of Shopify proves to be useless. I then start realizing in the 5 months it took me to get myself established, dozens of generic storefronts emerged selling the same general sh*t, except theirs are poorly made (but customers never find out until it's too late). I then resort to Facebook Ad Campaigns.

Present Day: As the title says, I have managed to attract 2,033 unique visitors to my website within two months of my Shopify storefront going live. I have reached 32,398 people from my Facebook Ads, I get constant traffic each day, but I've only managed to get TWO sales out of all of that. My bounce rate is a whopping 70.37%, but at least people spend a minute or two on average on the site before closing it out.

Now, I'm thinking people aren't converting because my website's design is rather poor. This is what happens when you use a basic Shopify theme that has a horrible mobile version. I've tweaked it as much as Shopify would let me, and I noticed it improved the mobile user bounce rate by a bit. I also recently dropped the price of the product by 30% and started running sales ad campaigns on FB (This resulted in a lot more traffic, but as you may have guessed, no new sales).

I know I'm not writing "quality content" on my Blog, but if that's really a solution I will consider that.

In one week, I started messing with Google Ads, and this is actually where my two sales came from. I'm bleeding cash left and right with these ads, but at least I know people are visiting the site (Yay!)

So I am here to ask for advice from you guys! I know I'm targeting my audience correctly, as I get a lot of engagement on my social media accounts and clicks on these ads. It just seems like the moment they see the site (mostly mobile) they lose interest. I kind of don't blame them. I just wanted to see what other people think (more experienced people specifically) before I spend another $100 plus on this damn site.

Posting my website URL so people can check out my site: www.orionsfootwear.com

I welcome any kind of constructive criticism.
I will also do my best to answer any questions anyone has, and maybe even share my targeting method I used to get so much FB engagement.

Edit: I should also mention I'm leveraging my eBay sellers account to move some product as well. The few sales I'm making off eBay actually fund the marketing and miscellaneous fees for now. I've also applied for Amazon Brand Registry, but it's a long work in progress.

The site doesn't look good at all. There's a lot of nice templates on shopify, even free ones...I would rebuild it. Post some good content, images and videos. Have some main images with sliders showcasing the shoes in action (night shots).

Have you tested the market for the need and want for LED shoes? Who are you targeting on FB? I don't think a lot of people desire these shoes. The only market I can think of are ravers (if targeted to adults only).

 

[Turbo]

Congrats on your two sales via Google PPC so far- that's good progress for your first week. How much have you spent so far on Google ads, and what is your conversion rate so far?

Are you doing Google Search (text) ads only or have you tried Google Product Listing Ads yet (Google Shopping, the image/product based ads)?

 

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[jfny]

Well,

You're biggest problem (aside from the fact that light up shoes were never cool) is that your website flat out SUCKS.

but here's something else to consider, I attempted a similar venture once and got feedback from some people on the facebook page saying they weren't sure if it were legit. I used Shopify too (later just created a website from scratch, using my knowledge of coding), but it almost looked like I was processing my own payments, and I guess they didn't feel comfortable inputting their credit card info into some random guys website. Once I made it more obvious that the payments were being processed through Shopify, the level of trust increased and people felt more comfortable buying. That might not be your problem. Or might not be a problem at all if you have a more reputable product, but I'm just sharing my own experience.

 

[Rinzler]

Well,

You're biggest problem (aside from the fact that light up shoes were never cool) is that you're website flat out SUCKS.

but here's something else to consider, I attempted a similar venture once and got feedback from some people on the facebook page saying they weren't sure if it were legit. I used Shopify too (later just created a website from scratch, using my knowledge of coding), but it almost looked like I was processing my own payments, and I guess they didn't feel comfortable inputting their credit card info into some random guys website. Once I made it more obvious that the payments were being processed through Shopify, the level of trust increased and people felt more comfortable buying. That might not be your problem. Or might not be a problem at all if you have a more reputable product, but I'm just sharing my own experience.

Haha thank you for the feedback.
Light up shoes may not be cool to some, but that just shows you're not my target audience

Thank you for sharing your experience. I thought the same thing at first, but I fixed that along with a few other issues I had at first with my checkout page.

 

[Rinzler]

Your product pics are bad. They make your shoes look dumb (which they do when they're not being used for their primary purpose).

Change your product pics to look like this:

These shoes look pretty cool. The others don't.

Also: Don't put your product on sale. If you want to sell it for $45, sell it for $45 - not $60 on sale for $45. No one's shopping around for the best deal on light up shoes. They're asking two questions: 1) Are these shoes cool? 2) Is the price reasonable?

You're selling into a niche that is not focused on price, but focused on looking cool. Putting the shoes on sale suggests that no one wants to buy these shoes, hence you're creating negative social proof. Get rid of the sale.

Thank you for the awesome feedback.
I'm going to retake all the product photos now
Great point on the sale as well. I'll remove the "sale" tag from the site asap. I appreciate you taking the time to respond!

 

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[jfny]

Thank you for the awesome feedback.
I'm going to retake all the product photos now
Great point on the sale as well. I'll remove the "sale" tag from the site asap. I appreciate you taking the time to respond!

Once you actually apply all this advice, care to report back and let us know if your sales increased?

 

[Rinzler]

Once you actually apply all this advice, care to report back and let us know if your sales increased?

Definitely. It'll probably take a bit for all the photos, but I'll definitely come back in about 2 weeks!

 

[Rinzler]

First impression, this dude tho, wtf, shoes look like something 2003 would wear with those light spots.

But when @AgainstAllOdds posted that pic, it changed the game. Looking at it I think there is a niche for that product for sure.

They look WAY better in that photo. And that is where I think you went wrong, you didn't present your product in the right "light"

Also, try to interact with your buyers on social media, that can be huge.

Just my 2cents, good luck.

Haha, thank you!
I'm glad everyone is providing their insight on the photos. I'll definitely retake all of them to fit the right light (Nice pun btw)
Much appreciated

 

[Rinzler]

Also: Do you have samples of other colors (instead of just white or black shoes)?

If not, get some.

Then list those on the site as sold out. That will make people think that your shoes are being purchased, and make them more likely to sell.

This is a great idea, thank you! I do have some set aside that I can do that with.

 

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[Rinzler]

It might just be my computer, but when I pull up your site, the top banner (the part in black) takes up almost half of my computer screen. I know others have mentioned that the site could use some improvement, but when you tweak it, i'd consider making sure the top banner is thinner, so you can showcase the stuff the visitors really want to see, meaning the shoes.

A brainstorming idea: Any chance of getting some action shots of the shoes? I'm envisioning a video of hip-looking people dancing (or skateboarding or whatever) in them or something, even if you only showed the people from the knees down. I know that money is tight. Maybe you could shoot something yourself, making it look like something someone would've taken with their phone?

This is a weird/stupid question, but are the white shoes really white? They look beige to me?

A semi-outlandish idea: Maybe take one of the shoes and put in some crazy shoe-laces to make them more zany, and here's why: The top half of shoes are quite conservative. From the pix, they look like something older people would wear. I think you might need something to make them look younger, even if it's some photos of younger people wearing them with hip/crazy socks or weird shoelaces or something.

This is fascinating! Good luck, and I hope you'll keep us posted!

Thank you for the suggestions!
I've actually considered doing videos of myself wearing them and doing stuff, since a few of the people I reached out to for that stuff have yet to respond.
But the white shoes are actually white white. Super white. I like your shoelace idea and I'll put that into consideration as well since my supplier gave me extra laces for each pair. Perhaps I can just interchange them for now.

I appreciate the insight!

 

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[sparechange]

hey im into the rave music thing, your unique visitors is horribly low...i just looked up ultra miami facebook page and they have 3.2mill likes, then you got tommorowland and all the other small festivals like veld and whatever else....you should get a dj/promoter to flash your brand, imagine you had tiesto or armin van burea rocking your stuff, your brand would be the coolest thing in town,

another idea is you should be going to these raves yourself and have a booth open / or start hanging around your customers, gossip about these cool new shoes you found online or w/e