Small Biz Success Tips – Since 2012

Tag: marketing tips

by Gail Oliver, Online Marketing Consultant

Happy National Deep Dish Pizza Day! There really is a national day for everything, isn’t there? Here are some other marketing tips you may find helpful for your online shop.

marketing tips

Product Photos

Screen shot 2016-04-04 at 6.22.06 PMOne tip I always give in my Marketing Ebooks is that when shooting your products be sure to show their purpose. In other words, don’t just show a bowl, show a bowl full of something so that potential customers immediately get a purpose for the bowl. Don’t just show a bracelet, show the bracelet on a model or with other bracelets of yours (to upsell more) or with outfit ideas, and so forth. Customers are more likely to look at photos than read the copy, so use your photos to put these “reasons to buy” in their head.

Drunk Online Shopping

Have you heard about “Sip and Click? A new report from Lyst (an e-commerce site) shows a huge spike in women’s online shopping habits late on Friday evenings resulting in 48 percent more orders Saturday at 2 a.m. when compared to Monday night sales. It seems that after 1 a.m., the dollar value of the order goes up 40 percent compared to that same time on a Monday night. The feeling is this spike is due to women going online after having a few drinks and, as such, have more “relaxed” shopping habits. Now, I am not saying to take advantage of these women, but it is good to know that late into Friday evenings a lot of women (not all drunk) are online shopping so you may want to tailor your social media postings for these times.

Social Media Demographics

Who are you trying to reach on social media? According to a new report from Social Media Today, if you want to reach the 18 to 24 age group, SnapChat should be your number one social site as it completely dominates this segment. 25 to 34-year olds rank Instagram as #1, ages 35 to 44 favor Pinterest, for 45 to 54 it is LinkedIN, and for 55+ it is Facebook.

Sales Conversion Rates

While time spent on mobile continues to exceed time spent on desktop (67% vs 21%) according to the Social Media Today report above, a new report from Monetate shows that sales conversion of people shopping online via desktop is 3 times what it is on mobile. In the last quarter of 2015, online shopping from a desktop had a conversion rate of 4.43% while online shopping from a mobile phone had a sales conversion rate of just 1.53%. So do not eliminate all of your desktop advertising just yet.

Trending This Week

  • April 5 – #NationalDeepDishPizzaDay, #TuesdayTreatScreen shot 2016-04-04 at 7.26.38 PM
  • April 6 – #WednesdayWant
  • April 7 – #MastersWeek
  • April 8 – #NationalBeerDay
  • April 9 – #Caturday, #SaturdaySwag
  • April 10 – #NationalSiblingsDay
  • April 11 – #NationalPetDay

BONUS TIP: Be sure to update your email signature with any monthly promotions or Mother’s Day offers if you haven’t already.

New Service!

My Quick Fix is perfect for those of you on a tight budget. With my Quick Fix ($19), I will examine your online shop and identify 3 things you need to do/change/fix to drive more traffic and get more sales. If you would like a more extensive evaluation with detailed, step by step recommendations, then check out my Online Shop Critique ($129).

© 2016 Gail Oliver. All rights reserved.

93 Awesome Marketing Ideas for October

by Gail Oliver, Online Consultant

Aren’t you happy fall is here? So am I and October brings a ton of opportunities for your small business.

My monthly Marketing Calendar & Planner is a great way to stay on top of all of them as I give three tactics to do every day, plus I include several “insider” secrets that I don’t mention on my blog. Here is just a sneak peek of what is in my October calendar:marketing-calendar-small-business

  • October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month, so if your business is doing anything to support this cause, add a pink ribbon to your site and let people know how you are helping.
  • #MondayMotivation continues to be one of the most searched hash tags on Twitter so be sure to tweet out a #quote and/or inspiration photo each Monday.
  • If you haven’t submitted editorial pitches to online media for holiday editorial, the first week of October is really your last chance.
  • The World Series starts this month so expect it to be trending big time on all social media sites, especially in the evenings.
  • Mars and The Martian movie have been all over the news the past few days so expect a lot more trending, especially when the movie opens on Friday.
  • Next month is Small Business Saturday (November 28th) and American Express Open Forum (who selected my blog as one of their Top 10 Small Business Blogs to Follow) offers tons of freebies on their site for businesses.
  • National Coffee Day trended big on social media a few days ago, so hopefully National #PumpkinCheesecakeDay on October 21 will have the same momentum
  • Most of this month, particularly the last two weeks, every Halloween costume, decoration, food and makeup pin will be the most popular pins in your feed.
  • I have just started selling my monthly marketing calendar and marketing ebooks on Gumroad.com. You can sell products and services here as well. The cost is just 5% + 25 cents per transaction, no hosting fees, no monthly fees, no bandwidth feeds, no refund fees. Trust me, that is an awesome deal!

Want the other 84 tips and tactics for October? Get my Monthly Marketing Calendar for October available now for download. You will love it!


small business bloggersI’m Gail Oliver, a longtime marketing professional advising small businesses. If you need help marketing your small business, ask me how I can help at attentiongetting@gmail.com. Be sure to also see my Marketing Ebooks for more creative ideas.


© 2015 Gail Oliver, Attention Getting Marketing. All rights reserved.