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Marketing Ideas for the $4.7 Billion Market for Grad Gifts

May 6, 2013 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

marketing ideas graduation gifts Need some Graduation Gifts Marketing Ideas?

A survey by BIGInsight showed that Americans will spend more than $4.7 billion on gifts for students graduating college or high school. The average gift price is $99.94, and they predominant give cash, cards, clothes, electronics, and gift cards. So how does your online business cash in on this spending?

Change or Add Shop Sections for Grad Gifts

Add shop sections based on the keywords above. Also offer a graphic right on your landing page that directs visitors to the section.

Alter Your Keywords for Grad Gifts

Here are some of the top searches on Google: Grad Gifts for Her, Grad Gifts for Him, Grad Gifts for Daughter, Graduation Gifts 2014

Offer Fast Shipping for Grad Gifts

For anyone buying online, a worry is that the item won’t arrive in time. So you have to be very clear that you can expedite shipping if necessary, that items are in stock and the minimal amount of time you need to get it there.

Offer to Send Directly to Recipient

So many people leave shopping to the last minute, so your services will get you the sale over someone else, if you allow the gift to be sent directly to the gift recipient and not to the purchaser.

Ask the Question to Potential Shoppers

Again, sometimes people need to be prompted. Add the headline, “Know Someone Who is Graduating This Year?” to your home page.

Offer Personalization for Grad Gifts

This is a great time to offer customization, especially since it is shown above that personalized grad gifts are highly searched. You could offer it as a free service if you feel you need the sales, or if your competition is, but depending on the work involved people typically don’t mind paying for this service.

Offer Gift Cards for Grads

This is a great time to add a gift card for the graduate to your offerings. The front design of the gift card should have a congratulations message on it, for added value.

Grad Card Pricing

One thing I never understand is why independent card vendors sell these beautiful, intricate, hand-made cards for so cheap. Again, not the occasion to do it. Graduation cards are a keepsake, and something you don’t have to buy too often, unlike birthday cards. So charging $10 to $12 for a 5″ x 7″ is perfectly reasonable. But don’t tack on too large a shipping fee or that could end the sale.

About Me

Do you need your Brand Story written or an SEO-Optimized Blog Post or a Personalized Business Consultation? As a 20+ year marketing professional and small business consultant, all of my services are super affordable.

I have consulted for thousands of small businesses since 2012, and my advice has been featured in the NY Times, Success Magazine, Yahoo Business, American Express, Big Commerce, Business2Community to name a few – so this is professional advice you can trust!

My Publicity Pitch service has also gotten my clients featured in Real Simple Magazine, Apartment Therapy, House Beautiful, Vanity Fair, Houzz, Martha Stewart, Glamour Magazine, LONNY, DesignMilk, Emmaline Bride,– just to name a few.

6 Mothers Day Marketing Ideas for Your Online Shop

April 29, 2013 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

Need some quick and easy Mothers Day marketing ideas for your online or Etsy shop? The North American Mother’s Day holiday is one of the biggest buying holidays of the year. If you have products that appeal to this target market, are you making it obvious on your online store? It’s not too late to get those late minute shoppers so here are some ideas to try.

Remind Visitors of the Date for Mother’s Day

Not a lot of people remember the actual day. They know it’s May, but are not sure which weekend. A polite reminder gets them to buy right away, especially if the day is getting close.

mothers-day-marketing-ideas

Offer Free Shipping and Quick Shipping

If buyers have left their shopping to the last minute, which they often do, then an obvious worry is will you get it to their Mom in time. Ensure them that you will, and doing it for free is always a big plus.

Appeal to All Budgets

Not everyone spends the same amount on Mother’s Day, so make sure you have divided up your product selection for all types of budgets.

Have Something for Every Type of Mom

A lot of people have to buy for a mother, mother-in-law, step mother, and they all have different tastes. Try to make your shop one stop shopping by appealing to their different interests or styles.

Give a Deal or Special Mother’s Day Offer

Everyone loves a sale so why not offer a special discount for Mother’s Day? Using a coupon code tracks the effectiveness of the offer.

Up-Sell Your Other Services

You can either offer additional services for free, such as monogramming, personalization, adding a card or gift wrapping, or for a small additional fee.

I hope your enjoyed these Mother’s Day marketing ideas. If you did not prepare properly for the Mother’s Day buying rush this year, then remember to make it a priority for next year. Start your marketing campaign in early April and use all of these suggestions to maximize your sales. For more awesome ways to drive traffic and sales at your online or Etsy shop, be sure to check out my Marketing Ebooks and Downloads.

You might also like: 7 Marketing Ideas for Valentine’s Day

How to Make Your Ecommerce Product Categories More Appealing

April 25, 2013 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

Your Ecommerce Product Categories are very important.

Last week I wrote about altering your shop sections/categories to make them more in sync with seasonal buying habits. For example, adding categories for Mother’s Day, Prom, Cinco de Mayo, Memorial Day, etc. (in case you missed it: Keep Your Online Shop Categories In Sync with Seasonal Buying Habits).

But there are also other ways you can help visitors zero in on what they really want to find in your shop, in order to maximize purchases. People don’t have a lot of time these days. A lot of the reason online shopping is so popular is because it is easier to find what you want, due to searching capabilities. So consider some of these shop categories used by popular online stores that might work for you:

Add Fun Categories to Peak Interest

Piperlime is an online clothing store with all the typical categories such as Dresses, Tops, Pants, Shoes, etc. But they also offer the visitor other ways to shop with categories such as Spring Trends, Girl on a Budget (Everything Under $100) and New to Sale.

Add Niche Categories

West Elm sells home décor products with your typical product categories such as pillows, furniture, etc. However, they offer other categories such as Most Pinned Products, Eco/Green and the Monogram Shop.

Promote Specials and Seasonal Items

P.S. sells children’s clothing. They have interesting shop categories that appeal to moms who are looking for something specific, the convenience of already put together outfits, or a bargain, such as: Mix & Match 2 for $12, $5 Fun Finds and Shore Things (items for the beach).

Promote Value Offers

Everyone knows what Victoria’s Secret sells.

What was interesting in their online store is how they really push the deals, with shop categories such as 2/$40 Tops and Tees, 2/$60 Shirts and 2/$40 Yoga Bottoms.

YOUR NEXT STEP: Think about how your typical buyer shops. Do they want something for a specific occasion, do they want a deal, do they want style advice? This is an opportunity to really facilitate that buying decision and generate more sales. For more great marketing advice, visit my Shopify Store for marketing plans, guides and worksheets.

Marketing Strategy Plan and Ideas for Beauty Products Business

April 23, 2013 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

If you need a marketing plan, ideas and strategy for beauty products business, look no further! My 12-Month Marketing Plan for Beauty Products will help you indie brand get the exposure it needs to drive more traffic and customers to your business. Here is a sample for January.

January Marketing Plan for Beauty Products

SOCIAL MEDIA IDEAS

Post your skin care or beauty resolutions for the new year and ask followers theirs.
Post a unique morning beauty or skin ritual to start your day every Monday for #MondayMotivation.
ο Post a photo of a beauty makeover or skin care transformation every Tuesday for #TransformationTuesday.
Post a photo of a female celebrity whose beauty style you admire every Wednesday for #WomanCrushWednesday and ask followers theirs.
Post a quick lapse video / reel on how to apply one of your product(s) #makeuptutorial #skincareroutine.
Pin a carousel of tips for beautiful skin and entitle it, “How to Get Beautiful Skin” as this phrase gets 5 million searches a month on Pinterest (also use the hashtag #HowtoGetBeautifulSkin in the pin description).
Post a carousel of favorite Valentine’s nail designs that you curate from other blogs #nails #naildesigns #nailart.
Comment daily on the Instagram, YouTube and TikTok posts of major beauty blogs, magazines and influencers you follow, so that their followers take notice of your shop including brands such as Ulta.

EMAIL MARKETING IDEAS

Create a free email signature (use WiseStamp.com) and include a linkable shop banner, links to your social media and your latest blog post.
Email your customers an after-Christmas sale on deeply discounted items as well as any Valentine’s offers.
Change up your email opt-in incentive to include a free calendar printable for the new year.

SALES & PROMOTION IDEAS

Ask a few local spas or health stores if they will carry your products on consignment or as wholesale.
Explore adding your products to the beauty monthly subscription box, Ipsy.
Start planning for selling opportunities at spring beauty expos, women’s shows, fairs, festivals, farmers markets and craft shows.
Consider adding value offers to your shop to do more volume, such as Buy any 3 items get 15% off, Buy any 5 and get 25% off.
Comment daily on the latest blog posts of popular beauty blogs like Into The Gloss as a great way to get seen by their readers, and especially if they let you add your shop url to the comment.

CONTENT MARKETING IDEAS

Write a short article on “Cool Indie Beauty Products for the New Year” (including one of yours) and submit it to Buzzfeed.
If you haven’t already, create a blog to drive traffic to your shop. You can then circulate your blog posts on social media as well as on blog sharing sites like Bloglovin’ and Blogarama even if your posts are something as simple as curated content, such as “Beauty Roundup: Our Favorite Beauty Posts of the Week”. It also gives you a reason to email your customers monthly.

I hope you enjoyed January’s plan. Get all 12 months by downloading my 12-Month Marketing Plan for Beauty Products.

Trending Twitter Hashtags – Are You Taking Advantage?

April 22, 2013 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

Trending Twitter Hashtags – are you taking advantage for your small business.

I bet the NFL draft is this week. How do I know that? Because NFL was been showing up in the trending box on Twitter all morning. In fact, when something major is going in the world, Twitter can act as your news feed.

Are You Capitalizing on Trending Twitter Hashtags for Your Online Business?

I’ve discussed this before in previous posts, but I wanted to give you some further insight. When a hash tag shows up in the Trends box on the left, it does peak people’s curiousity. So if they click on it they will be taken to a list of tweets using that hash tag.

I have been telling my small business clients (depending on what they sell) to be ready to take advantage of what I thought would be trending topics on Twitter this month for sure.

One is #Coachella. The popular California music festival has been on the last two weekends, and it always gets as much attention for its fashion as it does its music acts. So in the past two weeks #Coachella has been showing up as a trending hash tag. Great way for anyone selling boho clothing and accessories to get in front of this audience.

I also made them aware of #EarthDay, which is today (April 22nd) and is trending. So if you have eco-friendly, green or organic products, why aren’t you tweeting with the hash tag #Happy Earth Day? I even sent out a bunch of tweets of my followers who fit this description.

Besides annual events, there are weekly events you can take advantage of. If you have products relating to #GamesofThrones, you have to know that every Monday Game of Thrones is trending because everyone is talking about the episode that aired Sunday night.

Also, you will notice on Mondays the trending hash tag, #NewMusic. That is because new CDs drop only on Tuesdays in the US. So on Mondays, music lovers are trying to find out what #New Music will be available tomorrow. That is why the hash tag, #NowPlaying, is also popular on Mondays, as that is how new song clip tweets are tagged.

Trending Hash Tags to Expect in May

#MothersDay, #CincodeMayo, #MemorialDay, #KentuckyDerby.

FINAL WORD: Are you keeping an eye on those Twitter hash tags to make sure your products and services have a chance of getting seen by a target market relevant to what you sell? If not you could be missing out on a potential PR opportunity. Follow me on Twitter @AttentionGet.

6 Sure-Fire Tips of What To Do When Business Is Slow

April 18, 2013 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

What to do when business is slow.

I hear online businesses complaining all the time why people aren’t buying. There is definitely a slow down after the holidays as people have bills to pay and spending may be limited. There is also another slowdown around tax time for obvious reasons.

If visitors to your store like your product, but dont’ feel they really need it, they won’t buy if money is tight. They may come back, but it you want to make the sale, you have to create a strong need to buy it now.

6 Ways You Can Still Make Sales in Slow Times

Provide a Low Price Section – People always have that desire to buy something new, even when they can’t afford it, so have a category in your online store marked “Under $20” if you can. Even call it something like, “Inexpensive Pick-Me Ups Under $20”. Highlight it with a ★.
Offer a Freebee – Buyers love to take advantage of free offers, but it has to be a limited time offer, and that is key. “Buy any 3 prints today ONLY and get the 4th for free”.
Offer One Day Only Free Shipping – Shipping costs can be a real deal breaker, but, again, if you say it is just for one day only, people will take advantage right away. While it might take a toll on your bottom line, the key is to get that initial customer which will lead to repeat business.
Buy Now, Pay Later – If you can, allow buyers to purchase items, but you will not process the transaction (or send the items) until the end of month (which is typically when they get paid again).
Last One – Put a “Last One Available” icon right on the product photo. If the buyer thinks they can’t get it again, or not for a few weeks, they will act quickly.
Sold Out – Have a sale, but mark certain items with a “Sold Out” icon. This indicates to buyers that your items are selling quickly and they have to act fast.

FINAL WORD: If business is slow to keep making sales you’ve got to pull out all the tricks and appeal to buyers’ need for a deal.

Visit my Etsy shop for planners, marketing plans, worksheets and more.

New Product Ideas: Ways to Find Inspiration for

April 16, 2013 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

Looking for new product ideas? Everyone wants to come up with that next great product. So how do you find the innovator in you and either start or identify that next big trend? Try these tips to get inspired.

Find Inspiration in Commercial Establishments

I’m sure you have noticed the huge “chalkboard trend” the last few years, whether it is in home decor products or wedding products or graphic design, do you wonder how it got started? Think of the proliferation of Starbucks and other coffee shops and how they turned their everyday chalkboard menus into works of art. The same trend is now with subway or transit signs. You’ve looked at these signs for years, but suddenly they have become decor chic.

Was it Starbucks Menu Boards that Launched the Current Chalkboard Trend?

So go to the downtown core of your city and check out:

restaurants
retail shops
coffee shops
churches
museums
libraries
historical buildings

and really look at everything. From the art on the walls to signage to light fixtures to packaging – try to note interesting design details and how you can apply to the types of products you create.

Find Inspiration in other Eras

Another big product of the last few years has been the slogan, “Keep Calm and Carry On“, a propaganda poster made by the British government in 1939 during the start of the Second World War. People love inspirational sayings and slogans, so when a British bookstore rediscovered this poster back in 2000, it launched a whole slew of products and reworkings of the slogan itself.

So go to a library or bookstore and pull out every pictorial book you can on every decade and really study the photos.
Ask to look in your parents or grand parents’ attics (or just look around their homes) to see memorabilia from their era.
Take a look at their old photo albums, even their wedding album.
Watch movies and television shows from other decades, but with an eye for detail. Don’t focus on the story, but instead look at the set design, the wardrobe, and see what can inspire you.

Find Inspiration in Currently Popular Products

A lot of inspiration can come from creating products as add-ons to currently top selling products. iPhone cases came about because of the popularity of the iPhone and now there are over 160,000 iPhone cases listed on Etsy alone.

All the different accessory products for the iPhone

Take a journey over to Amazon.com and see what the most popular products are in any category – from food to baby to beauty to jewelry to gadgets – and see if you can find inspiration for a complimentary product for one of these top sellers. You now have a huge market to sell to.

See What People are Asking

If you go to Google and in the search box type “Where Can I Find...” or “How Do I….” and other types of open ended questions, you will get ideas for product that people want, but might not exist.

The number one reason people develop a product is to solve a problem, so find out what problems people are searching to solve.

Sometimes all you have to do is stop and look around you to get inspiration. There are obviously many more ways to get inspired, these are just a few to get you started.

How to Get More Email Subscribers

April 15, 2013 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

Want to know How to Get More Email Subscribers? One of the biggest revenue streams for any online business is repeat customers. Once someone has bought from you, if they are happy, it would seem obvious that they would likely buy from you again. Getting them to subscribe to your email list is a great way to keep customers coming back, but it can also turn people off in fear they are going to be inundated daily with messages from you.

So, here are some tips to get customers to subscribe:

Explain Exactly What They Are Getting. It’s as simple as stating, “We frequently offer one-day sales up to 40% off. If you would like to be notified, please add your email to this list. We promise, no more than one email a week.”
Give Them Options. Better to have them a little, than not at all. For example, “If you would like to be notified when we are having a sale of 30% or more off, please subscribe to our 30%+ list. If you wish to be notified of all sales, please subscribe to our All Sales list.” OneKingsLane.com actually allows you to choose which days of the week and times of the day (AM or PM) that you wish to be notified of any sales. People like having options and being the one in control.
Allow Emails to be Product-Specific. Maybe you sell a variety of products and they are only interested in certain ones. So, offer customers the ability to select certain items that they would like to be notified if they go on sale. This is similar to some services out there which allows you to track your favorite products on any shopping site and be notified when that specific product goes on sale.
Maintain Email Etiquette. You can also offer a feature whereby you will stop sending you emails if they detect that they are going unopened. It is a new form of email etiquette as they are assuming you are away and they do not want to fill up your inbox unnecessarily.

If you are not selling on your own site, but a major marketplace, you can still have customers sign-up for Email Alerts through your Gmail Contacts Group.

FINAL WORD: If you want repeat customer business from your email marketing campaign, you have to be more flexible and scale it to what different customers want and need. People have become leery of email, so give them options and they will be more likely to subscribe. (By the way, did you know you can be alerted by email when I have a new blog post by just clicking on the Follow icon in the right side bar). Related: Email Marketing Tips.

Be sure to see my 96-Page Marketing Planner that has an entire section for Email Marketing.

Keep Your Online Store Product Categories In Sync with Seasonal Buying Habits

April 11, 2013 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

online store product categories As you know, your online store product categories, whether on your own website or a major marketplace, are also picked up by search engines. Therefore, are they carved in stone or do you alter them depending on the buying season?

Online Store Product Categories Examples

For example, I was on a site called Accessorize that sells jewelry and accessories and I noticed that they had an interesting shop category among the regular ones called, “Vacation“. When you clicked on this category all the items they sell that would work great on a beach vacation were listed here. Now, why I don’t think they optimized the title of this category ideally for SEO, I do think it is a great way to help customers zero in on what they want.

That has always been the beauty of online shopping. The fact that you can quickly search and narrow down what you are looking for, something you can’t do in a physical store. How many times have you walked out of a store because you couldn’t find what you were looking for? So spoon feeding your busy, time-strapped customers by tailoring your shopping categories to buying patterns at certain times of the year, really helps.

Another example. Obviously everyone is gearing up for Mother’s Day sales in May. A lot of online shops, such as Williams-Sonoma and Etsy have added Mother’s Day categories.

Online greeting card shop, Treat, has not only pushed its Mother’s Day category to the very front of the list, but it has also added, Graduation, obviously another top search this time of year.

At World Market, they have a product category entitled, Cinco de Mayo, helping out customers looking for products for this upcoming holiday.

Amazon has a Green Category every April for Earth Day.

Even Amazon has added an Earth Day category (April 22nd) for visitors looking for eco-friendly and green products, a big topic in the news this time of year.

FINAL WORD: Are you taking advantage of calendar buying habits to bring the buyers over to your shop? Your online shop should always be adapting to and anticipating buyer behavior if you want to be selling all year long.

Need More Advice?

Please visit my Shopify and Etsy stores to see my small business marketing products and services. You can also ask me a question at attentiongetting@gmail.com.

How to Use Google to Find the Features Your Customers Want

April 8, 2013 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

How to Use Google to Find the Features Your Customers Want.xx

We all know Google is a pretty powerful search tool. Just start typing a phrase in the Google search box and their Autocomplete feature finishes your sentence for you with the most popular endings to what you are asking. What a great way to find out what your customers are looking for.

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How to Use Google Search for Product Research

Let’s say you sell dog toys and you are looking to add new features based on what customers want. Just type, “dog toys that….” and Google will offer a variety of searches, such as:

dog toys that hold treats
dog toys that last
dog toys that can’t be destroyed
dog toys that are indestructible
dog toys that makes them think
dog toys that talk

This is also great for highlighting features in your product copy as well. Let’s try it again with “iPhone cases that…” and I got:

iPhone cases that charge
iPhone cases that light up
iPhone cases that hold cards
iPhone cases that protect the screen
iPhone cases that look like books
iPhone cases that change color
iPhone cases that are waterproof

It helps you to see the features that are important to iPhone users. They don’t want their phone to run out of power, they want to be able to find it in the dark, they want the phone not to get damaged. These types of features seem to be taking precedence over style.

I tried one more. I entered the phrase “baby car seats that…” and I assumed the words “are safe” would come up. It didn’t. Instead I got:

baby car seats that swivel
baby car seats that rotate
baby car seats that turn into strollers
baby car seats that recline
baby car seats that lie flat
baby car seats that grow with baby

So these are the most important features to new parents. The focus is definitely on convenience and functionality. Maybe they are just assuming that they are all safe.

You can also try this same strategy using with, for example, “baby car seats with…”

FINAL WORD: Try it with your products and services and see what comes up (you may want to clear your personal search history first so it doesn’t taint the results). It may help you better position your business to the needs of your target market.

One of the best ways to drive endless, free and qualified traffic to your business is through a blog. If done correctly, over time, one blog post can bring anywhere from 2,000 to 20,000 visits a month. And SEO has proven to convert the highest into sales, more so than email, advertising or social media. I offer a blog writing service if interested!

Change or Add Shop Sections for Grad Gifts

Alter Your Keywords for Grad Gifts

Offer Fast Shipping for Grad Gifts

Offer to Send Directly to Recipient

Ask the Question to Potential Shoppers

Offer Personalization for Grad Gifts

Offer Gift Cards for Grads

Grad Card Pricing

About Me

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Remind Visitors of the Date for Mother’s Day

Offer Free Shipping and Quick Shipping

Appeal to All Budgets

Have Something for Every Type of Mom

Give a Deal or Special Mother’s Day Offer

Up-Sell Your Other Services

Please Share on Social Media:

Add Fun Categories to Peak Interest

Add Niche Categories

Promote Specials and Seasonal Items

Promote Value Offers

Please Share on Social Media:

January Marketing Plan for Beauty Products

SOCIAL MEDIA IDEAS

EMAIL MARKETING IDEAS

SALES & PROMOTION IDEAS

CONTENT MARKETING IDEAS

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Are You Capitalizing on Trending Twitter Hashtags for Your Online Business?

Trending Hash Tags to Expect in May

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6 Ways You Can Still Make Sales in Slow Times

More Product Articles:

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Find Inspiration in Commercial Establishments

Find Inspiration in other Eras

Find Inspiration in Currently Popular Products

See What People are Asking

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Online Store Product Categories Examples

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How to Use Google Search for Product Research

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