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High Traffic But No Sales?

November 19, 2012 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

High Traffic But No Sales? Does this sound like your business?

Do you ever see marketing promises that say, “We’ll get you tons of traffic”. Well, that’s very nice but traffic is not a guarantee of sales.

For example, say you sell jock straps. If one day 500,000 women visited your site, how many jock straps do you think you would sell as opposed to if 500 men visited your site? Exactly, if they have no need for your product, they’re not going to buy it.

Another offer you’ll see is, “I will post you to my 200,000 Instagram followers”. Well who are these followers? Are they just other companies who wanted a follow back, so the person reading your post is their Web marketing person (who is not reading posts, just sending them). How many of their followers are actually still active on Instagram. Don’t be lured in by high numbers. Again, if their followers are not who you are selling to, it is not going to make a difference.

What You Want is Traffic That Is Your Target Market

For example, let’s say you sell wedding products and someone says they will get you in front of 200,000 brides, this is reliable traffic…maybe. How long have these “brides” been on their blog, Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, etc.? A woman plans her wedding in 12 to 18 months so if she first joined their blog two years ago, she is married now and not interested in wedding products. She just hasn’t taken the time to unfollow. So, it could be only 60% of these 200,000 brides are still potential customers. Which is still good, but remember numbers can be overestimated.

Same thing if you are selling maternity clothes, for example. Women are only pregnant 9 months, so if they’ve had the baby, they may still be on that person’s email list but have no need to buy your products.

So you need to find where your potential customers are really hanging out online, at this moment in time, and that is where you will find the traffic that will buy what you are selling.

How Do You Find Where Your Target Market Is?

Simple, ask them. If you are selling to 13-year old girls, you must know a few – family, neighbors, friends’ kids. Ask them where they go online and that is where you’ll find your traffic that will lead to sales.
You can also poll your current customer base via a social media post. One day simply ask followers, “What are the blogs you read the most?” or “What social media site are you on the most?”

Effective Product Packaging Example

November 13, 2012 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

If you need an effective product packaging example look no further than Philosophy. If you are not familiar with this product line you definitely should check them out because they do branding really well, especially when it comes to packaging.

Now if the word branding is throwing you off and you don’t do packaging for your products, keep reading because that is not totally what this post is about.

Why Their Packaging Works

On their product bottles, Philosophy uses few graphics (except for special holiday products), mostly text (and a simple font at that), and they don’t even talk about their product on the label. Instead, their products have names like Hope, Purity, and Grace and the label is taken up with a well-written, inspirational paragraph that typically has nothing to do with the product.

Philosophy’s Simple but Clever Packaging

- The names are simple, but clever, and they relate back to what the product is for. For example, Hope is a moisturizer.
- Their skin care products are all in white or cream bottles, evoking an image of clean.
- Their fragrances‘ packaging is light pink and ivory, creating a very feminine feeling.
- Their bath products are bright colors (because baths are fun) and they have fun names like Gingerbread Man, Candy Cane, and Sugar Plum Fairy. In fact their Mimosa Bubble Bath actually has a recipe for Mimosas on the label. Not what you would typically see on a bottle of shower gel, but that’s what makes it eye-catching.

So How Can You Apply This To Your Small Business?

Simple and clever always work. Simple makes it easier on the customer who is thinking of purchasing the product (no hard sell, not a lot of typical “marketing” words on the package) and clever always gets attention. And great packaging alone can sell products.

Now, maybe you don’t package your products, but you can apply these same techniques of simple and clever to your logo, shop design, website design, product names, even product design.

It is a crowded, crowded marketplace so you have to do something to separate yourself from the pack and create a brand that is memorable to customers. If they don’t remember you, they can’t come back and buy from you.

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!

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Clever Creative Product Names

November 8, 2012 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

Do you like clever creative product names? The other day I was on a clothing site called LuLus, whose fashions are obviously aimed at young women. I was looking at the purses and noticed that they were all labeled with very creative names. For example, Seven Year Itch Quilted Stitch Purse, In Hot Purse-uit Purple Purse, and Weave Got Your Back Brown Tote. Cute, right?

As I was reading these I was reminded of the names cosmetic companies give to lipsticks and nail polish colors. Back in the day, shades were just given a number. But due to growing competition in the makeup industry, clever lipstick and nail polish names became a way to show personality, create an image and set their brand apart. A clever lipstick name can actually get publicity just because of the name.

Why Have a Clever Product Name

I have to be honest, these cutesy names were attention getting and kept me on their site longer. I kept reading each product name more out of interest than anything. So maybe that was the intention, if not the result. Creative product names and copy writing can keep people on your site longer and make them actually read the product descriptions instead of just scanning for bullet points. It also made them look like a cool, hip site which I believe is the image they are trying for.

I have always been an advocate of clever writing because it evokes a sense of personality, and when potential customers can get a better sense of who is selling to them, it helps them to feel like they know you a bit better and that helps to get them to trust buying from you. It’s also a great way to establish an identity against competitors who are a little more standard.

Email Marketing Tips: Promotional Emails That Get Attention

November 7, 2012 / Gail Oliver, Online Small Business Consultant

Need some email marketing tips! I get a lot of promotional emails from stores such as Old Navy, Gap, to name a few. I subscribed to them, so that’s okay. However, I thought I would point out a few tips on how to effectively email your customers, based on what the big companies do that are attention getting (plus a couple of things you shouldn’t do).

6 Email Marketing Tips

1. Free Shipping always gets attention. With gas prices what they are today, it only makes sense to buy something online if you can save money and time driving to the store.

Email-marketing-tips

Little icons get attention. ★’s and even ♥’s do draw the eye to the subject line. For example, ★ 40% OFF TODAY ONLY! ★. But don’t over do it. Too much and it’s annoying. You just want to grab them, you don’t want to blind them.

3. A limited time to act. When the offer says “25% off until 11/09/13” and that is only 2 days away, it gets attention. The customer knows they should probably look at it now if truly interested, otherwise they are going to miss out. Email-marketing-ideas

A significant discount of either 75%, 50%, 40% even 25% will make people act. A 10% or 15% discount doesn’t seem worth the effort.
Don’t add customer’s name in email subject line. A lot of marketing people think this is more personal, but I feel the opposite. I know that when a large company sends out an email and my name is in the header, that they did not personally write each email, but rather just used technology to add my name. This feels more like spam to me than anything. So unless this is an individual email that you physically wrote, do not put the customer’s name in the subject line.
Don’t email too often. There are some companies that send me 2 to 3 promotional emails a day. That’s too intrusive and what will happen is customers will get annoyed and take their name off the email list or just block it as spam. A small business should only email customers either when they have something really special to offer or right before the big holiday shopping season (early November), and no more than twice a month.

FINAL WORD: Email marketing is a very effective way to get sales, so think about what you like and dislike when promotional emails are sent to you, and don’t make the same mistakes with your own customers. Related: How to Get Customers to Join and Stay on Your Email List.

Need Marketing Help?

My 12-Month Marketing Plans will walk you through EVERYTHING you need to do to bring more traffic and sales to your online shop, and they are specific to the types of products you sell. You can download my plans HERE.