Physical and Online Store in need of help

SteveMcCormick

12 years ago

Have you considered selling the products on eBay?

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1 reply

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kittyblackheart 12 years ago

Originally Posted by SteveMcCormick

Have you considered selling the products on eBay?

Thank you for taking the time to respond to me Steve!

My physical store has mostly clothing and lingerie and my online store is solely lingerie for now so not very in demand for retail prices on Ebay.

~Kitty B.
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Dan Allard

12 years ago

Get a Facebook fan page up and work on getting fans in your area. Do some Facebook ads to get started then start doing weekly contests- for example "Win a $25 gift certificate, to enter just share this post to your wall". You'll see your local fan base start to explode.

Then you'll have a targeted local audience, and you can post info about your products along with photos, maybe put up a video or two walking through your store or explaining what your mission is and what makes your business unique.

And of course post information about any promotions you run. This plan should only take 2 weeks- 1 month to implement and you should see a significant increase in sales and interest if done correctly.

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Studio13

12 years ago

You don't need more "online sales" you need more sales period, isn't that right?

You may not want to compete with the internet retail clothing stores — they are big fish. You have something they don't. One huge asset that you have is of course a physical location — a brick and mortar store.

I would take my marketing dollars and focus on local radio advertising, local tv ads and mail to your list if you have one. If you don't have one, start building one.

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vivi62

12 years ago

perhaps you could try some free ads or get a celeb round and offer wine and cheese party and invite all the locals.
Regards
vivi62

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Randall Magwood

12 years ago

It doesn't take much to promote your business online. Sign up for Google Adwords, MSN Adcenter, take advantage of Google Places. Also, utilize QR Codes in your marketing also.

Have you ever considered renting a list for your offline operation? Have you ran any ads? Any examples of ads that you ran could be critiqued and made better from me and other warriors.

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kittyblackheart

12 years ago

Lots of good ideas, thank you for responding!

I have done the basic local advertising, google places and social media. We have had in-store events, off site fashion shows, etc but I would really like to boost online sales more than in store so that if the local economy stays the way it is, the online sales will take me through. I thought it would be easier and more trustworthy since there is a physical store to back up the online one but it hasn’t been the case. Maybe just better SEO? Our budget is almost non existent at this point. :-(

Thanks
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rooze 12 years ago

Originally Posted by kittyblackheart

Maybe just better SEO? Our budget is almost non existent at this point. :-(

You're in a very competitive niche online (which you already know) so it's hard to make an impact without a budget.

Do you have any traffic worth speaking of?
Do you have a list?

Since you're in a competitive market you have to make every click to your site count. I suggest you create a good funnel to build your email list then you'll have a captive audience whom you can market to over and over.

To build a list effectively you need some kind of incentive to get people to join. Create a fun competition and offer them a discount coupon or something free and get them to register for it. Use an autoresponder/mailer service to start sending regular mailings to your email list. They are cheap to use, and if you have Joomla or Wordpress on your website, they're free.

Create a real buzz about your competition on the website and get your in-store visitors to sign up online for your 'web only' competition/giveaway. Print up some small flyers promoting the competition and hand them out to everyone in-store. Hit the local community, pin the flyers up on notice boards, hand them out at spas, fitness centers anywhere basically.

Now go online and start telling people about your competition. Go to blogs where people might have an interest and make a very friendly blog post. I did a promo for a client before the Holidays, she had a surplus inventory of Burt's Bees skin care products so we gave it away in a competition. We made a blog post with an image and asked people to write a fun caption to go with the image. They had to register their email to submit their entry and agree to receive occasional updates. I outsourced the task of going to different health related blogs and posting something like this -
'Dear Blog owner,
I have something I'd like to share with your readers if you'd allow me to. I'm giving away a [whatever] on my website and it would be something I believe your blog visitors would be interested in. To learn more just visit this page [link]. Thank you in advance for considering this post.

OK that needs some work but you get the drift. In my promotion before the Holiday we used blogs, twitter, Facebook to promote the competition and added 1650 people to my client's email list. The client also claims many people responding to the blog email and Facebook actually bought products from the online store.
The cost of doing the above is practically nothing, you could do it all yourself for the price of the ink to print up some flyers.
There are tons of different ways to take this to different levels - Press Releases, articles, local newspapers, online stuff and much more.

Good luck.
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Nanaswhimsy

12 years ago

Originally Posted by kittyblackheart

Lots of good ideas, thank you for responding!

I have done the basic local advertising, google places and social media. We have had in-store events, off site fashion shows, etc but I would really like to boost online sales more than in store so that if the local economy stays the way it is, the online sales will take me through. I thought it would be easier and more trustworthy since there is a physical store to back up the online one but it hasn't been the case. Maybe just better SEO? Our budget is almost non existent at this point. :-(

Is your online store mobile optimized? If so, then I would look at using QR Codes to drive traffic. Have signs with the QR Code on it, that says visit our online store for more discreet shopping! or something to that effect. You may find that your online sales shoot up, especially if you have the QR Code in the window so that even if you are closed that shoppers or "shy shopper" see they have options. You may need to decide a return policy up fron about whether online purchases can be returned in store, etc.

Hope that helps!
Suzanne

P.S.
You didn't say where you were located, you might find a local warrior who could help you.

Thanks

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kittyblackheart

12 years ago

Wow Rooze thank you!

I am actually in the middle of a few of the things you mentioned but I love the "script" you gave me, that is very helpful! I have a surplus of cosmetics so that would be a good one to give away I think.

I do have a small list of people that have signed up for my mailing list giving them 10% off their purchases in-store and online every month with a printable gift certificate and online code. I have the AR but still setting it up and researching how to do effective email marketing.

I have joined forces with an accessories store owner around the corner to pass out fliers with discounts and give-a-way incentives for both of our stores and we are planning some events together for Valentine’s Day and in the future. We cross promote through our social media accounts but she has an even smaller list than I do since she just opened.

Did you get the additional traffic via Social Media by using the blog owner’s list? That’s an amazing amount of additional people! I will have to look into people with whom I can partner. You’ve got some ideas flowing for me. Thank you so much for your time and insights. It is very appreciated. :-)
~Kitty B.

Thanks

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rooze

12 years ago

Hi Kitty,

When I do my web consultancy I tell people to track everything like crazy. With this particular project, it was for a friend, and we took a few shortcuts to keep the cost down, so the tracking side suffered. We didn't use the owners email list since we didn't need to get people on a list twice in this instance (sometimes you might want to do that with a segmented list). We picked up around 500 people coming in from external blogs. We scored a good hit with a blog post on Martha Stewart Living, of all places! (that might be one for you to try). We had around 400 or so hits from Facebook. Her Fan page is quite small (1200) but we had a few shares and it worked out well. Then of course we hit her regular Google visitors.

It sounds like you have all of the pieces of the puzzle and you're well on your way to putting the picture together. Your 'partnership' method is a great idea. If you've teamed up with a couple local businesses could your local area Chamber of Commerce help you with some promotion? Depending on where you are they can work pretty well for you. Maybe have them come out and do a ribbon cutting (they like to do that it seems!!) then you can hit people up with your flyers and maybe get a feature on their website. I always find you have to put these people to work for you, they don't volunteer, but that's what they're there for so make a nuisance of yourself!
Since you're pretty adept with the concepts of collective marketing, have you thought about an affiliate program for your store? You could try somewhere like Share-A-Sale for starters. I've found you can 'haggle' with them over start-up fees. Write to the affiliate manager and tell them you're starting out and the $500 fee (or whatever it is now) is too high, would they work with you for $200 then $300 down the line.

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kittyblackheart

12 years ago

Rooze thank you so much! I will let you know how it goes. :-)

Nanawhimsy, thank you for the suggestions! I never thought of a local warrior! I am in New Hampshire, no sales tax, yippee! I am currently working on a QR code and fliers actually. :-) I want to make the site mobile optimized and hope that is something I can work on soon. The stats on purchases made on smart phones and IPads is astonishing!

I am so appreciative that warriors have taken time out to lend their suggestions. Thank you all sooooo much!

~Kitty B.

Thanks

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seobro

12 years ago

Hi Kitty:
This advice will not cost you any money. Set up some advertisements in craigslist, kijiji/ebay classifieds, and back page. These are free, but my fave is CL because you can create links to your own web pages.

Please create one ad per product or service. Put in your phone number and physical address so people can come and see you. Also, add lots of pictures of what you are selling - CL allows four max. I think with some services is six.

I like to add links to my page. Also, a link to you tube where I demonstrate my products and services. In you tube description are more links to my site as well as adding my phone number so people can call me.

Theses are great ways to gain exposure. Also, they do not cost you money. Videos are easy to create and finding models is easy. I find that find that social book marking is a waste of my time - your mileage may vary.

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Don Schenk

12 years ago

Kitty,

I sent you a PM through the warriorforum. You will be able to read it, but you won't be able to respond by PM until you have a higher post count.

I've sent you something that you will find to be a great help to your business. No strings attached.

Enjoy.

:-Don

Thanks
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kittyblackheart

12 years ago

Originally Posted by Don Schenk

Kitty,

I sent you a PM through the warriorforum. You will be able to read it, but you won't be able to respond by PM until you have a higher post count.

I've sent you something that you will find to be a great help to your business. No strings attached.

Enjoy.

:-Don

I got it and replied, thank you so much Don! It is more than appreciated. :-)

Thanks

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arwa99

12 years ago

facebook page
submit google product search
forum

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Physical and Online Store in need of help

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