Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

It`s all dependent on his overall objective...depending on how he answers, the mall concept could be totally wrong, or it could be absolutely perfect...

You don`t see Starbucks selling wedding supplies and they`re upscale as it gets?

You don`t see high-end wedding suppliers selling coffee either...

If he`s barely able to market and advertise his business because of limited funds, then he won`t be able to afford to market 7 different products (which he`d have to do if he went the `mall` route). He can`t just advertise the `mall` by itself, he`d have to bring in targeted traffic into `each store` in the mall.

Whereas, if for example he only chose to go after the `tea` industry, then he`d only have to make funds available to market that one niche...versus 7 niches.

It`s easier and more affordable to promote 1 or 2 niches versus 7 totally different ones.

BUT...all this is totally dependent on his model/objective.

This question can`t be answered without the facts.

I don`t know if he`s a supplier, wholesaler, distributor, or just a guy looking to sell some products online to make a few bucks.

More data / information is needed before telling him what model to follow.

Cartess

I`m sorry ... but I still disagree !!

I honestly believe that the concept of up-scale products in an up-scale "Borgata" mall environment is a niche market.

And isn`t that what whats his name was talking about ... selling up-scale, more expensive products ... that soooo many of you agreed with?

The current look of his web site reminded me right away of the Borgata of Scottsdale.

http://borgata.com

http://www.guideaz.com/video/borgatamov.html

And with that snazzy ZenCart it should work great .... or better yet ... use the new AppleCart Mutiple Data Base Desktop Management System ... and he can control everyone of the store data bases .. right from a single off-line management control panel !! And have all your vendors drop-ship too.

I say ...

Go for the gusto, man ... !!

Oh, I forgot ... he doesn`t have any money..

Well, tell you what ... I believe in the project that I`m willing to put my money  where my mouth is ... and help fund the project !! (Private Message me if you have the "eye of the tiger" to go for the brass ring .)

Now, how`s that for SuN entrepreneurship??

Has Jeff or Rich ever made that offer out here in the open before?

Once again, thank you one and all for your response.

As for our target market. We are aiming for that `shopper` who has the money but not the time for looking all over the net (if they are doing the net search, they obviously do not have the time for a foot search or yellowpages serach).

We were trying to simplify that for them by presenting several exellent choices at one spot. The coffee portion tied in as I was already doing that work locally and most of my clients liked my home delivery, roasted to individual tastes. Most of those people are docs, lawyers and such where the husband is one and the wife the other. In short, very busy with no time for shopping.

If my local market (Colorado Springs, Pueblo-these are actually kind of back water locations) has this opportunity, what about the rest of the country and who knows where else. And I know the Albuquerque market as well, although not as well. There has been some interest in the coffee set up there.

As for being specific and targeting, being very cheap at the moment (living off some loans as I complete my PhD), we are constantly at the moment scanning the web sites of those `stores` that are first on the differing search engines, looking at their metatags and key words and making sure, where possible, that our site has those or can realistically incorporate them. While both my wife and I are relatively computer literate, neither of use are (as you can tell) web designers.

So we reasoned, if a mall works, why not a web mall. If we can target each individual store so that it appears in the search engines, why should we not draw in that customer. We already have had some sales, but not as much as our traffic would indicate we should be getting. Hence, my original question.

My apologies for not being more specific.

Obviously I thought that the concept was good. I thought (being rookies, you can make that error) we could even shoestring this as we are both bright and hard working (which does not automatically equate to success), we could do this concept.

So, we are still open to ideas.....

Charlie & Cheryl

Maybe I`m wrong here as I`m definitely not a SEO expert. Assume you have a landing page for each shop in your mall. Say you had a silk flower shop. When you clicked the silk flower shop button on the home page you then go to the silk flower shop landing page. That landing page would(could) rank highly in searches for "Silk flowers" right? The home page may not but the silk flower shop landing page would. So you would still get the traffic from searches for "Silk flowers" even with a mall concept because that page is 100% relevant to the search words.

I love the mall concept personally because I would go there whenever I was looking for an upscale gift and I wasn`t sure what I wanted. I would keep it. But, the brown is really depressing and boring. There`s no contrast. You need to use a good pre-designed template or get a professional to help you.

There you have it from the horses mouth ....

Charlie and Cheryl, congrats !!

Bootstrap that wonderful idea .... bust your butt and it`ll take off.

Since you are in CO, Vince Creazzo of Spads.com, http://spads.com , is the man you want to see about your dream.

He`s in Littleton ... (Denver area)

He`s got the software and the data base that`ll do everything you need ... and the right design team to put the site together. (And he`s fair and honest.)

Good for you...

But I think the smarter marketer would wait to hear it from the horses mouth prior to giving all types of advice without all the facts.

Cartess

Perhaps they will take you up on your offer to help with funding the project. I`d love to see the results.

Cartess

Not when you grasp the VISION, the DREAM, and PASSION from visiting their web site. The minute I saw the site , and spent time viewing the product selections, the store names, and the overall concept ... I could "see and feel" the finalized and revised web site.

They`ll do just fine ... as long as they keep the PASSION ... and stay away from some of the nay-sayers here at SuN.