Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

Rob
I completely agree with your advice. Put flyers up at the Post
Office, local stores etc...


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Sarah Founder www.sarahsperfectgift.com Gift giving made easy

Rob,

Thanks.  I just had some business cards made up to hand out to people I do business with,  like my hair stylist, etc.  Never thought about the flyers, a good project for me to work on.  These are especially helpful suggestions for me because I am really in the very early learning stages of marketing.  This is something I can do right away.

I have received many helpful suggestions about the site.  Mostly, less words on first page, more pics of actual product.  As a web designer, I would appreciate your comments if you have time to take a look.

Thanks again so much.

Vicki

I started out cleaning windows and I hate flyers....I hate them, I hate them, I hate them. There is nothing fun about driving around putting out flyers....The problem is that it is terribly effective.

I do not recommend stores. I mean it is okay, but I doubt you cathc many people. The rubrick I use is that I want to get to the most people and get to them in a way that they at least have to look at my ad. If you deliver 1000 flyers to 1000 homes on their mail box then 1000 people will see you. Lots may toss your flyer, but they will see it. In stores you get too many people passing by.

I like the site. I am not so concerned about the forgotten title. Your web designer did a classy job, and the site is fast and easy to use. Most people do not know that you get about 30 seconds to get your point to the visitor before they leave. Your designer obviously knows this and accomodates it! (I am usually very critical of some in my industry because too many of them are not as ethical as they could be, so high praise and kudos to your designer!)

I tell people to think of the website as secondary. It backs up everything else you do. If you do a mailer and put your website on it, people will go there, same with anything else you do. I can tell from reading the reports everytime a client does an ad because it is reflected in traffic to the site.

I think this is true for you too. The difference is your webiste is doubling for the bricks and mortar. If you get the message out through the traditional places I think you win some great sales and build from there.

Rob,

Thank you so much!  We appreciate your kudos, especially since my web designer, my guy, has never designed a web site before taking on this one.  Coming from a professional like you, this means alot.  We will take all of your suggestions to heart and sincerely appreciate you taking the time to review it.

Thanks again,

Vicki

Hello Vicki,

As a fellow Michigander, I`d like to welcome you to the StartupNation community.

Have you checked out Titus Blair`s ideas for building profitable website traffic? He has an ongoing contest where people select a wish list of items from his website. Every month he gives one person an item off their wish list. Like you, I`m just starting out so I haven`t had a chance to integrate a contest into my website but I think it`s a great idea and I plan to.

When you say "lots of clicks, no sales" do you mean very little sales or absolutely zero sales? If it`s absolutely zero, have you purchased something from your own website to make sure everything works?

Good luck with your business,
Steve


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Steve

Thanks for the welcome.  I will check out Titus Blair.  I agree give aways and contests are always a great idea.  It`s just about trying to find the time to do everything you want to do.  I`m working on that.  We have had a few sales, so everything is working as it should be.

Gluten free Cookies, how great! Have a family member who is always looking for gluten free products.  Do you ever plan to expand your product line?  All of the cookies sound wonderful, I will have to give them a try!

Thanks again,

Vicki

Yes, cookies are just the beginning. More products are in development right now.

My philosophy has always been "do what you can, where you are, with what you have." The facility we`re leasing has all the equipment needed to make tons of cookies so that`s what we`re starting with. We plan to reinvest the profits to expand our product line. I can`t wait!




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Some people have said it could be as low as 4 seconds.  If you are sellign something on your website, the visitor wanting to make a purchase has to recognize that it is an ecommerce site, and not just an informational site, as quickly as possible.  Most visitors are not going to click through 2 sections of content to see that there is acutally something to sell.  I think Vicki needs to at least put some featured products on the webpage above the fold to capture the purchasers attention.


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Steve James Fresh Yields- a new media firm, providing ecommerce solutions, redesign consulting, web design, email campaign management, and internet marketing.

Across our client base we are seeing the average visit as 30 seconds or less. I cannot measure in exact seconds only in groups (0-30 seconds/30-60 seconds, etc.)

Inferring from page views and pages per visit, I doubt we are as low as 4 seconds. It brings up the value of Vicki looking at the average pages views per visit.

I have a client whose sales platform is totally web based and he uses Google Adwords. His volume averages between 5000-7000 unique visitors per month with an average of 2.51 page views per visit. We have not been able to substantially move that number higher.

This is one of the reasons even as a web designer I very strongly push localized marketing efforts. Clients who depend on localized marketing tend to have higher per visit page views than sites use sponsored search.People spend more time on the site than the surfers do.

In the end to get the traffic you need to impact sales she is going to have to either put some money into localized efforts or cast her sponsored search net wider and farther. Both are going to cost money, and experience suggests the localized efforts draw more quality and more dollars.

Hi,

And I was one of those people who did not know about the 30 second time frame, so thanks for letting me know.  The majority of kind folks who took the time to respond (which mean more to me than I can say) have pretty much helped me realize that there is just too much reading and not enough product on the first page. 

Thanks all you wonderful people!

Vicki