Forums: Discussions for entrepreneurs and small business.

Hello everyone,

A few years ago I started a custom baby crib company. But I am having problems really getting it going. I am not sure why. Most new moms love my cribs. Comparatively the price is low. I researched custom cribs and most start at $1800.00 and up, mine are priced at 635.00. Any suggestions would be gratefully appriciated. WWW.Cutecribs.com

Thanks

Obviously you have a very niche market, because most won't see the point in spending money for custom cribs. I love your site, and designs. Any type of buzz you're going to generate from this business is most likely going to come from referrals. But if you aren't getting any, you've got to be actively reading on how to market small businesses to the public. How is your marketing coming?

C9 is right. You

Hi:

Here is some feed back I hope will help.

The first thing I looked at was your meta tags for your home page. Your title is very short and you don’t have a description. So it will be hard for your site to rank for very many keywords. Also you have very little text on your home page, Just the “Welcome To Our Web Site” message is text, the left hand side of your home page is actually made up of images - so there isn’t much information for the search engines to use.

You should use “ALT” tags for your images. An ALT tag is just  a way of labeling your images with keywords so the search engines know more about your site. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, the person who designed your site should be able to help you with this.

If you have a Google Adwords account, you can use their research tool to find out what terms people are using when they search for cribs. If you don’t have adwords, you can use this Google tool for free - http://www.google.com/sktool/#

to do your keyword research. When you include words like bedding, furniture, newborn, gift etc there thousands of searches each day where you can show up.

I would then create a separate page for each of your cribs, - instead of putting them all on one page. And each page could be written to score well for a specific keyword. Also if each crib has it’s own page you can show more pictures and go into more detail about what is unique with each crib.

Also, I think it’s a mistake to try selling cribs; you should be selling the idea of happy, safe, warm babies! Ithink video would work great for your site. If that’s a little too complicated at this point, at least have some pictures of babies in the cribs.

Lastly, I didn’t see any place where you talk about a guarantee - do you offer one? If so, I would feature that fact prominently. Do everything you can to remove the customer’s risk of spending $650.

Just a thought, but you might want to see about having some of the other websites list your products.  You'll give up a good portion of money on a sale, but it would still be a sale.  Or, maybe furniture company sites. 

when my sister bought her crib, her main concern was safety.

It seems that you are marketing in the wrong places to the wrong people.  As someone posted here - those looking for a cheap crib do not search for custom cribs.

Suggestions:  Work on a new marketing plan and really get to know where your customers are seeking information - then put out your message in those spots.

Second, raise your price - double it.  I know it does not sound right but I can almost guranatee it will drive business - people relate price with quality and if your price is too low they will think your product is sub-par and mothers don't want sub-par product for their infants.