When most online business owners optimize their websites for organic search, they begin by optimizing their copy for search terms they’ve selected. They pepper those terms into their copy and add them to their meta-tags. But many stop their efforts there, and that’s a mistake. There are some fairly easy measures you can take to further optimize your e-commerce website to capture more traffic and make more sales.

Other Shopping Sites

Many online shoppers start shopping for a product by using a search engine. You can list your product data and photo at Google Merchant Center. Just open a free Google account first, if you don’t already have one. The info you post with the products you list will link back to your e-commerce site.

Always include a product photo with your listing. When possible, make it one you’ve shot yourself if you have the equipment to do it right. Otherwise your photo may look the same as those of your competitors.

Update regularly. Put a reminder on your calendar to update your listings so they always show the latest model, price, features, etc.

If you can, it’s best to vary the copy on your product listing from the copy on your website. That’s because Google looks for duplicate content and rather than listing all the sites with duplicate content, it picks what it thinks is the most valid and only lists that one. So if you change up the copy on your outside listings, you may have your products come up multiple times on a search, instead of having Google see it as a duplicate and leave it out of the results.

Blogs and Other Social Media

Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter became much more relevant to e-commerce when search engines started to index them. Social media postings tend to affect search rankings only temporarily, though, so it’s best to post regularly. There are auto-posting tools on which you can pre-load posts for some social media sites to help you have a consistent presence.

Each social media site in which you establish a presence adds another touch point that can help increase public awareness of your website or products. It’s easy to feel overwhelmed when you start to realize the huge number of social media options available to you. The thing to do is start small. Pick two or three social media sites and get good at staying on top of them. Once you’re comfortable with them, you can add more to your social media repertoire and start to get a feel for which sites are doing the most good for your business. Then you’ll know how your time is most profitably spent.

Local Search

If you haven’t listed your business there yet, go to Google.com/Places and list your business. Even if your business is strictly online, your listing includes a back-link to your website—always a good thing. Additionally, people looking at Google Maps in your area will happen upon your listing.

Many metropolitan areas have search engines specific to their areas. Make sure your business is listed in those, as well.

Images and Videos

Product images are essential to your e-commerce site’s success. If you can add video, your conversion rate will likely go up. Photos can tell about your products far more quickly than copy, and video can do it even better.  

When you put images on your website, remember to incorporate rich ALT text for each image. Describe the image using the same keywords for which you’ve optimized your copy. Include those same keywords in the image file names, when possible. Finally, make sure that the image caption and all the copy around the image are highly relevant to the image.

Video reduces bounce rate by keeping customers on your site longer. That’s because it’s engaging. Instructional or how-to videos are best. Keep them short—two or three minutes—to increase viewership. Visitors will often stop a video or not even start it when they see it’s long. Remember to tag your video with appropriate keywords that will maximize searchability. In addition to putting your video on your website, upload it to other popular sites, as well, to get more exposure.

Everyone has their own reasons why they started (or will start) an online business. An informal survey of Internet entrepreneurs revealed some of the most common reasons why people start online businesses. It's interesting to see the variety. Here they are in no particular order.

1. More time with family and partner. People value their relationships and want to stay close to the ones they love. Many people who work outside their home spend too much time away from their children or partner. It can cause conflict in their lives. Running an online business from home solves that problem to a large extent. You're still very busy but at least you're present.

2. Illness or injury can cause massive change to people's lives. It can mean that working outside the home is simply no longer an option. As long as you can still type and think, you can run an online business.

3. It's surprising how many online entrepreneurs became such because they retired from regular jobs they held for years. After retiring, many people find that either they still need an income or they're simply bored.

4. This one's probably the most popular reason: money. The Internet provides new opportunities for people to realize their financial goals, whether by starting a new online business or by expanding an exisiting business into cyberspace to reach a global market.

5. Some people get into it simply because they are fascinated by the idea of making money online and want to see if it really can be done.

6. Many people have it as a life goal to own a business. However, most of those people aren't able to realize that goal once they see the cost of establishing a traditional business. The Internet provides an opportunity for those who want to start a business but don't have the large amount of start-up capital it takes to start a traditional business. Starting a business online takes money but not nearly as much as starting a traditional business.

7. Most people who start traditional businesses tend to do it in their 30s or 40s. Age is much less a factor in online business. You can start your online business at age 12, age 72, or anywhere in between.

8. Finally, there are those who start an online busines because of a lack of opportunity where they live. Sometimes they live in a rural area. Other times they simply don't see any good opportunities around them. In either case, by starting their own online business, they make their own opportunities.

Setting Up My Drop-ship Relationship - Part 2

My friend agreed to the situation where it would cost him nothing for me to design and build another website to sell his products. I’ll get a percentage of the products I sell on the website I build and I won’t have to deal directly with customers at all. He ships to them and deals with any returns, damage issues, shipping issues, etc. He communicates directly with the customer and the customers won’t call me, they’ll call him, the drop-shipper, directly. That’s because the phone number on the shipping documents will be his. I made that very clear to him. He likes it because it’s new revenue for him without his having to spend any time or money to find it.

He already had a wholesale price list because he already sells products wholesale to other retail businesses. I’ll just basically be buying from him at his wholesale prices and selling them on my Web site for retail.

One of the issues that come up in any deal like this is how to deal with shipping. Who pays for what percentage of the shipping costs? In my experience, the best thing to do is keep it simple. Instead of dealing with complicated numbers like X% of sales and Y% of shipping, we just agreed that I will get a percent of the gross, including shipping. So if someone makes a purchase on my website of $50 and the shipping cost is $10, that’s a $60 gross sale. I get to keep 30% of that amount and send him a check for the rest. That makes the accounting very simple.

If there are returns, he has to deal with them himself. Once the sale is made, it’s his responsibility to fulfill it. I don’t have the time to deal directly with the customers of the new website, so in this deal that’s his job.

I realize that in setting it up this way, I may be handing all repeat sales over to him because customers may contact him directly. But in this situation, it’s a drawback I’m forced to accept because most of my time has to be occupied with running StoresOnline.

The next thing we needed to do was agree on terms. We both agreed on simple net 30 terms. That means that every 30 days, he’s going to get a check from me for all the products he’s shipped to my customers over the prior 30 days. You may find that terms vary per supplier. I’ve seen situations where suppliers require payment every week. It just depends on their situation.

So those are basics of the agreement we set up. Next, I’ve got to choose a domain name that will help draw traffic to my new site, get my account set up, and start building the Web site.

StoresOnline merchants and others looking to boost a site’s search ranking see a lot of advice about how to build links and optimize their Web sites for search engines. We all know that search engine optimization (SEO) and link-building are important because they increase search engine rankings, but not if we do it the wrong way. Here are three paths you should avoid.

 

1.      Slack Off. Whether out of frustration, laziness, or poor follow-through, the surest way to fail at link-building is to not do it. Think of link-building like gardening. A garden has to be tended and cared for on an ongoing basis in order for it to yield its crop. The same is true of link-building. You can’t just do a bunch of it and forget about it. Spend a set amount of time each week just link-building.

 

2.      Write For Search Engines. Search engines are getting smarter and smarter. Every day they’re getting better at detecting when they’re being played. That means if you clutter your Web pages with repetitive terms designed to snag the attention of search engines, the likelihood that it will ring the bells of those search engines is decreasing rapidly.

 

Even if that weren’t true, consider what happens when real live people visit your StoresOnline Web site. It’s easy to see when a page has been written for search engines and not people. The result is a page that turns people off and gives you a huge bounce rate; i.e. people take one look at your page and leave within seconds.

 

Your StoresOnline Web site has to appeal to the people who visit it. A high traffic rate does little good if your bounce rate is sky high. Write your Web copy with the goal of appealing to your customers. Then, go back and see where you can add in your chosen search terms without hurting the effectiveness of your copy.

 

3.      Pay For Linkbacks. You’ll see companies that offer to give you bunches—even hundreds—of linkbacks for a fee. Stay away. Because search engines are getting smarter, they can tell when a site has had this done. It sees a load of irrelevant linkbacks and the result is a lower search ranking. So not only does it not work, but you will have paid to hurt your search ranking.

 

That said, there are also companies who can provide relevant backlinks. These companies have real live people who do their link-building, not automated software “bots”. A live person can make sure the links he builds are relevant to the site they link to. Those are the kinds of links that boost search rank.

 

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Creating a press release to promote your product or e-commerce Web site requires thought and preparation. Without certain core fundamentals your release will never get read. A well-written press release can be a valuable asset for your business. Here are seven mistakes people commonly make when writing a press release.

1.  Lack of proper research.  Read and subscribe to press releases not only in your own niche, but from some of the larger and more successful companies in the world. See how they are structured and worded. Incorporate the parts you like into your own releases.

2.  Rash Assumptions.  Your reader may know nothing about your products or Web site. One goal of a press release is to have your reader generate buzz to their readers or media outlet, so lay out the specifics for them.

3.  Condescension.  While fatal flaw #2 says to be specific with what you are writing, be careful not to write in a condescending tone. It’s a sure way to turn readers off. Assume your readers are reasonably intelligent.

4.  Overselling.  The purpose of a press release is to put information into the hands of those who have influence and a crowd to share it with. They are not the ones who will be buying or using whatever is in the contents of your press release. Don't try to make them the buyer, rather look at them as your reseller and present the information in the same way you would teach a sales associate how to sell to a customer in a store.

5.  Bloat.  A press release is not an article. It should be informative and easily digestible; keep the fluff to a minimum and focus on the details that pertain to your service, product, or Web site.

6.  Dull titles.  Look at your deleted email folder and see which messages you deleted without opening. Chances are the subject line didn't entice you to open it. Be creative and to the point with title. It can mean the success or total failure of your press release.

7.  Incorrect or outdated information.  Wait until you have all the facts, specifics, and proper information included in your press release, then send it. Don't send a release announcing a forthcoming release, either. It will break the trust of your readers. You're better off sitting on a release for a few days than sending it out missing crucial information.

Avoid these simple mistakes in your press releases and the information in them will be more likely to get used. As with all writing, re-read it, proof it, and then read it again to ensure it flows smoothly and conveys the exact message you need it to.

Beginning next week, we'll be starting a second blog we'll call the President's Blog. It will follow the experiences of our company president as he goes through the process of setting up his own e-commerce website. He'll make periodic entries as he finds a supplier, sets up a drop-shipping agreement, builds the website, and starts marketing it to get traffic and sales. We're doing it as a separate blog to make it easier to follow.

This blog will continue under the heading Marketing Blog and keep offering tips to help make your e-commerce business more successul.

As a small business, you're in a position to give your customers far more personalized service than your larger competitors. Here are some ways to take greatest advantage.

#1) Be sure to answer all questions from customers promptly. Answer questions completely and in as much detail as possible. Don’t use technical terms or acronyms without explaining their meanings. Your customer may not know what they mean

#2) Always double-check your calculations. Math errors make a very bad impression, especially if you overcharge a customer. Take the extra minute or two to add everything up a second time to be sure.

#3) ALWAYS provide your contact info. Provide several methods of contact: phone, fax, two emails, and a physical address. Include this info on business cards, automatic email signatures, receipts, etc.

#4) ALWAYS thank your customers for their orders. Let them know they’re important to you. Send a follow-up email or “thank you” card. Again, include your contact info. You want their repeat business and future referrals.

#5) Wait two weeks, then follow up. You can email them, call them, or send a postcard. Let them know you are still there for them. Make sure they got what they ordered and are happy with it. Ask them if they are happy with the transaction and if they aren’t, do your best to make it right immediately. If you leave customers hanging when something goes wrong, they won’t be your customers anymore.

#6) Wait six months and make contact with each customer again. Let them know of any upcoming sales, referral specials, etc. Email them or send a postcard or catalog. Keep your customer aware of your business but DO NOT overwhelm or pester.

#7) If you miss a call, return it promptly. Call back within 24 hours, no matter what. The same goes for email. If you go out of town, make sure your loyal customers who order very frequently know you will be unavailable.

#8) No matter how familiar you are with a customer, never use vulgar language around them. Don’t eat, smoke, or chew gum while speaking to a customer in person or on the phone. Speak in a pleasant tone of voice. If you are in a bad mood, get into a better mood before you return your calls. Customers can sense your bad mood.

#9) Phone interruptions are not okay. If you take calls at home, step away from noisy children before you answer. Don’t engage in other tasks while speaking on the phone. Focus entirely on your customer.

#10) When you can, offer extra small services or products free of charge. That’s the sort of thing they’ll mention when they tell their friends about your website.

You know your business. You know what it’s all about. That makes you uniquely qualified to know what words your potential customers will use in a search engine to find you, right? Not necessarily. The range of your customers may be far broader than you think. That’s why it’s a good idea to use the Reverse Search tool that comes with your StoresOnline subscription. Put in the search terms you think your customers will most likely use. You might be dead on. But if you experiment a little, you might find some you hadn’t thought of before. Ask your friends for ideas on this. Think about people looking for specific niches or features you may offer.

Once you know the terms you want to use, place them liberally in the copy of your site. The more you have, the better ranking you’ll likely get with search engines.

That’s one of the reasons blogs are so useful. If you don’t do one yet, you should consider it. Not only does it help position you as an expert, it lets people know your site is current and run by someone who cares. Most importantly, it’s another place you can use your chosen key words. Pay particular attention to the title, first paragraph, and tags of your blogs. Write each entry well, first. Then go back and see where you can put in your keywords where they’ll make sense. This technique alone probably won’t get you high enough in search rankings of often-used search terms. But if you pay particular attention to niche terms, you may be surprised.