Today’s Friday so I feel lazy and chatty. Think I’ll share with you guys some things I’ve been idly pondering about the online shop I launched. This isn’t a rant, just mundane and pointless musing.
I knew going into it that I’d have to learn and do some marketing. I never had the impression that “if you build it they will come”. However, I am surprised at just how much marketing is needed. I’m starting to see that it needs to be a constant effort, doing various different marketing programs one after another and sometimes simultaneously. My shop is new so I have to get my brand name known and build a reputation. I knew that. The surprise is that until that happens, sales are lower than low, very close to nil.
For example:
I worked my personal network and had people distributing discount coupons for my store. Result: 0 sales
I did a few weeks’ of SEO (Google Adwords). Result: 0 sales
I posted a fun challenge to get people to participate: if they posted a picture on my Facebook page of their dog destroying a toy, I would send them a 10% discount for a new toy from my shop. So far one person posted a photo. I would think that implies she was interested in the discount, yes? I sent it to her. Result: no sale.
I’m constantly blogging, and posting my blogs on Facebook and Twitter. Result: 1 sale (woot!)
All of those things have greatly increased the traffic of people browsing my shop, which is terrific. I believe I just need to keep doing them and gradually the sales will come. (Thus, this isn’t a rant.)
Most interestingly, though, is this:
I found a well-known blogger in my market space who works with companies on online promotions. One of the promotional offerings is a product giveaway. I, the sponsoring company who gives away the product, can write up a short article on who I am or why I’m promoting the product. That gets posted on the blogger’s site for two weeks and they publicize it through their Twitter and Facebook and newsletter channels, as well as my own. It’s going gangbusters so far, with well over 16000 entries on my giveaway and over 300 comments on my article. Tons of people browsing my site. No sales yet. But this is the interesting bit: somewhere upwards of 80% of the commenters say they love the products and would totally buy one from me. Some go into detail, like saying they would like the red one or they’d prefer a different (specific) product. Have they actually gone the added step of buying one? Nope!
I think that’s so odd and funny!
I’m also going to be doing some in-person sales starting in a few months. We’ll see how that goes! People like to touch and handle things, so hopefully I’ll sell some stuff.