Web Marketing Strategy Update

Handmade goods are rapidly gaining popularity, and it’s no wonder when you consider that they often slot in perfectly with the modern trend for ‘green’ products. Handmade products, whether clothing, cupcakes or carved ornaments, are often an eco-friendly alternative to mass produced items from the high-street, and they’re more unique too.

After all, it’s very unlikely you’ll catch someone else wearing the same hand-knitted scarf as you when it’s been shipped all the way from Texas and the seller only makes five of each design!

So if you’ve got some crafty talent, why not make a business of it? At the very least, you’ll pocket a little extra cash on the side as well as getting to spend your weekends indulging in your hobbies, and at best you could start up a thriving, full-time business doing what you love the most!

If you’re considering selling your handmade goods, once you’ve got the product nailed you need to find an audience who’s willing to pay for them. You have all sorts of options such as local craft fairs or starting your own website, but which is best for you? Below I’ve listed some of the best places to sell your handmade wares, and the types of businesses they work best for…

eBay / Amazon

Becoming a seller on eBay or Amazon is easy and until you actually sell anything, the fees are nominal which makes them a brilliant place to start out. Simply create an account, list your products and away you go.

However, both sites do have their downfalls too. They’re both often associated with ‘bargain hunting’ which can be a great thing if your product is low cost, but if you’re targeting the luxury market you can expect your sales to be few and far between.

These sites also allow only minimal branding – you can customise your seller page with basic information such as your logo and a short description, but that’s about it.

Etsy / Misi / Folksy

There are sites like the massively popular Etsy and the lesser-known but nonetheless brilliant Misi and Folksy that cater to lovers of handmade (and, in Etsy’s case, vintage) goods which makes these sites an excellent choice for those just starting out – their visitors are exactly your target market!

Unlike eBay or Amazon where visitors may simply be searching for a bargain, the people who visit these handmade sites are more likely to be willing to pay out for the quality they associate with handmade items.

Again, you can customise your profile with your logo and some information, and the selling fees are low, but the sites still lack the opportunity to really create your brand. There’s also the fact your products will be mixed in with thousands of others, so you may need to resort to on-site ads to be seen, which can get expensive.

Specialist Stores / Websites

Another great option is to search out stores, either online or offline, that focus on your industry. If you make wooden bookmarks, look for bookstores who may be interested in buying a batch to place at their counter. If you knit scarves, contact some local fashion shops (by which I mean small boutiques, as Topshop likely won’t be interested!) or find places that specialise in indie designer fashion online such as US Trendy.

Esty Lingerie is a brilliant e-boutique for those creating handmade lingerie since they focus solely on indie brands, with over 30 currently on the site. The benefit of a site like this above one that sells handmade products in general such as Misi is that visitors are not only looking for handmade products, they’re looking for your handmade products – in this case lingerie. Putting your product in front of your target market doesn’t get much better or easier than this!

Craft Fairs / Markets

Markets, especially craft markets where all the products are handmade, are another great way to sell your goods if you’d rather sell offline. Markets are the original sales-place, and have been tried and tested for thousands and thousands of years!

However, selling at markets almost always comes with a price. At bigger markets, you can expect to be paying over a hundred pounds for a space and even at small, local fairs you’ll usually still have to pay a small fee to the organisers. Add to that the price of an actual table or stand (often not provided) and some sort of decor such as a tablecloth, and you’ll need to sell a decent number of products just to make your money back, before you can make a profit.

However, if you’re putting desired products in front of the right audience and enough of them, you will make sales. If you’re unsure, try starting at a local Christmas craft market since lots of sales are made at these as people buy gifts – just package your products appropriately, such as selling gift-wrapped sets as well as individual items.

Your Own Website

Last but not least, starting up your own site is both good and bad for the newbie retailer. On the one hand, you can brand it exactly as you want (graphics, texts, placement of different features and so on) which, especially if you’re aiming at the luxury market, definitely comes in handy.

However, unlike big sites like eBay or Etsy, you can’t benefit from existing traffic and will have to work hard to build up traffic to your website yourself. Especially if you’re not already an SEO expert, you may make very few sales for the first months or even year!

Setting up a website can also be expensive, and difficult if you’re not using a ‘what you see is what you get’ editor and don’t have any web-coding skills. WordPress is a free website-creating software but for e-commerce, there are better (but also more costly) alternatives.

Overall though, setting up your own website is by far the best long-term strategy. At first though, you may want to also use other methods to start making sales immediately and get your product in front of people, which is the best way to get your brand ‘known’!

Do you sell your own handmade goods? Where did you have the most success selling? Leave me a comment below!

Estelle Puleston is the owner of Esty Lingerie which she has been running for over 3 years.

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Together with your shipping terms, your return policy is one of the most important factors influencing the purchase decision. An attractive returns policy can can encourage more sales and develop customer loyalty to create a strong customer base, simply because of the reassurance of knowing that it’s safe to try a products. Here’s how to make sure you get the most from your returns policy.

Don’t Bury Your Returns Policy

A lot of businessmen bury their return policies because they are afraid to encourage returns. This is actually a wrong way of looking at things. Hiding your return policy will just frustrate potential customers.
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Consumers these days aren’t like they used to be. Today, they are well informed, confident, understand the significance of their market actions and choices, and are enabled to making better purchasing decisions.

With that said, marketers need to be more aware and careful when analyzing data and their target market. Data doesn’t lie like people do. Often, consumers will not lie out of spite. They may not want to appear harsh or critical, or they may not clearly articulate their sentiments about a certain product or experience.

One of the most important aspects of any customer loyalty platform is the ability to differentiate between the informed consumer and the browser. In either an online or brick and mortar retail environment, the informed consumer is far different to the browser. The browser will typically make several, small impulse purchases whereas the informed consumer will want to make a specific purchase. It is important to note that the two groups are not exclusive. For example, some people might act as browsers only when buying holiday gifts whereas others might browse exclusively. By effectively utilizing customer data and omnichannel marketing strategies, you can often increase brand loyalty from both groups.

Which Group Should You Cater To?

The good news is that there is no definitive either or as to what group you should focus on overall. However, data gathered loyalty program analytics can help you decide where your marketing efforts will be best spent. An aggressive omnichannel marketing approach caters more to the informed consumer than to the browser.

Logically, few people will spend the same amount of time doing independent research before buying an item that costs $4 compared to an item that costs $400. One easy illustrative example would be a large store that sells furniture as well as home accessories. Instead of only looking at the average ticket price, examine the prices of items sold. If the majority of customers purchase many smaller items instead of one large item, dig deeper. Does the store appeal to the browsing crowd? Or, do many customers make multiple purchases within a year of varying value? Loyalty platforms can help collect the right data to determine which approach is best.

Instead of only focusing on demographic data, focus on numerical data as well. Using the example of a store that sells furniture and home décor, it is logical to surmise that people purchase small items more frequently than new living room sets. Applying statistical data is both a science and an art. First, you must collect a body of evidence to be analyzed in a meaningful way. Next, you need to question why and what if. Why does this furniture store make 85% of its revenue on low-priced gift items? What could happen if the store only sold gift items?

Listen To Your Numbers As Well As Your Audience

Your numbers may tell you that gift items are a goldmine, and a less aggressive omnichannel approach might be better than an extensive educational campaign. What does your audience say? In the end, loyalty program analytics helps you gather data from personal opinions, demographic data, and straight from quarterly financial reports. The best approach to pleasing your audience is to sort through all evidence and give customers what they need, even if they didn’t know exactly what it is. By meeting customers’ needs, you will be able to create meaningful brand loyalty. In the end, brand loyalty and positive public perception is the ultimate foundation of any successful business.

Thomas Gibbs writes for the Themarketingrobot.com

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These days anyone can launch an ecommerce site and sell products online anywhere in the world, whether you have a physical store or not. Consumers’ behaviour has changed in the past few years and due to the convenience factor and the lack of time, they’d rather buy their stuff online and have it delivered to their doorstep than have to waste time going shopping.

However, it’s one thing to open an online shop and another one to make it profitable. If you’re struggling to generate enough sales and just can’t figure out why, take a look at these five ecommerce mistakes that online shop owners often make. These are all simple things, but they can hurt your sales if you’re not aware of them. But once you are, it’s easy to get your site to convert better.

1. Your Site Is Too Slow

Consumers choose to buy products online because they know it takes a few minutes to get all their shopping done. If your site takes too long to load, your customers will feel as if they are standing in line at the cash register. Did you know that 40% of consumers will abandon a site if it takes longer than three seconds to load? One second delay can see a 50% reduction in a site’s revenue. In other words, you may have tens of thousands of visitors but if your site takes too long to load, your customers will lose their patience and just move down the list to one of your competitors.

What to do: The best thing you can do is test the loading speed of your site and if it’s too slow, simply move your site to a hosting provider that can offer the strong and fast infrastructure you need for your site to load quickly.

2. Your Site Doesn’t Look Safe

No customer will buy from your site if they feel unsafe. Trust is one of the most important things you need to focus on building when managing an online shop. People need to be reassured that your site is secure and that they can share sensitive information with you, otherwise they just won’t risk doing business with you.

What to do: Use a security seal. This will show in your visitors’ browsers letting them know that your site is safe and secure.

3. Complicated Order Process And Checkout Procedure

Time is money, even more on the web where people want to get their shopping done as easy and painless as possible. That’s how your order process and checkout procedure should be – easy. Just look at Amazon and eBay, the world’s favourite retailers. Buying a product from their sites is just a matter of a few clicks, sometimes just one if you have an account. So, if your order-process is too complicated, you’ll be losing customers just when you were about to make a sale.

What to do: Have one of your friends who is not web-savvy try to buy something from your site. See where he gets stuck and try to simplify the process. Usually, the ordering should be done in 3 easy steps: click buy, add delivery information and pay.

4. Lack Of Customer Testimonials

Most people look for reviews, recommendations and feedback from other customers before buying a product online. They want to know other customers’ opinions of the online shop or the products that they want to buy. This can be decisive to whether they buy a product from your site or decide to take their business elsewhere.

What to do: There’s no such thing as a successful online shop without product reviews from customers. So, if you want yours to convert give your customers a positive purchasing experience and also the possibility to write their reviews after purchase.

5. Poor Customer Service

Bad feedback from customers can ruin a business. If you’re not responding to your customers’ enquiries before and after they buy a product from your site, you will gain a bad reputation in less than a day. Ecommerce is highly competitive and if you’re not taking care of your customers, someone else will.

What to do: Provide excellent customer service and the positive word will spread out about your business.

Alex Gavril is part of the Webfusion hosting blog team.

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