Okay, okay: I know a few people who violate this guideline, yet attract lots of business. I would encourage them to run a test, comparing the "welcome" site with a more direct marketing site. Some markets respond to gentle. But don't be too sure.
(3) Paint word pictures.
We've all heard "perfect life," "take it to the next level," and even "boost your business." Instead, let your readers put themselves in the picture.
"Imagine yourself in a bookstore, standing next to your published book..."
You can be even more vivid:
"Imagine yourself signing your first published novel in the Miracle Mile Borders Bookstore..."
(4) Choose photos and images that supplement your copy.
Photos of sailboats, mountains and rivers. Woodland scenes. Sunset over the Golden Gate bridge. If you're a scenery photographer, include them all. If you're a sailing instructor, definitely include photos of sailboats, preferably with yourself in your instructor's role.
But if you're a business consultant, use photos of yourself working with clients. If you use stock photos of people, dig for photos you won't find on every site. There's one photo of a young woman with a laptop that seems to show up everywhere we look.
(5) Quote yourself -- not Chopra, Gandhi, Kennedy, and other iconic figures.
Don't get me wrong. These folks are worth quoting.
But for your website, use your own words to share your message. You'll come across as more authentic and convincing. Your readers stay focused and, yes, feel energized by your words.
And that's when their fingers start tapping out numbers from their credit cards to your order form.
As Americans aim to curtail their spending, more retailers are cutting deals to reel in customers.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Times are tough. The economy is weakening, consumer confidence is at a low and Americans are struggling just to buy basics like gas and groceries. So when it comes to getting goods that fall beyond the bare necessities, shoppers are getting smarter.
Not only has scouring the Web for the best possible price become standard protocol before buying a big-ticket item, but more consumers are employing creative strategies for scoring hot deals on everything from stereos to sweat pants.
Comparison shopping, haggling and swapping discount codes are all becoming mainstream marks of savvy shoppers. And retailers are playing along.
Swapping online coupons or discount codes is one quick way to score a reduced price. Often simply applying the right coupon or promotion code during the online payment process can mean a savings of 10% to 30% or at least free shipping.
"People are feeling a bit of squeeze and are looking for ways to save money without cutting back their spending," said Barry Boone, owner of currentcodes.com and naughtycodes.com.
Web sites like currentcodes.com list discount codes for a number of online retailers from Amazon to Zappos. If you find a code to an online store you're shopping at, just copy it and paste it into the "promotional code" box in the checkout area of the retailer's Web site.
Printable coupons, which can be used in stores, are also readily found online at various Web sites and blogs like printable-coupons.blogspot.com and wow-coupons.com.
And sellers are taking note, offering more coupons more often as the coupon sharing sites surge in popularity.
According to a recent survey conducted by retailmenot.com, 63% of respondents said they would not make a purchase if there was no deal attached. The coupon site expects 4 million visitors in May, up 260% from a year ago, according to co-founder Bevan Clark.
Clark says the savings shouldn't end there. He urges online shoppers to check a comparison service like pricegrabber before making a purchase, and then go to a coupon sharing site "to really stack on the savings," and lastly, watch for any future price drops with a price protection service like priceprotectr.com. Many retailers will refund the difference if the price of a product is reduced within two weeks after the purchase is made.
That's what he calls a "Triad of Shopping Awesomeness."
Awesome deals can be found inside brick-and-mortar stores as well. Whether it is expressly stated or for those in the know, boutiques and big box stores alike are often willing to price match or offer a discount to reel in those that are ready to buy.
Circuit City and Sears not only have price matching policies, but they will undercut a lower advertised price by taking off an extra 10% of the difference. Plus, if customers catch a lower advertised price from another local store within 30 days of the purchase, the chains will refund 100% of the difference.
Even luxury retailers are willing to do what it takes to compete. A sales manager at Montmartre, a high-end clothier in New York City, said that even though it's not written in the store policy, they will match lower prices from other retailers on request and also give a 10% discount to their "VIP" customers, which include those that shop at the store regularly or have reached a certain spending threshold. Not a bad deal for a $400 dress or pair of $190 designer jeans.
In light of the current economic conditions, the store recently added more clients to the VIP list, the manager said, hoping to boost sales.
Even outright haggling - once restricted to flea markets and car dealerships - has become acceptable in the mass retail marketplace.
Most store policies on bargaining are informal, but shoppers with the nerve to ask about flexible pricing may just save some serious cash.
A good place to start is to ask to speak with a manager. Often a sales associate will defer to the store manager, who has more leeway to cut deals. Open the discussion by asking if the listed price is the best possible deal.
Electronics retailer P.C. Richards is willing to negotiate on everything from air conditioners to HDTVs. With a little prodding, a sales manager agreed to take 10% off the retail price of a Garmin Nuvi 200W GPS System, which comes to about $30.
There is more flexibility to haggle on products that have been on display and show some wear, such as shoes or sports equipment. A garment displayed on a mannequin or an item in a store window might come with a discount if it's missing original labels or packaging.
Electronics sold "out of the box" are also a source of great bargains, and usually have little more wear than a few fingerprints. Though they are generally missing instructions, these can often be easily downloaded online.
A manager at Best Buy said he would knock 10% off the price of a product if the box had been opened - even if it was in perfect working order.
At PC Richards, a manager slashed the price of the display model on a navigational system by 50% - not bad by bargain hunting standards.
Having a blog can be somewhat exciting and rewarding at the same time. But sometimes if you aren't getting the traffic that you want or the search engine rankings you are looking for it can be discouraging. So how you can improve these areas and make money on the internet?
One way to get great results and make money on the internet is by coming up with some great viral content that will keep your readers coming back for more continually. There are some great ways that you can really attract a lot of readers and over a long period of time also.
What Is Viral Content?
Viral content may be a term that you are not familiar with but you may have been hearing over and over again lately. So why not learn what it is so you can take full advantage of it? The advantages of having viral content on your blog could not only help you now but their effects last a long time.
Viral content is usually something that is easy to access and understand and is generally worth sharing with others. A lot of viral content comes in the form of great lists of information or other forms of great information all rolled into one. These are posts that will be looked at time and time again.
How To Come Up With Good Viral Content
One place to start looking for ideas is on other people's blogs. A lot of times, the best place for ideas is on other viral content. Start reading other posts on other blogs and decide which ones really catch your attention. These will also be the ones that won't be updated soon and that are full of good information.
Now that you have a good idea of what others are posting using viral content, you can take a stab at it. Try to come up with a good list or bunch together some information that will be useful to many and that will not be outdated as soon as you post it. Try to make it as interesting as you can--something that you would enjoy reading over and over again.
What Kinds of Benefits Can You Get?
One of the major benefits that you will get from having viral content on your blog is that others will come back to your post. And not just over a few days, but hopefully up to a year! Just think how successful you can be if you have several different great viral posts? You will be on your way to making money on the internet in no time!
No matter how you do it, just make sure that your content is something will be really worth their time reading and exploring. Good viral content should not be hard to come by. If you are having a hard time deciding what to post, then try to think of something new and exciting that you would want to know about and then learn it and share it with others.
It's as important today as it was before the invention of ecommerce and the Internet. No matter what business you're in, customer feedback is one of the most important things you'll need to work out if you want your business to grow and become successful. To that end, the Internet has presented the online entrepreneur with a great advantage over his predecessor who could only rely on postage stamps, envelopes and the telephone to get an accurate feel for his customer. Today's business owner has the use of technology that makes getting a feel for what the general consumer wants almost instantaneous with technologies like email and pay per click testing. There's absolutely no reason in today's world for the business minded go getter to design a static web site that's got only what he or she thinks the customer wants on it.
In the Internet world, getting the necessary feedback is fast and a lot cheaper than the methods used only several years ago. In virtually minutes, it's possible to gather information from customers who bought from you-what it is they bought, and how much they spend, as well as whether they plan on coming back. This kind of data can be gathered and analyzed in house. There is no need to guess at what attracts customers to your site and what keeps them there. Almost all website hosting accounts include ways to track the statistics for your website such as which page is popular, how long they're staying on your website, what they like or dislike and so much more.
There's no reason not to build your site with the intention of adjusting at least the written content once you've got it online. ALM gives you the option of allowing you to change the content through an administration site at will. By following the visits to your site, you should be able to quickly adjust the written content to get a good idea of what works and what doesn't.
Other methods combine the new technologies with older more traditional methods. "Was this information helpful?" boxes somewhere on various sites should give a clear indication of how the site works. Some of these even go a step further and ask respondents to number their responses from one to ten.
Remember that you're trying to sell something when you start an online business. Following the trends, regardless of your personal opinions of them, can be a great way to keep your site on or near the top of the page rankings. For example, one of the latest trends is incorporating video into your websites. These short clips are on the cutting edge of what's popular today and they add an even more personalized touch to the other graphics and sound bites available to web designers. These videos often introduce the principles in the company or demonstrate part of the product line.
Our Enterprise RMS (Relationship Management System) is an all encompassing Web based system designed for Pizza companies that have multiple locations. The system contains a main portal site (for the corporate Web site) and a separate Web site for each individual location. The system is designed for maximum flexibility in all aspects. There are no limits on the number of locations the system can support.
Click on the image below to see a live demo! Our graphic artists will customize the look and feel specifically for you!
The base system has an incredible number of features built in:
I. Content Management
A. Site Owners can EASILY update any text and format it accordingly on any page of the Web site. Parts of pages can be blocked to edits for the individual locations, entire pages or anything in between. Photos can be changed, new ones uploaded or old ones deleted.
B. Event Calendar- Special events can be highlighted to the site visitor in a typical calendar format. Events are easily created and deleted by the site owner.
C. Blog- Site owners can post a Blog on the site that is easily updated in real time.
D. Testimonials- Site visitors can post comments on their experience. The comments do not show up on the site until the site admin approves them.
E. Services: A default services page will be set up by the corporate entity and individual locations can choose which of these services, if not all will show up to the site visitor on their individual sites.
F. Job Listings: Each location has the ability to post job listings and receive form submissions with prospective employees.
G. Products listings: Default menus of products such as food entrée’s, merchandise, class sign ups or any other product can be set up in the system. Individual locations can then be allowed to choose from the default menu, which products they want to offer for their sites or the entire menu. We customize this area to the client’s exact specifications.
H. Promotions- Specific areas of the Web site can be set up to contain a default menu of promotions. These can be graphical in nature such as coupons or they can be shown in text. Site owners and administrators can simply click these promos on or off depending on their individual sites needs.
II. Communication Center
A. Message Board- A secure encrypted (not viewable to the outside world) Message Forum with unlimited categories and sub categories. Individual locations owners can use this tool to communicate with each other and discuss ideas etc.
B. Help Desk- This Help Desk feature will allow the site owners and locations owners to open trouble tickets. These tickets can be addressed by the site owners or for site bugs can be administrated by ALM.
C. Mass Emailer- This email system contains HTML templates that can be easily edited by the site owners/admins. The email can be sent to all customers in the database or to configurable partial lists.
D. Downloads Area- Site owners/admins can upload Pdf documents, Word documents, Excel spreadsheets etc. to this area for download by individual site owners/admins.
E. Users Guide- a comprehensive Users Guide for operating the system is customized for the client.
III. Reporting Center
A. Financial Reports- Customized, detailed financial reports that can be accessed by custom levels of User authentication. If the site is set up to conduct eCommerce transactions, full reporting on those transactions will be available. Reports can also be imported from another source should the client need to have reports on information from their current POS systems etc.
B. Site Analytics- Highly detailed reporting on site traffic is available using Google Analytics. Unique visitors by hour, day week, month, year are available as well as Search engine tracking, keyword tracking, browser tracking etc. etc.
C. Change Log- Detailed records of site content changes are kept to insure the security of the system.
D. Customized Reporting- Clients can request any type of customized reporting necessary for administrating their business.
A recent study by the Kelsey Group confirms what most of us already know, but all too rarely think about: Seventy percent of all U.S. households now use the internet as an information source when shopping locally for products and services.
As America’s leading provider of market research and analysis to publishers of Yellow Pages, electronic directories and other local print media, the Kelsey Group knows as much about local buying trends as any research organization anywhere. Among other things, they use daily consumer surveys and statistical analysis to evaluate business, social, economic and technology trends that are changing local markets and forecast how those trends will effect local and regional businesses.
So when the Kelsey Group says that small businesses without a web presence are at a serious competitive disadvantage in today’s shopping environment, you can take that opinion to the bank.
The fact that consumers in 70 percent of American homes are now using the web to research products and services they intend to purchase locally, also puts a tremendous pressure on local and small-business websites of all types to increase both the size and, most especially, the quality of their online presence. Think about it for a moment. If you’re a local businessperson with a sporting goods, apparel, toy, drug, consumer electronics, or any one of a dozen other types of stores, you’re not only competing fang and claw with WalMart, Kmart and Target in the brick-and-mortar environment, you’re also going head to head with them online.
If a consumer in Your Town USA likes Walmart.com better than he or she likes YourSite.com, they’re more likely to get in the car and go to Walmart to make their purchase than they are to visit your store.
Fortunately, there’s good news as well as bad in the Kelsey Group report.
Let’s read Kelsey’s conclusion again. Carefully.
Seventy percent of all U.S. households now use the internet as an
information source when shopping locally for products and services.
Long about the middle of that sentence we see two crucial words: Information source.
That 70 percent isn’t necessarily using the web to decide where to buy
products. In a vast number of cases they’re using the web, to get
information on what to buy and why product A will work better for them
than product B.
Fortunately for small-business entrepreneurs, big-box store websites generally do a fairly miserable job of providing any information beyond the barebones descriptions printed on product boxes. And they provide absolutely zero information that will help anyone except totally generic consumers decide what to buy.
Two quick examples: Neither Walmart.com nor Homedepot.com offers any real guidance to help people decide which of the many snow blowers they offer is best suited for dry, dusty Montana snow and which aren’t terribly good on powder but are excellent for the heavy, wet snow common on the East Coast.
Staying with seasonal products, some air conditioners are engineered to give peak performance in hot desert climates; others work best in hot, humid conditions. National chain websites don’t tell consumers which is which, local appliance store sites can — and should. Though it may not be immediately apparent, the fact that a huge number of local consumers are turning to the web for information is of incredible benefit to savvy local businesspersons competing with big chains.
What keeps local TV and appliance vendors, for example, in business when the same products are available in big box stores for less money? Nine times out of ten, there’s two one-word answers to that question: Expertise and service.
Some chains, think Circuit City and Best Buy, do make an effort to have their “sales” people memorize a line of technological patter about the various products they’re selling. But such information is generally sketchy at best and, at worst, totally compromised by which companies are offering the best “spiffs” (extra commissions on specific models the companies are trying to unload) on any given day. Then there’s Walmart, Costco and all the lesser “marts” and “co’s.” Try and find someone there who can intelligently explain the pros and cons of plasma vs. LCD flat-panel HDTV. The “try and find someone” part is often difficult enough, the intelligent explanation part is almost always impossible.
Consider the difference at a local consumer electronics/appliance store. Yes, the prices are somewhat higher, but the staff is educated, they know their stuff. If they didn’t, they would have gone out of business years earlier.
And they’re a lot less likely to sell you an inferior product just to pick up a fast 20- or 30-buck “spiff.” Dependent, unlike chain stores , on repeat customers and word-of-mouth advertising, their imperative is selling you what will work best for you, not what will make a few extra dollars for them. With more and more retail shoppers turning to the web for their preliminary product research, local businesspeople are now able to establish themselves as their community’s real specialists in their fields online as well as in their stores.
Adding well-written professional content — articles, blogs, extended product information — to local sites elevates local businesses above chain stores. It gives customers confidence in the merchant as well as the merchandise.
To go back to the HDTV example, a blog discussing technology, programming, surround sound, room lighting and all kinds of consumer questions that are never answered on BigBoxStore.com can drive customers away from Walmart and into local stores. Similarly, a local garden products retailer can use a website to win customers away from the chains by including regularly updated articles on local climate and growing conditions.
One of the really great things about adding more quality information to a website is that it’s one of the few business moves you can make that has absolutely no downside. Unlike buying more newspaper advertising or radio spots, adding pages to a site generally costs nothing. Even if you don’t feel comfortable with your copywriting ability, acquiring customized web copy from a service like GetWebContent.com is relatively inexpensive.
You don’t even have to worry about providing too much information. The more questions you answer online, the more new ones consumers will think of. Best of all, the new questions will more advanced — much more impossible for a big box store clerk to answer — than the original ones.
Imagine Customer A, a true newbie, looking at a 56-inch TV in Costco. The four-line information tag says “Dolby Digital sound.” After a great deal of effort, Customer A lassos a clerk and says “that Dolby Digital there, is that the same thing as surround sound?” The clerk, not knowing or caring if the set’s surround sound is dependent on external speakers, says “yes.”
Not a complete answer, but more or less correct.
Now consider Customer B, who’s studied HDTV 101 on your website. Customer B goes to Costco, lucks into an employee, and says “Does this set support 5.1, 6.1 or 7.1 surround sound?” Look for that person, Customer B, to leave Costco, shaking his or her head, and drive straight to your showroom.
The morale of this story is simple: A huge percentage of your potential customers are already taking a close look at your site’s content, maybe you should join them.
Copyright © Austin-Lloyd Marketing 2008. All rights reserved.
