Growing Your Online Business

NO LISTING FEES!!

All month long in September. Sell on eBay with no listing fees!

• Use a Gallery picture
• Start pricing at $9.99 or less
• Insertion fees are taken care of by eBay

Starting Wednesday August 29, 2007 and ending on Sunday September 30, 2007. Get stared now! Click Here!

SES - Day 4 SMO

SMO (Social Media Optimization)

In terms of SEO, they panelists were looking at SMO as a way to increase links and traffic. Todd Malicoat from SEO Stuntdbl talked about creating content that would get votes and popularity in the social media sites. He breaks down a strategy for starting out.

Think of your hook first. Using different kinds of hooks for different kinds of topics and audiences.

• The Attack Hook- Telling people they are wrong or stupid. Very difficult.
• The Humor Hook- Starting off with something funny
• The Contrarian Hook- Taking the devil’s advocate.
• The News Hook – If you have something newsworthy.
• The Resource Hook – Offering something useful or educational.
• The Ego Hook – Playing to peoples emotions and egos.

Then Think of your title second.

• He says to use Copy Blogger as a resource for headline formulas. And as a good practice, write 10 different headlines based off of different hooks or combinations of hooks before you decide on one.

Remember that content is really king!

• The subject matter is really what gets picked up, so it better be good.

Rand Fishkin from SEOMoz talked about the different social media sites. He even ranked them from most important to least. You may not agree with his ranking, but the list is good.

• Youtube
• Stumble Upon
• Wikipedia
• Yahoo! Answers
• Digg
• Yelp
• Reddit
• LinkedIn
• Flickr
• Netscape
• Del.icio.us
• Facebook
• Myspace
• Craigslist
• Amazon
• Technorati
• Newsvine
• Sphinn
• CitySearch
• Helium
• Wikihow
• Second Life
• Twitter

These are the areas you want to focus your SMO efforts.

The important thing is to a be a community player. Add friends that have the same interests, vote for others content. Don’t buy votes, don’t promote yourself, just add value. Social Media Marketing is tricky and don’t get discouraged, some of your efforts will fail miserably, but keep trying.

--Jason--

SES Day 3- The Battle for Links Continues

Are Links Evil? - A loaded title for the controversial session I attended yesterday, and it didn't disappoint. The first speaker was Google, which was quite immovable on the subject of buying links. It hurts more than it helps. Google knows about all the sites out there selling links, and it won't give any credit to these links purchased from those sources.

But the session got heated when the next panelist spoke. He came out swinging, claiming that Google is not the government and creates unfair practices. He basically said ecommerce sites have a hard time generating links naturally and are more likely to purchase links. Google, by stopping the practice of purchasing links, is forcing ecommerce sites to revert to PPC—a major money source for Google.

However you view it, and the whatever side you take, remember that Google is not the government. But, it does make the rules, so if you want to play on its search engine, you have to follow them.

In another session I attended today, Link Q & A with the search engines, this controversial subject continued. The first question out of the gate was how can the search engines tell if a link is purchased or not. The representatives from the search engines were pretty vague on their answers, but basically admitted that if its a good relevant link, it could have some benefit.

The bottom line is this: If the link comes from a site that is relevant to yours, is a well respected site, and is not practicing "black hat" SEO tactics, the link will most likely help you.

Avoid buying links from sites that do nothing but sell links. Period. These sites are on the search engines radar and will not help but only hurt you. The best practice is to engage in link baiting and to provide good content that will entice people to link to you.

Links are important, but controversial and difficult to obtain. Do your due diligence. Be careful; and when in doubt, ask a respected SEO professional. The wrong move could set you back months in your SEO progress.

--Jason--

SES Day 2 - Images and Search Engines

Since we are talking ecommerce here, it's important to understand how your images work with the search engines. Image search is the second fastest growing vertical search. More and more people type the product keyword phrase for the product they are looking for and go straight to image search on Google or other search engines. Shoppers are visual people, they want to see it before they buy it.

Some of the things that search engines see for images are:

• Surrounding text- captions if applicable and the text that is near or surrounding the image.
• Alt tags
• Title Tag of the page- especially if the image has a larger view and that view is a page all its own.
• File Name- Very important, atm-machine.jpg is probably an image of an ATM machine while image123.jpg could be anything
• Is it a JPG or Gif? Jpegs are photos to the SE’s. While Gifs aren't always considered photos.

Tips:
1. Don't let software generate image names for you.
2. Format your graphic images correctly
3. Name files in a way that makes sense
4. Make sure your image is included in the shopping comparison feeds, if you use them.
5. Make sure the page and the text surrounding it is optimized and relevant.

How do you get your photos out there? How do you use them to your advantage in Search Engine Optimization?

As well as the tips listed above, consider social media optimization. Chris Smith from NetConcepts made some excellent points about using Flickr and other photo sharing websites to your advantage.

Optimizing through Flickr

            Flickr offers the following attributes when loading an image.

• Title
• H1
• Captions
• Keyword Tagging
• Cross-Grouping
• Comments
• Sharing
• Alt Text
• Optimal linking hierarchies
• Date Taken and Page Views displayed
• Interestingness algorithm

Chris also mentions that you should consider licensing your pictures or offering them for free if people will link back to you.

SEO for ecommerce is more than just about optimizing your text or copy or tweaking your HTML code. Ignore image optimization at your own risk. The savvy ecommerce professionals will realize the value of images in the search engines and will use it to their advantage.

Remember, for product searches, people use image search. I have and I know you have too.

--Jason--

SES-Day One

I just got into San Jose and headed straight to the conference center to attend my first session of the SES convention. The first session I went to was a good one, so I'm off to a good start. I’m optimistic that most of the sessions will be very informational.

The first session I attended was about Quality Score on PPC campaigns. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, read on. The days of creating an ad and bidding more money on keywords than your competition to achieve the top spots are long gone.

Google pioneered the Quality Score (QS) on PPC, and Yahoo and MSN quickly followed suit. The algorithm they use to determine QS is not the same one they use for natural rankings.

Getting a good QS is important. If done correctly, you could bid considerably less on a certain keyword than your competition and still show up higher in the listings than they do.

How do you do this? Three experts in the industry spoke on this first, and then the search engines each had a representative who spoke briefly as well. They focused on slightly different things, but the discussions basically boiled down to a couple of key areas:

· CTR (Click Through Rate)- This is a large determining factor on how good of a QS you can achieve. Test your ad copy constantly to increase your CTR.

· Ad Copy- Delivering the right message. An ad that relates to the keyword searched for will generally get a better click through rate. Use the keyword in your ad, and use copy that speaks to the keyword.

· Landing Pages- What user experience are you delivering, and is the content relevant to the keyword that started the search? Use the keywords and phrases that started with the search and that continued in the ad. Make sure the landing page delivers good authoritative content.

The example used was instead of “local plumbing,” a keyword search for “emergency plumbing” will have quite a different ad and landing page. The correlation of the keyword, the ad, and the landing page, along with the CTR, are all taken into consideration for your QS.

Next time you go into your AdWords account and see that the quality of your ad is not great--or worse yet, that AdWords is telling you that the minimum bid for your ad is a $1 or more for it to be shown--first look at your ad and then your landing page. Fixing these areas may get your ad shown and increase your QS.

And if you increase your QS, you get a better position for less money. It's not as easy as out-bidding your competition, but if done right, it’s more cost effective in the long run.

More from SES to come. Stay tuned.

--Jason--

Where's the traffic? 3 of 5. Are you selling on Amazon?

Number two on the list of online shopping destinations is Amazon. Be it Seller Central or Marketplace, every month we see encouraging sales growth on Amazon. These results aren’t surprising given Amazon’s Q2 earnings. Amazon sales grew 38% in North America

in Q2, with sales of electronics, jewelry and general merchandise climbing 55%, and books, DVDs and other media sales 27%. These numbers are very encouraging as we move into busy Q4.

Other than the impressive sales growth on Amazon, there’s one other HUGE motivating factor for listing on Amazon: There are no listing fees! While there is a variable fee structure when an item sells, as well as a low monthly subscription fee, Amazon is a great place to test the market for your inventory because of the lack of up-front, per-product-offering fees.

There are two selling opportunities on Amazon – Seller Central and Amazon Marketplace. Amazon Seller Central is open only to approved merchants and is currently closed for a few categories (jewelry, cell phones, books, DVDs, to name a few). If you search for a non-media item on Amazon, you’re likely looking at something offered by Amazon merchants via Amazon Seller Central.

If you’re a media seller looking to get in on the Amazon action, Amazon Marketplace is for you. Remember, Amazon is in the business of selling media items. When you search for a book, you’ll generally be taken to an item being sold directly by Amazon. Look for Amazon Marketplace merchant listings in the “used & new” area.

A true multi-channel online strategy includes selling on the two biggest players out there. So, I ask you, are you selling on Amazon?

--Cindy--

Cause Marketing - "Cause we said So"

Successful companies have long recognized the benefits that come from associating their name with charitable organizations. “Cause marketing”—strategic marketing efforts that connect your business with relevant non-profits for mutual benefit—can provide opportunities to elevate your company’s image and increase brand awareness in new markets. However, helping a worthy cause and boosting your bottom line at the same time hasn’t always been an easy task. Until now.

Through Infopia’s integration with the eBay Giving Works Program, powered by MissionFish, you can use cause marketing to significantly improve your online performance and support something you believe in. Simply designate the charity of your choice and a portion of your eBay sales will be donated for selected listings. By aligning yourself with a charitable cause, your listings and your brand benefit from increased visibility, customer loyalty, and profitability within the eBay marketplace.

Increased Visibility

• Set your listings apart with special icons

• Place your listings on a dedicated MissionFish page

Enhanced Loyalty

• Set yourself apart from competitors

• Build a positive company image

Improved Profitability

• Receive more bids per listing

• See higher final prices

 
To learn more about MissionFish and Giving Works check out an upcoming webinar brought to you by the Professional eBay Sellers Alliance (PeSA). Your hosts Kristin Cunningham (General Manager, eBay Giving Works) and David Yaskulka (Vice President, Product Marketing, Kompolt) will show you how to differentiate your retail brand, attract new customers, and improve customer loyalty by giving back to causes important to you and your customers.  Cunningham and Yaskulka will be joined by special guest Elizabeth Bennett of Africa Direct, a Platinum PowerSeller and winner of the 2007 eBay Community Hall of Fame award.

Click here to register: http://www.missionfish.org/ForSellers/forsellers_PeSA.jsp

You can also learn about Infopia’s integration to eBay’s Giving Works here:
http://www.infopia.com/website/partners-givingworks.shtml

--David--
 

More SMO please!

No, I'm not talking about the gooey marshmallow and chocolate goodness sandwiched between two graham cracker halves.

I'm talking about Social Media Optimization (SMO). It's an important part of internet marketing, right along with SEO, PPC and CSEs. (Don't you love all the acronyms?)

The basic five tenets of SMO were created by Rohit Bhargava:

1. Increase your linkability
2. Make tagging and bookmarking easy
3. Reward inbound links
4. Help your content travel
5. Encourage the mashup

The goal of SMO is to keep your site relevant in social circles on the web—providing content that people want to share, tag, bookmark, and link to your site. You also want content to be valuable enough that it gets passed around. You also want to create a shopping experience that is interactive and enjoyable, even to the point where visitors begin to change the experience to fit their needs.

The tricky part for online retailers is the dynamic nature of this type of marketing. New social sites are popping up all the time. Where do you get started? How do you take advantage of this phenomenon?

In upcoming posts, we'll explore each of the 5 tenets of Rohit's SMO philosophy and apply them to ecommerce. In preparation for that discussion, treat yourself to some SMOs. Visit sites like, youtube.com, digg, reddit, netscape, myspace, facebook, and any of the countless numbers of new social sites popping up everyday.

Until then, mmmmmmmm, SMOs!

--Jason--

Spring Cleaning in the Fall

You're probably familiar with that concept of being overtaken by the urge to deep clean in early Spring. (Well, at least you remember watching your Mom go through that!) It can be a challenging exercise, but man, does it feel good when you're done! I propose that we all experience that feeling in the later part of the year as well. While Christmas is still a few months away, wouldn't now be the perfect time to start preparing for it so that you don't have the crazy Christmas season you had last year, and the year before that, and the year before that...?

Some ideas:

• Clean Your Workspaces. Smooth and clean order processing and fulfillment has at least a little to do with the cleanliness and order of your workspaces. I know there's a certain degree of charm in the bobbleheads and coffee cups, the event swag and scribbled-on notepads lying around, but when that "charm" blocks your way, creeps into your working space, or, God forbid, stains your packing slips(!), it hinders your professionalism and your ability to work quickly. Grab a garbage can and some antibacterial wipes and go to town. For that stuff you have to keep, get some organizers to keep things contained and handy but out of your way. Voila! You're a man in motion.
• Merchandising Cleanup. Do you want to sell more this season? A little merchandising work goes a long way towards this goal. Start with your top performing product lines and examine them to make sure that all the pertinent information is provided and is correct. Then go one step further and ask yourself what else you could provide that would help spur a customer to a purchasing decision. Sizing charts. Color charts. Features (e.g., spec lists) as well as benefits (e.g., use and care instructions) (manufacturers generally provide feature lists, not benefits). It's easy to use Marketplace Manager's bulk export and import feature to make changes en mass.
• Look for Blockers and Demolish Them. Remember last year? What were your biggest blockers in quick and efficient order processing? Was it listing products? Was it payment collection? Was it label creation? Was it running to the post office? Start thinking about how you can remove those log jams. Talk to your Account Manager and other online sellers to learn about ways to solve your biggest challenges.
• Find One Thing That Makes You Better. Even if you're humming along like a well-oiled machine, you can always find one area that could use improvement or fine-tuning. Maybe you've been meaning to update your eBay listing template. Do you have a business process that needs to be recorded, or changed, or just updated? Maybe you've been meaning to do a price and service comparison between the leading shipping carriers. Have you been putting off doing a mass promotional email to your customer base? Maybe you've been considering selling in a new channel or improving your SEO opportunities. Pick one thing that's been bugging you--even if it's a small thing--and do it.

These are just a few ideas. Make your to-do lists. Then get to work checking them off (you can check them twice if it makes you feel better!). Santa Claus is coming to town...soon.

--Jessica--

No Listing Fee, Flat Rate.

Today Buy.com announced it's new Garage Sale feature that will allow its users to sell items on Facebook (with service to other social sites coming soon). Everyone knows about the power of social networking. Savvy social marketing guru's will be able to take advantage of this feature.

How many times have you purchased something based on the recommendation of a friend? Or caught the buzz of a new and hot product?

The appeal to online retailers will be the flat 5% fee for the sale. No listing fees, one flat rate.

It will be interesting to watch and see how quickly this catches on. Do you think eBay is a little bit worried?

Leave a comment and let me know if you will be taking advantage of Buy.com's new Garage Sale feature. Or at least looking into it?

--Jason--