Siting in on Ecommerce Success

A Home Business Article Contributed by Sharon Hill

Bringing Sight to Your Site

You can build the world's most eye-catching, easy-to-use, proficient web site but it won't help your ecommerce business unless folks find it. Let's look at some of the ways you can accomplish this.

Ecommerce Search Strings are Not Your Only Answer

The days of setting up meta tags so that search engines could list your site for free are long over. Yes, there are still plenty of free search engines out there, but they are increasingly charging ecommerce business people for the privilege of prominent placement. What this means, for instance, is that you can certainly go onto Google or Yahoo and add your site to their search engine at no charge but unless you pay for prominently placement you'll get lost.

Let's say, for instance, that you are Hilda's Home Design ecommerce firm. You create your dynamic site and list it with Yahoo - for free. After several weeks your site is listed.

Then a consumer turns to Yahoo to find firms that can help with their interior decorating. Yahoo returns 8200 sites. Your is number 4200. Do you expect a response from that consumer? Emphatically no. Have you ever searched down that far for anything? I know I haven't. Most folks choose from the first page displayed. The rest never search past the second. But, however, if you took advantage of their pay per click site option you'd be more prominently displayed.

But even then there's no guarantee of where. With pay per click you are always bidding against your competition. If, for instance, you tell Yahoo that you will pay $1 for each person that views your site you may this week be listed on the first page in a search of interior design firms. But, if next week 50 folks bid higher than $1 your firm now becomes 51 in the ecommerce listing when a consumer searches for someone to redecorate her home.

Effective Ecommerce Marketing Alternatives

One ecommerce alternative for bringing folks to your site is to join web rings. This is a proactive form of ecommerce marketing - an opportunity to talk about your site and services. Web rings are forums where folks gather that are interested in one specific topic. In a short online search of "Family and Home" web rings for instance I found 35 web rings dedicated to home decorating.

One ring, entitled "Best Home Decorating Sites on the Web" included 25 ecommerce sites offering home decor liquidation sale items, collectibles and wind chimes, stained glass, photography, and even handmade tire mats. Adding your ecommerce business and its url to this web ring is simple - just complete a free registration page and you're done.

Ecommerce Word-of-Mouth

Once you have a few folks at your site you'll want to keep them coming back and encourage these ecommerce folks to bring other consumers to your site as well.

Make sure you offer the opportunity to bookmark your site - preferably on each page of your site. Adding your site to a consumer's list of favorites is a great ecommerce marketing tool. Let folks know, on your home page, that portions of your site are updated daily, weekly, or monthly. Offer them a free newsletter subscription. Make it easy to add their email address to the ecommerce subscriber list. Give them a short feedback form to recommend your site to their friends.

Brand your site - retaining the same "look" on each page - same colors, same logo, same motto. Offer freebies - white pages, downloadable information on topics about which you have expertise and they have an interest. Add affiliate programs and links to related sites.

The old adage that it's far easier to keep a customer you already have than to find a new one is as true with ecommerce as it is with your brick and mortar location. Be good to your customer - reliable, honest, and quick to respond. They'll come back for more. And bring others with them.