We spend a lot of time in our
Newsletter and on our Web Site telling people
that there really are no "secrets" to success.
It's simply common business sense and hard work.
That's a true statement no matter what, and I will
always stand by it.
However, it is also true that if there
is something that's common business sense, but you don't
know about it, it could be perceived as a "secret" or a
"trick of the trade".
In this article I want to mention some
out-of-the-way common sense that I've mentioned in my
writings before, but may have been overlooked by many.
It's been a while since I've talked about it.
We all know that in order to sell on the
Internet, you need an Internet presence of some kind.
Whether it's an ECommerce Store or Auctions, it all boils
down to the same thing. You have to have some thing, some
place on the Net where someone can look at your product,
and buy it from you.
Lots of people have that, though!
There's a lot of competition out there, right? So the
issue, if you want to be successful, becomes making
yourself a little different from everyone else. A little
more memorable to the people who view your site or your
auctions. A little more interesting than the other guy
that's selling your same product. You need to give people
a reason to like you, to trust you, to remember you, to
come back to you time and time again. If there's a "secret"
to Internet sales at all, that's it.
How do you do that?
Well, one very good way is information.
Tell your customers something they didn't know about the
product you want them to buy. Give them information they'll
be glad to have when they buy it. Give them ideas on uses
for that product that they wouldn't have thought of
on their own.
For example, here's what we do with one
of our web sites. Our site, www.ElectronicDartShop.com,
sells indoor and outdoor games. We concentrate on Darts
and Dart Boards on that site. So, we have a page that our
customers can refer back to over and over again that gives
them all the rules for all the games they can play with our
boards! Sounds simple, doesn't it? Yet that one page gets
more hits than the rest of the site's pages combined! Those
hits tell us that our customers are returning to those Dart
Game rules over and over again, telling their dart-playing
friends to refer to it, etc. It gives our customers information
they can really use, and didn't really expect to find when they
first went to our site. Giving a pleasant, unexpected surprise
to your customers is absolutely invaluable in ECommerce!
It's not hard to do. We sell Dart Boards on
that site, so we give them a compilation of Dart Game Rules.
If you're selling Cookware on your site, give them some really
good recipes! If you're selling Recreational Vehicle Parts, give
them links to information on the highest-rated RV Parks around
the country. Anything that lets them take more away from visiting
your site than your competitions'. They will remember.
So, let's get down to the reason for
this article's title.
There are many good ECommerce Hosting
Solutions out there. We recommend the ones we think are
the best, in our Resource Center. Finally, though, we've
seen someone combine the concept of ECommerce Hosting with
the concept of free, valuable information for your
store's customers.
I have long respected the work of Dr. Ken
Evoy. His sites and books are excellent resources for those
who want to be successful on the Internet. He also believes
in the concept that we discussed above. He's taken that concept
even further, though, by creating www.SiteBuildIt.com.
SiteBuildIt.com takes the products/free
information concept and does it the other way around. When
you build a web site using SiteBuildIt.com, you present free
information first, then you lead people to the products.
This concept works exceptionally well, as
long as the information you're presenting is honest, original
and valuable.
Let me explain what I mean:
Yesterday, I was searching online for a
Cholesterol Testing Kit. Yes, alright, I'm getting older, and
I want to be around to watch my kids and my two grandkids get
a whole lot older themselves! So, I'm looking for this Cholesterol
Testing Kit, and I don't really know anything about them. I went
to a search engine, and did a search. At the top of the page,
the very first result was a direct link to purchase a particular
brand name and model of this kind of kit, for sale in an
online store.
Well, perfect, right! Whoever owns that store
is doing a good job positioning their products on the Search
Engines! That's the way it should work!
In about third or fourth place, though, I
saw a link that led to information on what Cholesterol Testing
Kits are, and how they work.
Guess which one I clicked on? Yep, I clicked
on the link that told me what this product was all about
and how it worked.
Like most people, if I'm not really familiar
with exactly what product I want, I need to find information on
that product before I buy it. I want to know how they work,
which ones are better than others, what kind of price range
I'm looking at, etc.
That link I found that gave me all of that
information was the first one I clicked. When I bought one, I
bought it from the site that gave me the free information;
and not the site that only gave me a link to buy one
particular product.
Promoting information about your products
for free is an excellent way to gain loyal customers. That's
what SiteBuildIt.com is all out.
Instead of just allowing you to build a web
site and put products on it, SiteBuildIt.com walks you through
the whole process of creating and distributing information about
your products, which will then lead much more qualified customers
directly back to your site to purchase from you. Those customers
will also stay with you, because they now know where they can go
to really understand the products they are looking at, instead
of just buying something and hoping it's right for them.
The concept of free, original, quality
information is very powerful on the Internet, and when it's
linked directly to your products, it becomes almost invincible.
I'm really glad to finally see an ECommerce Store Solution that
recognizes this and puts it all together so well.
I highly recommend that you go to
www.SiteBuildIt.com and take a free Tour. Even if you
already have an active ECommerce store, SiteBuildIt's
insight into this method is definitely
worth a serious look!
