Posted on

How can I sell things fast?

How can I sell things fast?

Creating a successful ecommerce brand revolves around building trust and a loyal following, which doesn’t happen overnight. But if you do need to sell things quickly, we’ve put together a few tips to help you get your products off your hands! 

Price it right

First, look at products that are similar to yours on online marketplaces. On Ebay, you can refer to the “completed listings” section, which shows you what products have sold and how much they cost. This can help you evaluate both the demand for the product and the standard price. 

If speed is your priority, list the item for slightly less than other similar products, but be willing to negotiate, especially if you’re selling on an online marketplace. Everybody loves to get a good deal, so prepare to sell your product for 10-20% lower than the price you listed it. If you’re using your own ecommerce site, consider offering discount codes or having a sale section.

Description and pictures

When writing the copy for your product, think about what you would want to know if you were buying this item. If it’s second-hand, make sure to include what condition it is in and why you’re selling it, and as for any other product, include detailed specifications, any special features that will help it stand out, and what accessories come with the product. 

The pictures of the item can make or break a sale. Make sure they are clear and taken in good lighting, and if there are any issues, take a close up of these as well. This helps build trust and gives the customer a good idea of what they’re buying, whereas limited and poor-quality pictures make the product look worse than it is and suggest you might be hiding something. 

Sell more than one product at a time

If you really need to get rid of some stock, you can sell your products in ready-made packs that will encourage your potential customer to buy more than the one product they originally wanted.

Selling items quickly isn’t always easy, but if you follow these steps then you can give yourself a good chance to speed up sales on your products! If you want to try out some of these tips on your own website, check out Go Sitebuilder’s 14-day free trial and have a look at all of the extra features they offer for ecommerce sites.

Posted on

How can I sell things online for free?

Female business owner accepting a package from a delivery person.

Maybe you already have an online store where you sell your products, or maybe you’re just starting out in the ecommerce world. Either way, online marketplaces are a great option to diversify your customer base and increase your income, as you can capitalise on the site’s already-existing loyal audience. 

If you’re just starting out, it’s not worth paying the fees for high-traffic sites like Amazon and Ebay, so we’ve had a look at two of the best online marketplaces that don’t cost a penny.

Craigslist

Created in San Francisco during the early days of the internet, Craigslist is now the world’s largest online classifieds website where you can advertise anything from houses to plant pots. According to SimilarWeb, the marketplace is ranked 15th in the United States and 48th worldwide, so the site has a large and loyal audience. 

Craigslist is good for selling items locally, as the buyer usually picks up the item in person and hands over the payment in cash. This can help you develop a good relationship and trust with your customers, but isn’t so good for expanding your customer base beyond your immediate area. If you do want to send your products further afield, you will have to handle everything from the point of sale, including the delivery and any after-sales issues. 

Facebook Marketplace

Using the ever-popular social media platform, Facebook Marketplace is a simple and easy way to sell your products. Just upload a picture and description of the item, and people can contact you directly through Facebook messenger. One of the benefits that this platform has over Craigslist is that you can look at the profile of the person you’re selling to by checking out their Facebook profile, which can help you identify scammers or bots. 

Being part of a social media site, Facebook Marketplace is also a good way to expand your audience, as content is easily shareable, either by you or by happy customers. Similar to Craigslist, this platform works better on a local scale, unless you’re prepared to handle delivery and online payment yourself. 

If you’re based in the United States, LetGo and Geebo are also good alternatives for free online marketplaces, but they are not yet available in the UK. 

Free online marketplaces are useful for local sales, but they are often limited if you’re looking to expand your reach beyond your city. If you want to set up your own ecommerce website, why not try out Go Sitebuilder’s 14-day free trial? Their online store has unlimited products, a variety of payment options and you can even create customised discount codes! 

Posted on

How to choose the perfect domain name for your online store

Female small business owner stood in the middle of her shop updating her online store via a tablet device. She is wearing dark green clothing and glasses

Your domain name is the first time your users will connect with your brand, and it’s important that you get it right. We’ve put together some tips to help you create a memorable and unique domain name for your online store. 

Does it reflect your brand and product?

If you’ve already developed and established a brand name, then use this for your domain. If that isn’t available, brainstorm words related to your core brand and values that are relevant to your business, and think about your potential customers; does this evoke the concepts and feelings your business represents? If you’re not sure, show some examples to friends and ask them what they think the website is selling and what kind of brand it is – if it’s way off, consider changing it to make it clearer. 

Can you optimise it for SEO?

Including keywords in your domain name will help your site rank higher on search engines and be more visible to potential clients, so pick a name that is specific to your product. However, be aware that this could make your site sound generic (cottontshirts.com) and could also limit what you can offer in the future. You can also use the domain extension .store as it both shows that you’re an ecommerce brand and helps you get that keyword into your domain name.

Is it simple and easy to understand?

You want your domain to be unique, but also memorable. Keep it short (17 characters max) and avoid unnecessary characters, abbreviations and numbers. Avoid unusual spellings and make it easy to say out loud, as then it’s easier to remember. 

When you’re starting out, brainstorm lots of ideas! Choose 10 words that represent your brand personality and your product, and play with different variations until you find one that sounds right. Check if it’s available and remember to buy it quickly; there are bots that buy up domains that have been recently searched to sell that at a profit later. 

A domain name should represent you and your brand, but you need a high-quality website as well! Go Sitebuilder has ecommerce capability, personalised domain names and offers five email addresses with that domain. Try out their 14-day free trial, and use their pre-built themes and designs to create a website that your customers will love. 

Posted on

What are five benefits of selling online?

Female ecommerce business owner boxing up new orders she's just received through her online store. She is casually dressed, leaning over a white table, looking at her laptop

If you’ve already got a brick and mortar shop or you’re just starting out in the ecommerce world, selling online is a great way to expand your company’s reach. If you’re not sure whether it would be beneficial for you, we’ve put together five benefits of selling online that could help you decide.

Shoppers start online

87% of shoppers start their search for products online, to compare cost, brands, inventory levels and to check customer reviews. Even though they may end up buying the item in a physical store, the only way you can form part of this initial search is for your shop to have an online presence. 

Lower set-up and running costs

With website builders, it’s possible to set up an ecommerce platform with ready-made templates in a couple of minutes, which usually cost around £15-20 a month. Compare this to renting a physical space and paying for bills, which can easily run over a thousand pounds a month. Your budget for staff will also be drastically reduced as the sales system in an online store is automated; all these savings mean an online store is often more profitable and more scalable. 

More customers, more opportunities

Your ecommerce site will be open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. As it is not limited by the people who can actually visit your store in person, you can expand to new demographics and reach a global audience. This maximises both your sales and your profits, as there are no restrictions for customers to purchase from your site.

Easily measurable and marketable

Analytics tools are invaluable for helping you collect data on who is visiting your site. Not only can you look at customer activity, like average cart total, cart abandonment rate and how long your customers spend on certain pages, you can also look at the demographics of your audience. 

You will be able to use this data to develop better marketing initiatives that are geared towards your target market, which will boost your conversion rates and increase your profits.

Work from anywhere

One of the greatest benefits of working online is that you are not restricted to a city or even country. As long as you are able to cover delivery costs, you can oversee your ecommerce business from anywhere!

Does setting up an online shop sound good for your business? Getting online is simple and quick with Go SiteBuilder; you can even try out their 14-day free trial to see if it works for you!

Posted on

How to go about launching a digital product

Male wearing a blue, white and red checkered shirt is standing in his kitchen looking at his phone and making a coffee

To launch a digital product, it’s very helpful to have a digital presence. You can create this digital presence in one of several ways. You can do it through social media, online advertising, or you can do it by publishing a blog. But the thing that underpins all of these methods and makes it easy for interested parties to be aware of your digital presence is a website. A website is a place to tie it all together and express yourself with your customers.

Your website is your digital presence

A digital product is an online representation of a product or a service in the virtual world. Or in easier terms, this us what you do or sell – but online. Launching that digital product or service is all about raising awareness of its existence. But if you first use blogs and online advertising through social media or virtual directories to awaken public interest, in order to receive and action orders for whatever it is you are offering, you will need a website. A website helps you finish it all up, make payments and more!

To launch a digital product successfully, creating a website has to be your starting point. A website is your digital presence. It announces your existence to the virtual world and shows potential customers where to go.

How to create your first website

You could hire a bespoke website designer to create a website for you from scratch, but most product launches start off in a small way through a small business. Small business owners need to keep their costs down and hiring the services of a dedicated website designer can be an expensive undertaking.

So, to help entrepreneurs to get started affordably, we here at Go Sitebuilder came up with the modular website design concept. It empowers users to create their own professional websites a section at a time. Most importantly, you don’t need any website building experience. It works just as well for novices as it does for geeks.

By building your website in sections, you can make it as small or large as you require and add or subtract from it as your needs change. But whatever you do, thanks to the user-friendly programmable templates we have, you can customise your own unique website with ease. It will look and perform as good if not better than if you had employed the services of a bespoke website designer at many times the cost.

The complete website package

All of the websites you can create through Go Sitebuilder are available with a personalised domain name chosen by you, and five unique, business email addresses. The websites are compatible for mobile use, and you can access them via any device from anywhere to modify the site, process orders or do any other sort of maintenance as you see fit.

Ready for launch

With your website up and running, you will then be in a position to launch your digital product or service. You now have that all-important anchor point and can set about updating social media outlets, publishing blogs and instigating email marketing campaigns.

Anyone who wants to know more about the product(s) you are offering or who wants to go ahead and make a purchase will know where to go. You are on your way.

Having a website is crucial for every business. If you haven’t created yours yet, why don’t you check out Go Sitebuilder? Create your website from anywhere without the need for any technical skills. Try Go Sitebuilder free for 14-days to see just how easy it is to get your business online.

Posted on

How do you create an online store from scratch

Creating an online store from scratch

Selling online has never been easier. There are numerous routes to market that will allow you to have a successful and profitable career as an eCommerce business owner. To be successful, you need to start a store from scratch and for this, you need to think carefully. The more planning you do, the better it is for your business. So, here are a few quick steps for you to consider when starting your online store.

Choose a niche

The first thing you need to do is to select a niche market that you would like to sell into. This will have to align with the product you’re creating as well. It has to be something that you’re passionate about. Something that you could talk about all day. The more passion you have for your product, the easier it will be for you to sell it.

Choose the products

Some niches will have a wider selection than others. Or you might have developed your own products. It is important to aim for a profit margin of between 40-70% with the higher amount being better. Be sure to benchmark your pricing against your competitors to ensure you’re not overcharging. For instance, if you’re selling a product for £20 but everyone else is selling it for £10, then you might struggle to find customers.

Buy your domain

Next, you need to buy a domain name. This should be something that resembles the branding for your store, allowing you to build long-term relationships with customers. Having a domain name that represents your brand efficiently will help you with your marketing and in most cases is very cost-effective. Connect your domain/brand name to something that is meaningful. For instance, if you sell teddy bears, having this in the name or something to do with cuddles could be important. Go Sitebuilder offers a free domain name with every subscription.

Build your website

The next step is to build your website. You want to create several pages including pages for home, about, contact, terms and conditions, delivery and more. Building a website is very easy and you can get started for free with Go Sitebuilder.
Your website should be optimised for search engines and conversions to help you generate more revenue. However, you shouldn’t expect success straight away. While search engines may have some restrictions for new businesses within the first 6 months, this will allow you to put some time into other important areas such as perfecting your storefront and building out your launch plan.

Add your products

Now you need to add products. Products should have a great description and lots of high-quality images and videos to help them sell. You should also concentrate on writing descriptions that sell the benefits and not the features of your products.
Finally, always include a call-to-action in your product descriptions, encouraging visitors to buy your items.

Building a new eCommerce store is easy, especially with Go Sitebuilder. Discover how you can create an online store today for as little as the cost of a coffee a week.

Posted on

How to take great product photos

Product photography tips

Following on from our blog on how to write great product descriptions, we’ve rounded up our top tips for taking great images to match. When you’re selling products online, it’s absolutely vital to show them off with professional-looking, accurate images. A well-taken set of photos will immediately instil trust in your customers and make them more likely to purchase. While descriptions are great for explaining the ins and outs of a product and winning over customers, 90% of the information we absorb is visual. More than that, 93% of consumers consider appearance to be the most important thing when making a decision!

Choose your camera

The good news is that you don’t need to splash out on a big, swanky camera to take great product photos! Most modern smartphones have great cameras these days – and if yours doesn’t, you probably know someone whose does, who’d be willing to let you use it for an afternoon in exchange for a cup of coffee/chat/evening of babysitting. For more tips, Hubspot have a great guide to taking good photos on your phone.

Name your images

Give your product twice as much chance of showing up in search results by giving it a relevant title. It’s unlikely that many people will search for ‘image123456.jpg’ – and if they do, they probably aren’t looking for your image! Use concise, clear terminology to help people to find you. This will also help search engines to index your image, as well as providing a backup description if your image doesn’t load for some reason.

Consistency is key

The key thing to consider is uniformity; always try and shoot your images in the same style. This will ensure that the customer has a clear idea of what the products look like, and make your online store front look really professional.

Pick your light

Avoid fluorescent overhead lighting – nobody looks good under this, and that goes for inanimate objects too! Natural light is normally a safe bet, so try to shoot in this wherever possible. The light changes dramatically throughout the day, so pick a time when you like the light and try to always shoot at around the same time.

Use multiple images

Just as you need to make sure your written descriptions help customers to really get an idea of your products, you should also include enough of the right images to help people get a feel for them. You’ve probably noticed that most online stores include product shots from multiple angles and this is why – the majority of customers need to know that they aren’t missing any details by not being in a physical store and seeing a product for themselves. This also applies to product variations: if you have a product in multiple colours or sizes, always show them all!

Give an idea of scale

Hopefully you’ve provided the technical specifications of your products, but unless your customers have a tape measure to hand, they might want a more tangible idea of how big something is. You can help by providing a point of comparison: if your product can be held in your hand, think about including a photo of this; if it’s designed to be worn, show it on a person; if it’s something you put in your home or garden, include a photo of it in situ. This will help your customers to make an informed decision and help you to avoid having to deal with complaints when a product arrives and is a different size from the one they were expecting!

Create professional backgrounds

You can create a sleek, uniform background for your products by taping a large sheet of white paper between the wall and the surface your products are on, to form a curve or ‘sweep’. This creates a really professional look, and gets rid of any annoying unwanted background marks or shadows!

If you keep these tips in mind and get into the habit of following them, you’ll be on your way to having an online store to rival the best of them! A little effort and consistency goes a long way, and will ensure that you’re never selling your products short. 

If you don’t have an online store yet, you’re in luck: a Go Sitebuilder subscription includes an online store (with unlimited product listings!) and much more – for less than the price of a coffee a week. Sign up for a free trial today and put your newfound product photography skills to use!

Posted on

How to write effective product descriptions

When shopping online, your customers are relying on you to give them a clear, informative and persuasive picture of your products, as they can’t get a feel for them in the same way as they might in a bricks-and-mortar store. We’ve rounded up some top tips for creating effective product descriptions to help your products sell and make your store a success.

Define your target audience

Who are you trying to win over? In an ideal world, you would have customers from all demographics and all walks of life, but chances are there’s one group of people who are more likely to buy your product. Think about what kind of language they would and wouldn’t engage with, and keep this in mind when you’re writing. For example, if your target audience is people over the age of 50, they probably aren’t going to be overly receptive to slang words or excessive familiarity; however, if you’re targeting millennials, they’ll be more receptive to this style of language.

Tell a story

Did you decide to create a product because you needed it and realised it didn’t exist yet? Did you already make it, and decide to start selling it because it was your grandma’s favourite? Many products have a story behind them, and this is a great way to gain customers’ trust and engage them. It doesn’t have to be long, but a personal touch in a product description can go a long way. 

Explain the results and benefits

Rather than just explaining what’s good about a product, explain why it’s good. If you’re selling a travel mug with a rubber sleeve, for example, what does this sleeve do? Chances are, it makes it easy to carry the mug on the go! Wherever possible, include this kind of justification so that your customers know exactly how they can benefit from the features you’ve put time and effort into!

Create evocative descriptions

Sensory words (e.g. ‘feels’,’ sounds’, ‘looks like’) are really effective when it comes to making sales. Always use these where you can – although don’t fall into the trap of using them where they’re really not relevant!

Don’t forget the product specifications

It’s easy to get bogged down in the stylistic elements of creating a product description, but don’t forget to include the basics! Make sure you supply product dimensions, care instructions and other details as applicable for each product.

Use relevant keywords

It goes without saying that people need to be able to find your store for you to make sales. Using relevant, SEO-boosting keywords will help your website to show up on Google, so that people searching for products like yours will end up in the right place (on your website!).

Include reviews

Nothing breeds trust like trust. Wherever possible, include positive reviews on your product listing pages – either with the tried-and-tested star rating system or just as quotes from satisfied customers. If you don’t have any reviews to hand yet, try asking customers for feedback – although make sure you’re complying with GDPR and only contacting them if it’s okay to do so. This article has some great tips on how to get reviews, so you can start building that trust straight away.

Keep these guidelines in mind and you’ll have a simple format to follow for all your product descriptions. As with all creative business activities, you’ll find your own style, but these are things you should always try to include. A little effort will go a long way, and you’ll soon find your products flying off the virtual shelves!

If you don’t have an online store yet, you’re in luck: a Go Sitebuilder subscription includes an online store (with unlimited product listings!) and much more – for less than the price of a coffee a week. Sign up for a free trial today and put your newfound product listing expertise to use!