1. Product variants – the two most common product variants in clothing is going to be size and colour. Ensure that the e-commerce platform you choose allows you to easily add clothes with different colours and sizes. This may sound obvious but even with some of the “popular” platforms, this isn’t a standard feature and customization can push the costs up
2. Stock levels – a good e-commerce platform will track inventory levels and notify you for out of stock goods. Again, the thing to note here is that the system allows you to set a custom ‘low stock notification’ for the different items available in your online store. For example, for fast moving items such as maxi dresses or polo shirts, you may want to set the low stock notification to a higher value than let’s say an expensive scarf. Most platforms allow for a single low stock notification for all the products but few offer individual configuration without the need for customization
3. Product zoom – this is a must for any e-commerce site selling clothes and especially important if you sell own or non-branded clothing. In an online environment where the user cannot touch of feel the clothes, giving them as many visual aids as possible will ensure better conversion levels. Ensure that your platform has inbuilt support or offers easy integration of a good zoom tool (we love the ease of use and cost-effectiveness of Magic Zoom) allowing the user to view the clothes in maximum detail.
4. Multiple images – along the lines of our point above, this is another way to help the user make an informed decision and maximising conversions. One common mistake to avoid here is to take the time and effort to shoot and then upload multiple images only on the higher value items. This can be off-putting for many users who had intention of buying multiple items but choose to abandon their shopping cart because of inadequate product information on one of the items.
5. Out of stock items – if a product runs out of stock, you have 2 choices – you either program the system so it removes the item from display or you display an ‘Out of stock’ sign on the item. We personally recommend the latter as it can help improve conversions if you allow the user to make enquiry for out of stock items (perhaps a ‘back order’ or ‘enquire about this out of stock item’ next to the product). If the customer can get in touch, you also have the opportunity to offer him another similar item increasing the chances of a sale otherwise wasted.

If you’re thinking of selling online, Flow20.com can help you get started.
We’re here to help you on every stage of the process from helping you choose an e-commerce platform that’s most suitable for your stock, to creating and building upon a design that complements your offering and getting the most from your online store by creating up selling opportunities.

For more information, visit http://www.flow20.com.

There’s not much wrong with this approach but a little extra attention to the often-neglected individual product pages and a little extra effort on improving the information-quality of your e commerce site can not only help it attract traffic that a simplistic SEO strategy may not alone be able to deliver, but also improve your visitor-to-customer conversion levels, resulting in a better return for your SEO investment.

Here, we look at 8 ways that can help your e commerce site attract more visitors and convert more of those visitors into customers.

1. Looking beyond the product pages
A typical e commerce site consists of several pages which consist of details about individual products which are often assigned to a particular product  category. Individual product pages are often specific to the product and contain features of the product which makes for content not very attractive to search engines.
If you want to make your online store more attractive to search engines, and your users, consider having something like a  ‘Resources’ section which offers rich content about the products and services you are selling, beyond the mere descriptions and features.

Some ideas on generating rich-content for your online store:

• Customer reviews / Testimonials – think Amazon. Allow your customers to post reviews about a recent purchase from your online shop. Link this to the related product pages and to the home page of course. Not only will it help increase your natural rankings but also help your customers make purchase decisions
• Case Studies – this is especially important if you are selling a service. talk to your customers, find out how you may have helped make a positive difference to them in some way. Document this (with their permission, of course) in a Case Study.
• Blog – search engines love blogs! Why not start a business blog offering your customers tips/tricks/useful advice on your related industry. Your customers will thank you for it and so will the search engines!

2. Differentiate your inner pages
A common challenge many online retailers face is that many of their product pages are similar to each other. This is especially true if they are selling mainstream / generic products such as electronics where the product description is often provided by the main manufacturers – many online retailers stocking the same item tend to have the same or very similar product descriptions.Main problem with this approach is the risk of being penalized by Google and other search engines for duplicate content.

Consider spending some time, especially on the higher value items of creating your own product info – focus on the benefits, rephrase the jargon and enhance the product appeal by mentioning how it can benefit the user. Not only will this help you rank better but also help you differentiate your product from your other online competitors.

3. Optimize your PDF product catalogues
Yes, you can SEO pdf product catalogues too! You have probably come across pdf results in Google when searching for something.
Some tips on optimizing your pdf product catalogues:

• Make sure you support images with relevant text. Lots of them. search engines can read text within pdf files and in many ways, treat them similar to a regular html page
• Pay attention to the title of the pdf and include your keywords in page titles, anchor text and so on.
• Try to keep the size of your pdf file as small as possible without compromising quality – smaller ‘lighter’ fonts, ‘optimal image resolutions and so on all help in optimizing the size. Not only will this help in rankings (search engines love fast loading objects, be it files, pdf, html) but also reduce the possibility of user abandoning the file download which often happens if the file size is too big and the user is on a slower internet connection.
• If you want to learn more, the folks at websiteoptimization.com have written a great article on optimizing pdf files.

5. Optimize your product images
Remember to include alt text and captions for all your images – this will help in better search engine readability. Do this correctly and consistently and there is a better chance that your product images will show up in image searches of search engines, creating a new source of traffic for your online store.

6. The importance of your product pages
Your individual product pages can in many ways play a more pivotal role in increasing your profitability than your e-commerce’ home page when optimized correctly.

How? Products such as electronics usually have a well defined product no and users often use this to search for the product online. By optimizing your individual product pages for the model no (alongwith the other, more generic info) can help it appear high with the results page, increasing the likelihood of a sale.

Some ideas on optimizing individual product pages:

• Assign appropriate page titles and meta information
• Include the model name and name with the H1 and alt text
• Include the product name and if possible, model no within the URL:
  Good www.yoursite.com/category/product_name_model.html
  Bad www.yoursite.com/uniqueID=?1234.html

7. Expand your sales channel
Your own e-commerce site is only one of the many online outlets that you can use to sell your products. Google Product Search, Live Product Search, MSN Shopping are just some of the search engine product catalogues. Uploading your products is usually free and can be done by submitting a feed or manually (one item at a time or uploading a CSV file).

Uploading your inventory to third party sites can not only result in increased sales by the way of more traffic but also increase the chance of cross-selling as users who arrive at your site for one product may decide to purchase a second one if they spot a bargain!

8. Deploy Social media
If you still haven’t gotten your head around the concept of Social Media tools such as Facebook and Twitter, at the very least, your product pages should have a social bookmarking widget such as Addthis or Addtoany. This will allow users to save their wish list and favorite products to Facebook, twitter and so on.

Do you have any SEO E commerce tips that you have found particularly useful? We’d love to hear about them…

What you may not know is that if you are a self-employed professional or a small-business owner and wishing to take complete control of your website SEO, we also offer comprehensive SEO Courses designed to teach you how to do exactly that.

Best of all, you can take up one of our SEO Courses either at our Hubworking site in Central London or at the comfort of your own workplace and even home!

For more information, visit http://www.flow20.com/SEO_Tuitions.php

Simply enter the URL of the page you want to convert to pdf on www.PDFmyURL.com and the software will instantly create a pdf of  the entire web page and allow you to save it as well.

If you use a smartphone or a e-book reader, you can use this tool to instantly convert to pdf, online case studies or white papers which you can then read on-the-go.

Although, this service has just been launched, and to convert to pdf a web page or an online case study, you have to visit their website. In the future however, if it could offer a widget to website owners so this functionality can be easily embedded within websites allowing users to create pdfs from web pages without leaving the site, that would be absolutely amazing!

The birth of PageYield is interesting and could affect Yahoo and it’s users in a huge way.

We know that Google’s PageRank gives most importance to the quality and quantity of inbound links to your website. The actual content/design/usability is less important. PageYield measures ‘engagement time’ – how users interact with your webpages. (Bounce Rates, Time on site, Clickthrough rates all come to mind).

This can be a great incentive for website owners to improve the quality of their webpages and increase its relevancy to its users in order to get good rankings within Yahoo searches.

A huge implication this can have for Yahoo which potentially turn its fortune around is if enough of its users see the value in having a high PageYield and are motivated to improve the quality of thier webpages. This could mean that whilst Google is excellent in delivering ‘relevant’ results, Yahoo is better in delivering more ‘useful’ results (using the word ‘useful’ in a relative sense here).

How long before a PageYield measurement bar appears on your Yahoo toolbar?

Although the birth of what would later become known as the ‘Internet’  started in 1958 with the Advanced Research Projects Agency by the US, it was in 1983 when the first ‘network’ of interconnected computers was operational using a TCP/IP network, technology which is still in use to this date. In the begining, the internet was mainly used by the US Government for military projects, nature of which was mostly classified and outside of the public domain.
It was in 1989, when ‘web’ started to take a more commercial shape and it was in this year that Tim Berners-Lee, a British scientist introduced the internet publicly.

According to the Institute of  Computing Technology, the Internet doubles in size every 5 years approximately and Advanced Micro Devices, a manufacturer of computer chips estimates the population of  Internet users to be 1.5 billion as of January 2009.

References:
The internet on Wikipedia
New Journal of Physics – Evolution of the Internet and its cores

Match your words to your audience:

Your target audience will respond to your sales copy message if it is written using language that they can relate to and understand. For example:

If your target audience is the 55+ age group, you probably should not use acronyms or abbreviations such as ‘FAQs’, ‘wifi’, or ‘3G network’. While it is certainly true that there are plenty of very web savvy older people, you should be sure that your 55+ group shares that knowledge base before you start slinging around those terms.

If you are a UK based etailer that provides bespoke products and want to break into the U.S. market, do not use the word ‘bespoke’. This is not a term common in the U.S. and it simply will not be understood. You will need to use words like customized or specially designed instead.

If you are talking to moms with kids, you can be a little bit cheeky as in referring to their children as kids or little tykes or something similar, but you need to understand that mothers are all about protecting and loving their children and if you get too irreverent, you will turn them off.

Your words need to be understood, need to resonate and need to respect your audience.

Establish and maintain a style:

Branding is a huge part of product promotion. Your writing style should be a part of your branding strategy. For example, if you go to the Apple site, you will find that their computer descriptions all seem to swirl around themes of easy, creative and seamless, no matter which computer product is being described.

Think about what style you should use? Do you need to attract 20 somethings with edgy, sharp language? Are you looking for a very affluent market that needs to hear about prestige, one of a kind options, and highest quality available kinds of phrases?

Your sales copy is a great way to demonstrate who you are as a company and how you feel about your products.

Positive, not negative phrasing:

This guideline should be obvious but if you read product descriptions, you can see that it is not. Write in positive terms, not negative terms.

Try not to say, ‘Only available in black or white.’ Instead say, ‘Available in your choice of black or white.’
Try not to say, ‘We only ship domestically.’ Instead say, ‘We are happy to ship within the UK.’

Helpful hints:

One of the best ways to both help your customers and gain their trust is to write helpful hints into your product copy. For example:

After describing your smashing new jeans, you might say, ‘These are made a bit roomy so if you are a size six and wish you were a size four, here is your chance.’

After describing the lustrous colour your hair colouring products will provide, you might give a piece of advice, “Although you will find that our product is completely non irritating, it still makes sense to skip a hair wash before using any hair colouring product, the natural oils in your unwashed hair will help protect your scalp.”

Remember to ask for the sale:

Be sure that your sales copy asks the reader to purchase and gives them the means to do so. Announce your limited offer of free shipping and provide an icon to click or ask, “These are so handy, do you want to buy two right away?’

Bottom Line:

Writing good sales copy gets easier as you understand more and more about your customer and how they think.

Flow20.com has helped many businesses improve their website ROI by making the offering more compelling and complete with the help of our Website Copywriting Service.  If you would like to know more about how we can make your offering more appealing to your user, contact us today.

The folks at esources.co.uk have produced a brilliant piece on how to create ad copies that make your offer more appealing, by using the basic principles of Human Needs as put forward by Dr Maslow .

In the 1950s Dr. Abraham Maslow proposed a hierarchy of human needs:

1. Physiological needs include the need for food, clothing and shelter.
2. Security and Safety needs include the need to be free from physical danger and to be secure in the feeling that physiological needs can be met.
3. Social needs involve the need to be loved, to be accepted and to belong.
4. Ego needs involve the need to be heard, to be appreciated and to be wanted.
5. Self Actualization needs involve the need to achieve one’s fullest potential.

In general, most people in developed nations have met their physiological and safety needs. Therefore, they are seeking now to satisfy social needs, ego needs and self actualisation needs. It is probably no coincidence that social media is such a fast growing phenomenon in such societies that seek acceptance and belonging.

You can apply Maslow’s hierarchy to sales writing by understanding where your product/service fits on the hierarchy of need and where your target market sits on the hierarchy of need, then tailoring your writing to respond to that need. For example, retailers who sell clothes may fit on one of several levels:

1. Physiological: Durable, warm children winter coats.
2. Security: Children winter coats with no dangling pull strings that could strangle, reflective material that can be seen in the dark and weatherproofing against snow and rain.
3. Social: Children winter coats in up to date styles and colours.
4. Ego: Children winter coats with high status brand names such as Tommy Hilfiger or celebrity status such as part of the David Bekcham or Kate Moss collection.
5. Self Actualisation: Children winter coats that are made by women cooperatives or do not contain any material from animals.

Your children winter coats may actually respond to each level of the hierarchy. You might write about the coats differently, depending on which target market you hope to attract.

Attract the reader with a powerful headline.

A. Describe a benefit that responds to the hierarchy, e.g.:

1. Physiological: The warmest winter coat you will find this year.
2. Security: Keep your child safe and warm.
3. Social: She will be a fashionable in our faux leopard print winter coat.
4. Ego: Vera Wang gave our children fur lined Sherpa jacket as a gift.
5. Self Actualisation: Your child will love our ultra warm winter coat and she will love helping a child in Botswana as well.

B. Use an emotion that responds to the hierarchy:

1. Physiological: Your child will never be cold again.
2. Security: Safety first with our best winter coats.
3. Social: Belong to the in crowd with our fashion first winter coat.
4. Ego: Your child will turn heads in her new winter coat.
5. Self Actualisation: Build a bridge of caring with our top of the line children winter coat from the Mexican Women Cooperative.

C. Announce something new or special about your product:

If the headline does not grab your customer, they will not read the rest of the copy.

Solve your customer’s problem.

One of the biggest mistakes that sales copy writers make is to focus on the product features, at the expense of making the connection between the customer’s problem and how the product solves the problem. Here are some examples.

Instead of ‘Our portable mobile phone charger has 1800 mAH say ‘You can use your mobile  phone for six hours longer when you use our 1800 mAH portable cell phone charger.’
OR
Instead of ‘This shirt comes in five jewel toned colors’ say ‘With this shirt’s choice of five jewel toned colours, you can choose the colour that best expresses your personality.’

Take a step back and think about your product in terms of the needs it meets and/or the problems it solves, then try writing problem solving phrases. The idea is to understand why your customer wants and needs your product, then frame your copy in those terms.

What does this list tell us? Not much but here are some observations:

• Interesting to note that although the internet started as a government project, 80% of the first 100 registrations were all commercial organizations (full list available at http://www.iwhois.com/oldest/)
• More than 70% of initial registrations were made by some of the large world-class companies who were as big then, as they are now – gives some idea to their level of foresight and innovation
• Where’s Microsoft?

However, the very effectiveness of SEO in helping your business grow has led to it’s global popularity which has also led to the birth of many companies who deploy unsfafe SEO Techniques to deliver short-term results. At best, your site may appear high within the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) for a little while. At worst, Google may ban your website altogether if it feels your site tried to spam the results.

Here are questions that you should ask your SEO company

1. What techniques do you use to carry out SEO?
Most SEO companies use a variety of tools and techniques to carry out the optimization process. However, some in order to produce short-term results, deploy tricks rather than proven techniques such as inserting hidden content, creation of door way pages and reciprocal linking. Reciprocal links are not really unsafe but rarely effective since the value of a reciprocal link is undermined by the reciprocity.
SEO should be viewed as an investment and the best chances of keeping your investment safe and getting a return is with companies who can leverage on their expertise as well as utilize safe and proven techniques such as optimizing your website content, creation of relevant one-way links to your website with quality sources and so on.

2. Can I see a few examples of the sites you have previously been successful in optimizing?
Examine the sites both, in terms of rankings as well as the site itself. Apart from the high rank that it should obviously be enjoying, also pay attention to the site content: Are there any hidden text? Has the design been compromised by heavy use of keyword-rich text for benefit of traffic (which almost negates the purpose of SEO unless carried out extremely effectively)?  Does the site load fast enough (if not, large amounts of additional coding has been inserted which makes the site slow to load)?

An effective SEO strategy will include carrying out steps to attract targeted traffic to your website without compromising design and usability for traffic. It should also include the necessary optimization to improve conversion of the traffic into leads or customers.

3. What happens if my site does not appear within the page that you say it will?
This question is extremely important in determining the potential risks with your investment. Although it is simply impossible to predict the exact page or position your SEO company can bring, a company with a proven track-record should have the experience in giving you a good indication of possible results as well as a guarantee that covers you at least partially.

4. Does the scope of your SEO Service include help with conversion of the newly gained traffic into visitors?
As pointed out in Q.2, in order to get the best return on your investment, you should look for companies that have the know-how in delivering traffic as well as converting traffic into leads or customers for your business. In most cases, having a high level of traffic is of little use until the user actually performs the necessary actions such as buying something  (customer) or filling out a contact form (lead).

5. Is there a minimum term contract? If yes, for how long?
Most SEO Companies operate on a 6 or 12 month minimum term with an initial payment payable upon start of campaign and a reduced monthly payment, thereafter. This makes sense since producing SEO results take time and requires patience. However, make sure you understand the payment terms and whether the first monthly payment is payable after a certain no. of days once your campaign begins. This is important because you shouldn’t be paying the monthly charges until nearer the time once your rankings are expected to start improving.

It is important to carry out your own due-diligence before making your choice. When carried out effectively, SEO can be extremely beneficial in helping your business grow and reducing your marketing costs.