I used to think that a ‘keyword rich’ title simply meant stuffing as many keywords into a title as possible. If that meant a title was just a string of keywords instead of a statement, so be it. In my mind a title like: Canon Digital Camera with Camcorder & Memory Card would help shoppers on eBay find my item. However, as search terms become more valuable for finding what seekers are looking for, it’s important to understand how to use keywords in your title effectively.

Understanding who and where your customer is in the “buy cycle” can help you hone in on the correct keywords that will attract purchases (if that’s the purpose of your site – or listing). Your site might not be to attract a sale right away – in that case you’d want a different set of keywords. For instance, if you had a blog that you wanted to attract readers, not necessarily buyers, you might want to target the searcher who is in the research mode. Someone who is simply looking for more information will type in a different keyword string than someone who is ready to buy. The buyer knows specifically what they want and will type in more specific brand and model information, the researcher may type in some less specific.

Let’s take a quick look at the three types customers, or researchers and where they are in the ‘buy cycle’

Browsers are in the information gathering mode. These types are looking for more information about a product or service. They are in the first step in the ‘buy cycle’. This type of looker often types in generic keywords for search. For instance, I’ve recently decided that sometime in the near future I want to buy an RV to do a little traveling – without sleeping on the ground. My first step at gathering information is to find out more about the RV itself. So, I went to Google (knowing nothing) and typed in the simple phrase ‘RV Magazine’ – I don’t know anything about RV’s but my guess is that magazines about the subject will get me started. Notice that the search was two words and they are very generic. I’m a long way from making a purchase at this point, I’m simply trying to find out more information.

Shoppers have identified a need and tend to use more keywords in their searches. These types of searches make up the bulk of searches on Google, Yahoo, MSN, etc. To continue my RV shopping (but still in the gathering mode) I want more information. At this point my searches start getting more specific to the item or service I’m looking for. Like I may type in ‘reviews of class C motor homes’ ‘Winnebago class c RV’ or ‘places to visit on RV vacations.’ If I come to an RV dealership that has the information, it’s possible that I’ll bookmark it for later reference and even come back when I’m ready to purchase. So, it’s a great idea to target the shopper – but don’t expect to have a high rate of purchases from this group of researchers.

Buyers have done all their research and are ready to hit the ‘buy now’ button – once they’ve found specifically the item they want at the price they’re willing to pay. Let’s say I’m ready to head out to the showroom or even ready to start bidding on the RV of my dreams – I’m going to start my Internet search by using, more specific and longer phrases. My search may include: “Pre owned Winnebago Outlook 331C Class C Motor Home”

What researchers have found is that the way people use search, and the number of keywords typed into search tends to get longer and more specific as the buyer gets closer to purchase. You can take advantage of this by considering your product – how a buyer may search for the item as opposed to a browser and tweak your ‘long tail’ keyword string accordingly.

In some cases it’s hard to distinguish the difference between ‘browse’ words and ‘buy’ words – but keep testing until you find the sweet spot. In general, the highest click through and buy ratio will be with the longer, three words (or more) phrases. If there’s a make, model number or type related to your item be sure to put them in. Be as specific as possible about your product and you’re much more likely to find buyers.

Here are a few tips to get you started.

Make sure you are buying from a reputable source.

• Look at their history
• How long have they been in business?
• Generally it’s better to find your source offline; like a trade show or through a business association
• Check the suppliers references with the Better Business Bureau, do a Google Search on the company, etc

Start small and build a relationship

Ask what the MOO is (Minimum Opening Order) and try to keep the first order at that amount. 

Try to conserve your capital (cash) don’t over-order. Ask for show discounts if you are at a trade show.

Once you’ve ordered, reviewed the products and company the next step is to set-up a credit account.

Purchase on credit (not your credit card – on the vendor invoicing system) and pay off completely before due date, but not too soon. Keep your cash as long as possible. But always pay your suppliers on time. This one step will get you more goodwill than anything else you do!
After you have ordered and paid a few times, it’s time to start negotiating. Suppliers and sales representatives will be more open to working with you after you show them you are a reliable seller. Find out if there are any ‘early order’ discounts. Early Orders are placed before they bring in their supply. Vendors will give you a discount if they know you’ll take delivery as soon as their shipment comes in.
As you start to build trust with the vendor and see how they control their inventory you can decide whether the company is reliable enough to approach about drop shipping. If the supplier keeps good stock, has a good communication system (or customer service support) you should consider approaching them to work out a deal. Ask the vendor drop ship the larger or more expensive items while you continue to order the smaller or less expensive items in larger quantities.
If your vendor agrees to drop ship don’t expect a super discount on the drop-shipped items. Because your supplier is holding the inventory, tying up their storage space and capital investment, they’ll expect the lions share of the profit. That’s OK, you’ll still be ahead of the curve because you can offer a greater ‘depth of inventory’ or larger selection for your buyers.

Building a relationship with your suppliers takes time. Expect to start slow. As you get started (unless you have an ‘in’ with the company) you probably won’t get the best prices on products until you prove yourself. Conserve your cash, start small and build slowly, and always be on the look out for the next vendor to start a relationship with. It’s healthy in business to have more than one source for your products.

I know that social media is all the rage these days.  You’ll hear every marketer and guru tell you that you “must be on Twitter and Facebook.”
They tell you to get out there and be friends with others but they never tell you how or why. Without that important piece of the puzzle you wonder what the value of it is, and how it works.

Let me quickly tell you. Selling products is more than filling a need for a customer. It’s an exchange. Sometimes, it’s simply an exchange of an item or cash – but often, in the buyers mind, it’s an exchange of cash for a lifestyle improvement. That’s a pretty big thing to your customer and they want to know they can trust you to give them what they seek.

That’s where social media comes into play. Using blogging, facebook or twitter to show people who you are, what you know, and how you can help them builds trust in an otherwise faceless medium; the Internet.

The main focus of “being social” is to use these applications to build relationships with your customer. However,  I think many of us are Twittering – or using Facebook or MySpace and not seeing the results we are looking for – because we are targeting or ‘friending’ the wrong group of people. In other words we are not targeting our segment of buyers.

Start thinking of who you have on your friends list – are they your family and friends – or your customers? Here’s the difference if you have friends and family, are they your purchasing customers?  For example: It’s great to have all your family following you on Twitter, it makes you look very popular indeed. But those thousands of followers aren’t necessarily your buyers.

If you enjoy the ‘social’ part of social media, perhaps you should have one account to talk with friends and another account to build your list of potential customers.
You’ll get a lot more return on investment by following the one simple rule below.

SOCIAL MARKETING GOLDEN RULE: Spend your time on socializing with YOUR CUSTOMERS.

 If you have time and energy left at the end of the day, spend the rest socializing with your friends on Facebook and Twitter.

 Here are five more tips to maximize your social marketing:

1. Focus your Tweets and Facebook posts on your business. Make the blurbs benefit your customer; “just in rare first edition Harry Potter” or “check out this blog post about Starbucks Collectibles” These types of tweets are much more interesting to your buyers than which conference you attended or what you had for lunch.

2. Toss in an invitation to join your blog RSS feed, Twitter Account, Facebook or MySpace account in every email or package you ship to your customer and tell them what’s in it for them if they join. Super bonus – make it a handwritten invitation signed by you!

3. Don’t waste your valuable time on sites that don’t return the investment. Check out the social media sites demographics before spending time building a following. Facebook is more likely to be your place if you sell products to women over 40 – Twitter if you are selling to Internet geeks and marketers – MySpace to the youngish rockers, etc.

4. Post regularly – people love stability – but don’t take up all the oxygen in the room! Twitter & Facebook can seem like a really loud party with everyone shouting to be heard. Tip: People who post too much, get removed from feeds.

5. Ask questions! Your clients and customers want to know you are listening to them more than anything else in the world! Set up surveys, invite them to reply to your tweets and posts and be open to comments.

Referred to a generic domain names in the survey – they found higher click through rates – or better pay per click ad performance when the web address includes even a generic mention of the product or service provided. A domain name like TaxPreparation.com or Carnavigation.com attracts more clicks than a less intuitive or lesser branded company name.

They tested three names and found these interesting results:

ElectricBicycles.co.uk (generic domain name with an exact product match)
YourBikes.co.uk (an alternative generic domain name)
InAHurry.co.uk (a non-generic name)

The generic domain name with an exact match had a 15% higher click-through rate than the generic and a 42% higher click through rate than the non-generic domain.

They concluded that:
Memorable Domains attributes the strong performance of generic domain names to several factors:

Because a generic domain name describes a product or service using the words people automatically associate with the topic, it encourages them to click more.
The presence of search terms in the domain name leads to higher organic rankings or a
better ad quality score in pay-per-click ad ranking algorithms.
Search engines commonly automatically bold any word in the domain name that matches the search term, drawing attention to the listing.
There is a potential positive impact of the domain name on ad quality score.

My conclusion to reading this is that while a keyword included in the domain name may not be as important as thought when it comes to SEO spiders - it absolutely plays an important role when it comes to the human factor. Don’t forget the end goal of all naming and branding is to get a person to click and the best way still is to tell them what’s in it for them. A name like ElecticBicycles.co.uk tells the viewer quickly it’s a site about electric bikes.

More information about the study can be found at:
http://www.marketingcharts.com/interactive/generic-domain-names-in-ads-outperform-non-generic-8957/?utm_campaign=newsletter&utm_source=mc&utm_medium=textlink

Today we take a look at the group of users called Connectors
This group of newbie users are looking for a reason to use the Internet. Connectors account for 36% of the active Internet user population; however 40% of them have been using the Internet for two years or less.  Of this group only 42% have made a purchase online (compared to the average 61% of other groups).
Connectors often use the Internet to ‘connect’ with other people through email, chat rooms and social sites. With the popularity of Facebook for women who are 55 and older – I’d guess many Connectors can be found on Facebook.
While connectors may not be ready to purchase online now, this big segment of Internet users shouldn’t be ignored. As they become more comfortable with the Internet they may soon learn how simple it is to buy online.
Getting the Connector to your site may be harder if you don’t have an ‘off-line’ presence. This group is very likely to come to the Internet on recommendation of a trusted brand. However, you can build your own loyal group from this segment if you can befriend the Connector on a social site. Although banner ads are not always effective, if I purchased any banner ads it would be on Facebook to start building brand confidence with the Connector.

This post covers Surfers
Surfers – the activity of browsing the Internet is often called ‘surfing’ and this group certainly lives up to that name. Surfers account for 32% of online time, far more than any other group. However, Surfers only make up about 8% of the online population.
This group visits many more pages than the average user in the hunt for what’s new. To attract this group to your site you’ll need to offer cutting-edge design and features, or content. These users are the ones who expect fresh blog posts, or a new assortment of products or services regularly.
The thrill of ‘new’ keeps the Surfer moving on in the search. While these users are less likely than Simplifiers to purchase – don’t shut the door on them.  Its human nature to want to share and Surfers are very likely to be your evangelists. If you provide them with new products and fresh content they are very likely to tell their friends about their find and send buyers or users to your site.
Check out the next post about Connectors

A new online study byMcKinney and Media Metrix at http://www.prnewswire.co.uk/cgi/news/release?id=44955 breaks internet users into 6 groups, based on their online habits.

This study can help you zero in on your group or tribe in a way that raw analytics can’t. Site stats and Google Analytics can give you lots of good information about visitors, such as where they came from, unique visits and even demographic information. While all that information is useful, there’s another static they can’t give you; the users motivation for coming to your site.

This new study breaks down the reason people come to the Internet. It segments the users based on time online, pages and domains accessed and the amount of time spent per web page. The study broke users into six segments. They are:

* Simplifiers
* Surfers
* Connectors
* Bargainers
* Routiners
* Sportsters

Let’s take a look at what the study found out about each of these segments and consider where and how to reach your market.

Over the next six posts I’ll discuss each group of users and give you marketing or business suggestions to help you target each group.

The first one is: Simplifiers

Simplifiers use the Internet to make their lives easier. They come online with a specific purpose in mind. Buying a book for example, they just want to purchase it quick and easy. Simplifiers spend less time online that most – about 7 hours a month. On the flip side they have the longest tenure on the net 49% have been using the Internet for 5 years or longer.

OK – but here is the real take away about Simplifiers – they account for over half the total transactions online! If you are in the retail sector you must provide these users with an easy to use platform, or “end to end convince.”

Simplifiers generally don’t care about coupons or comparison sites, they don’t want to read long sales copy, and are not likely to spend time socializing online. If you want to target this group, don’t expect a banner ad on Facebook to work. You may need to use social media sites to build your links, and create an authority ranking with the Search Engines, but don’t expect to engage with this group via Twitter. Simplifiers will be the ones most likely to do a Google/Yahoo/MSN search and choose the top results. Once you have a Simplifier make sure you provide them with clean navigation tools and an easy to use check-out system or they’ll leave. To build their loyalty make sure these users don’t have to jump through hoops to buy from you. Amazon.com accommodates to this group beautifully with their ‘one click check out.’

Check out the next post about Surfers. And, please feel free to leave a comment or suggestion about how you might target a Smiplifier.

I know many readers are exploring how to monetize their websites and blogs with affiliate links.

Setting up the sites are easy, but getting lookers to stay on your site and click on the banners and links is hard. You have about about 3 seconds to capture their attention.

Knowing what the viewers will see in those first few seconds can help you put those banners and links in the best spots.

The video above shows you how to use a free heat map service to do just that.

Do you want to own your own business?

Are you pulling your hair out trying to figure out how to make money without endangering your home mortgage?

Do you hope to turn that dream of being your own boss into a reality, but you’re not sure where to turn for solid business advice?

You’ve heard that selling on the web is profitable, but…

You’re learning that in today’s tough economy; you are faced with increasing competition as more people start using web to earn income. As competition heats up, many established sellers are cutting corners – and profits – just to stay in the game.

You’re finding that the days of tossing off a listing and seeing what happens are gone. To be a successful merchant, you must outperform your competition. It is hard to keep up with all the rapid changes and still manage your day to day operation.

We want to help you with those challenges and more at the Web Sellers’ Circle.

This week I’m interviewing Dennis from Netoscan.com. He’s going to talk to us about the Amazon scouting tool and show us a new desktop researching tool that will be helpful for buying in bulk to resell on Amazon. I’ll have the recording up later this week.

Recently, we offered members a special discount price on the upcoming Internet Sellers Conference admission. I hope you took advantage of the deal; it was a time sensitive offer. I’d love to meet you at the conference.

We’ve got several more interviews with industry leaders coming up soon.

This is a small sample of the many programs we have planned once the site officially launches in June.

At that point the Web Sellers’ Circle will change from a free site to a paid subscription service.

I want you to continue enjoying all we have to offer so I’m giving you a chance to become a charter member.

Right now we’re offering the first 25 people who sign up a LIFETIME membership. No continued fees, just quality content for a one time sign-up fee.

Plus we have some amazing bonuses for those first few pioneers. Do you have the entrepreneurial spirit?  This is your chance to jump in on the ground floor and learn how to change those day dreams into real life.

I did over 20 years ago, when my partner Dany and I opened our first business – a garden shop, before the age of the Internet. As the retail climate has changed, so have we. Now we are successfully using the web to sell our products and services. The platform may have changed, but business principals haven’t. We’ve leveraged that knowledge to continue to ‘be our own boss.’

We’d love to help you build your dreams.

To find out more about becoming a charter member of the Web Sellers Circle please click over to:

www.websellerssecret.com

Cindy Shebley

eBay Certified Business Consultant

Author: eBay Marketing Bible

www.websellerssecret.com

PS: Don’t forget this is only for the first 25 subscribers. If you join us now we’re going to make your return on investment grow. Check out the bonuses we’re offering if you sign up now.

www.websellerssecret.com

After all this talk the last few weeks about how the eBay Trust And Safety team removes listings first, asking questions later…. I’d like to tell you that if there’s a instance where you are the victim of someone violating your rights it’ll be taken care of quickly…. but…..

Not so fast there McGraw!

I can now say that I’ve had experience on both sides of the eBay Trust & Safety department. And I can tell you how amazed I am that this department seems so unresponsive. Maybe it’s because I called them the Keystone Cops the other day – but I doubt they ever heard – LOL.

My issue this time is over another seller who ‘borrowed’ a picture of mine. Well, actually it was an eBay Store Certified Designer Logo I have been authorized to use. You can see it on my website at www.clovercity.com. Normally, I really wouldn’t care if someone ‘right clicked’ and saved the logo to their hard drive.

But, this seller – took it a step further. Instead of saving it and then uploading it to the eBay picture services, or to Photobucket she directly linked to my site – stealing my ‘bandwidth.’ While not the worst thing ever, it is considered  bad manners on the Internet to cyber squat like that.

So, I wrote the seller and asked her to remove the links. She wrote back, apologized and said someone had told her that was the correct way to host photos. (I think she really got a few wires crossed). She promised she’d remove them but could I please give her a couple of days. So, I wrote back told her how to use photobucket to host her photos and told her she had two weeks to remove the links.

Two weeks later, the seller had used my suggestion about Photobucket on her new listings, but never removed the links from her existing listings – about thirty listings.

I think I was fair with her, giving her two weeks. So I was slightly annoyed – and felt very used-  that she continued to list new products without fixing the old listings – so yes, being human – I reported all the listings to the eBay Trust and Safety department. I received an auto-reply instantly and a week later – nothing had been done… umm, so much for the Trust & Safety department helping the little guy.

Luckily, in an instance like this – it’s better to get creative than to get mad. So, because she is ‘pointing’ her listing to an image on my website – I can change  a few things. I went to work creating a new graphic (see above) and renamed it the original logo’s name. Before I uploaded the new graphic to overwrite the old, I renamed the original graphic and and changed the name on the URL that points to it.

The result: an invite to learn eBay to everyone who visits this sellers listings, complete with my URL.

I don’t have a solution for you if you find your photos are being borrowed and eBay Trust & Safety isn’t responding, except to suggest that you watermark each of your images. If they do get used by someone else, your branding will be all over them. The person borrowing them will look like a loser and you’ll be marketing your business.

Remember, it’s always good business to try and keep a level head. You don’t want to end up looking like a jerk because someone else is getting away with something you know is wrong. Yes, it’s frustrating – but it’s very bad business to look like a sore looser. I’ve heard of sellers changing the graphics to say something like “this seller is a bandwidth thief” Yes, that’s true, but really people who see the post – think worse of you then the offender.

If possible, try to turn the situation around to your benefit. Now, I get a smile when I see those links showing up in my report – means more people are seeing my ad.