How long did your store take?

[Kerrib4]

Hi,

I am basically looking for a bit of advice as to whether or not I should keep my online store. When I first opened my store, I thought that after 1 year would be doing okay. If you could please give me your opinion on some stats for my website it would be much appreciated.

Store opened - June 2009
What we sell - Baby safety products such as baby car seats, head support cushions, safety reins, baby carriers, and more.
Average visits per day - 80
Average unique visits per day - 70
Average bounce rate - 58%
Ecommerce rate - 0.3%

I know that the ecommerce rate is very poor and so is the bounce rate. I have recently had many people proceeding to the cart or checkout then leaving. I am thinking about offering free shipping and possibly bring the product prices down slightly, although it will only leave me with a small profit. I am just trying to think of ways I could increase my conversion rates and bring down the bounce rate.

I was completely new to SEO when I first set up the store, so I have had to learn SEO over the past year from reading up on it online. It took me around 6 months to fully get my head round the basics of SEO, and now I am finally starting to see some results from my SEO work.

For these of you who own an online store, how long was it before you were seeing at least one sale a day? I am not sure how long I should give my website to see if it will work out or not, which is why I am asking this question. I do understand though that results are different in every niche.

Thanks in advance

 

[AndyP]

Whats the site URL?

 

[Kerrib4]

babyonthego.co.uk

Thanks

 

[S-Marketing]

A website is not a business. The website is a tool of the business. The website itself will not make money if it is not run like any other business.

If it just sits there getting a few hits and you dont proactively run the business and promote it, it will never make money.

 

[alanc]

In answer to the OP's original question: about 2 to 2-1/2 years. I have heard that this is a typical time.

 

[S-Marketing]

Just had a look at your site. I quite like it. It certainly has potential. How are your prices on the car seats and stuff compared to Halfords and such like?

 

[Kerrib4]

A website is not a business. The website is a tool of the business. The website itself will not make money if it is not run like any other business.

If it just sits there getting a few hits and you dont proactively run the business and promote it, it will never make money.

Thanks for your input. Could you please give me a bit more detail on what you see as running a business and promoting it?

The products are cheaper than Halfords and most other 'large' stores. The only problem is other online stores. There are other stores online that sell these products for very cheap. I guess they have the advantage of bulk buying though.

 

[Kerrib4]

In answer to the OP's original question: about 2 to 2-1/2 years. I have heard that this is a typical time.

Wow, I'm really surprised by that. Is that the typical time for businesses to be earning a proper wage? Or is it for businesses to be hitting one sale a day? Thanks.

 

[sysops]

Store opened - June 2009
What we sell - Baby safety products such as baby car seats, head support cushions, safety reins, baby carriers, and more.
Average visits per day - 80
Average unique visits per day - 70
Average bounce rate - 58%
Ecommerce rate - 0.3%

You can do a lot to improve the conversion rate. You should eb able to hit 1.5% without too much difficulty.

But 1.5% at 80 visits a day doesn't make a viable business. 1.5% at 800 visits a day might, if you sell a lot of your higher value lines, but it's still a squeeze.

To have any chance of making this work, you will need to x5 your conversion rate, and x10 your traffic.

When we launch a new site, we put in a certain amount of work to promote it, then let it grow on its own. If it's not seeing 5 sales a day after 12 months, we shut it down.

 

[S-Marketing]

Thanks for your input. Could you please give me a bit more detail on what you see as running a business and promoting it?

Thanks

Thats a pretty open ended question. Do you have a marketing plan, a general business plan? Do you do any offline promotion of your business? Have you conducted any research into your target market?

 

[Kerrib4]

You can do a lot to improve the conversion rate. You should eb able to hit 1.5% without too much difficulty.

But 1.5% at 80 visits a day doesn't make a viable business. 1.5% at 800 visits a day might, if you sell a lot of your higher value lines, but it's still a squeeze.

To have any chance of making this work, you will need to x5 your conversion rate, and x10 your traffic.

When we launch a new site, we put in a certain amount of work to promote it, then let it grow on its own. If it's not seeing 5 sales a day after 12 months, we shut it down.

Would be great to be getting 800 visits per day. Do you have any marketing tips for gaining more web traffic?

According to google adwords keyword tool, one of my keywords is getting 18100 hits per month, but I am finding that I am not getting all that many visits from that particular keyword. I am number 10 in google for that keyword just now.

Thanks

 

[AndyP]

OK....well the site is nice enough. I would, however, suggest that you make more of your shipping rates as I couldn't find them and even at checkout you are asking for postcode, county etc before I can see anything....I wouldn't mind betting that is why you get so much abandonment at checkout.

Step back from your site and be critical.....put yourself in your customers shoes and ask what they would ask.....are you answering the critical questions easily and overtly. Shipping charges are a big issue and people want and need to know them. They will rarely jump through hoops to find them.

I don't think you are doing anything terribly wrong...it just needs tweaking here and there. And, of course, you need to be competitive, not necessariy the absolute cheapest but certainly in the ballpark. You need a USP, a reason for people to buy from you rather than whoever else.

As for how long....difficult question to answer.... that will depend on how much money you throw at it, what your marketing agenda is, what your business plan is...but for a new site you are heading in the right direction.

I do think though that to expect to earn a living from a site in its infancy is a tall order. You need a back up whilst the site grows to the point where it is supportive. To be honest, as mentioned earlier, even 2.5 years is optimistic. I would double that and some in these difficult trading times.

But you have what you have, if you want to keep going then you need to buckle down and prepare for the storm, keep improving your site on a daily basis, be forever critical, importantly take inspiration from sites that you admire and criticise, criticise, criticise.

What syspos has said is true but I suspect that you aren't in the same place, so to speak.

 

[sysops]

Would be great to be getting 800 visits per day. Do you have any marketing tips for gaining more web traffic?

You don't need tips, you need a marketing plan. Sit down with a sheet of paper and make a list of all the different marketing channels. Assign a budget (time, money or both) to each one for the next 12 months, and start work. The cost will not be small - either you will pay someone a lot of money, or you will spend thousands of hours on it (or a combination of the two).

 

[Kerrib4]

Thats a pretty open ended question. Do you have a marketing plan, a general business plan? Do you do any offline promotion of your business? Have you conducted any research into your target market?

Basically my online marketing consists of article marketing, video marketing, blog commenting, social bookmarking, and social networking.

I was thinking about doing a subscription newsletter although I am not sure if that would work well in my niche.

I have not yet done a lot of offline marketing but this is something I will certainly look into.

 

[fiona davies]

Hi,



I know that the ecommerce rate is very poor and so is the bounce rate. I have recently had many people proceeding to the cart or checkout then leaving. I am thinking about offering free shipping and possibly bring the product prices down slightly, although it will only leave me with a small profit. I am just trying to think of ways I could increase my conversion rates and bring down the bounce rate.

There might be a problem here????if people are leaving at the checkout stage, then is there something wrong with the checkout.??? I know I hate having to log into a site and become a member when I purchase something, and i know on your site there is an option to NOT become a member but it is in really small writing, so perhaps people don't read it and then think "what the hell I can't be bothered thinking up another password"....just a thought. Maybe have a play around with the cart, get some of your friends to do test orders and see what feedback they give you.

 

[Kerrib4]

OK....well the site is nice enough. I would, however, suggest that you make more of your shipping rates as I couldn't find them and even at checkout you are asking for postcode, county etc before I can see anything....I wouldn't mind betting that is why you get so much abandonment at checkout.

Step back from your site and be critical.....put yourself in your customers shoes and ask what they would ask.....are you answering the critical questions easily and overtly. Shipping charges are a big issue and people want and need to know them. They will rarely jump through hoops to find them.

I don't think you are doing anything terribly wrong...it just needs tweaking here and there. And, of course, you need to be competitive, not necessariy the absolute cheapest but certainly in the ballpark. You need a USP, a reason for people to buy from you rather than whoever else.

As for how long....difficult question to answer.... that will depend on how much money you throw at it, what your marketing agenda is, what your business plan is...but for a new site you are heading in the right direction.

I do think though that to expect to earn a living from a site in its infancy is a tall order. You need a back up whilst the site grows to the point where it is supportive. To be honest, as mentioned earlier, even 2.5 years is optimistic. I would double that and some in these difficult trading times.

But you have what you have, if you want to keep going then you need to buckle down and prepare for the storm, keep improving your site on a daily basis, be forever critical, importantly take inspiration from sites that you admire and criticise, criticise, criticise.

What syspos has said is true but I suspect that you aren't in the same place, so to speak.

Thanks for your reply. I understand what you mean, and thanks for your optimism. As you mentioned, Syspos may have had an easier start than me. I started the site not even knowing what SEO was, and had a very small investment to start the business off.

I will ask family and friends to take a proper look at the site too, and see if they can go to the checkout page etc without me showing them how to do it. This will give me an idea of how simple the site is to navigate.

I will definitely take your comment on my shipping into account. I will make sure the prices are more noticeable for customers to see (although I am going to see if I can afford to give free shipping).

Thanks again

 

[Kerrib4]

There might be a problem here????if people are leaving at the checkout stage, then is there something wrong with the checkout.??? I know I hate having to log into a site and become a member when I purchase something, and i know on your site there is an option to NOT become a member but it is in really small writing, so perhaps people don't read it and then think "what the hell I can't be bothered thinking up another password"....just a thought. Maybe have a play around with the cart, get some of your friends to do test orders and see what feedback they give you.

Thanks Fiona, I will contact my shopping cart and find out how to take the log in option away from the site.

 

[TotallySport]

IMO your web site has a few issues, when the home page loads in without scrolling, it me it looks like your selling a service that helps children be safe online, the statement "The UK's favourite Online Child Safety Store", with a lady underneath like a receptionish doesn't advertise your service correctly.

Baby on the go, to me sounds like things for babies and babies to go eather on days out or hobbies, not safety products.

Personally I think you need to do some market research, when my kids were little I would have gone to a shop to buy a car seat, so I can feel and touch them, but also becuase I would have wanted it there and then and not to wait.

On the home page you have a car seat which has the "Cars" design on it, yet you don't sell this product or any character based chairs, which was a little confusing.

I personally don't like the navigation, it takes to long to filter products and there is alot of scrolling to move between catagories.

Personally I don't think your product range is ideal for the web, safety products are always iffy and the touch feel and fitting services you can get instore combined with the instant buy, combined with all your addons are impluse buys which which I also wouldn't buy online, I would buy them when I was buying something else. Then you have so much high street competition its going to be hard to compete.

You can do it, but you really going have to put some real time, ideas and money into getting known and pulling the orders in IMO.

 

[AndyP]

Thanks for your reply. I understand what you mean, and thanks for your optimism. As you mentioned, Syspos may have had an easier start than me. I started the site not even knowing what SEO was, and had a very small investment to start the business off.

Oh don't get me wrong, I am not suggesting for a moment that sysops has had or does have it easier than anyone else. That's not what I was saying at all. I was simply suggesting that sysops is quite probably in a different place to you, different approach, different driving mechanism, more established, been around the block a few times. I am certain that his trading is as tough as everyone elses. His advantage, if indeed he has one, is that he has experience and can draw on that when times get tough whereas for you, for example, its all new and you are unsure of your next step...

 

[TotallySport]

I will ask family and friends to take a proper look at the site too, and see if they can go to the checkout page etc without me showing them how to do it. This will give me an idea of how simple the site is to navigate.

My family always tell me how good my web site is, either because they love me, or becuase they have better things to do with their time, my point is it will never be as objective as people you don't know.

It might be better signing up and paying the forum £36 so you can ask people on here to review the site, or asking 20 people online to for a competition some how.

 

[alanc]

Wow, I'm really surprised by that. Is that the typical time for businesses to be earning a proper wage? Or is it for businesses to be hitting one sale a day? Thanks.

No, not earning a proper wage. That was the point at which it became self-sustaining. This was a few years ago, and there was less competition.

 

[Kerrib4]

IMO your web site has a few issues, when the home page loads in without scrolling, it me it looks like your selling a service that helps children be safe online, the statement "The UK's favourite Online Child Safety Store", with a lady underneath like a receptionish doesn't advertise your service correctly.

Baby on the go, to me sounds like things for babies and babies to go eather on days out or hobbies, not safety products.

Personally I think you need to do some market research, when my kids were little I would have gone to a shop to buy a car seat, so I can feel and touch them, but also becuase I would have wanted it there and then and not to wait.

On the home page you have a car seat which has the "Cars" design on it, yet you don't sell this product or any character based chairs, which was a little confusing.

I personally don't like the navigation, it takes to long to filter products and there is alot of scrolling to move between catagories.

Personally I don't think your product range is ideal for the web, safety products are always iffy and the touch feel and fitting services you can get instore combined with the instant buy, combined with all your addons are impluse buys which which I also wouldn't buy online, I would buy them when I was buying something else. Then you have so much high street competition its going to be hard to compete.

You can do it, but you really going have to put some real time, ideas and money into getting known and pulling the orders in IMO.

Thanks for your honest opinion.

Unfortunately we recently had the navigation changed to top bar navigation (it used to be left navigation). I did this as I was told it was better for SEO. Although, now I am hearing from some people that left navigation is better .

The idea for these products came about as we had paid someone to help us choose a niche and set up a website. At this point we didn't have a clue how to do research on niches, so the guy we paid chose the niche for us. Now that we know how to do the research, we wish we had started with a different niche. Because we have put so much time into Babyonthego, we don't really want to shut it down and start something else. I am aware though that it may come to that.

I know what you mean by the homepage looking like an info site, I will see what I can do to change this.

Thanks again

 

[Kerrib4]

My family always tell me how good my web site is, either because they love me, or becuase they have better things to do with their time, my point is it will never be as objective as people you don't know.

It might be better signing up and paying the forum £36 so you can ask people on here to review the site, or asking 20 people online to for a competition some how.

I agree with what you are saying. Good idea, I will try that out.

 

[Kerrib4]

Oh don't get me wrong, I am not suggesting for a moment that sysops has had or does have it easier than anyone else. That's not what I was saying at all. I was simply suggesting that sysops is quite probably in a different place to you, different approach, different driving mechanism, more established, been around the block a few times. I am certain that his trading is as tough as everyone elses. His advantage, if indeed he has one, is that he has experience and can draw on that when times get tough whereas for you, for example, its all new and you are unsure of your next step...

Yeah, I know what you mean. Personally I do think I have learnt quite a lot about SEO in the last year. Of course now I need to learn how to fix common problems such as conversion rate and bounce rate.

 

[TotallySport]

A couple of things, you can run more than 1 web site at a time, open another one in something our interest in, or know more about, based on the information you know now, give the current one 12 months to try and push it, you might end up with two sucessful business, you might end up with one or none but at least you will be moving forward with a better knowledge of what and how to do it.

I have never heard SEO advantages for menus or links at the top, IMO navigation is more about people browsing, in which user friendly is important, but the product pages come up, then you select a filter, which removes all the products, and it takes another 1-2 clicks to get back to products, thats 1-2 clicks to many IMO.

I do think there are lots of conflicting bits on the site, like you have products in different colours, and they are shown on the colour I have selected to look at, as though they are options becuase they are above the buy it now buttons, yet its cross promotion so if I click on them they take me to a different page.

 

[Kerrib4]

A couple of things, you can run more than 1 web site at a time, open another one in something our interest in, or know more about, based on the information you know now, give the current one 12 months to try and push it, you might end up with two sucessful business, you might end up with one or none but at least you will be moving forward with a better knowledge of what and how to do it.

I have never heard SEO advantages for menus or links at the top, IMO navigation is more about people browsing, in which user friendly is important, but the product pages come up, then you select a filter, which removes all the products, and it takes another 1-2 clicks to get back to products, thats 1-2 clicks to many IMO.

I do think there are lots of conflicting bits on the site, like you have products in different colours, and they are shown on the colour I have selected to look at, as though they are options becuase they are above the buy it now buttons, yet its cross promotion so if I click on them they take me to a different page.

Do you know of any websites with what you consider to be good navigation? Just so I can have a look myself to compare it to my site.

About the product pages, I'm actually getting these redesigned soon so that they are more tidy looking and so that the price and buy buttons are above the fold. Do you feel that the other colour links shouldn't be there? The reason we put them there was so people could easily find the other colour options.

 

[NuBlue]

You can do a lot to improve the conversion rate. You should eb able to hit 1.5% without too much difficulty.

But 1.5% at 80 visits a day doesn't make a viable business. 1.5% at 800 visits a day might, if you sell a lot of your higher value lines, but it's still a squeeze.

To have any chance of making this work, you will need to x5 your conversion rate, and x10 your traffic.

When we launch a new site, we put in a certain amount of work to promote it, then let it grow on its own. If it's not seeing 5 sales a day after 12 months, we shut it down.

This is pretty solid advice. You need to be measuring your daily unique visitis in at least the 100's and preferably the 1000's. Getting 80 visits a day is not enough. The big problem you face is that you are inthe baby market which must be one of the most oversubscribed areas online.

In my opinion you really need to be looking to sell unique products which are hard to get elsewhere and then generate content for the website based on these products to establish your website as the leading supplier for these products. Your conversion rate would seriously increase if people findng your website were looking for a specific product which you supplied as it would make the purchase a no brainer.

I would work to increase traffic first (offsite promotion) and then look to increase conversions (onsite optimisation).

Best of luck with it.

 

[Kerrib4]

This is pretty solid advice. You need to be measuring your daily unique visitis in at least the 100's and preferably the 1000's. Getting 80 visits a day is not enough. The big problem you face is that you are inthe baby market which must be one of the most oversubscribed areas online.

In my opinion you really need to be looking to sell unique products which are hard to get elsewhere and then generate content for the website based on these products to establish your website as the leading supplier for these products. Your conversion rate would seriously increase if people findng your website were looking for a specific product which you supplied as it would make the purchase a no brainer.

I would work to increase traffic first (offsite promotion) and then look to increase conversions (onsite optimisation).

Best of luck with it.

Thanks for the advice.

Just now I am doing mostly article marketing, video marketing, blog commenting, social bookmarking, and social networking. Should I be trying paid methods?

 

[sysops]

Should I be trying paid methods?

There is a quick and easy way to find out if your business model is viable. Run a comprehensive adwords campaign for 2 months, targeting all your products, all your categories, as well as general sector keywords.

If you can get this campaign to run at breakeven (so that you cover your stock costs and overheads), then you have a viable business model. if you can't, then you don't.

This is a much better approach then spending the next 12 months carrying out SEO on site which may or may not turn into a viable business.

People think of ppc as 'paid traffic' and seo traffic as 'free traffic' - this is not the case. You pay for every single visitor you get, one way or another.

 

[Kerrib4]

There is a quick and easy way to find out if your business model is viable. Run a comprehensive adwords campaign for 2 months, targeting all your products, all your categories, as well as general sector keywords.

If you can get this campaign to run at breakeven (so that you cover your stock costs and overheads), then you have a viable business model. if you can't, then you don't.

This is a much better approach then spending the next 12 months carrying out SEO on site which may or may not turn into a viable business.

People think of ppc as 'paid traffic' and seo traffic as 'free traffic' - this is not the case. You pay for every single visitor you get, one way or another.

Thanks for this comment - People think of ppc as 'paid traffic' and seo traffic as 'free traffic' - this is not the case. You pay for every single visitor you get, one way or another. - I never looked at it this way, so thanks for pointing this out.

I had a look at google adwords a few days ago and set up a very small campaign. Although I don't really know how to use google adwords so not had many clicks through to the site from it. I know that the ads are ranked as well which determines how high they show in the search results. I have no idea how to get mine to rank better. Will need to research how to use google adwords and put a plan into place.

 

[sysops]

I had a look at google adwords a few days ago and set up a very small campaign. Although I don't really know how to use google adwords so not had many clicks through to the site from it. I know that the ads are ranked as well which determines how high they show in the search results. I have no idea how to get mine to rank better. Will need to research how to use google adwords and put a plan into place.

If I were in your position, I would pay someone to run the campaign for me. The reason is that someone with the right skills will get a lot more clicks and conversions per £ than you will.

You can of course acquire the level of skills necessary, but it'll take you a year or so.

 

[Kerrib4]

If I were in your position, I would pay someone to run the campaign for me. The reason is that someone with the right skills will get a lot more clicks and conversions per £ than you will.

You can of course acquire the level of skills necessary, but it'll take you a year or so.

Really, I didn't think google adwords was as complex as that. I will look into it then and see if I can find someone with the necessary skills.

 

[AndyP]

Really, I didn't think google adwords was as complex as that. I will look into it then and see if I can find someone with the necessary skills.

Believe it! Adwords can bankrupt you or make you money. Very easily. You need to know what you are doing. Follow sysops' advice. Its sound.

 

[sysops]

Really, I didn't think google adwords was as complex as that. I will look into it then and see if I can find someone with the necessary skills.

Setting up a campaign and getting it burning through your money is easy. Tweaking that campaign to maximise your return takes quite a bit of skill.

It's easy to shy away from spending money on something like this, and stick to the 'free' options. But ask yourself this - how would you feel in 12 months time, having invested hundreds of hours, if you then find out that what you are doing isn't viable? Far better to get a good feel for it now, so that you can make an informed decision about how to proceed.

 

[Kerrib4]

Thanks sysops, I definitely wouldn't want to waste 12 months of my time. I think that is an excellent plan, to find someone to handle a campaign for me for 2 months. I will definitely try that. Do you by any chance know where I can find someone who can do this? I would look on Elance, but I would prefer the person was from the UK. I know a lot of marketing companies have bad reviews, so I'm not too sure where I could hire someone.

 

[OptiRick]

It is a nice site.

Do you have kids?
Do you post on forums frequented by people who might buy your stuff? Like mumsnet for example?

It might be worth offering prizes in a competition on forums such as that to get some exposure.

 

[sysops]

Thanks sysops, I definitely wouldn't want to waste 12 months of my time. I think that is an excellent plan, to find someone to handle a campaign for me for 2 months. I will definitely try that. Do you by any chance know where I can find someone who can do this? I would look on Elance, but I would prefer the person was from the UK. I know a lot of marketing companies have bad reviews, so I'm not too sure where I could hire someone.

There are a few UKBF regulars who offer PPC management. Spend some time reading their posts and choose one you like the sound of.

Do set a realistic budget for this exercise, both for the ads and the management.

 

[Kerrib4]

It is a nice site.

Do you have kids?
Do you post on forums frequented by people who might buy your stuff? Like mumsnet for example?

It might be worth offering prizes in a competition on forums such as that to get some exposure.

No I don't have kids, which is one reason I haven't joined many parenting forums. Another reason is that there was one forum I joined but the forum rules said I was not allowed to post links etc. I will have a look at mumsnet though, their rules may be less strict. Good idea about the competitions etc on forums, thanks for that

 

[Kerrib4]

There are a few UKBF regulars who offer PPC management. Spend some time reading their posts and choose one you like the sound of.

Do set a realistic budget for this exercise, both for the ads and the management.

I will have a search through the posts later on today then, and will contact some of the members who offer this service.

Thanks very much for all of your tips, you have been very helpful.

 

[lesliedocherty]

Some info from someone who is working at Halfords and sells Babyseats every day.

We do a reserve and collect service but just thought about it and people dont reserve seats online, all our customers are instore sales, 60-70% have been online before their visit to the store and have narrowed down what seats they want to try.

We do free fitting, but today for example a woman in a Passat had to try 5 different seats in her car before she got one that fitted right, having 2,3 or seats in and out a car is not uncommon.