A Perspective on Promoting Your New Website

Once you open your website, you need to direct traffic to it in order to gain sales. I thought perhaps this note would help put into perspective what our own websites are like, versus having a shop on Etsy.

ETSY:

Etsy is a marketplace of many shops. Think of Etsy as a shopping mall.

If a shopper walks into the mall, they walk past all the shops in the mall, and may or may not stop in to the stores they see. They are the natural traffic to the mall – though not always specifically to a single store.

Their decision to stop into a store is based largely on whether they were attracted to the store, or if they need something from that store. If they don’t need anything, they may just be “window shopping”.

YOUR OWN WEBSITE:

Having your own website is like having a store somewhere in your town, but outside of a mall – a stand-alone store with your own parking lot.

If your stand-alone store is on a busy road, and if you have great signage that tells the people that drive by what your shop sells and entices them to see what you sell, you have a better chance of getting that traffic to stop into your store and shop.

If your store is not on a busy road, you have to work harder to direct traffic to your store from the main roads.

GETTING TRAFFIC

ETSY:

On Etsy (a shopping mall), traffic is already there. The shoppers are there already. If they can find what they are looking for, or they happen upon a shop that looks interesting, they may stop in, shop, and make a purchase.

YOUR OWN WEBSITE:

On your own website, it’s all about directing quality traffic to your site. How do you do that?

• If your brick and mortar store is on a heavily travelled road near prime real estate, you must have an attractive (and intuitive) sign or store front that makes people want to stop in.
  • Is your website home page attractive enough to keep people on your website? Is it clear what you are selling?
• If your brick and mortar store is not on a road that gets a lot of traffic, have you done all you can to direct traffic to your store?
  • Are you promoting your website (and often enough) on social media to capture the attention of passerbys? Sort of like billboard signs for your shop along the road.
  • Is your website SEO (search engine optimization) the best it can be to attract people to your site? It’s no different than people searching the yellow pages to find a particular type of store in their area – if you don’t have the words they are searching for, your shop won’t be found.

MARKETING

ETSY:

On Etsy, some shops play the “games” – you favor five shops above yours in a post, etc. But think about this… are the people who are playing those games REALLY the people that purchase from you? Statistics show that they are not. A very small percentage of Etsy shop owners buy from other Etsy shop owners – yet these are the “customers” you are playing the promotional “games” with. You are spending time and resources favoring other shops and other shop items, but are gaining very little in regards to SALES for YOUR shop. It’s like McDonalds advertising a Burger King Whopper sandwich next to a Big Mac burger on their menu.

YOUR OWN WEBSITE:

There are no “games” when you have your own website. This is a good thing! You don’t have to rely on anyone else to promote your website – all you need are good marketing techniques.

How do you do that?

• If you had a brick and mortar store, you could post signs and billboards on those high traffic roads. For a website, those “signs” are social media sites where you promote your website.
• If you had a brick and mortar store, you would contact the local newspaper, to publish helpful information that your customers could use. For your website, you write helpful blog articles.
• If you had a brick and mortar store, you could include your store in local directories for people searching for the types of things you sell. For a website, you perfect your SEO to make sure people can find your website quickly and easily.
• With a brick and mortar store, you determine WHO your buyers are, and you go to where they hang out to gain their attention and business. For your website, you find forums, blogs, magazines, etc. that your potential customers frequent, where you can interact with them and promote your store through normal conversation.
• You do keyword research to find what your customers are searching for, then make sure to include those keywords in your listings.

SUMMARY

The basic difference between a shop on Etsy and a stand-alone website is:

• Etsy – Etsy has built-in traffic, though not always traffic to your store
• Your Website – You have to generate the traffic to your own website

Notes:

• Marketing your website is really no different than marketing your Etsy shop. The more you market your website (or Etsy shop), the more qualified traffic you generate. When you have qualified traffic (meaning people who are looking to buy what you have to offer), you will convert that traffic into buying customers.
• Once you know who your customers are and where they hang out, it will be easier to market to them. Think like a brick and mortar store that is in a remote location (off the main roads) – what would you do to steer traffic to that store? Use those same techniques to steer traffic to your website.
• I’ve used this phrase before, but to repeat – the phrase “if you build it, they will come” does NOT apply to having your own website. Just like it wouldn’t apply to having your own brick and mortar store in a remote location. You have to “make some noise” about your store in order to attract people to it. You have to let them know it’s there! With the internet and social media, there are MANY ways you can get the word out about your store – just make sure you’re directing your efforts toward the right audience.