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Not one sale....... Any ideas?
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Saint Petersburg, FL
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Not one sale....... Any ideas?   February 22, 2012, 03:59 AM
Hey all.

I've had one of my sites up and running a few months and I have not gotten even one sale. Not even one.

My prices are competitive. I think my site looks fairly good. I've got a 1-800 number. I've got a logo. I have trust graphics before the fold.

I am at a loss. Any help is appreciated. PM me if you would like the URL if you think you may be able to offer some help/advice...

Thanks..........
Shaolinsteve  Zulu Cart owner  MVP member  This member currently makes a full-time living in e-commerce.
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Re: Not one sale....... Any ideas?   February 22, 2012, 04:29 AM
Hey James,

How well are you doing in terms of Organic search engine traffic? Usually this is a number one priority (it is for me anyway) then any additional traffic you get through the likes of other methods would often be minimal at the early stages.

Are you currently using PPC or what methods are you using to get yourself out there?
- To Achieve A State Of Excellence, Is To Achieve A State Of Mind -
Saint Petersburg, FL
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Re: Not one sale....... Any ideas?   February 22, 2012, 04:45 AM
I'm using all organic traffic, I get ~30-40 uniques a day at the moment.

This is my analytics past 30 days:


740 Visits
 
691 Absolute Unique Visitors
 
1,999 Pageviews
 
2.70 Average Pageviews
 
00:01:09 Time on Site
 
48.11% Bounce Rate
 
92.30% New Visits


--------------------------------

This is all organic traffic from google
Shaolinsteve  Zulu Cart owner  MVP member  This member currently makes a full-time living in e-commerce.
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Re: Not one sale....... Any ideas?   February 22, 2012, 10:07 AM
What are you doing on a daily / weekly basis for store performance?

I guess you have added your store products to the recommended free shopping portals, however there is not a big traffic demand for these although its more targeted driven as Coach says. Are you currently using the Store Coach SEO Plan?

Although it's great to see your starting to get some daily traffic, I can't remember the estimate buying % but 30-40 visits a day will not be enough for a sale. It could be but I really don't know what your doing in terms of marketing for your store.

Definitely look at the Store Coach SEO Plan if you haven't already, because in time as your doing things right, it will all come together. Remember eCommerce stores are not meant for quick money (unless your selling them) but long term business, so I would take that into consideration.


If the research you done at the beginning met all the 3 key factors and the keyword(s) your focusing on, then it will come along. Your link building is one of the most important things you can maintain, so how is your link building coming along?

Have you started asking relevant people in your niche, about posting information about your store and tried out PPC yet? If you look around, you can actually find some sites offering $50.00 worth of free PPC credit, so it could be worth taking them up on that and testing out some effective PPC campaigns.
- To Achieve A State Of Excellence, Is To Achieve A State Of Mind -
cindymoynat  Zulu Cart owner  MVP member
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Re: Not one sale....... Any ideas?   February 22, 2012, 10:52 AM
From my experience and looking at your bounce rate I would say that the KW's that are bringing those
visitors has no commercial intent and/or it's not "answering" to the need of those visitors.

Let's say that you are selling "red widgets"......however,  those widgets have dozen styles and you are selling
only one. They come, they look at and they go.

Or, as ShaolinSteve explained before, your traffic are coming only  from the  portals.

Cindy
Saint Petersburg, FL
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Re: Not one sale....... Any ideas?   February 22, 2012, 11:43 AM
@Steve, I'll be honest and say no I am not keeping up with that just yet. I have been link building and my ranks are gradually building. I just recently got on first page for a long tail keyword, for instance:

I was #13 for "red widget" and #14 for "red widgets" --- and I was getting OK traffic. Those terms get HUGE volumes daily.

I decided to redirect my efforts to a long tail keyword such as "red widgets for computer screens" -- and this term has a daily search of 400+ and a high MOS. There are tons of competitors in this niche, but I see that as a good thing because if they are making money on it and they are as big as they are, it's encouraging.

I just recently got onto page 1 (rank #5 or #6) for that long tail keyword maybe two weeks ago, but my other KW's "red widget" and "red widgets" both went to #16 since I stopped linkbuilding directly for them.

I was just really wondering because I figured with 700 unique visitors I would have gotten ONE sale at least... but nothing.

I haven't been keeping up with the free shopping portals but I was listed in there once upon a time, I just felt I didn't carry a big enough selection to keep it up, I'll probably update those today.
Shaolinsteve  Zulu Cart owner  MVP member  This member currently makes a full-time living in e-commerce.
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Re: Not one sale....... Any ideas?   February 22, 2012, 12:31 PM
Hmm...

Like Cindy mentions, it could be down to the 'Intent To Buy' keyword phrase. Probably using the longer tail keywords are more 'intent to buy' but I have no idea, as I don't know what your site is and all (I'm not asking you to tell me).

If link building is working for you, then I would continue to maintain that progress. Being ranked 5th or 6th is great for page 1, but if the Adword Tool (if that's what your using for keyword research) is showing 400+ daily searches, keep in mind these results are only based for the number 1 position. So the numbers you give will not always be up to par.


Are you currently using any Social Networking or something? As you have been currently up and running for a few months now, I would advise trying out PPC (test purposes only). Find yourself a discount or free start up credit and test those interested buyers to see whether or not you store can make sales.

One of the things I like about PPC is that you do not have to be so broad, obviously writing campaigns like 'Dogs' will give you empty pockets in probably a matter of hours, but if you come up with targeted titles with the 'Intent to Buy', then this could work in your favor. You don't have to continue using PPC, but at least give it a go to test whether or not it's something about the site that can be adjusted or simply the keyword your store is built around does not have the 'Intent To Buy' factor.
- To Achieve A State Of Excellence, Is To Achieve A State Of Mind -
Scooter  Zulu Cart owner  MVP member  This member currently makes a full-time living in e-commerce.
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Re: Not one sale....... Any ideas?   February 22, 2012, 02:46 PM
I have to differ slightly from two things stated above.

First of all, if the traffic is coming from a shopping portal, there is a VERY HIGH intent to buy; otherwise, they would not be at a shopping portal. Your conversions from shopping portals should be at least double or triple what organic traffic conversions are.

Secondly, it looks like you are actually getting a little more than 20 uniques per day, which should mean a sale every five days or less. This would suggest that you are not offering what people are looking for for those keywords, that your price is out of line with others that they have found or something about your website is turning them off (grammar, colors, layout, shipping). Or, as Cindy suggested, it really is not a buying keyword phrase.

I am going to take a wild guess and say that there is some degree of commercial intent with your keywords and that it is something about your offering that they do not like. When you divide the total number of visits by the number of pages viewed, you will see that the average person lands on your site, clicks and views exactly one more page (likely a category page) and then leaves.

This has split test written all over it!
Real Musical Artists: Neil Peart - God of Percussion!
Coach  Zulu Cart owner  MVP member  This member currently makes a full-time living in e-commerce.
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Re: Not one sale....... Any ideas?   February 23, 2012, 03:42 PM
As with all site reviews on this board, I had a quick look but can only spend an extensive amount of time on it if you order a premium website review..

I saw a handful of red flags:

  • Your web pages load insanely slow & this is a conversion rate killer! This isn't a problem with Zulu, I think you have an issue with the graphics in your header. Go into Zulu admin, detach them, and insert them again to see if this solves the problem.
  • Many of your MAIN navigational links go to your 404 error page (shop-by-category page). You need to check all links in your template and make sure they are attached to the correct locations.
  • Although you do have some trust graphics, you could certainly use some more. Shoot me a private message with your email address and I'll send you the entire bundle containing hundreds of them.
  • When you are specializing in a certain micro niche product line, you want products at multiple price points. Right now you appear to only be offering mid-to-high end products. I would strongly recommend finding a supplier with lower cost products to widen your offering, even if the lower end stuff has slim margins.
  • You aren't showing any "support" or "policy" type pages whatsoever. I would highly recommend enabling all of your support pages in admin. You not displaying a privacy policy or return policy could be a red flag with a lot of potential buyers.
  • You have very little textual content site-wide. This is especially an issue on product pages. Customers are going to expect more data than that, especially given the price point of your products. If you were looking to buy that type of product, would you pay hundreds of dollars for a product that has 3 or 4 sentences of generic info on the product page? I wouldn't.

I hope this is helpful James!!
Dave Hermansen "Coach"

"Black hat SEO works in the short term, but you'll always be in an arms race against Google's spam team!"
Scooter  Zulu Cart owner  MVP member  This member currently makes a full-time living in e-commerce.
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Re: Not one sale....... Any ideas?   February 23, 2012, 06:29 PM
I looked at your site, too, James and PM'd you with my suggestions and thoughts, which practically mirror Coach's (I know, what a shock!). I was just thinking about your website on my hour round trip drive to and from the post office and Dave's last point is the one that I kept coming back to.

Sitting ahead of your website, ranking-wise, is a specialty website, such as yours, WalMart and Best Buy. You have not given people any reason to pay more for your products than the ones at Best Buy, which look similar and are far less expensive.

Surely there is a reason that yours are priced higher and you need to convey that reason to the customer. Maybe Best Buy's products aren't made as well, maybe they have an inferior warranty. Unless you point out why someone should spend more for something, they are not likely to do it.

Emphasizing a low price guarantee when your competitors are not selling the same exact things really doesn't mean much. Take a look at the website in position #1 and contact a couple of the manufacturers that are on the lower end, price-wise. I can almost guarantee you that website is dropshipping their merchandise. Also consider optimizing a category around the other two keywords I suggested just to see if that makes a difference.
Real Musical Artists: Neil Peart - God of Percussion!
Saint Petersburg, FL
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Re: Not one sale....... Any ideas?   February 24, 2012, 02:22 AM
I'm gonna absorb everything you guys just said and I'll let you know what I come up with!

Thanks for the input guys, I really appreciate it. I want this site to succeed, and since there are other successful stores in this niche I figure it has to be a viable niche... but we will see.
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Re: Not one sale....... Any ideas?   February 27, 2012, 11:11 AM
I actually like the niche and think it has some serious potential. Use the input and I'm confident you will see some results.. Then it's just a matter of doing some A/B split testing to improve from there!

Good luck & please keep us posted with your progress!
Dave Hermansen "Coach"

"Black hat SEO works in the short term, but you'll always be in an arms race against Google's spam team!"
    
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