How do I get people to view my online store?

Question

I have my own online business in which I sell camping products, supplies, equipment, etc. Unfortunately I have yet to have a sale. I really don't know how to market my site. I have the site entered in major search engines. Anyone have any ideas or suggestions to help me out? I'm pretty desperate here to get my store moving, please help me out if you can. By the way, the link to my website is www.bestcampingdeals.com if anyone is interested.

Answer 1

The key to success is obviously driving traffic -- but not just any traffic, traffic from people who are looking to buy what you are selling. There are several aspects to online marketing that you can explore:

-- Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
-- Search Engine Marketing (SEM)
-- Banner advertising
-- Email marketing
-- Viral marketing
-- Affiliate marketing
-- Cause-based marketing
-- Ebay

Here are some examples of how each of these might work for you.

** Search Engine Optimization:
This is the cheapest (i.e. free) way to drive traffic. It's all about making sure that your web site gets crawled and catalogued by the big search engines, namely Yahoo! and Google. Then, when someone searches for "camping supplies" or "tents" your site will appear at or near the top of the list in the "natural" search results (the results that appear in the left-hand column). A big part of your success with SEO is not only the information people can see, but also the information that they cannot see – information that is embedded in the “meta-tags” (i.e. information about your site) which is part of the html used to build and display your pages.

** Search Engine Marketing
This is where Yahoo! and Google make their money. It’s all about bidding for “key words” (i.e. search terms like “camping supplies” and “tents”) so that when someone searches on those phrases, your site will appear at or near the top of the list of “sponsored” search results (the results that appear in the right-hand column). The way this works for both Yahoo! and Google is that you pay each time your ad is clicked. What you pay is determined by your bidding and the bidding behavior of competitors. If you’re just getting started, here’s where to go and a couple smart strategies.

http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com/
http://www.google.com/intl/en/ads/

1) You might not want to buy the word “tent” – that’s very broad, lots of people might be bidding on it, and you’ll get a lot of unqualified clicks (i.e. people not looking to buy anything, but instead researching this, that, or the other thing about tents). Instead, consider buying “Coleman 6-man tent” or whatever product is appropriate. The point is that if someone knows enough to search on “Coleman 6-man tent,” then they are more likely to be intent on purchasing…chances are they are looking for the best deal or want to compare with other similar products. These are good leads and because the term is more specific, it’s probably searched less and cheaper to buy when bidding.

2) Make sure you’ve created an Excel model that shows you if you get x number of clicks per day, that will cost X dollars. Of those clicks, y people will buy and you’ll earn Y dollars. After subtracting your cost of goods sold, you’ll be left with X profit. If the return on investment (i.e. ROI) isn’t positive, adjust your keyword bidding. Likewise, make sure you have the budget to invest. This is a high stakes, high returns channel.

** Banner Advertising
These are the graphical ads you see all over the Internet. Probably not a good place for you to spend money unless you’re trying to build your brand. These display ads are more expensive and may not drive the type of traffic to your site that you’re looking for now unless you’re able to narrowly target the sites on which you advertise and have the resources to create attractive looking ads.

** Email Marketing
Content on your site or a regular newsletter is a good way of building a subscriber base that you can contact later regarding special offers or sales. You can also purchase email lists and there are many vendors who can help you manage this type of program. Again, forecast your ROI to determine if purchasing a list is a good investment…. X people receive the email, Y people open it, Z people click to your site, and P people purchase.

** Viral Marketing
Looks like you have some experience with that here – you promoted your site and got people talking and thinking about it. Good job. Consider doing the same sort of thing on camping blogs, message boards, or with other influencers who might be able to help you spread the word. Your suppliers might be able to help you here – obviously they have an interest in seeing you sell more goods.

** Affiliate Marketing
You may investigate whether there are affiliate marketers who can help you. These are typically a network of sites that drive traffic to your site and get paid a bounty either for clicks to your site, or sales generated from traffic they drove for you.

** Cause-based Marketing
Is there a cause that you might align yourself with such as a local wetland restoration project or environmental conservation group? Chances are that you have some mutually aligned interests in the great outdoors. You might be able to tap into their membership base, and they might appreciate the benefit you can offer their members for discounts. It’s a match made in heaven. (And, they could also help supply interesting and timely content for your newsletter. They have a special project, you have a sale on related goods to help them. Nice, huh?)

** Ebay
Books have been written about selling on eBay. This may be the only sales / advertising channel you need. You can get started for free, test and learn, and then explore becoming a “power seller.”


The great thing about the Internet is that it’s constantly evolving, so there are probably many more avenues to explore and variations on the things outlined here. This probably raises more questions for you, too, but hopefully it will help you get started thinking creatively about the exciting options you have to build your business. Good luck!

Answer 2

Hi, perhaps you can try Google adwords to market your service/product.

Google adwords is a text-based system for advertising on its site and its partner sites. The service allows you to create your own ads, choose keywords to help match your ads to your audience, and control the cost of your advertising—you pay only when people click on your ad (a cost per click plan). Anyone wishing to promote a product on Google can enroll in this program.

you can get a 5 detail pages information about Google adwords at :

http://www.adcenter.net.cn/google-adwords/

Good Luck && Best Wishes!

Answer 3

Let me know when you find out.

Some of the things I have done are:

Search engine submission

Pay per click

Sell on ebay, yahoo & Overture always include something referring to my website. They will not let you add a link in the auctions anymore. But I will mention it. And when I sell something when I send invoices I have a link then.

Answer 4

There are a number of free resources available to advertise your website and increase traffic. You can advertise on relevant free classifieds ( www.craigslist.org) ,directories (dmoz) and relevant forums. Major search engines like Yahoo, Google , MSN search are a major source of visitors for most websites and you can submit your website to these search engines for free. You can also run contests offering prizes to regular visitors. I have found the following website useful
http://tinyurl.com/n547z

Answer 5

First of all this is not the place to advertise your web site.

Second, you can learn everything you need to know about Internet Marketing at the link below

Answer 6

Here is a free advertising link. Check it out. http://www.hits2u.com/?240840
The more people you refer the more add time you get. It is very easy to refer people to free things also. I upgraded to Pro membership so I can add up to ten links in my toolbar which is then seen by all my down line members and their down line and so on. Plus you get commissions.

Answer 7

First rule of getting traffic, make sure everywhere you put your link that the link is actually clickable, and can be followed by search engines. www.bestcampingdeals.com doesn't work, but

http://www.bestcampingdeals.com does work.

And if I were advertising http://www.bestcampingdeals.com I'd really want my http://www.bestcampingdeals.com to be clickable. Got it?

Good Luck, you've chosen a tough niche, but you can make it go.

Answer 8

do an out link thing. Its where they put a link from their site to yours and you do the same thing for them.

Answer 9

Scantily clad ladies in the photos!

Answer 10

Visit this site http://net-new.blogspot.com and also this site
http://netnew.tripod.com and search for