This week we are winding down the semester and focusing on some broader aspects of running an online business and some of the things that can significantly help you and some of the things that might actually hinder you in the process.
One thing we focused on were Back Links. These are links that navigate the consumer to your site. These can be from Social Media applications, blogs, etc. However, at the end of the day the thing we need to remember with them is how vital they can be for our growth and prosperity if we choose to chase the dream of having our own online business.
Back Links, specifically from reputable websites, help boost your SEO which will inevitably help funnel people to your site. And as we know the more people that come to your site the more likely you are to get a sell. Sometimes it is about getting that just right guest, other times it is simply a matter of numbers. I like to compare waiting for a sell to knocking on doors if you have ever been a missionary. You will get 100s if not 1000s of doors shut in your face for every 1 door that is opened to you. It sometimes is a downer but we just have to keep pushing forward.
Something else that we studied this week in order to help our businesses is the power behind Google Analytics. Google Analytics is a great little app that you can put into the code of your site that will collect all kinds of information regarding visitors to your site. They can pick up everything from gender to location to web server and more. It's crazy what kind of information it will gain for your benefit.
I think the biggest thing about Google Analytics is to remember to use it for you own good and for the purposes of redirecting your marketing. An example if you notice that more men are visiting your site, but more women are purchasing... Then it is probably time to try to make your marketing a little more woman friendly to help bring in more women to view your site.
Though it felt like a fast quick week, we learned a TON of useful information. I hope it helps you as well.
Saturday, April 6, 2019
Saturday, March 30, 2019
Social Media & SEO
So we probably have a pretty decent grasp on what SEO is. Why it's important, and hopefully some semblance of how to achieve it. But did you know that Social Media can also be an important part of SEO. I for one didn't until this past week.
It makes perfect sense. We want to be able to have back links to us from trustworthy, reliable sources. Hello Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, and everyone else. These are all trustworthy, well-known, reliable sites. So it is easy to see how they help out with SEO.
However, here is the tricky part. Which one should you use for your company? Well in all honesty it depends on lots of different things. An example is when I made a random company last semester based on information regarding travel to Disney World. I had 2 different Social Media marketing strategies happening simultaneously. One of them was on Facebook, and the other was on Twitter. My Facebook marketing worked really well, I quickly gained followers and had friends sharing posts etc. However, my Twitter account was a total dud. As you can see, which platform you choose should be important to you.
If you have a company that is selling product I would recommend something like Instagram so you can show off what you are selling. If you are providing a service maybe something like Twitter or Facebook where you can really talk it up. Each platform has it's own weaknesses and strengths. It is our job as we strive for SEO to pick the right one for our circumstances and then run with it. Though I would recommend doing some research first to find out where your target audience hangs out, and where your competition is looking for new customers. This is more than likely where you will want to go to as well.
It makes perfect sense. We want to be able to have back links to us from trustworthy, reliable sources. Hello Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Twitter, and everyone else. These are all trustworthy, well-known, reliable sites. So it is easy to see how they help out with SEO.
However, here is the tricky part. Which one should you use for your company? Well in all honesty it depends on lots of different things. An example is when I made a random company last semester based on information regarding travel to Disney World. I had 2 different Social Media marketing strategies happening simultaneously. One of them was on Facebook, and the other was on Twitter. My Facebook marketing worked really well, I quickly gained followers and had friends sharing posts etc. However, my Twitter account was a total dud. As you can see, which platform you choose should be important to you.
If you have a company that is selling product I would recommend something like Instagram so you can show off what you are selling. If you are providing a service maybe something like Twitter or Facebook where you can really talk it up. Each platform has it's own weaknesses and strengths. It is our job as we strive for SEO to pick the right one for our circumstances and then run with it. Though I would recommend doing some research first to find out where your target audience hangs out, and where your competition is looking for new customers. This is more than likely where you will want to go to as well.
Saturday, March 23, 2019
More on SEO
So the main point we studied this week was SEO, Search Engine Optimization. In short this is a complex calculation that web engines such as Google or Bing use to decide where you are going to rank, and how often your ad will display to potential consumers.
As you can tell this is pretty important if you plan on being successful, and want something more out of your enterprise than a money sucking black hole.
Some of the things we learned about are pretty simple and common sense. This includes having your keywords show up in your body copy. Being an overall reliable website aka not crashing all the time or having links to dangerous sites. Having a strong title etc.
There are however, plenty of nuances to all of this. Some things you may not think about is what the title of your pages are within the HTML code. Unless, you hand coded your site you may not be aware of what the title is or how to change it to optimize your place in the world of Search Engines. Certainly, something worth investigating and finding out. This also applies to alt names for your photographs you may have on your site. Who knew that knowing a little about HTML could pay out dividends in the world of business.
As you can see there is a lot that goes into this, and some of it may be hit or miss. As most things with running your enterprise there is a touch of trial and error to the mix. The most important thing though is not be afraid to try. And as Thomas Edison famously said "I did not fail, I simply learned 999 ways how not to make a light bulb."
So hang in there and keep pushing forward, all the effort will pay off in some measure. Whether it's learning how not to do something, or learning how to make your company soar.
As you can tell this is pretty important if you plan on being successful, and want something more out of your enterprise than a money sucking black hole.
Some of the things we learned about are pretty simple and common sense. This includes having your keywords show up in your body copy. Being an overall reliable website aka not crashing all the time or having links to dangerous sites. Having a strong title etc.
There are however, plenty of nuances to all of this. Some things you may not think about is what the title of your pages are within the HTML code. Unless, you hand coded your site you may not be aware of what the title is or how to change it to optimize your place in the world of Search Engines. Certainly, something worth investigating and finding out. This also applies to alt names for your photographs you may have on your site. Who knew that knowing a little about HTML could pay out dividends in the world of business.
As you can see there is a lot that goes into this, and some of it may be hit or miss. As most things with running your enterprise there is a touch of trial and error to the mix. The most important thing though is not be afraid to try. And as Thomas Edison famously said "I did not fail, I simply learned 999 ways how not to make a light bulb."
So hang in there and keep pushing forward, all the effort will pay off in some measure. Whether it's learning how not to do something, or learning how to make your company soar.
Friday, March 15, 2019
ROI Oh my!
This week we were discussing ROI (Return On Investment) as well as ad optimization.
ROI is critical to any business. If one isn't recouping the money they expended on the product or the ad, then they are losing vital financial stability and the house of cards will quickly crumble and fall. The way we determine ROI is that we first look at the expenditure, and then we look at the return. In the case of what we were studying this week it would be the cost of advertising vs. your conversion rate.
If an ad is successful, that means that you have a good conversion rate. A conversion rate is getting the consumer to do something. This could be anything from signing up for an email, to purchasing an item, it is really up to the individual business owner to try and decide what a conversion is to them. Now that we understand what a conversion is, we need to determine how much the conversion cost us in terms of advertising costs.
If the conversion was purchasing a product, and the product sold for $10.00 and our ad cost us $3.00 at the time of conversion, then it can be said that our ROI is $7.00. In other words we made money after we adjusted for the investment that it took to make the money. So you can see it's actually pretty simple to calculate.
Now on to ad optimization. This really boils down to how to make your ad more successful, and get rid of the bad clicks. We need to focus on good keyword choices, good negative keyword choices, and using google ads to tell us when we have a bad score.
As with anything we are learning that is new to us, it can be a bit of trial and error. However, the key is to keep tweaking and doing our best to get it "just right..."
ROI is critical to any business. If one isn't recouping the money they expended on the product or the ad, then they are losing vital financial stability and the house of cards will quickly crumble and fall. The way we determine ROI is that we first look at the expenditure, and then we look at the return. In the case of what we were studying this week it would be the cost of advertising vs. your conversion rate.
If an ad is successful, that means that you have a good conversion rate. A conversion rate is getting the consumer to do something. This could be anything from signing up for an email, to purchasing an item, it is really up to the individual business owner to try and decide what a conversion is to them. Now that we understand what a conversion is, we need to determine how much the conversion cost us in terms of advertising costs.
If the conversion was purchasing a product, and the product sold for $10.00 and our ad cost us $3.00 at the time of conversion, then it can be said that our ROI is $7.00. In other words we made money after we adjusted for the investment that it took to make the money. So you can see it's actually pretty simple to calculate.
Now on to ad optimization. This really boils down to how to make your ad more successful, and get rid of the bad clicks. We need to focus on good keyword choices, good negative keyword choices, and using google ads to tell us when we have a bad score.
As with anything we are learning that is new to us, it can be a bit of trial and error. However, the key is to keep tweaking and doing our best to get it "just right..."
Saturday, March 9, 2019
Relevance and Quality Score
Did you know that GoogleAds has an ability to tell you how your ad is actually performing? Honestly, I had no idea there was such a thing. However, this week that is what we discussed and learned about.
Google has an algorithm that uses "Power of the Crowd" to estimate how successful or unsuccessful your ad is. This is vital information for the advertiser because it tells us what is or isn't working. When we are given this vital information we are able to make changes to hopefully develop a more successful ad.
The Quality Score is a score ranging from 1-10. 1-2 is an awful score and tells you that you need to shape up and definitely change something. It is also costing you significantly more for your Price Per Click. Up to 400% more. A score 3-4 is still poor and means your ads aren't showing very often, and when they do you are paying more than the average cost. This again means that you need to stop and think about what is going on with your ad and how to adjust it. 5-8 is a good score and means you are on target for the most part, there is still room for improvement but you are definitely doing okay. When/if you reach 9-10 this is the A++ of Quality Score and you shouldn't change a thing.
As you can see with that brief overview of Quality Score. It gives you a ton of quick and easy information and data to use to tweak and adjust to make your ad the best it can possibly be.
Google has an algorithm that uses "Power of the Crowd" to estimate how successful or unsuccessful your ad is. This is vital information for the advertiser because it tells us what is or isn't working. When we are given this vital information we are able to make changes to hopefully develop a more successful ad.
The Quality Score is a score ranging from 1-10. 1-2 is an awful score and tells you that you need to shape up and definitely change something. It is also costing you significantly more for your Price Per Click. Up to 400% more. A score 3-4 is still poor and means your ads aren't showing very often, and when they do you are paying more than the average cost. This again means that you need to stop and think about what is going on with your ad and how to adjust it. 5-8 is a good score and means you are on target for the most part, there is still room for improvement but you are definitely doing okay. When/if you reach 9-10 this is the A++ of Quality Score and you shouldn't change a thing.
As you can see with that brief overview of Quality Score. It gives you a ton of quick and easy information and data to use to tweak and adjust to make your ad the best it can possibly be.
Saturday, March 2, 2019
Google Ads
This week we began studying about google ads. Specifically we were learning about how to write a good solid Google ad that would result in a higher rate of conversion.
In my opinion one of the most important things we need to think about when creating a new ad is keeping it simple. Simple doesn't mean that it won't work, rather it is straight forward and shows the consumer what we have, and why they want it.
When we are keeping it simple there are a few things that we need to keep in mind. We need to make sure that it is clear what we are offering. For example if we are showing something on sale we need to make sure that our landing page offers that item immediately. The consumer that clicked on the ad should not have to search for what we were advertising. We also need to make sure there is a call to action. We shouldn't just say we having something for sale. We want them to take the action of coming to our site and for all intended purposes purchasing one of our products.
I believe that as we keep things simplified and focused it will help us run a successful ad campaign. It helps draw people to us that are interested in our product, and it helps keep things brief and to the point. Too often we have a tendency to over complicate an idea rather than just giving it breath and letting it breathe.
So in the words of the ARMY make sure you are KISSing your ad. KEEP. IT. SIMPLE. STUPID.
In my opinion one of the most important things we need to think about when creating a new ad is keeping it simple. Simple doesn't mean that it won't work, rather it is straight forward and shows the consumer what we have, and why they want it.
When we are keeping it simple there are a few things that we need to keep in mind. We need to make sure that it is clear what we are offering. For example if we are showing something on sale we need to make sure that our landing page offers that item immediately. The consumer that clicked on the ad should not have to search for what we were advertising. We also need to make sure there is a call to action. We shouldn't just say we having something for sale. We want them to take the action of coming to our site and for all intended purposes purchasing one of our products.
I believe that as we keep things simplified and focused it will help us run a successful ad campaign. It helps draw people to us that are interested in our product, and it helps keep things brief and to the point. Too often we have a tendency to over complicate an idea rather than just giving it breath and letting it breathe.
So in the words of the ARMY make sure you are KISSing your ad. KEEP. IT. SIMPLE. STUPID.
Saturday, February 23, 2019
The Power of Keywords
This week we were learning about keywords and AdWords via Google. I found it interesting to note that keywords aren't usually just one word, and that a keyword can definitely become too specific. I also learned that there are negative keywords which are actually a good thing in the land of AdWords.
Keywords are words that we want to use to attract buyers to our wares. It is the bread crumb as it were for Hansel and Gretel, though it isn't going to the evil witches house, but rather to the site the consumer was hoping to find. If we utilize them correctly and in a unique manner we can attract the audience we are specifically looking for. These are the people that we are likely to convert rather than just get empty clicks from. However, using keywords should not be like using a large fishing net (we don't want everybody coming to our sites) It should be more viewed as a harpoon to catch those special "fish" that we might see value from.
As we focus on the special ones, it becomes much easier to make those conversions. They are the ones that were specifically looking for something that we can provide them.
Part of this targeting method, is also pushing away those that we aren't interested in attracting.
In class there was an example that I really liked and was easily understandable. If we were selling women's yoga pants, we may think of using yoga as a keyword. Yes, the use of yoga as a keyword would draw a large audience. However, a large part of the audience probably are not looking for yoga pants, let alone women's yoga pants.... this is where negative keywords can come into play. We can say that yoga mats are a negative, along with yoga studios. This helps weed out those who wouldn't benefit from our site.
As you can see with a little work and forethought keywords can be extremely useful as we continue to build our businesses.
Keywords are words that we want to use to attract buyers to our wares. It is the bread crumb as it were for Hansel and Gretel, though it isn't going to the evil witches house, but rather to the site the consumer was hoping to find. If we utilize them correctly and in a unique manner we can attract the audience we are specifically looking for. These are the people that we are likely to convert rather than just get empty clicks from. However, using keywords should not be like using a large fishing net (we don't want everybody coming to our sites) It should be more viewed as a harpoon to catch those special "fish" that we might see value from.
As we focus on the special ones, it becomes much easier to make those conversions. They are the ones that were specifically looking for something that we can provide them.
Part of this targeting method, is also pushing away those that we aren't interested in attracting.
In class there was an example that I really liked and was easily understandable. If we were selling women's yoga pants, we may think of using yoga as a keyword. Yes, the use of yoga as a keyword would draw a large audience. However, a large part of the audience probably are not looking for yoga pants, let alone women's yoga pants.... this is where negative keywords can come into play. We can say that yoga mats are a negative, along with yoga studios. This helps weed out those who wouldn't benefit from our site.
As you can see with a little work and forethought keywords can be extremely useful as we continue to build our businesses.
Saturday, February 16, 2019
Legal Structure
This week we studied about different legal structure within businesses. There are several and each seems to have many pros and cons.
I personally feel that choosing a legal structure for your business is almost as important as choosing your business itself. You need to decide what type of liability you are willing to take with your business. How large your business is, or will become etc.
I chose to stay with a legal structure that I was familiar with. I chose to stick with a Sole Proprietorship or DBA (Doing Business As). I and my mom have a business we have already set up as a DBA, so this was one less step that I had to take in order to get my online business up and going.
This particular legal structure holds us completely liable for all taxes and any other problems that may arise as a "business entity" because the business entity is really just us. This may sound a bit scary, but our business really doesn't have a large risk with it. We sell handcrafted items such as blankets, jewelry, etc. None of the items we sell tend to be "big ticket" items, nor items that have a large potential of causing personal harm or injury.
As you can see there is a lot to think about when choosing your legal structure. However, with the right planning and talking with the right professionals you can choose the right legal structure for your business, and have a much easier first fiscal year.
I personally feel that choosing a legal structure for your business is almost as important as choosing your business itself. You need to decide what type of liability you are willing to take with your business. How large your business is, or will become etc.
I chose to stay with a legal structure that I was familiar with. I chose to stick with a Sole Proprietorship or DBA (Doing Business As). I and my mom have a business we have already set up as a DBA, so this was one less step that I had to take in order to get my online business up and going.
This particular legal structure holds us completely liable for all taxes and any other problems that may arise as a "business entity" because the business entity is really just us. This may sound a bit scary, but our business really doesn't have a large risk with it. We sell handcrafted items such as blankets, jewelry, etc. None of the items we sell tend to be "big ticket" items, nor items that have a large potential of causing personal harm or injury.
As you can see there is a lot to think about when choosing your legal structure. However, with the right planning and talking with the right professionals you can choose the right legal structure for your business, and have a much easier first fiscal year.
Thursday, February 7, 2019
Designing a Site
This week we started thinking about and discussing what it take to design our site. We learned a lot of different information including that the average person spends less than 5 seconds on your site before they judge if they are going to stay or leave. This is a very critical time, and we need to make sure that the site looks professional, welcoming, and accessible.
Another thing we discussed this week was implementing PayPal into our site. We had a chance to use a website to create a button for our website. There were several different buttons to choose from, each of which would fit into a different business model.
I am going for a manufacturer business model, and so I found it very easy to pick a button. I feel that an add to cart button would be best for my scenario. This allows the customer to add the item, and select other items if they choose before "checking out". The could also use a Buy Now button, but I feel that, that comes off a bit too forward for my liking.
This week really reminded me of my past classes and understanding of design and user-interface. It feels a bit like a culmination of a lot of my previous classes, and the principles and theories I have learned from them.
Another thing we discussed this week was implementing PayPal into our site. We had a chance to use a website to create a button for our website. There were several different buttons to choose from, each of which would fit into a different business model.
I am going for a manufacturer business model, and so I found it very easy to pick a button. I feel that an add to cart button would be best for my scenario. This allows the customer to add the item, and select other items if they choose before "checking out". The could also use a Buy Now button, but I feel that, that comes off a bit too forward for my liking.
This week really reminded me of my past classes and understanding of design and user-interface. It feels a bit like a culmination of a lot of my previous classes, and the principles and theories I have learned from them.
Friday, February 1, 2019
Site Hosting and Builders
This week we learned a lot about different options that are available to make our e-commerce site function. There are several options from creating a web page that has a lot of custom coding, to ones that only allow you to "drag and drop" but in their pre-made templates.
Before this week I wasn't aware of the large array of different options to build a website there were. However, that wasn't all that we learned this week.
We learned all about hosting engines. This probably sounds a bit more complicated than it actually is. There are several options when you are thinking about hosting. A host is the company that "stores" your website on their servers allowing people across the world to find it, if they click the right link or are aware of the web address of your domain.
Several e-commerce site builders have hosting built into their model. However, you can still choose to use an outside host to "host" your page with.
After some research I decided that shopify seems to fit my needs the best out of any site builder, and it includes hosting as part of their fee for allowing you to build your website using their software.
Before this week I wasn't aware of the large array of different options to build a website there were. However, that wasn't all that we learned this week.
We learned all about hosting engines. This probably sounds a bit more complicated than it actually is. There are several options when you are thinking about hosting. A host is the company that "stores" your website on their servers allowing people across the world to find it, if they click the right link or are aware of the web address of your domain.
Several e-commerce site builders have hosting built into their model. However, you can still choose to use an outside host to "host" your page with.
After some research I decided that shopify seems to fit my needs the best out of any site builder, and it includes hosting as part of their fee for allowing you to build your website using their software.
Saturday, January 26, 2019
Drop Shipping, Affiliation, and More OH MY!
This week we learned a lot about 2 different business models. One business model was drop shipping, which I had never heard of before, the other was affiliation.
Let's start with drop shipping. Drop shipping is a situation in which you offer the product for sale. However, you are not the one that keeps the inventory or ships the inventory you've effectively contracted out to another company to process your orders. (ish)
In some situations this would be an ideal solution, for example if you were selling a fashion accessory. The client would select what they wanted to purchase from your site, you would reach out to your drop ship contractor and pay the fee, and the drop shipper would in turn ship the item that was purchased from your site. However, one should know that if there are any issues where the client isn't happy with the product you are the one that is going to have to refund the money etc. So this is good for some situations, and not so great for others.
Then there is affiliation. Affiliation allows you to build a site such as a blog, informational, etc. Then you are "contracting" with a larger company (think Amazon) and place links to their items. The user simply clicks on the link on your page, is whisked away to your affiliates page and they purchase what they were wanting. In return for you funneling traffic to their site the affiliate gives you a "cut" (commission) for the sell.
The question is, what's really best? The answer isn't a straight one... It all depends on what type of site you are wanting to build. Do you want something that is a very traditional store front? Or are you looking for something with more creative license? The answer to both of those will determine which one is your best match. Creative license and freedom is more available via the affiliate program, while a traditional storefront would be quite reasonable to utilize drop shipping.
Let's start with drop shipping. Drop shipping is a situation in which you offer the product for sale. However, you are not the one that keeps the inventory or ships the inventory you've effectively contracted out to another company to process your orders. (ish)
In some situations this would be an ideal solution, for example if you were selling a fashion accessory. The client would select what they wanted to purchase from your site, you would reach out to your drop ship contractor and pay the fee, and the drop shipper would in turn ship the item that was purchased from your site. However, one should know that if there are any issues where the client isn't happy with the product you are the one that is going to have to refund the money etc. So this is good for some situations, and not so great for others.
Then there is affiliation. Affiliation allows you to build a site such as a blog, informational, etc. Then you are "contracting" with a larger company (think Amazon) and place links to their items. The user simply clicks on the link on your page, is whisked away to your affiliates page and they purchase what they were wanting. In return for you funneling traffic to their site the affiliate gives you a "cut" (commission) for the sell.
The question is, what's really best? The answer isn't a straight one... It all depends on what type of site you are wanting to build. Do you want something that is a very traditional store front? Or are you looking for something with more creative license? The answer to both of those will determine which one is your best match. Creative license and freedom is more available via the affiliate program, while a traditional storefront would be quite reasonable to utilize drop shipping.
Saturday, January 19, 2019
Choosing a Business
This week we have been discussing business models and how to choose the type of business for our online business we will be creating in this class.
Before reading through some of the scenarios and really gaining a solid grasp on online businesses I had assumed that the only type of online business was that of a E-commerce. This would encompass the typical site that would offer some sort of product for sale.
However, I have learned this week that there are tons of other ideas out there, some in fact that don't require any actual "sales" on your part. Some of these would be affiliate business model which allows someone to have a site that directs the viewer to a link where they can purchase an item. Others sale space for ads by other companies... the list of ideas is fairly deep.
One of the most important things when regarding what type of business one should choose is to keep in mind key words and their competition. We also learned to look at that and take that into effect this week. The hardest part of the keyword search, is simply coming up with several different key words for your idea of a product or service you think you'd like to offer.
As a long time crafter, and having a mother who has always dreamed of having an online presence to sale some of the handmade goods we make, I am 90% sure I will be attempting the E-commerce model and selling some of our one of a kind handmade goods. Though I know it won't be perfect, I am viewing this as an experience and an experiment. I think this class, and project will be a wonderful time to get my toes wet, and be able to "tinker" and look at different avenues with regards of getting an online presence for our handy crafts.
Here goes nothing!
Before reading through some of the scenarios and really gaining a solid grasp on online businesses I had assumed that the only type of online business was that of a E-commerce. This would encompass the typical site that would offer some sort of product for sale.
However, I have learned this week that there are tons of other ideas out there, some in fact that don't require any actual "sales" on your part. Some of these would be affiliate business model which allows someone to have a site that directs the viewer to a link where they can purchase an item. Others sale space for ads by other companies... the list of ideas is fairly deep.
One of the most important things when regarding what type of business one should choose is to keep in mind key words and their competition. We also learned to look at that and take that into effect this week. The hardest part of the keyword search, is simply coming up with several different key words for your idea of a product or service you think you'd like to offer.
As a long time crafter, and having a mother who has always dreamed of having an online presence to sale some of the handmade goods we make, I am 90% sure I will be attempting the E-commerce model and selling some of our one of a kind handmade goods. Though I know it won't be perfect, I am viewing this as an experience and an experiment. I think this class, and project will be a wonderful time to get my toes wet, and be able to "tinker" and look at different avenues with regards of getting an online presence for our handy crafts.
Here goes nothing!
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