What should I focus on now?

[greenandchic]

My site has been up (officially launched) since mid October. I have been working on it for about a year before my official launch. Right now I get about 40 visits a day (give or take) on average. According to Google Analytics, 86% from referring sites, 45% from search engines and 38% from direct traffic. I get about 80-250/day from my blog. Since I started, I haven’t had any sales.

My questions are:

-Besides blogging, social networking and SEO (which I just started) what should I do?
-How many visits should I get on average ideally to generate sales?
-How long does it typically take from a launch to start generating sales?

[JEccles]

The first thing you need to do is rethink the design. It is very dark and you can't even tell, at first glance, that it is a commerce site since your feature products do not appear until after the "fold". Leave this

Welcome to Green Chic where we specialize in green and natural personal care products. We are the perfect place for your natural skincare products. From vitamin-infused bath and body products to organic tinted diaper cream we have the perfect equation for your natural and green personal care needs.

at the top and move the rest to the footer. The dark background and bright white center do not accurately reflect your products IMHO. You products are also not aligned properly on the category pages....some are breaking the right margin. Move your newsletter signup to the front page. Since you said that you are just starting on the SEO, I won't do into that.

As for driving traffic to the site, you may want to consider submitting your products to places like Google Base or a PPC type of shopping site. I prefer the Google Base since it doesn't cost anything.

[BasicECommerce]

You are falling into the trap of trying to be too much at the same time. You are an e-commerce website first and foremost (I assume).

Make the products more visible. Make it clear that this is a site to buy products for your niche. Then, provide the additional information elsewhere as a benefit for those who are interested.

-BEC

[greenandchic]

BEC - I thought having the text at the top was best for SEO? I had the products at top before but was told that wasnt best for the search engines.

JEccles - Thanks for the suggestion. My site was very different before, very white, plain (but it was DIY and horrible) and was told to change it and add color.

In terms of the products over the right margin. I dont see that on either the PC or Mac I use. IE or Firefox. I did have some problems with it before and had a really hard time with it at first because FF showed me something that IE wasn’t and vice versa.

[BasicECommerce]

You are correct that having text higher on the page is better for SEO. But, what is better for selling items and making money? This should be your question/mantra.

Visitors decide whether to stay or leave a website in about 2 seconds - usually without scrolling. Without having your products at the top, visitors think they are simply visiting a content-oriented website and not what they want to buy (especially since you're appears to be optimized for broad keywords-not high converting keywords).

Hope this clarifies.
-BEC

[greenandchic]

I guess it’s a catch 22 because I need to be able to attract visitors in the first place. You do make a great point about the two second rule. Ill try to fix this issue of not having the products visible.

[GrayDrop]

I think you're off to a good start, but now you need to step it up a notch, focus on building your brand and start promoting the differences between you and the 3 million other vendors of similar items. I assume you started this site because you love the product. Make that show.

If you're not in a position to spend a lot of money with PPC, I certainly don't blame you. Unfortunately it's just going to take you longer to drive good traffic that's willing to spend money. You'll need to focus on the reasons people would want to come to the site. Are there topics you can talk about that would be of interest to other? Why are your products worth buying. What makes your company better then the billion dollar brands already out there?

You also need to keep in mind that average conversion rates run around 2-3%. At that rate you're looking at getting less then 1 order per day. Is that what your seeing? And if you are getting that make sure you are treating those precious few customers with amazing service - they will be you're best and least expensive marketing tool going forward.

I see that you have products for babies and expecting mothers. Are you taking advantage of all of the blogs / forums in those realms. You need to get your self out there and start talking about them. I'm sure there are lots of posts on topics your products can help with. Tap in to that market - but don't beat people over the head. You don't need to be a door to door sales person you need to be a brand builder and self promoter. A good example of this is Sara Blakley from Spanks. If you're not familiar with her - go out and learn all you can about her. I think she could be a great inspiration to you.


As for your site - here's my list of suggestions.

1.) Use the home page to promote the product a bit more. You don't need to copy Bath & Body, but you do need to get people excited about the products you sell. I would use this real estate to focus on a combination product/solution.

2.) Your shopping cart is a bit clunky. You want the checkout process to be fun, easy and simple. For example, you shouldn't have to ask people what state they are in to determine sales tax. You know this by the billing/shipping addresses. Elminate as many fields as possible.

3.) On the about us page - get more personal. It's a simple paragraph that seems very boiler plate. Sell yourself, your products and your brand.

4.) Consider setting something like BoldChat up not for the chat part, but the real-time visitor tracking. Google is great, but you can't watch how people are actually using the site click by click. You'll learn a wealth of information watching visitors on your site. (Warning - this can be a bit addictive)

[BasicECommerce]

I guess it’s a catch 22 because I need to be able to attract visitors in the first place. You do make a great point about the two second rule. Ill try to fix this issue of not having the products visible.

There are many ways to get visitors. The point is to attract customers - not visitors.

Look at Home Depot stores as an example. They offer small little classes to teach people the DIY tricks at their stores. But they do not spend much time promoting it. They promote their product. The product is always in your face. If Home Depot starting focusing on providing the information rather than the product, people would begin to only use them for their information and not the product.

That is exactly the trap you are falling into and it happens to many many websites. Put your product prominently on the homepage. Make people aware that this is a place to buy things.

-BEC