Top Ten Wholesale Tips for Online Retailers and Wholesalers

 
Online sellers take note -– New study research shows that up to 70 percent of online shoppers will abandon their shopping cart or purchase transaction BEFORE they click the Submit Order button. That’s a 70% Rate of Shopping Cart Abandonment, according to a company specializing in abandonment tracking software (SeeWhy).
 
Online wholesalers/retailers and e-tailers who face this online seller challenge also need to know that the rate of Lost Sales (abandoned shopping carts or incomplete purchase orders) has increased in 2009 over sales transactions completed vs. abandoned from 2005 to 2008.
Primary Reason? Buyers have more alternatives: Comparison Shopping Sites let buyers move easily between sellers, product sources, and search devices (smart phone, laptop, desktop) to comparison shop.
Top Ten Wholesale thinks every wholesale merchandise seller or online retailer can capture lost sales revenue and stop abandoned shopping cart pile-ups. Here are tips on Trusted Sites, Steps of the Online Buyer/Seller Process and Meeting Online Buyer Needs that say . . .
Don’t Drop That Shopping Cart!!
1. Offer Alternative Payment Plans. A 2009 PayPal Checkout Abandonment Study found 24% of online shoppers did not complete their purchase transaction because they could not find their preferred payment option.
· According to a 2008 report released by PayPal and Jupiter Research, 55% of customers think about payments before they reach your checkout processing page,
· Also, the consumer credit crunch — plus news of data thefts and security breaches at credit card processing centers – now drive customers to search for Alternative Payment Plans.
Ignore it at your seller peril, especially since Javelin Strategy & Research estimates that, inside two years, “Alternative” Payments will be over 30% of all online dollar volume.
· Offer Bill-Me-Later … PayPal Payment … Electronic Funds Transfer . . . and Direct Debit Options to potential buyers.
Bill-Me-Later payment plans, in particular, are important to close the sale on high-price tag and higher-ticket merchandise items.
2. Can You Be Trusted? Usability studies repeatedly point to buyer trust and confidence in the seller’s online site as reasons to either stay or to bail out of the buy transaction.
· Offer “Contact Us” and “About Us” links on your opening pages. Offer buyers the option to call you or request LIVE CUSTOMER SERVICE before they place a single item in their shopping cart. And make sure you list a physical office address – rather than a P.O. Box – at the top or bottom of your main web page and on your Contact Us page.
All increase buyer confidence in trusted sites. A visible, physical local address also helps get you indexed in local search listings … multiplying your other search, display and trade show advertising efforts.
· If your online business has earned Better Business Bureau or eTrust or VeriSign or any other standard of approval in the e-tailing industry, then feature the logo on your top web pages. Burying such industry approval seals on only the purchase transaction pages means they may never been seen at all. What sort of trust-builder is a hidden seal of approval?
· Put clear text links in Home Page footer lines, as well as on every purchase transaction page, to your Privacy Policy and your Returns Policy.
How will personal and contact data you request from buyers be used? How do you keep buyer financial data secure? Do you truly offer No-Hassle Returns? Are you a liquidation reseller who offers clear manifests of the contents of every shipment? Then, make this No Unpleasant Surprises policy accessible from the first web pages a potential buyer sees.
· Just like providing live customer service before merchandise is dropped in the shopping cart, don’t bury Privacy and No-Hassle Returns Policies in small print or only on inside pages. Looks like you’re hiding from the customer.
3. Display Shipping Charges Up Front. The number one reason online buyers gave for abandoning their shopping carts was high shipping costs. (That’s from the 2009 PayPal Checkout Abandonment Study conducted by online market trackers comScore.)
· Don’t leave shipping costs to the end of a purchase transaction as a Last-Step Surprise. The above-noted survey found that giving buyers a specific idea of shipping costs right up front might have resulted in more completed purchases and fewer shopping carts abandoned.
· At the consumer e-tailing level – This excerpt is from a User Comment on Shopping Cart Abandonment.
“… When I close or abandon a cart, it is because the seller is charging a lot more to send me the order. One seller. . . may charge more for the item, but the total is less than the first seller’s total because the shipping is a lot less. Comparison shopping does exist!”
· At the wholesale supplier level – Do you supply Dollar Store Inventory to resellers or Liquidation Merchandise lots for resale? And do you have regional warehouses or drop-shipper facilities?
Then note Regional Warehouses and Dispersed Shipping & Fulfillment Centers … right up front. Nearness of the shipping point to the wholesale buyer is the main shipping cost factor you control (as opposed to fuel costs).
4. Cut Down Buyer Purchase/Checkout Steps to Two or Three, Maximum. Nothing piles up emptied or abandoned shopping carts faster than putting the buyer through too many questions and too many steps.
· Do you require Site Registration First? Then don’t load that into your Checkout Pages. How many online buyers will patiently re-load their shopping cart – or go through all the purchase steps again – after registering with you and waiting to receive an email verifying that they are allowed to shop with you? Answer: Not many. It’s easier for a potential customer to bail out of your site and hit the “Back” button, to see who else is out there selling the same merchandise.
Break up Registration requirements and sign-up forms on a lead-in page to your online sales site. Then direct interested buyers to the Purchase or Checkout or Buy Now pages.
· Seal the Sale with a 3-Step K.I.S.S. That’s an old graphic design principle that certainly works to keep buyers at your company web site straight through to the Submit Button. K.I.S.S. stands for: Keep It Simple, Stupid. That means …
Don’t ask for too much unnecessary information during a purchase transaction. It’s tempting to ask a lot of questions like, How did the buyer find out about your products? What are their personal preferences for recommended products? How can you serve them better in the future? Resist the impulse to collect marketing data. You need to close the sale.
Make the process from “Add to My Shopping Cart” > “Supply Shipping and/or Billing Address” > “Payment Options” > “Shipping and Handling Charges” > to final “Submit this Order Here” no longer than two or three steps.
Break up requests for needed information and streamline the entire checkout process to no more than two or three steps or screens. The longer the checkout path, the higher the rate of Shopping Cart Abandonment.
5. Who Else Likes You? OR What Else Do They Like? Online comments, User/Buyer Reviews and Product Ratings – all social media interactions at merchant sites – are 2nd only to Word of Mouth Recommendations from trusted others to drive a final purchase or sale. (Rubicon Consulting Study of 2008)
· Track Current Customer Opinions. Set up Ratings and User Review input buttons at your web site. With permission, highlight product recommendations and customer comments.
· Personalize Recommendations with Re-Targeting Tools. I receive regular emails from Amazon.com when new books or DVDs are released that are similar to my last order. These re-targeting emails come in two forms:
(1) A call-out from Amazon product pages titled: Customers Who Bought (my last title) Also Purchased (these other titles) … and
(2) New Products That Might Interest Me.
Here’s a sample of my latest retargeting email from Amazon on food safety headlined: Recommended for You: Amazon.com has new recommendations for you based on items you purchased or told us you own.
 
Note that each re-target suggestion includes:
· Cover art, some labeled “click-to-open” offering a sample chapter;
· List Price, Current Price, My Savings;
· Buttons to “Rate this Item” and click to “Own it.”
Here’s the second part of my personalized Recommendations email.

 
This facsimile shows my purchase history and the explanation – “We recommended items above because you purchased or rated these items.”
Then it requests my Feedback — Was it a gift? No longer interested?
Then, it states – “If you already own or have experience with the items we recommended, use the link next to these items to continue improving your recommendations.
Finally, there’s the option to opt-out – “We hope you found this message to be useful. However, if you’d rather not receive future e-mails of this sort from Amazon.com, please opt-out here.”
That’s a good example of personalized recommendation and re-targeted emailings to existing customers. Vendors like ChoiceStream work with your customer database to provide personalized product category recommendations. Or, you can work with your Product Specialists and Web Site Developers to managing your Customer Relations, mining a buyer database for returning customers and Lifetime Customer Value.

30 Ways to Show Your Customers They’re Always Right

When you’re a start-up with few employees and few customers, it’s easy to stay on top of what customers want and what they’re getting. But as you add more customers and employees, you add links to the customer service chain. That creates the potential for growth and the potential for poor service along the way. That’s why creating a customer service policy and adhering to it is so important. Here are some steps you can take to ensure that your clients receive excellent service every step of the way.

1. Put your customer service policy in writing. These principles should come from you, but every employee should know what the rules are and be ready to live up to them. This doesn’t have to be elaborate. Something as simple as “the customer is always right” can lay the necessary groundwork, although you may want to get more detailed by saying, for instance, “any employee is empowered to grant a 10 percent discount to any dissatisfied customer at any time.”
2. Establish support systems that give employees clear instructions for gaining and maintaining service superiority. These systems will help you outservice any competitor by giving more to customers and anticipating problems before they arise.
3. Develop a measurement of superb customer service. Don’t forget to reward employees who practice it consistently.
4. Be certain that your passion for customer service runs rampant throughout your company. Employees should see how good service relates to your profits and to their futures with the company.
5. Be genuinely committed to providing more customer service excellence than anyone else in your industry. This commitment must be so powerful that every one of your customers can sense it.
6. Share information with people on the front lines. Meet with your employees regularly to talk about improving service. Solicit ideas from employees-they are the ones who are dealing with customers most often.
7. Act on the knowledge that what customers value most are attention, dependability, promptness and competence. They love being treated as individuals and being referred to by name.

Phrases That’ll Make Your Customers Happy
Principles of customer service are all very well, but you need to put those principles into action with everything you do and say. There are certain “magic words” customers want to hear from you and your staff. Make sure all your employees understand the importance of these key phrases:

• “How can I help?” Customers want the opportunity to explain in detail what they want and need. Too often, business owners feel the desire or the obligation to guess what customers need rather than carefully listening first. By asking how you can help, you begin the dialogue on a positive note (you are “helping,” not “selling”). And by using an open-ended question, you invite discussion.
• “I can solve that problem.” Most customers, especially business-to-business customers, are looking to buy solutions. They appreciate direct answers in a language they can understand.
• “I don’t know, but I’ll find out.” When confronted with a truly difficult question that requires research on your part, admit that you don’t know the answer. Few things ruin your credibility faster than trying to answer a question when you are unsure of all the facts. Savvy buyers may test you with a question they know you can’t answer and then just sit quietly while you struggle to fake an intelligent reply. An honest answer enhances your integrity.
• “I will take responsibility.” Tell your customer you realize it’s your responsibility to ensure a satisfactory outcome to the transaction. Assure the customer you know what he or she expects and will deliver the product or service at the agreed-upon price. There will be no unexpected changes or expenses required to solve the problem.
• “I will keep you updated.” Even if your business is a cash-and-carry operation, it probably requires scheduling and coordinating numerous events. Assure your customers they will be advised of the status of these events. The longer your lead time, the more important this is. The vendors customers trust the most are those that keep them apprised of the situation, whether the news is good or bad.
• “I will deliver on time.” A due date that has been agreed upon is a promise that must be kept. “Close” doesn’t count.
• “Monday means Monday.” The first week in July means the first week in July, even though it contains a national holiday. Your clients are waiting to hear you say “I deliver on time.” The supplier who consistently does so is a rarity and will be remembered.
• “It’ll be just what you ordered.” It will not be “similar to,” and it will not be “better than” what was ordered. It will be exactly what was ordered. Even if you believe a substitute would be in the client’s best interests, that’s a topic for discussion, not something you decide on your own. Your customer may not know (or be at liberty to explain) all the ramifications of the purchase.
• “The job will be complete.” Assure the customer there will be no waiting for a final piece or a last document. Never say you are finished “except for….”
• “I appreciate your business.” This means more than a simple “Thanks for the order.” Genuine appreciation involves follow-up calls, offering to answer questions, making sure everything is performing satisfactorily, and ascertaining that the original problem has been solved.

Neglecting any of these steps conveys the impression that you were interested in the person only until the sale was made. This leaves the buyer feeling deceived and used, and creates ill will and negative advertising for your company. Sincerely proving you care about your customers leads to recommendations and repeat sales

Never Let Your Customers Forget You
One important tool for generating repeat business is following up. Effective follow-up begins immediately after the sale when you call the customer to say “thank you” and find out if he or she is pleased with your product or service. Beyond this, there are several effective ways to follow up that ensure your business is always in the customer’s mind.

• Let customers know what you are doing for them. This can be in the form of a newsletter mailed to existing customers, or it can be more informal, such as a phone call. Whatever method you use, the key is to dramatically point out to customers the excellent service you are giving them. If you never mention all the things you are doing for them, customers may not notice. You aren’t being cocky when you talk to customers about all the work you have done to please them. Just make a phone call and let them know they don’t have to worry because you handled the paperwork, called the attorney or double-checked on the shipment-one less thing they have to do.
• Write old customers personal, handwritten notes frequently. “I was just sitting at my desk and your name popped into my head. Are you still having a great time flying all over the country? Let me know if you need another set of luggage. I can stop by with our latest models any time.” Or if you run into an old customer at an event, follow up with a note: “It was great seeing you at the CDC Christmas party. I’ll call you early in the New Year to schedule a lunch.”
• Keep it personal. Voice mail and e-mail make it easy to communicate, but the personal touch is often lost. If you’re having trouble getting through to someone whose problem requires that personal touch, leave a voice-mail message that you want to talk to the person directly or will stop by his or her office at a designated time.
• Remember special occasions. Send regular customers birthday cards, anniversary cards, holiday cards…you name it. Gifts are excellent follow-up tools, too. You don’t have to spend a fortune to show you care; use your creativity to come up with interesting gift ideas that tie into your business, the customer’s business or his or her recent purchase.
• Pass on information. If you read an article, see a new book, or hear about an organization a customer might be interested in, drop a note or make a quick call to let them know.
• Consider follow-up calls as business development calls. When you talk to or visit old clients or customers, you’ll often find they have referrals to give you, which can lead to new business.

With all your existing customers can do for you, there’s simply no reason not to stay in regular contact with them. Use your imagination, and you’ll think of plenty of other ideas that can help you develop a lasting relationship.

Dealing With Unsatisfied Customers
Studies show that the vast majority of unsatisfied customers will never come right out and tell you they’re unsatisfied. They simply leave quietly, later telling everyone they know not to do business with you. So when a customer complains, don’t think of it as a nuisance-think of it as a golden opportunity to change that customer’s mind and retain his or her business.

Even the best product or service receives complaints now and then. Here’s how to handle them for positive results:

• Let customers vent their feelings. Encourage them to get their frustrations out in the open.
• Never argue with a customer.
• Never tell a customer “You do not have a problem.” Those are fighting words.
• Share your point of view as politely as you can.
• Take responsibility for the problem. Don’t make excuses. If an employee was sick or a supplier let you down, that’s not the customer’s concern.
• Immediately take action to remedy the situation. Promising a solution and then delaying it only makes matters worse.
• Empower your front-line employees to be flexible in resolving complaints. Give employees some leeway in deciding when to bend the rules. If you don’t feel comfortable doing this, make sure they have you or another manager handle the situation.

Excerpted from Growing Your Business

 

Dress Up Your Online Store for the Holidays

 

These tips will give your customers–and your business–plenty of reasons to celebrate the season.

By Dani Babb   |   November 18, 2009

 

Online shopping last year was up 55 percent over the previous year for holiday shoppers as many time-crunched Santas and gift givers tried to save themselves time and money online. Many of us running online businesses run into the same scenario that brick-and-mortar stores face this time of the year–Black Friday! Yes, online stores generally have specific days of the year that they “run in the black,” get out of the red (or hit the break even point) for the web development and maintenance costs all year, and sell enough goods or services to finally make it “into the black” and start showing a profit. This is particularly true if you sell products online and you have costs of goods sold, website maintenance, hosting costs and so on.

 

Many people who run web stores offer coupons all year. One way to create a coupon, particularly if you run an open-sourced product like Joomla, is to create a coupon code, tweet it and post it on Facebook and other social media venues (be sure to have your friends retweet it too!) so that “word gets out.” Most coupons have expiration dates, and often they are set to Dec. 23.

 

But how can you dress up your store for the holidays? First, remember you have shoppers from all faiths. I’m not suggesting that you don’t “show your Christmas spirit” if you are Christian and so on, but make your site festive. Google does a great job of this, turning its logo into a pumpkin for Halloween, a heart for Valentine’s Day and so on. This is relatively easy and simple to do and should take your web designer an hour at most. Sometimes even changing the colors to holiday festive colors is enough to do the trick. If you’re using a content management system, this is usually as easy as the flip of a switch on the back end.

 

What else can you do to get your site ready for the holidays? First, offer your money-back guarantee logo, big and bold, right there available on the home page. Make it easy for shoppers to get right to the store, and make it clear right at the top of the page what benefit they get from shopping with you. Expert advice, forums and discussion boards for support and so on.  If you sell consulting services online, this is the time to add additional support materials as products because people don’t generally buy consulting time as a gift for others. But, products from an expert? You bet.

 

If you’re a small business, then you’re competing with the buy.com’s of the world sending out mass e-mails about $2 universal remote controls, and Amazon offering free products. So you’ll want to consider a loss leader you can advertise and send out to your collection of names you’ve been saving all year, and then offer an upsell product or two, too. Follow the advice of the big names. Don’t just send it out in a newsletter to your subscribers (and if you don’t have them now, is the time to start collecting!) but tweet, post on Facebook and consider tools like ShopIt for Facebook as well. Include direct links to your products so that people interested can retweet and don’t forget the hashtag that tells followers and non-followers what your product niche is. You may have several niches, and therefore several tweets with several hashtags.

 

Make shipping free for the holidays. Offer a no-hassle 90-day return policy. Offer to wrap and ship items directly to a third party. Offer gift certificates and gift cards to your online store, even if you’re a consultant. If you have products, consider posting them on eBay as well because lots of buyers will automatically tune in there for deals, particularly on Black Friday when many eBay sellers schedule their listings. Offer online downloads of products if they’re available. Offer personal gift guides, free advice and consulting on which product might be best for the consumer.  If you can afford it and have enough traffic, have someone available 24/7 to be available for live chat in case of credit card issues, payment processing problems or anything else that might come up during a transaction. Make sure you’re using Secure Socket Layer and an SSL Certificate for all payment transactions, and consider accepting PayPal. As sellers on eBay receive funds from buyers, they may find themselves paying out of PayPal to fund their Christmas shopping.

 

While you are at it, you will see more visitors to your site, so optimize your blogs, your affiliate links and all of the ways you earn residual income on your website. Happy Holidays!

 

עם או בלי בלוג?

 

האם אתם משתמשים בבלוג של החברה ככלי מכירה או כאמצעי תקשורת עם הלקוחות, המספק להם מידע מושך? אם עניתם בחיוב על האפשרות הראשונה – אתם יכולים לוותר עליו

בשעה טובה החלטתם בחברה להעלות בלוג. זה היה לפני חודשים אחדים ומאז העליתם  כמה פוסטים – שלא הביאו שום תגובה וזכו רק לביקורים מעטים.

 

אז לפני שאתם מחליטים לוותר על הבלוג, כדאי לשקול כמה רעיונות כדי להחיות אותו כך שגם אתם וגם הלקוחות שלכם תוכלו להפיק תועלת.

 

בלי מוצרים

קודם כל, בדקו איך ממוצב תוכן הבלוג שלכם: האם אתם משתמשים בו ככלי מכירה או כאמצעי תקשורת עם הלקוחות המספק להם מידע מושך.  חברות רבות טועות בכך שהן מתמקדות  באופן כמעט מוחלט במוצרים ובשירותים שהן מציעות, וכך משכפלות למעשה אינפורמציה שאפשר למצוא באתר המרכזי.

 

בלוגים הם כלי תקשורתי רב עוצמה, לכן חייב התוכן שאתם מספקים בו להיות מעניין ומושך, לסייע במילוי רצונות וצרכים של המבקרים  ולעודד תגובות. למשל, אתר סחר אלקטרוני שעלה לאחרונה ממקד את הבלוג שלו במדיה החברתיים ובטכנולוגיות תקשורת חדשות, לאו דוקא במוצרים ובשירותים שהוא מציע.

 

לקרוא, להבין, להגיב

תוכן מעניין ורלוונטי יביא תגובות. הדרך בה תתיחסו לתגובות הללו יכולה לסייע רבות בשמירה על רעננותו של הבלוג.

 

נקודה חשובה – האם אתם  מסננים תגובות? חברות רבות עושות זאת כדי למנוע ספאם ותגובות המכילות הערות פוגעות, גסויות וכיו”ב. אם אתם מסננים -  יש לוודא שתהליך האישור יהיה קצר והתגובות שיאושרו יעלו במהירות האפשרית. אם הגולשים רואים שלוקח כמה ימים לתגובתם  לעלות – הם יפסיקו להגיב. חוץ מזה, אנשים נוטים לקרוא פוסטים שיש להם הרבה תגובות, כך שככל שתאשרו את התגובות מהר יותר, סביר שהפוסט יקבל  עוד תגובות.

שווה לעשות מאמץ ולא רק להשיב למגיבים, אלא גם להיכנס לבלוג של המגיב ולהשאיר שם תגובה. זו דרך נהדרת להגיד תודה למבקרים המגיבים ולעודד מגיבים שזו להם תגובתם הראשונה להיות מגיבים קבועים בבלוג שלכם.

 

יתרון נוסף בקריאת הבלוגים של המגיבים הוא האפשרות להבין טוב יותר מה מעניין אותם – לא רק מבחינת סוגי מוצרים ושירותים אלא אופיו של תוכן הבלוג  המדבר אליהם.

 

לכן כדאי להגיב גם על הערות שמשאירים בבלוג שלכם וגם בבלוגים של המבקרים – כך תהיו חברים טובים בקהילה ושכנים טובים. אינטראקציה כזו  עם הקוראים תבטיח שהם  יקדישו זמן רב יותר לקריאה ולתגובה בבלוג שלכם.

 

להעלות פוסטים ברציפות 
הדרך הטובה ביותר לפתח קהל קוראים לבלוג שלך היא להעלות פוסטים באופן קבוע ורצוף. ההבדל בין בלוגים לאתרים אחרים הוא בכך שהתוכן בבלוגים משתנה כל הזמן. הקוראים מצפים לראות תוכן חדש בכל פעם שהם נכנסים לבלוג. אם אין – הם יצמצמו את מספר הביקורים עד להימנעות מוחלטת.

 

לשם כך כדי לקבוע לוחות זמנים להעלאת פוסטים. אם יש רק כותב אחד  בבלוג, יש לשאוף ל-3-2 פוסטים בשבוע, או יותר אם  אפשר. אם שניים או שלושה כותבים בבלוג, הרי שכל אחד מהם יכתוב 2-1 פוסטים בשבוע. הרעיון הוא להבטיח שלקוראים יצפה תוכן חדש בכל פעם שהם נכנסים לבלוג.

 

נקודה חשובה נוספת היא הצורך להתאים את הרגלי כתיבת הפוסטים להרגלי המבקרים בבלוג. קריאת בלוגים יורדת במידה ניכרת בסופי שבוע, כשהתנועה לבלוגים נוטה להצטמצם כבר ביום חמישי. לכן, האידיאלי הוא להעלות את רוב הפוסטים בין יום א’ ליום ד’.
 

תמונות

צירוף תמונה לכל פוסט  – חשוב. ויז’ואל מייד מושך תשומת לב ונותן לפוסט שלך סיכוי טוב להיקרא. אפשר כמובן לכלול תמונות של מוצרים, אבל לא להגזים בזה. אם אפשר השתמש בתמונות שאתה והכותבים האחרים צילמתם ואל תחששו לשים גם את התמונות שלכם לעתים קרובות. אנשים מרגישים נוח יותר ליד אנשים שהם מכירים, וצירוף תמונה היא דרך מצוינת להזכיר לקוראים שאת הבלוג שלכם כותבים “אנשים אמיתיים”.

 

לינקים –  גם למתחרים 
כשאתה מוסיף לינקים למידע נוסף בבלוגים או באתרים אחרים, אתה מעודד, כביכול, את הקוראים לעזוב את הבלוג שלך. אבל מנקודת מבטו של הקורא – וזו הרי נקודת המבט שאנו אמורים לאמץ -  הפניה למקורות נוספים נתפסת כעזרה שלך למציאת אינפורמציה רלוונטית.

 

במילים אחרות, אתה עושה מאמץ לשפר את החוויה שלהם ואתה מוכן להסתכן שלשם כך יעזבו את הבלוג שלך. הקוראים רואים בכך נכונות שלך להעדיף את צרכיהם על פני אלה שלך. 

 

וגם אין סיבה לחשוש לקשר למתחרים. מנקודת מבט החברה שלך  זה עשוי, לכאורה, להיתפס כ”עזרה לאויב”, אך הקורא שלך רואה בצעד כזה הוכחה לביטחון ולאמון של החברה במוצריה ובשירותיה. ואף יותר חשוב -  זה עוזר למצב את החברה כמובילה בתחומה.

 

החברה המקשיבה 
גולשים הנכנסים לבלוג שלך מחפשים משהו – בידור, מידע או הזדמנות להשאיר לך משוב. תפקידך הוא להתאים את התוכן לצרכים ולרצונות שלהם. המניע העיקרי ליצירת בלוג חייב להיות הרצון להבין טוב יותר את לקוחותיך. התיחס לבלוג כאל מכשיר לימודי: הוא מאפשר לך לתקשר עם הלקוחות, להבין מה מעניין אותם, מה  הצרכים שלהם, מה הם מחפשים. כשחברה מתחילה  לקבל משוב של צרכנים בבלוג ולפעול לפיו, השיווק שלה נעשה יותר יעיל ואפקטיבי, והוצאות השיווק מצטמצמות בהתאם. וכשהצרכנים נוכחים לדעת שהחברה מעודדת משוב ופועלת לפיו, הם  יספקו משוב נוסף שיסייע עוד יותר.

 
חברה המוכנה לעשות מאמץ כדי לתקשר עם לקוחותיה, לשוחח אתם וללמוד מהם מעוררת אמון ונתפסת כחברה רצינית. הצרכנים הנכנסים לבלוג, לא רק מרחיבים ומוסיפים תגובות אלא אף מעבירים בשיטת ‘מפה לאוזן’ את יתרונותיה של החברה המקשיבה. זה מביא צרכנים נוספים, צרכנים נאמנים נוספים – מה שמקטין עוד יותר את הוצאות השיווק.

 

לסיכום, מצב את בלוג החברה מנקודת הראות של הצרכן, לא שלך -  ותהיה המום מהתוצאות.

 

Nothing Says ‘Buy’ Like ‘Free Shipping’

By BOB TEDESCHI

EVEN in a country where Christmas trees start appearing in October, L. L. Bean may have set a record for beginning the holiday marketing blitz early by starting a free shipping promotion last month.

But the promotion also set the bar higher than many competing online retailers might have liked.

Bean’s free-shipping offer comes with no minimum purchase requirements. That is in stark contrast to the strings-attached shipping offers used by more than 80 percent of online merchants last year, which left some consumers wondering about the exact meaning of “free.”

“We try to make it truly free,” said Steve Fuller, L. L. Bean’s senior vice president for corporate marketing. “We want to have as few bits of small type as we possibly can.”

Nothing, however, is truly free. In L. L. Bean’s case, the fine print shows that holiday shoppers will not get free shipping for beds, couches, canoes and other heavy items, which can cost $20 to $60.

For other items, however, customers will not have to pay charges that would add, on average, $8 to the final price, depending on the item.

Mr. Fuller would not say whether the company expects to lose money on the promotion, but he said “the only people who make money on free shipping are FedEx and U.P.S. It is expensive to do, and it’s easy to lose a lot of money doing it.”

Although customers typically order more frequently from the site when they do not have to pay shipping charges, Mr. Fuller said the average order size drops. Because the company holds retail prices steady during the promotion, according to Mr. Fuller, shipping costs diminish the profit margin of each sale.

So why do it? Mr. Fuller said the promotion is essentially a way to attract new customers, both gift givers as well as those who receive gifts from L. L. Bean and who may later order more products from the company.

The company, he added, is coming off a strong spring season, so it can afford a more expensive promotion. And, he said, in contrast to some retailers, Bean’s typical shipping charges are meant to recoup costs, not generate profit.

That is perhaps one reason most other online retailers are not yet following suit. According to a recent report by Shop.org, an industry group, 54 percent of online retailers had tried unconditional free shipping offers, but fewer than half said they would use the tactic this year. By contrast, 80 percent had made conditional free shipping offers, and 71 percent said they would use this approach more this year.

According to Patti Freeman Evans, an analyst with Jupiter Research, a technology consulting firm, “retailers are trying to be smarter about free shipping. It definitely gets a response, but those customers may have bought anyway, even without that offer.”

Ms. Evans pointed to a case study last year of Timberland that found that the online division would have had to generate 40 percent more sales to justify the cost of an unconditional free shipping promotion.

But for companies that are still building a client base, like the Endless.com shoe store of Amazon, the increase in new customers justifies the cost, she said.

For the others, meanwhile, conditional free shipping is a much safer middle ground, since it guarantees customers will order a minimum amount of items and thereby help the company recoup more of the shipping costs.

Amazon popularized this approach years ago, and continues to offer free shipping on orders of $25 or more. According to Craig Berman, an Amazon spokesman, more products on the site are eligible for free shipping now that Amazon is storing and delivering items on behalf of more merchants, through its new Fulfillment by Amazon service.

Other retailers are betting that consumers will respond better to greatly reduced shipping charges that cover everything, rather than free shipping policies that do not.

Gap Inc., for instance, has for roughly two years charged customers who shopped at the Web site of its Old Navy subsidiary $5 for shipping, regardless of the order size. Based on the success of that approach, in August the company put into effect a similar strategy for its BananaRepublic.com and Gap.com sites, with customers paying $6 for each shipment.

Previously, BananaRepublic.com and Gap.com customers who ordered $125 or less of goods paid $6 to $12 for shipping. Orders above that amount were shipped free, said Toby Lenk, who oversees Gap’s online division.

“Our Old Navy customers love the flat rate because it’s simple, transparent and a modest fee is something they understand,” Mr. Lenk said. “There’s a real cost for that truck, and it’s going up every year.”

Mr. Lenk said that because the flat fee approach is more expensive, Gap will likely run fewer free-shipping promotions. “But over all, we have something the customers like better,” he said.

Ms. Evans of Jupiter Research said that customers like free shipping promotions more than product discounts that save them considerably more money. “We don’t do a lot of the math,” Ms. Evans said of consumers. “Most people don’t really want to take the time.”

Overstock.com has found other, somewhat puzzling, behavior among its customers. The company has for years offered $2.95 shipping fees on all sales. But according to Patrick Byrne, Overstock’s chief executive, the site will occasionally drop the fee to $1, “and suddenly people start ordering $400 bookcases and beds,” he said. “The average order size goes up unbelievably.”

Partly as a result, Mr. Byrne said he would offer more free or discounted shipping promotions this holiday season, testing various offers with different groups via e-mail, and broadly offer those promotions that performed well.

As for why consumers generally respond to shipping promotions more avidly than discounts, Mr. Byrne said it was not necessarily an irrational behavior.

“In a world of complicated shipping offers, there’s a cost to figuring out what the actual shipping fee is,” he said. “It might be rational to only consider a flat fee or free shipping.”

 

Marketing Small Businesses With Twitter

By CLAIRE CAIN MILLER

SAN FRANCISCO — Three weeks after Curtis Kimball opened his crème brûlée cart in San Francisco, he noticed a stranger among the friends in line for his desserts. How had the man discovered the cart? He had read about it on Twitter.

For Mr. Kimball, who conceded that he “hadn’t really understood the purpose of Twitter,” the beauty of digital word-of-mouth marketing was immediately clear. He signed up for an account and has more than 5,400 followers who wait for him to post the current location of his itinerant cart and list the flavors of the day, like lavender and orange creamsicle.

“I would love to say that I just had a really good idea and strategy, but Twitter has been pretty essential to my success,” he said. He has quit his day job as a carpenter to keep up with the demand.

Much has been made of how big companies like Dell, Starbucks and Comcast use Twitter to promote their products and answer customers’ questions. But today, small businesses outnumber the big ones on the free microblogging service, and in many ways, Twitter is an even more useful tool for them.

For many mom-and-pop shops with no ad budget, Twitter has become their sole means of marketing. It is far easier to set up and update a Twitter account than to maintain a Web page. And because small-business owners tend to work at the cash register, not in a cubicle in the marketing department, Twitter’s intimacy suits them well.

“We think of these social media tools as being in the realm of the sophisticated, multiplatform marketers like Coca-Cola and McDonald’s, but a lot of these supersmall businesses are gravitating toward them because they are accessible, free and very simple,” said Greg Sterling, an analyst who studies the Internet’s influence on shopping and local businesses.

Small businesses typically get more than half of their customers through word of mouth, he said, and Twitter is the digital manifestation of that. Twitter users broadcast messages of up to 140 characters in length, and the culture of the service encourages people to spread news to friends in their own network.

Umi, a sushi restaurant in San Francisco, sometimes gets five new customers a night who learned about it on Twitter, said Shamus Booth, a co-owner.

He twitters about the fresh fish of the night — “The O-Toro (bluefin tuna belly) tonight is some of the most rich and buttery tuna I’ve had,” he recently wrote — and offers free seaweed salads to people who mention Twitter.

Twitter is not just for businesses that want to lure customers with mouth-watering descriptions of food. For Cynthia Sutton-Stolle, the co-owner of Silver Barn Antiques in tiny Columbus, Tex., Twitter has been a way to find both suppliers and customers nationwide.

Since she joined Twitter in February, she has connected with people making lamps and candles that she subsequently ordered for her shop and has sold a few thousand dollars of merchandise to people outside Columbus, including to a woman in New Jersey shopping for graduation gifts.

“We don’t even have our Web site done, and we weren’t even trying to start an e-commerce business,” Ms. Sutton-Stolle said. “Twitter has been a real valuable tool because it’s made us national instead of a little-bitty store in a little-bitty town.”

Scott Seaman of Blowing Rock, N.C., also uses Twitter to expand his customer base beyond his town of about 1,500 residents. Mr. Seaman is a partner at Christopher’s Wine and Cheese shop and owns a bed and breakfast in town. He sets up searches on TweetDeck, a Web application that helps people manage their Twitter messages, to start conversations with people talking about his town or the mountain nearby. One person he met on Twitter booked a room at his inn, and a woman in Dallas ordered sake from his shop.

The extra traffic has come despite his rarely pitching his own businesses on Twitter. “To me, that’s a turn-off,” he said. Instead of marketing to customers, small-business owners should use the same persona they have offline, he advised. “Be the small shopkeeper down the street that everyone knows by name.”

Chris Mann, the owner of Woodhouse Day Spa in Cincinnati, twitters about discounts for massages and manicures every Tuesday. Twitter beats e-mail promotions because he can send tweets from his phone in a meeting and “every single business sends out an e-mail,” he said.

Even if a shop’s customers are not on Twitter, the service can be useful for entrepreneurs, said Becky McCray, who runs a liquor store and cattle ranch in Oklahoma and publishes a blog called Small Biz Survival.

In towns like hers, with only 5,000 people, small-business owners can feel isolated, she said. But on Twitter, she has learned business tax tips from an accountant, marketing tips from a consultant in Tennessee and start-up tips from the founder of several tech companies.

Anamitra Banerji, who manages commercial products at Twitter, said that when he joined the company from Yahoo in March, “I thought this was a place where large businesses were. What I’m finding more and more, to my surprise every single day, is business of all kinds.”

Twitter, which does not yet make money, is now concentrating on teaching businesses how they can join and use it, Mr. Banerji said, and the company plans to publish case studies. He is also developing products that Twitter can sell to businesses of all sizes this year, including features to verify businesses’ accounts and analyze traffic to their Twitter profiles.

According to Mr. Banerji, small-business owners like Twitter because they can talk directly to customers in a way that they were able to do only in person before. “We’re finding the emotional distance between businesses and their customers is shortening quite a bit,” he said.

 

עשר עצות לשימוש אפקטיבי בלינקדאין

 

לפעול בקניון הדיגיטלי

יריב לבסקי

עולם האינטרנט הוא כמו קניון ענק בעיר מגוריכם בו השכירות היא חינם, או במחיר נמוך להפליא, אין מגבלת מקום וכל הלקוחות מגיעים אליו ■ אם אתם לא שם אתם עלולים להחמיץ את הרכבת ולהשאיר למתחרים את הלקוחות בשוק ■ בעלי עסק קטן שחושבים בגדול חייבים להיות פעילים במדיה הדיגיטלית החדשה – שם נמצאים הצרכנים. חברת Pink Cake Box מניו ג’רסי היא עסק להכנת עוגות ועוגיות לארועים (ימי הולדת, מסיבות וחתונות). בחברה עובדים כ 10 עובדים אך יש להם אתר אינטרנט מלא מידע ומעודכן www.pinkcakebox.com, בלוג- blog.pinkcakebox.com ואפילו חשבון פעיל מאוד בטוויטר- twitter.com/pinkcakebox עם יותר מ-1,600 עוקבים (Followers). “כרגע סיימתי להכין את אחת העוגות הכי מאתגרות שהכנתי, והיא מסתובבת!” כתבה אן היפ, הבעלים של Pink Cake Box בטוויטר, שם קיבלו את המסר כל העוקבים שלה והופנו אל הבלוג שלה כדי לראות את צילום עוגת הבר מצווה המפוארת שסיימה להכין לאחד מלקוחותיה. גאונות בשיווק? אולי, אבל בעיקר הבנה של הצרכים והמקומות בהם נמצא הצרכן החדש, אשר מאפשרת לעסק לשלוט בכל סוגי המדיה החדשה. אגב, בחיפוש אחר האתר גיליתי גם שהם מפרסמים במנועי חיפוש את כתובת האתר – ולא ממש הופתעתי. “הקניון” הדיגיטלי אם אתם בעלי עסק קטן שחושבים בגדול, אתם חייבים להיות פעילים במדיה הדיגיטלית החדשה- שם נמצאים הצרכנים. דמיינו שפותחים קניון ענק בעיר מגוריכם וחלק מהמתחרים נוהרים לשם. השכירות היא חינם, או במחיר נמוך להפליא, אין מגבלת מקום וכל הלקוחות נמצאים שם. הקניון הזה הוא עולם הדיגיטל וכל מה שקורה כרגע באינטרנט. אם אתם לא שם אתם עלולים להחמיץ את הרכבת ולהשאיר למתחרים את הלקוחות בשוק. אבל אם תנקטו בכמה פעולות, אתם יכולים להגדיל משמעותית את מחזור העסקים שלכם! הנחת התשתית: הפעולות הבסיסיות שמומלץ לבצע בתהליך הכניסה לעולם הדיגיטל 1. הקמת אתר אינטרנט אם כבר יש לכם אתר, תעברו לנקודה הבאה. אם עדיין אין לעסק שלכם אתר אינטרנט אז כדאי לעצור כאן. מצאו ספק שיבנה לכם אתר אינטרנט בסיסי ורק אז תמשיכו הלאה בשלבים. אתר האינטרנט הוא הנוכחות של העסק שלכם ברשת, הוא מאפשר את הימצאות העסק בעשרות מיליוני חיפושים תחת הקטגוריה של העסק והוא כרטיס הביקור הזמין ביותר שיש. 2. הקמת בלוג להבדיל מאתר אינטרנט, אותו צריך להקים פעם אחת, את הבלוג צריך לתחזק ולעדכן מדי כמה ימים. אם זה נשמע כמו מחויבות שיהיה לכם קשה לעמוד בה, קחו בחשבון שעדכונים יהיו הסיבה היחידה שבזכותה הצרכנים ייכנסו שוב לבלוג. הקמת בלוג היא קלה מאוד. אני ממליץ להשתמש ב-Blogspot או ב-WordPress. לבלוג ניתן לעלות קטעי וידאו, תמונות, ליצור ולנהל רשימת מאמרים ולאפשר ללקוחות להיות מנויים על מה שאתם כותבים, באופן קבוע. אם 2 האפשרויות האלה קצת מסובכות, יש אפשרות קלה יותר – Posterous - אתר שמאפשר להקים בלוג בתוך פחות מ-60 שניות. כל מה שצריך לעשות זה לשלוח מייל אל post@posterous.com ואתם מקבלים חשבון. מאותו רגע כל מייל שאתם שולחים אל החשבון הזה יעלה ידיעה אל הבלוג שלכם. מעכשיו אין כבר שום תירוץ – יש לכם את כל הכלים להקים בלוג (מידע נוסף על השיטה ב- posterous.com/faq. 3. קידום האתר והבלוג במנועי חיפוש רוב חיפוש המידע באינטרנט מתחיל במנועי חיפוש ובעיקר ב-Google ששולט על נתח החיפוש הגדול ביותר. זה המקום שבו הלקוחות העתידיים שלכם (הם כמובן עדיין אינם יודע שירכשו מכם מוצר או שרות, אבל אתם כן) מתחילים את המסע הקצר שלהם ברחבי האינטרנט עד שימצאו את מבוקשם. שתי שיטות שמאפשרות לקדם את האתר/בלוג של העסק כדי שיופיע במנועי חיפוש: השיטה האחת – Search Engine Optimization – SEO מיועדת להצליח להביא את אתר העסק למקומות גבוהים בתוצאות החיפוש על ידי בניית האתר בצורה מסוימת ושימוש במלים נכונות, כך שהאלגוריתם של מנוע החיפוש ימצא וידרג אותו לפני המתחרים שלכם. נשמע מסובך? לא כל כך, בשביל זה יש חברות שיעשו זאת עבורכם. תקלידו את המילה SEO ותמצאו מי יעשה את זה בשבילכם. השיטה השנייה מסובכת פחות, ומביאה לתוצאות לא פחות טובות – פרסום. בכל פעם שמישהו מחפש תוצאה במנוע חיפוש יש שטח פרסומי שמציע לו אפשרויות הקשורות לחיפוש אותו ביצע. אם כרגע רשמתי את המילה ‘אופניים’ אז חלק מתוצאות החיפוש יביא אותי אל חנויות ואל כתבות העוסקות בנושא. כל הקישורים הממומנים (כלומר– פרסום) הם של עסקים שמציעים שרותים לרוכבי אופניים. זה מאוד פשוט לפרסם את האתר של העסק, ומה שעוד יותר חשוב הוא שהתשלום הינו רק בעבור ההקלקות – כלומר מי שאכן נכנס אל האתר של העסק בפועל. למעשה, האינטרנט הוא המדיה היחידה בה ההוצאה הפרסומית של העסק היא בעבור תוצאות (כניסה לאתר) ולא רק חשיפות. תרשמו בכל מנוע חיפוש את הביטוי “פרסום האתר שלי” ותקבלו את הדרך לעשות זאת ישירות מול מנועי החיפוש העיקריים. 4. פתיחת חשבון בטוויטר זה אולי נשמע קצת עתידני ושייך לעולם של חברות הענק, אבל יותר ויותר עסקים קטנים משתמשים בטוויטר ככלי לעדכן את לקוחותיהם במידע רלוונטי. פתיחת חשבון בטוויטר היא קלה מאוד ולוקחת כשתי דקות שבעקבותיהם תוכלו להתחיל לכתוב עדכונים של עד 140 תווים לכל מי שעוקב אחריכם. מה אפשר להספיק ב-140 תווים? הרבה! בתור התחלה, תוכלו להשתמש במדיה הזו כטיזר לכניסה לבלוג של העסק. בכל פעם תרשמו כמה מלים בטוויטר ואת הקישור למאמר/עדכון חדש בבלוג. כל מי שעוקב אחריכם מקבל את העדכונים האלה. תוכלו להפיץ לחברים וקהל לקוחותיכם את כתובת חשבון הטוויטר כדי שיתחילו לעקוב אחריכם ולהתעדכן. חשוב מאוד להניח נכון את התשתית הדיגיטלית – עיצוב האתר, המסרים בבלוג וטוויטים שתרשמו הם מהלכי השיווק שלכם. עליכם לבנות אותם נכון כבר בהתחלה. אני מציע שתשתמשו קצת בכל הכלים שהזכרתי וגם שתקראו עוד מידע. כך תוכלו ללמוד איך עובד עולם הדיגיטל ותוכלו להיחשף לדוגמאות נוספות של עסקים קטנים, שנמצאים בשלבים הראשונים שלהם בעולם זה. עוד עסק קטן שחושב גדול Naked Pizza היא חברה שמייצרת ומוכרת פיצה – הפיצה שלהם אורגנית והדגש שם הוא על טריות ובריאות. החברה נכנסה לעולם הדיגיטל. היא פתחה חשבון בטוויטר שבו היא מציעה למי שעוקב אחריה לקבל קופון עם מבצעים והנחות. כאשר החברה קונה פרסום של שלט חוצות היא מפרסמת את חשבון הטוויטר שלה ולא את מספר הטלפון שלה – וזה מהפכני. במקום שהלקוח יתקשר פעם אחת ויזמין פיצה, החברה מעדיפה שהוא יעקוב אחריה באופן שוטף בטוויטר. ואכן, יש לה נכון להיום כ-6,500 – עוקבים בטוויטר. רוצים לדעת את הסוף של הסיפור? קונצרן המזון קראפט השקיע לפני כחודש בחברה. אני מאמין שזה בעיקר בזכות מחזור המכירות שהמודל העסקי הייחודי הצליח לייצר (מודל זכיינות עם דגש על מחויבות לאיכות וטריות) – אבל אין לי ספק שהתפיסה השיווקית החדשנית של החברה עזרה לא מעט. אכן, מגוון האפשרויות הקיימות באינטרנט מאפשרות גם לעסק קטן – להתנהג כמו עסק גדול.

How to Market Your Business With Facebook

 

 

By KERMIT PATTISON

Business owner, you might want to friend Facebook.

A growing number of businesses are making Facebook an indispensible part of hanging out their shingles. Small businesses are using it to find new customers, build online communities of fans and dig into gold mines of demographic information.

“You need to be where your customers are and your prospective customers are,” said Clara Shih, author of “The Facebook Era” (Pearson Education, 2009). “And with 300 million people on Facebook, and still growing, that’s increasingly where your audience is for a lot of products and services.”

Start Small

For most businesses, Facebook Pages (distinct from individual profiles and Facebook groups) are the best place to start. Pages allow businesses to collect “fans” the way celebrities, sports teams, musicians and politicians do. There are now 1.4 million Facebook Pages and they collect more than 10 million fans every day, according to the site.

Businesses can easily create a Web presence with Facebook, even if they don’t have their own Web site (most companies still should maintain a Web site to reach people who don’t use Facebook or whose employers block access to the site). Businesses can claim a vanity address so that their Facebook address reflects the business name, like www.facebook.com/Starbucks. Facebook pages can link to the company’s Web site or direct sales to e-commerce sites like Ticketmaster or Amazon.

Facebook offers an array of tools and networks, and it’s easy to wander down too many paths. Ms. Shih recommends that newcomers start by asking themselves a simple question: What is your basic objective? Is it getting more customers in the door? Building brand awareness? Creating a venue for customer support? Once you have set your goal, you can strategize accordingly.

“You can waste a lot of time on Facebook,” said Ms. Shih, founder of Hearsay Labs, a Facebook marketing software company. “But if you’re a business, you don’t have any time to waste. Figure out your objectives first, start small and do things that help you accomplish your objectives.”

Ms. Shih suggests that businesses ask friends and family to become fans of their pages so that they display a respectable crowd of supporters when they debut. Pages can grow organically by word of mouth — the average Facebook user has 130 friends on the site — or by advertising or promotion.

You can enliven your page with photos, comments and useful information. As you grow more comfortable, you can add videos or business applications. Flaunt your personality. The page of an ice cream parlor should feel different than that of a funeral parlor. “The pages that are most successful,” said Tim Kendall, the director of monetization at Facebook, “are the ones that really replicate the personality of the business.”

It’s Not All About Selling

Art Meets Commerce, a New York marketing firm, has struck up a never-ending conversation with fans. The company uses Facebook as a crucial part of its publicity campaigns for theatrical productions. Its Facebook page for the show “Rock of Ages,” for example, has more than 13,000 fans.

Staff members constantly update the page with new photos, videos and quotes from the cast. They’ve also learned what not to do: Once they posted a video of Paris Hilton plugging the show and got negative feedback from fans who professed to be sick of her.

But it’s not just about marketing — or, at least, it’s not just about selling. “You end up moving away from being an Internet marketer and go into almost customer service,” said Jim Glaub, creative director at the agency. “A lot of times people use Facebook to ask questions: What’s the student rush? How long is the show? Where’s parking? You have to answer.”

Some basic rules: Buy-buy-buy messages won’t fly. The best practitioners make Facebook less about selling and more about interacting. Engage with fans and critics. Listen to what people are saying, good and bad. You may even pick up ideas for how to improve your business. Keep content fresh. Use status updates and newsfeeds to tell fans about specials, events, contests or anything of interest.

These interactions can take a vast amount of time — the “Rock of Ages” page has 300 to 600 interactions every week — but they can also provide a big payoff. Facebook is one of the show’s top sources of new ticket sales.

Last year, Art Meets Commerce introduced a Facebook ad campaign to promote an Off Broadway run of the musical “Fela!” The campaign aimed at Facebook users with interests like theatrical shows or Afro beat. According to the company, it generated 18 million impressions, more than 5,700 clicks and $40,000 in ticket sales — all for $4,400 spent on advertising.

“We can advertise all day, but if we don’t give them what they want they will not be a fan anymore,” said Mark Seeley, a marketing associate at Art Meets Commerce. “Even though we represent the shows as marketers, we don’t want to constantly tell people to buy tickets. You talk to them like you talk to your friends on Facebook.”

Aim at Potential Customers Only

Some guys use Facebook to find single women. Chris Meyer used it to find women who are already engaged.

Mr. Meyer, a wedding photographer in Woodbury, Minn., had had little luck with traditional advertising. A full-page ad in a bridal magazine generated zero leads and a trade show yielded only four bookings, barely covering the cost of his booth. But Facebook proved a digital bonanza.

Mr. Meyer aimed at women ages 22 to 28 who listed their martial status as engaged in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metropolitan area. He estimates that he has spent about $300 on Facebook ads in the last two years and has generated more than $60,000 in business. He says about three-quarters of his clients now come to him through Facebook, either from ads or recommendations from friends.

“I’d be out of business if I didn’t have Facebook,” Mr. Meyer said. “Especially with this economy, I need to stretch each marketing dollar as much as I possibly can.”

Facebook enables small businesses to engage in targeted marketing that they only could have dreamed about a few years ago. Facebook users fill out profiles with information like hometown, employer, religious beliefs, interests, education and favorite books, movies and TV shows — all of which can help advertisers deliver messages to specific demographic slices.

As you create an ad, you can add demographic criteria and keywords and see how many Facebook users fall into your target audience and modify it accordingly to get the most bang for your buck. Advertisers can elect to pay per impression or per click, set maximum budgets and schedule the ad to run on specific dates.

Thus a coffee shop in San Francisco can display advertisements only to local people whose profiles or group affiliations suggest they like coffee. According to Mr. Kendall, Facebook’s director of monetization, ads can also aim at people based on social exchanges, like a person who sends a message to a friend, “let’s get together for coffee” or who posts a status update about just having awakened and needing some java.

“We can help you find customers before they even think about searching for you,” Mr. Kendall said. “We’re very, very well-positioned to generate demand, based on the fact that we know a tremendous amount about a user.”

The Facebook ad system provides instant feedback with metrics like the number of impressions and clicks-through. This reporting allows Mr. Meyer to improve his advertising; if one ad doesn’t generate enough hits within 24 hours, he pulls it and tries something new.

Give Away Cupcakes!

Charles Nelson has an M.B.A. and is a former investment banker who owns a growing national chain of stores. Yet this 40-year-old entrepreneur checks Facebook with the frequency of a college student. Up to 30 times a day, he logs onto the social networking site via his laptop or Blackberry.

For Mr. Nelson, this is serious business. He and his wife, Candace, own Sprinkles, a cupcake bakery that relies on social media in lieu of traditional advertising. Mr. Nelson considers Facebook marketing essential. “People are out there talking about your business everyday, whether you’re looking or not,” he said. “This gives people a place to come and speak directly to us.”

Sprinkles uses Facebook to give customers a whiff of what’s cooking. Every day it posts a password on Facebook that can be redeemed for a free cupcake. Since April, its fan base has risen tenfold to 70,000.

Mr. Nelson and his wife previously worked as investment bankers in the technology sector and were keenly aware that, even for a traditional business like a bakery, social media is a crucial ingredient. His advice: make it relevant to the customer, keep it fresh and remember that the return on investment may come slowly.

“Be patient with it,” Mr. Nelson advised. “People are not going to flock to your social media site overnight. Technology is about the network effect. It takes time for those connections to build.”

Quick Tips:

• Identify a short list of goals before you begin.
• Show some personality in your page.
• Don’t shill. Use your page to engage-and trust that sales will follow.
• Use Facebook data to analyze your customer demographics.

Estimated Quarterly U.S. Retail E-commerce Sales as a Percent of Total Quarterly Retail Sales:

the estimate of U.S. retail e-commerce sales for the second quarter of 2009, adjusted for seasonal variation, but not for price changes, was $32.4 billion, an increase of 2.2 percent (±1.2%) from the first quarter of 2009. Total retail sales for the second quarter of 2009 were estimated at $906.0 billion, a decrease of 0.4 percent (±0.4%)* from the first quarter of 2009. The second quarter 2009 e commerce estimate decreased 4.4 percent (±2.1%) from the second quarter of 2008 while total retail sales decreased 10.8 percent (±0.4%) in the same period. E-commerce sales in the second quarter of 2009 accounted for 3.6 percent of total sales.

On a not adjusted basis, the estimate of U.S. retail e-commerce sales for the second quarter of 2009 totaled $30.8 billion, an increase of 2.1 percent (±1.2%) from the first quarter of 2009. The second quarter 2009 e-commerce estimate decreased 4.5 percent (±2.1%) from the second quarter of 2008 while total retail sales decreased 10.6 percent (±0.4%) in the same period. E-commerce sales in the second quarter of 2009 accounted for 3.3 percent of total sales.