Archive for the ‘Offline Businesses Going Online’ Category

In these days of endless spam, it is incredibly tempting to try to avoid those countless reduction and enlargement messages that fill our mail boxes. Recently, I was offline for about 14 hours, due to thunderstorms blasting thru — I live in Kentucky in a 100 year old house and I unplug the computer in bad weather.

When I finally logged back on, my primary email address (which is a ancient 10 years old) had about 250 spam messages in the Junk Mailbox and another 350 messages in the Inbox. Of the messages in the Inbox, only about a dozen were NOT spam. YIKES! (To date, my personal favorite spam was promoting Pro Viagra — a concept I am still having difficulty wrapping by brain around — but, I digress!)

Anyway, we all get SPAM all the time and I am sure, we all HATE it! The temptation is to hide our email address or make folks fill out a form, but, as a business owner, it is YOUR responsibility to be accessible to your customers/clients. If they aren’t able to reach you easily, they will take their business elsewhere, and rightly so!

While there are a number of methods that can be used, I want to take today’s post to discuss an unfortunate side effect of the whole spam mess — ISP blocking. Many ISP (Internet Service Providers) and some hosting companies (the folks who provide the computer that a web site lives on) block some email addresses. Several of the big free email companies also do this.

This means that you, as a business owner may not be receiving some legitimate business email, even from folks who have no problems in the past — and — YOU MAY NOT KNOW IT!

I ran into this problem recently with a business hosted on one of the big name hosting companies. I know for a fact that many of my industry retailers host their ecommerce sites on here — and now I can no longer email them from my primary email address!

Can the problem be resolved? Possibly, but — not from my end. They have to take the initiative to do so.

Anyway, as a result of this problem, I have revised my stand on business email addresses of online businesses. I still feel that a business’s primary email address should be associated with the business’s web site – YourName@YourSite.com, for instance, but also I now believe that a business should also have — and display– a back up email address.

After much thought, I recommend using the Gmail service from Google for the backup email address. It should be reserved ONLY for business and should be checked often. There is a Cheat Sheet available and I have put a quick (and free) Tutorial up in the Academy – BASIC at SurviveAndConquerCoaching.com if you need help.

As an FYI – there is a recent Security Issue regarding Gmail and I have posted a Special Update in the Downloads area of SurviveAndConquerCoaching.com

Do have both email addresses on every page of your web site — easy to find and use. Don’t make it a scavenger hunt! ;-)

Sharing the Road to Success!

Tink

I ran into a problem recently… out of the blue!

I have a professional relationship with someone in one of my niches. We have communicated by email for a couple of years with no problems, other than an occasional email disappearing into the VOID. Ok, that happens. It can be inconvenient, but compared to the ease and speed with which most email is handled, I can live with it.

This last time however, out of the blue, and as Murphy would have it, with a deadline looming, my emails to her were suddenly AWOL!

Unfortunately, it took a while for me to realize that she wasn’t getting my precious missives… and she simply thought that I had failed to meet my deadline. ;-( To further complicate matters, all of this happened late one night on a weekend, so picking up the phone wasn’t a practical option… sigh…

Once the dust had settled, I realized that for some reason, Yahoo will no longer accept email from my tried and true primary email address. I have a number of web sites and use a couple of different hosting companies so I sent the final email from another site on a different host and she was able to receive it.

The problem arose in that she felt that this was MY problem, since it was MY email that was being blocked. As I looked into the matter, it became clear that I had no options to clear up the problem with Yahoo… sigh…

In this case, we now have a work around should we need it, but it got me to thinking. I consult with a fair number of independent retailers, many of whom sell online, and most of whom use email in their businesses.

I had just finished writing my ebook, *Email Marketing the RIGHT Way* and realized that I need to come up with a practical strategy to recommend to my retail clients, should this problem arise with their businesses.

I am in the process of writing a new Cheat Sheet to deal with this issue and to provide supplemental information for the Email Marketing the RIGHT Way. I’ll let you know as soon as the Cheat Sheet is ready!

Sharing the Road to Success!

Tink

One of the biggest barriers to Online success is applying Offline reasoning to Online situations– incorrectly.

Online marketing (and selling) is very complex and all of us are looking for ways to decipher its complexity. One tempting method is to look for parallels between the Offline and Online worlds and then apply that Offline reasoning to Online situations.

Now, as a former Theater Scene Designer, I was trained to use metaphor as a problem solving tool. Comparing apples to apples can be very effective, but in many cases, applying Offline reasoning to Online problems is more like comparing apples to screwdrivers.

What brought this to mind was hearing (third hand, I will admit) about a company that is planning on selling digital products online. OK… that is good. I sell digital products online and know that it is a viable business model.

Now– I do realize that as Offline Retailers YOU won’t be selling digital (downloadable) products, but please bear with me here! This is simply a conevnient exampel to illustrate the problem with drawing incorrect parallels. ;-)
What concerned me was hearing (again, third hand) that this company did not plan to show the book pricing until the item is added to the shopping cart.

As it was explained to me, the reason was that they were following the example of “real books” whose pricing is located either on the back or inside the front jacket, so viewing the price requires a little work.

Hmmmm… OK, let’s think about this…

I see this as faulty logic for three reasons. (Truth be told, I quit looking after these three, because I had other things I needed to do. LOL)

My thoughts —

Problem #1 – Following the example of “real books” only works if you understand WHY it is that way and your product and its selling mechanism are the same as “real books”.

With real books, putting the price on the back or inside the front jacket encourages the shopper to pick up the books. Many times this leads to looking more closely at the book, opening it and reading an excerpt, looking at the table of contents, the index, or, better yet, any illustrations (can you tell that I am a visual person? LOL).

The potential customer is interacting with the book, building a relationship with the book, and once that happens is more likely to want to give it a good home (meaning purchase it, for any of you poor souls who are not *book people* … smile…)

With a digital product, displayed online, this won’t happen…

While a digital product may have the same intellectual content as a physical printed version, the differences in its physical manifestation – it is a file on a computer, not a physical book– make this an excellent example of comparing apples to screwdrivers.

Problem #2 – Pricing on digital products can vary greatly.

With a physical product, it is easy to guess a ballpark price.

I don’t expect to pay the same for a beat-up second hand paperback book as I would for the newest, large, lavishly illustrated and beautifully printed coffee table book.

Pricing digital products is much less obvious. Often it is difficult to separate the issues of physical creation and manufacturing costs from the value of the intellectual property that the digital product contains. As a result, it is very difficult to predict accurately what the product cost will be.

Problem #3 – Online purchasers are wary about being taken advantage of or scammed.

Many folks are not aware that it is safe to back out of a purchase even after you have products in an online shopping cart.

Many are afraid that simply starting the transaction will commit them. Will they be willing to start the process, simply to find out the price? I doubt it!

One of the most important elements of successful online selling is creating customer comfort and trust. For that reason, it is important that an online merchant provide open and comprehensive information about a transaction BEFORE the transaction begins. This includes information such as a detailed description of the item, photograph of the item (if applicable), the format/size of the item, shipping charges, exactly how the transaction will take place AND the product’s price!

I believe that asking the customer to start the transaction before establishing the price is a poor marketing strategy.

Thinks of how differences between countries and cultures can affect business. In some parts of the world, black is the color of mourning, in others, white is worn to honor the dead. To someone wishing to show proper respect, wearing the wrong clothing can send a disrespectful message nonetheless.

There are many knowledgeable Offline business people who are moving Online and bringing with them a wealth of knowledge and breadth of experience from which all of us benefit.

The danger lies in NOT recognizing that Online is a very different universe than Offline. It is important to learn about this new Online world before incorrectly applying business principles from the old Offline world.

Sharing the Road to Success,

Tink