Struggling Online Shop

[marknc]

We have been online since April 2002 and still very much alive. However, business seems to be very slack. We are experiencing the worst September for 4 years and though we regularly keep the website fresh and up to date visitors are not buying.

We sell costume and fashion jewellery. We have around 1,500 products and add new items almost daily. We get fantastic search engine results from Google for all our keywords, usually on the first page without the need to scroll, and very often in the number 1 position. Our products are regularly called in by many fashion magazines to be included in fashion shoots for up and coming features. We have accumulated a myriad of back and reciprocal links over the years and some big website referers for our Bridal section such as hitched and handbag.com.

We have been featured in the fashion slot of GMTV on and off for some years and our name has become a bit of a "buzz word" in London and other major cities throughout the UK.

We give our customers the oportunity to comment when they place an order and in 98% of cases these are glowing comments, "beautiful design", "very colourful", "easy navigation" etc. We have a high incidence of repeat customers, some having been loyal for years.

But still, orders are way down. We are currently getting around 800 to 1,000 visitors a day and only around 3 to 4,000 page views. In the past, relative page view figures have been much higher.

At the moment our conversion rate is running at around .3 to .5%. Alarmingly low actually. We simply cannot figure out what we are doing or not doing!

So Im putting this out to this forum to see if anyone is experiencing similar circumstances. To try and find out if there's any glaring flaws in our procedure or website presence. We are a small team but work very hard to keep up the creative energy and delivery of the website content, and would welcome any suggestions, advice, comments and criticisms that might help us reverse the decline and start growing again.

Our website address is Jewellery Shop for Costume and Fashion Jewellery for all ages.

Look forward to hearing from you.

Mark

[crankydave]

Join the club.

Being in the jewelry business as long as you have, I'm sure I don't need to tell you that this is a soft time of year to begin with.

Couple that with the high current price of metals, the high energy costs folks are having to pay, etc., and people are being a bit tighter with their spending than usual.

Dave

[Feydakin]

Yup yup.. I run a B&M and Online jewelry store and sales are simply down in the segment as a whole.. Welcome to the joys of selling luxury items in a tight economy

[duvetman]

Hi Marc,
I've just had a quick look at your website and noticed some links were not working, Link to Us . Other Links . Terms & Conditions . Privacy Policy . Returns

This may be one of the reasons that customers are a little aprehensive to buy, especially the Returns link.

Hope this has helped.

[nipplecharms1]

Hi Mark,

First, let me say I would cut off my left... well you know what, to have a site a nice as yours. Awesome.

Second, I have to agree with Dave (as I do often with many of his comments) and that of Feydakin. We too have a jewelry site. Ours is more adult. We had a bad experience with Gozizzle at the last update and hopefully will make that up soon. We are seeing an up-tick for us on that engine.

That said, yes, we think the market is softer here in the US also. With the higher costs of most things here, people are looking at luxury items with a second thought. Our issues are that and our site design sucks. Wow, did I say that?

If you are doing as well in the organic searches are you say you are, take comfort in that fact and that eventually it will turn around. Keep up that work for the day people start buying again.

But if you find other answers, please post them here too. Good luck and keep us informed.

Michael

[craigmn3]

My Pool Clients tell me that they had the worst pool season in twenty years this year and that is echoed by everyone in the industry.
Over here in the US the fall out from questionable lending practices have closed up our wallets and our sphincters tighter than a drum. It will take a good year to sort this out. Add to it the climbing oil prices and you have slow market conditions all around

[marknc]

Originally Posted by duvetman

Hi Marc,
...noticed some links were not working, Link to Us . Other Links . Terms & Conditions . Privacy Policy . Returns

This may be one of the reasons that customers are a little aprehensive to buy, especially the Returns link.

Hope this has helped.

Thanks for that Duvetman, well spotted. I've fixed these now. Cold comfort that others are feeling the pinch also. We have a massive debt crisis here in the UK which gets worse every year. Gas is now at around £5 ($10) per gallon, mortgage interest rates are up, house prices are at break-neck proportions. Last Christmas stores were giving 50% off sales in November and December in the run up to it, desperately trying to drum up business.

I don't want to be a prophet of doom but it's hard to see how things are going to get better. I suppose we have to be thankful for small improvements these days.

I think we've got to think smarter actually. I mean a thousand people a day is a lot of visitors, not by ebay or amazon standards of course, but for a small independent internet jewellery shop it's not bad. Those visitors come because they are tempted and curious and probably would like to buy something for themselves, but something is stopping them from going all the way. With over 1,500 products, it's hard to believe we don't have something for everyone, especially as a lot of our stuff is hard to find anywhere else, if at all. So, creativity is the key. Make an offer they can't refuse! An inescapable incentive to buy.

Value for money is everything. Without becoming a home-spun psychologist, I think there is an element of "guilt" that stops people from buying something that is "not necessary" in their lives. I wonder how many shopping carts are dumped at the checkout for this reason. Guilt can hit a visitor as soon as she sees something she really likes and wants, bang! close the browser, she's gone, for today!

She will probably come back and it's up to us to offer fantastic value to overcome her guilt, in a way that does not compromise the so-called "luxury" products that we offer. The words "quality" and "bargain" have an uneasy relationship!

Anyway, I will keep you posted as to how things go. I do take comfort in the fact that we are not alone in this struggle so good luck to all of you, and do keep those comments coming, good ideas can come from the strangest places.
Mark

[gelcreative]

Hi Mark

I know it's still September, and the C word is a while off, but could you tempt buyers with "Buy now before Christmas and get a £xx" as an incentive to drive sales up to the big day? I know I am even thinking of being really efficient and starting early this year because the purse strings are especially tight and I'd rather buy a bargain now than wait until the 24th December for the prices to go down.

Just my ha'penny worth. (Nice site - maybe the home page could be a little bit more visual and less words.... we know what jewellery is... we just want to get to the product pages)

Jane

[mailboxlady]

I agree with Jane - give incentives now!

My first thoughts on your site were "too many faces"- I thought it was a site for make up at first. For a site on Jewelry, I want to see JEWELRY! When I clicked on that home page, for some reason I didn't feel enticed to go in, and I don't know why. (I also personally appreciate larger text).

I am an on line merchant as well, offering quality outdoor accents for peoples homes and sales this year are flat compared to last year. I've been on line 10+ years with an average of 10% per year growth, but I don't think that will happen for 2007. Some days 2 sales, the next day 20. Sales are VERY uneven and erratic. The smaller items, such as a $80 plaque for ones home have not been doing well, but the larger over $1000 items such as Cupolas and Arbors have been doing great. Go figure.

Just my 2 cents. Hang in there!

Barb
Mahvelous Mailboxes! We have a huge selection of Mailboxes, Flags for Mailboxes, Address Plaques, Hanging Metal House Numbers, Brass House Numbers, Mailbox Posts, and accessories for mailboxes.

[jcisar]

Hey Mark,

Online jewelry stores face the inherent challenge of meeting a shopper's desire to experience the jewelry, (see, feel, wear) as part of their decision making process. Aside from the claimed slump in sales effecting many online jewelers as a whole, perhaps shoppers may be having less disposable income for luxury goods after the market took a plunge, mortgage prices increased, and oil broke past $80 per barrel. But I'd take a closer look at website usability and design.

Question. Are you using web analytics to locate bottlenecks on your website? I'f not, I'm sure Web Analytics would help in revealing trouble spots. Also, try Multivariate A/B testing of web page designs, and asking visitors if they would take a few minutes to participate in a survey and ask questions addressing product selection and website design and website usability so you can gather feedback.

Hope this feedback helps and I wasn't merely recommending the obvious.

John

[wpriley]

Mark, when site visitors aren't buying, it generally indicates they didn't find what they were looking for and/or they were resistant to the pricing or apparent item quality. Here are a few quick suggestions:

If your site search function keeps track of search phrases, I'd examine them looking for items you don't carry but could add.

I see you also have the ability to search by price range. I examine those searches and consider adding more merchandise in the most popular price ranges.

Similarly, I'd look at your most browsed categories and consider adding more merchandise in the most popular categories.

I'd look at your most frequent exit pages and consider revising those product's descriptions, photos or pricing.

Add a "suggestive selling" function to your shopping cart showing matching or complementary items the visitor may want to consider. You might even offer a discount on the suggested items ("Click to add these matching earrings to your cart and save 10%...").

I'd also consider, as a test, reducing prices on selected items or categories and seeing if there's a resulting increase in sales volume sufficient to offset the reduced pricing. If the test is positive, cosider a site wide price reduction. Also, if you get substantial business on your 50% off items, consider adding more items there.

Browsing 1,500 items is tough. I'd suggest adding a home page scrolling image "showcase" of your best products designed to catch a visitor's eye and motivating them to take a look. The scrolling image will, of course, need to be linked to the matching product detail page.

I'd also make the entries in your home page "and much much more..." tag line links to the corresponding product category pages.

I'd additionally add links on your category pages linking to the 50% off items in that category (if applicable).

I see you have your "order hotline" number on the site. Consider adding text encouraging your site visitors to call if they did not find what they were looking for or would like to confer with a "knowledgeable jewelry expert".

Similarly, I've found adding a "click here for live support" function adds incremental business. I find that only a small percentage of site visitors use the function but those that do are substantially more likely to buy and also have larger average order sizes. The best live support function is LivePerson but it's a pricey hosted solution. I prefer PHP Live which is a low cost one-time purchase and is rock solid. Help Center Live is a free open source solution that's also good. All three offer a pro-active "invite visitor to chat" function but I found this seemed to scare my visitors away.

The presence of the ScanAlert Hacker Safe logo is purported to substantial boost eCommerce site conversions. I haven't tried this myself but their reference list is impressive.

Add a "join our mailing list function" promising subscribers information on new items, sale s and (if you're inclined) discount coupons. Mail this list along with your past customers as frequently as once a week.

I see you ship worldwide. Consider adding some "assurance text" to make non-UK visitors comfortable with you as an international merchant.

I hope this helps. Your site is very nice!

[sanver]

I must say that the members in this forum are very helpful to fellow members. marknc got a lot of insight into how his online business can become better and more profitable all without paying bucks to fancy marketing consultants. Great.

We also have two online businessess - one for Web Hosting in India and another for Airport Transfers & Car rentals from Mumbai & Pune Airports. Here the conversion rate from online visitors is good. The challange we are facing here is how to take number of daily unique visitors from the current level of 50 to, let us say, 500.

Any guidance for me on this?

As far as online chat option is concerned, we are using Crafty Syntax Live Help on our website. Very easy to setup, fully open source, supports unlimited agents and departments. I would strongly recommend it. If anybody wants, we can provide FREE trial of Crafty Syntax for your website. All you need to do is put oneline of HTML code on the place where Chat Icon is to appear. Login to your admin / user control panel and you are live on your website.

Sanjay Verma
Sanver E-Solutions
Mumbai, India

[PumaSpirit]

Originally Posted by craigmn3

My Pool Clients tell me that they had the worst pool season in twenty years this year and that is echoed by everyone in the industry.
Over here in the US the fall out from questionable lending practices have closed up our wallets and our sphincters tighter than a drum. It will take a good year to sort this out. Add to it the climbing oil prices and you have slow market conditions all around

Join the Club. According to the news, we (in the US) are heading for a recession. My site has also never had so few sales and to top it of, the few it has right now are mostly smaller orders.

Gee, has anyone been grocery shopping lately??? Prices are sky high! Gas prices are over the top, etc.

Hang in there everyone. Things go in cycles and will always get better.

[pagetta]

Unfortunately it seems to be a trend - high street sales are down everywhere people are tightening purse strings and rising interest rates mean disposable income is at a low.

that said i think there are some things you can do to perhaps improve conversions - for exapmle if i saw a beautiful necklace in a wedding magazine and went to your website i don't see an immediate link for 'necklaces' and would probably leave.

after looking i see there is one down the bottom, but ease of use facilitates more conversions, it would help if you had a main menu on the left, or used the bar across the top as a main nav menu that stays consistently in the same place for some major categories eg 'necklaces - earrings - rings - wedding - american' etc etc - at the minute these words in the top bar aren't links it is very confusing.

also i agree with the comment earlier - its great you have 3 major products featured on your home page as a 'call-to-action' but perhaps instead of the somewhat random pictures you could have some pictures of your most beautiful products. also as 'features' perhaps have something more inviting than 'earrings' - like have wedding, swarovski, navel and 50% off (or use your stats to find some of the more popular search terms that attract visitors so that your site can reflect these)

i'm personally not a fan of the black/blue colour scheme it is a bit 'techy' for a jewellry site more feminine colours may work better - but that is purely personal choice if your site has being doing well so far then stick with what works! that said, if sales are down perhaps a refresh of your site might help.

from recent experience i can say that flicking through a wedding magazine full of pink/feminine imagery, then see a piece of jewellry i like and go their website, a black site wouldn't really appeal to the fram of mind i was in at that time!

i do like the site though and the jewellry is fantastic you have great inages of it.

[marknc]

Well, I'm overwhemed with your responses, particularly wpriley and pagetta. These are really most helpful. We will definitely try all of your suggestions and see if we can't get things moving.

Email marketing is not easy these days. With so much rubbish circulating the mail services, spam filters ands junk mail folders are seriously impeeding delivery. We have put clear notices at the checkout and on the receipt page now alerting people that they need to add us to their safe list in order to receive their order confirmation and any newsletters they sign up for. I believe this has helped.

Thanks once again. Will keep you posted.

Mark

[Veikoh]

conversion rate of 0.3-0.5 is not very low for general merchandise. it's seems to be industry standard as you have lot of competition out there. mailing lists, coupons and more active marketing or special branding could increase it to 1-3%. To have higher conversion rates, your product should be unique, hot, easily downloadable and extremly well targeted. those are business models where conversion rate can be 25% or even 45%. Some new hot e-book for example. businesses I have consulted here, for example belfast black taxi tour, which is unique can be extremly well targeted, etc.. I would expect the conversion rate to be around 5%.

[Clarrie]

Originally Posted by marknc

We have been online since April 2002 and still very much alive. However, business seems to be very slack. We are experiencing the worst September for 4 years and though we regularly keep the website fresh and up to date visitors are not buying.

We sell costume and fashion jewellery. We have around 1,500 products and add new items almost daily. We get fantastic search engine results from Google for all our keywords, usually on the first page without the need to scroll, and very often in the number 1 position. Our products are regularly called in by many fashion magazines to be included in fashion shoots for up and coming features. We have accumulated a myriad of back and reciprocal links over the years and some big website referers for our Bridal section such as hitched and handbag.com.

We have been featured in the fashion slot of GMTV on and off for some years and our name has become a bit of a "buzz word" in London and other major cities throughout the UK.

We give our customers the oportunity to comment when they place an order and in 98% of cases these are glowing comments, "beautiful design", "very colourful", "easy navigation" etc. We have a high incidence of repeat customers, some having been loyal for years.

But still, orders are way down. We are currently getting around 800 to 1,000 visitors a day and only around 3 to 4,000 page views. In the past, relative page view figures have been much higher.

At the moment our conversion rate is running at around .3 to .5%. Alarmingly low actually. We simply cannot figure out what we are doing or not doing!

So Im putting this out to this forum to see if anyone is experiencing similar circumstances. To try and find out if there's any glaring flaws in our procedure or website presence. We are a small team but work very hard to keep up the creative energy and delivery of the website content, and would welcome any suggestions, advice, comments and criticisms that might help us reverse the decline and start growing again.

Our website address is Jewellery Shop for Costume and Fashion Jewellery for all ages.

Look forward to hearing from you.

Mark

Lots of good feedback already in this thread. Something else might be a jump in the level of competition - in the last year or so, I've seen quite a few new online jewellery sites (and presumably there's quite a lot more than just these launched) - so I suspect there's a lot more competition around diluting your sales.

All the sites I looked at were pretty similar and not a heap different from the shop part of your site, which means the only obvious differentiator between you and them (apart from your great looking home page) is price.

Maybe you need to give people a few more reasons for buying from you and not your competitors - uniqueness and quality - highlight the quality, product and service.

There's nothing that shouts out to me what Mad About Jewellery stands for - I quite like straplines that get over a message really quickly: say something like "No compromise on quality or price" or more direct "Top Quality, Best Service, Mad Prices" - doesn't actually mean much except it makes some form of qualititive statement and sets a tone. Think of those supermarket slogans.

You need to build buyer confidence - we're trustworthy, you can buy safely and with confidence from us, etc. If you've got good press reports, shout about it - What the press say about us, see our products on TV, customer testimonials etc. Give people reasons not to bother to shop elsewhere. Make it really obvious you are a quality operation, established, trustworthy, and reliable.

These are principles that are used in retail and direct mail marketing, and they are equally relevant to online business. Price is important, but confidence is also.

[crankydave]

An additional thought...

Yesterday, I played around a bit on your site. Clicked on a prominent link on the HP, then had to click an another to see product, added the first I saw to the cart, and went through a mock checkout.

The longer it takes to find and add products to the cart and go through the checkout process, the more opportunity the customer has to "think" about their purchase and abandon the cart.

You might consider, if you've not done so already, having a few friends and/or family members "shop" your site. Give them a task to accomplish, observe them, and get their feedback.

Dave