Testing Two Sites With Same Products

[bathgems]

I was thinking about setting up a second site selling our same merchandise but with a different selling proposition. Our current site focuses on selling unique bathroom vanities at a big discount.

My thought was to set up a second site with a focus on these same vanities being a high end fashion statement and sporting higher prices.

I would use two different company names and different descriptions but the merchandise would be the same. My theory is that there are different customer types searching for discount vanities than are searching for fashion statements.

As all of our sales are online, I was wondering if this strategy invites problems as regards, search engines and duplicate content? ANy other concerns?

Steve

[stymiee]

Duplicate content will only be an issue if you present them in exactly the same way. Otherwise only one ecommerce site would come up in a search for any product as everyone else would be duplicate content.

And your idea is a sound one in theory. Competing against yourself but from a different angle gives you the opportunity to reach a wider audience. Of course you still have the issue of how are you going to attract people to your website, etc.

[incrediblehelp]

Really don't see much of an issue as long as the pitch (content) is different. Their are plenty of websites out there that sell the same DVD players. The problem from Google point of view is when one company tries to dominate the search listings using basically the same copy/content. That is a not a good search user experience and Google will punish those types of websites.

[Tubby]

I like the basic thinking. . Years ago when I was on the sales floor, different approaches got different results, sometimes the sale pitch can be too 'pushy' sometimes too 'laid back'. On the sales floor the seller can get an instant response (feedback - just from the customers facial expressions) -
The net is different, we create a web page and it sits there unvarying. . this is one of the more difficult aspects of selling on the net. . Trying varied approaches is a good idea.

The problem is - well the problems are many.

If it were me attempting to try varied sales pitches I would probably sit down and work out how I could achieve this on the original single site. I think you have plenty of problems to counter. but solving them could well worth the effort.