Looking for advice and your opinion on my business

[jcrewe]

Hi everyone,

I am new here and I am really looking for some help here as I am totally stumped as to why I am getting very few sales from my website. I just want to start by saying that I am NOT using this to get more hits to my website....I really truly would appreciate some CONSTRUCTIVE critisism on my website, the products I offer and my prices from people in my local area (BC and specifically Greater Vancouver).

I create personalized event favours such as chocolate bars, Rolo cigars, wine and water bottle labels, tic tacs and invitations for event like weddings, birthdays, baby showers etc. My web address is www.funwrappers.ca

My site receives quite a few hits from local residents....here are some stats for the last 30 days:

456 Visitors of which:
338 were NEW visitors
Total time spend 14h 33m
Bounce rate 38% (Bounce rate is when a viewer visits your website and then leaves quickly)
Even with the bounce rate at 38%, that still leaves 282 visitors perusing my website.

I have only received a few orders within the last 30 days and I am baffled as to why.....what am I doing wrong? Is my website that horrible? Or maybe my pricing is off, although my pricing is in line with my competitors (as few as there are in my area).

I would love to hear what others think....please be kind, I've worked very hard at creating my website and my business.

Thank you

Jennifer

[insomniac]

Maybe you need to advertise and get your website popular somehow?
You can't expect most of your visitors to buy something right?
Posted via RS Mobile

[Jsunu]

For me I feel like the websites has a general lack of pictures which examplifies your work etc. I think you need to add more pictures showing more samples even in your first page. That way, customers know right away what you are selling and what it would look like in finished form without having to dig through the menus.

[jcrewe]

Originally Posted by 737!

Maybe you need to advertise and get your website popular somehow?
You can't expect most of your visitors to buy something right?
Posted via RS Mobile

Oops, I failed to mention in my original post that I do quite a bit of advertising. I advertise on many different wedding websites as well as on Craigslist. I do seperate online classefied ads for each of my products and try to make them as detailed as possible so that people who are viewing my website are there because they are actually interested in the product that was advertised.

[Jayboogz]

You also need to understand people who shop on the internet are generally window shoppers for the best deals maybe try posting on redflagdeals? If you get on the front page of that guarenteed more traffic. But like I said most people who shop online usually window shop and would only purchase items if they really deem cheap and if they need it in a future date due to shipping.
Posted via RS Mobile

[Renthal]

i'll lend a hand here, take it or leave it…

- First and foremost I would work on the facebook page as it is free and pretty easy to do. Start growing your fanbase as 25 people liking your page right now is not going to help your business much. Look into offering a discount for people that like your page… 10% off etc..refer a friend, get a discount. Facebook advertising works pretty well as you can pick and choose directly who will see your ad's, and you can set up parameters for how much you want to spend.

- Start a Newsletter or mailing list. Keep the email addresses of your previous customers to hit them up again for more business. It is way easier to keep customers then try to bring in new ones. Offer discounts to returning customers and more incentives for people to refer a friend. Your customers are your best ambassadors for your business usually, and consumers trust friend's opinions.

- Building trust with customers goes a long way… possibly include an "about us" tab with some info on your business yourself, whatever. People love to be able to connect with an organization, so they dont think they are dealing with crooks.

- If you have any camera skills or editing abilities, such as imovie or whatever make up some videos of your product, you making your product etc, then link those to your facebook and website, to build your online presence further.

- The website is a little bland, i'm not feeling the graphics and layout. I would try to make it more luxurious with a better background, nicer fonts etc. Your customers are thinking nice special occasions for a loved one, and i'm not really connecting that with your current website theme. There has to be more pictures included as well. Currently it takes to much navigating around to actually see any of your work.

-Think about your customers and who you are trying to appeal to, why would someone want to choose your business over someone else? Figure out what your competitive advantage is and push that hard.

- If you can handle the sudden inflow of business, there is always groupon or the hundreds of other daily deal offering websites. You will get big time exposure to your website, but some of those customers may never return again. Do your due diligence though, as some of the financial platforms for these websites work heavily in the favour of the big company.

- Start hitting up tradeshows and go on road trips showing your business and products off. They dont have to be huge, even the smaller city markets and what not gain tons of first hand customer exposure.

- Strategic alliances with other businesses can work well. Find another company maybe an event planner or something where you can both benefit from the same customer, and you can combine marketing practices.

In all I would say its all about exposure at this point. Either tinker with your website and do all the prep work, which is what I would recommend first, and then work on marketing your business with potentially some of the ideas posted above.

hope this helps, just my .02 cents

[dhawes]

re-do the whole website imo. Simplify and make it direct, get rid of guestbook, include pricing under the products so people dont have to navigate twice and search. Get rid of promotions tab and have that at the top of home page.

What is the purpose of the links tab? Drawing people away for your website to other businesses imo. Also I believe people, especially older people are wary about things that want them to be "members", nothing wrong with getting people to suscribe for email but that turns me off a bit unless you need to sign up in order to checkout. And the current lay-out with the facebook stuff on the right + testimonials looks like a re-bill ad landing page.

I'm no pro but that's my 2c.

Oh and articles of interest I think should re-direct to a page(s) on your website if you really must have them, looks more professional when YOU are telling them rather than sending them to a bunch of other sites, looks lazy.

[jcrewe]

Thank you all so much for your feedback!

Well, it appears the consensus is that my website it B-O-R-I-N-G.....Sigh BUT, at least now I know what the issue is and can attempt to fix it!

Just want to respond to a few questions/point that were made above:

I try to use Facebook as much as I can....I have paid advertisements but it hasnt really produced much. I think offering a discount to those who like my page is a good idea

I do have a mailing list that I use to update customers and site members on new products and promotions. It is not a requirement to become a member of my site to order or view the site....it's just an option that if someone would like to be updated on new products and promotions they will be updated.

I am currently working on an About Us page but want it to be personable AND professional which is proving to be a feat.

I have collaborated with quite a few wedding planners and u-brew/u-vins (for the wine bottle labels) and I will be attending a small "trade show" in July. The links page was developed because typically when you collaborate with another company they want you to add a link to their services on your site and they do the same for my business. Although, I do understand what you are saying, dhawes that the links may steer customers AWAY from my website.

Dhawes, I do have pricing under most of the items individually except for the chocolate bars as I havent had time to add it to the page. I decided to also have a seperate pricing page because i know that is one of the first pages I look for when checking out a website.

Soooo, I guess I have my work cut out for me! LOL! Thank you all so very much...your input is invaluable to me and I greatly appreciate you taking the time to respond to my post

Jennifer