It's one thing to get customers to purchase your products and another to have customers continue to buy from you. This article is going share with you the top 10 ways to keep your customers coming back for more.
1. Offer a freebie with each purchase Offering something free with each purchase is a great marketing technique and customers love it. It doesn't have to be something expensive either. It could simply be a small token showing your appreciation for them being a valued patron. Depending on the product you offer it's important to keep the free item somewhat related to what you sell in general. It could also be something with your website name on it such as; a pen, small notepad, calendar, key chain, fridge magnet, etc.
2. Quality is essential Offering quality products is truly the only way to go. Regardless whether you buy products wholesale or make your own products such as crafts, it's important that they be of high quality. Offering products that are not of high quality may earn you a first sale from a customer but rarely a second. Customers will return and purchase more products from you if they can tell they are high quality items.
3. Value Quality and value go hand in hand. Every customer is looking to purchase products that are a good value to them. This doesn't mean they have to be dirt cheap by any means. But it does mean that you need to be competitive and offer them a quality product at a reasonable price. Let's say you sell e-books. An e-book of course is a product that consists of no overhead for you and can be resold an infinite number of times. So instead of pricing that e-book at $39.99, offer the e-book for $9.99. Your jaw may have dropped at this point but let me explain why. It makes much more sense to sell 50 e-books at $9.99 and be ahead with $499.50 verses selling only 3 of the same e-books for $39.99 and only being ahead with $119.97.
4. Uniqueness You probably wouldn't be too happy if you went to a trade show only to realize that half of the vendors sold the exact products you also sell. Customers feel the same way. They want something that is unique. This could simply be a variation on an existing product. For example you sell handmade pet garments. Since there are a large amount of pet garments for potential customers choose from, what is it about yours that make them unique? Perhaps you make yours with a certain type of fabric or make them in a unique style. Be creative and don't be a carbon copy of the next guy.
5. Customer testimonials If your not utilizing past customer testimonials you are really missing out on a powerful selling tool. Everyone wants to know the product they are thinking about buying is going to be a high quality product. Testimonials from past customers can ease their minds and give them that extra nudge to go from thinking about buying your product to actually buying it.
6. Money back guarantee Consider offering a money back guarantee if your customers are not satisfied with your product. Like customer testimonials, having a money back guarantee can give your potential customers confidence in the quality of your product and perhaps that little nudge they need to go ahead and purchase it. If you offer a money back guarantee and a customer is not satisfied you must be prompt and return their money.
7. Sales and time sensitive offers If you utilize a mailing list, announce to your list when you have a sale. Another thing to do is to offer a time sensitive offer. For example tell your list members that they can purchase a certain item at a discounted price until a certain date and/or time. The sense of urgency helps to create impulse buying. Or you can even offer a discount on a product to the first 10 customers that purchase it.
8. Refer a friend campaign A creative way to offer your customers an extra bonus is to set up a refer a friend campaign. You can do this by setting up an affiliate type program where each participating customer would receive an affiliate code which would have your website URL and their affiliate code at the end. Or if you prefer you could simply issue the participating customers an affiliate number. If they have a friend that purchases a product from you, they would simply input that code number into a referrer box upon checkout. The customer participating in the refer a friend campaign would receive the point for the referral. You could set it up where when they reach a certain number of points they get a certain percentage off their order. This could be graduating for example; 10 refer a friend points would equal 10% off their entire order. 20 refer a friend points would equal 20% off their entire purchase and so on.
9. Coupons with purchases When your customers order from you consider adding a coupon to their order that they can use on their next purchase. For tangible products, the coupon could be placed in the package of their order or attached to their receipt. For non-tangible products like e-goods you can set up an autoresponder that will send out an automatic email to the customer after their purchase and contain the coupon. This non-tangible coupon could be a code containing letters and numbers. They would redeem their coupons during the checkout process of their next purchase through your website.
10. Customer loyalty programs Customers love to be rewarded so why not reward them for their loyalty? This can be done by rewarding them with something extra after so many purchases they make. This can work for both tangible and non-tangible purchases. For tangible product purchases you would include the loyalty reward item in with their package. For non-tangible items it could be in the form of sending them an email offering them 20-30% off their next purchase as a part of your customer loyalty rewards program.
© 2008 Kelle Arvay is the owner of Pattern Mart with offers customers access to thousands of craft patterns that they can purchase and download instantly. In addition to running several other online businesses, she is the co-publisher of a online magazine called Creative Times. She utilizes her own advice that she has gained over the years in her businesses.
http://www.PatternMart.com
http://www.eCraftClasses.com
http://www.CreativeTimesMagazine.com
You have permission to publish this article electronically, in print, in your ebook or on your web site, free of charge, as long as the author byline above is included. Copy and Paste the article including authors byline to use this article.
Monday, April 14, 2008
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Free Business Printable
Here is a free customer receipt printable that you can use in your business. It's always nice to include a receipt for the customer. Just click on the more info button below to download it.
Price: FREE!
Thursday, June 14, 2007
Profiting from Printable Products
Alot of people may not realize just how much society utilizes printable products. I think printable items can be one of those products we take for granted at times. There have been many times I myself have been in need of a chart or record keeping template and have been hard pressed to find a good one among the free ones that are offered online. So I found myself creating my own. I also become interested in designing printable products for crafting.In the crafting industry printable products can take on many forms. With the computer crafting industry booming printable items are in sought out by crafters.
Products such as:
· Altered Art
· Decoupage
· Tags
· Collage
· Gift Tags
· Greeting Cards
· Book Marks
· Printables for fabric printing
· Scrapbook templates and elements
· Templates for gift boxes, envelopes, and various paper crafts.
Just to name a few. Besides the crafting industry there is also a market for other types of printables like business related products such as:
· Charts
· Templates
· Calendars
· Stationery
· Thank you notes
· Organizational printables
· Supply list templates
· Contact list templates
There is also a growing need for home schooling printable products as well as those geared towards children in general in the form of color pages, skill building products and many more. With a market only limited by ones imagination it's easy to see that profits could be achieved from designing and offering printable products.
Some of the benefits of offering printables are:
· The ideas can be limitless and the only limit is your own imagination.
· Once created they can be sold over and over, thus creating a product that has endless resell value.
· There is a growing need for a variety of printable products.
· Printable product sales can be automated on the internet by memberships to such sites as www.InstantPrintables.com
· Automated sales of printable products create less work for the designer.
The price of printable products can vary depending on the printable itself. If it’s a simple business template or single printable image, the price may be between $2-$3 dollars. More complex products such as a pre-made scrapbook page may cost anywhere from $10-$15 dollars. The great thing about designing printable product though is once you have a product designed and ready for sale, the work is done and the product can be resold repeatedly.
So if you have always wanted to expand your current business by designing printables or start a new business now is the time!
© 2007 Kelle Arvay is the owner of Instant Printables which offers customers access to downloadable craft printables. In addition, she is also the owner of eCraft Classes which is a site dedicated to all types of online craft classes. Kelle has been working with customers for over 6 years.
http://www.InstantPrintables
http://www.eCraftClasses.com
You have permission to publish this article electronically, in print, in your ebook or on your web site, free of charge, as long as the author byline above is included. Copy and Paste the article including authors byline to use this article.
Products such as:
· Altered Art
· Decoupage
· Tags
· Collage
· Gift Tags
· Greeting Cards
· Book Marks
· Printables for fabric printing
· Scrapbook templates and elements
· Templates for gift boxes, envelopes, and various paper crafts.
Just to name a few. Besides the crafting industry there is also a market for other types of printables like business related products such as:
· Charts
· Templates
· Calendars
· Stationery
· Thank you notes
· Organizational printables
· Supply list templates
· Contact list templates
There is also a growing need for home schooling printable products as well as those geared towards children in general in the form of color pages, skill building products and many more. With a market only limited by ones imagination it's easy to see that profits could be achieved from designing and offering printable products.
Some of the benefits of offering printables are:
· The ideas can be limitless and the only limit is your own imagination.
· Once created they can be sold over and over, thus creating a product that has endless resell value.
· There is a growing need for a variety of printable products.
· Printable product sales can be automated on the internet by memberships to such sites as www.InstantPrintables.com
· Automated sales of printable products create less work for the designer.
The price of printable products can vary depending on the printable itself. If it’s a simple business template or single printable image, the price may be between $2-$3 dollars. More complex products such as a pre-made scrapbook page may cost anywhere from $10-$15 dollars. The great thing about designing printable product though is once you have a product designed and ready for sale, the work is done and the product can be resold repeatedly.
So if you have always wanted to expand your current business by designing printables or start a new business now is the time!
© 2007 Kelle Arvay is the owner of Instant Printables which offers customers access to downloadable craft printables. In addition, she is also the owner of eCraft Classes which is a site dedicated to all types of online craft classes. Kelle has been working with customers for over 6 years.
http://www.InstantPrintables
http://www.eCraftClasses.com
You have permission to publish this article electronically, in print, in your ebook or on your web site, free of charge, as long as the author byline above is included. Copy and Paste the article including authors byline to use this article.
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
How to Avoid Business Burn Out
At some point or another, anyone who owns their own business will face some degree of burn out. Instead of learning to cope with such burn out it is better to learn how to avoid it in the first place. Below are several ways you can avoid business burn out.
1. Organization
Staying organized is one of the first steps in avoiding burn out. Utilize all the resources at your disposal such as filing systems for tax information, payables, receivables, advertising, marketing, etc. This will help you keep your paperwork in order and easily accessible.Additionally, make sure you have a work place that is also organized. This could be your home office, studio or any other type of work place depending on the type of business you have. Making sure everything is organized and can be easily located will help you tremendously.
2. Time Management
Time management is probably the biggest challenge for most people. When you work from home it can be especially easy to get distracted from your work. While working from home allows you a lot of flexibility which is a good thing, it can also present challenges in regards to remaining focused. To help you, consider setting up a daily schedule for your self. Utilize calendars and tasks list to keep yourself on track. At the beginning of each week write out what you need to accomplish for the week. Keep the list handy in case you need to add to it throughout the week. It is also important to allow for those unexpected interruptions such as last minute doctors appointments or a trip to the office supply store. Additionally, consider setting up your weekly schedule based on what tasks you need to do on particular days. For example, Tuesdays may be a day you set aside as a marketing day. Every Tuesday your focus should be on tasks that have to do with marketing your business.
3. Hire Help
If you find that you are overwhelmed most of the time or getting close to being overwhelmed, it may be time to hire some help. Help can come in the form of a virtual assistant, marketing manager, mailing list manager or simply from setting up a auto responder. Anytime you can automate certain tasks, the better. But for those times you can’t, consider hiring someone to do those tasks for you. You may find that even the small, menial tasks like sending out an email to your mailing list, is a task that you could hire someone else to do. Even all the small tasks that seem relatively simple add up and before you know it, you are spending a great deal of time on these things.
4. Joint Ventures and Partnerships
If you have a large project or new business idea, consider looking into establishing a joint venture with another business owner in a similar niche. The benefits of sharing the work load can be enormous. Also consider partnerships with other similar businesses in the areas of cross promotion and marketing. This could be in the form of exchanging web site links, mailing list advertising or other types of partnerships where the results benefit both of you.
5. Work Ahead
It is so much better to be ahead then to be behind. The pressure you begin to feel when due dates for finished work is upon you can be stress inducers. Avoid this by working ahead if you can. One example of work that can be completed in advance is article writing. When you have completed your daily tasks, consider taking a few moments to work on an article your writing. Another one would be blog posts. The nice thing about blogs is you can write a post in advance and save it for later. This is very true for several of the blog programs out there today. If you host your own blog, you can always save the post as a word document and post it later when your ready. Think of some of the other things you could work on in advance.
6. Take a Break.
One of the best things you can do to avoid burn out, is to take breaks. Don’t wait until your in desperate need of one either. Take breaks regularly. Each day you should take breaks throughout the day. Also you need to set aside breaks that consist of either an actual planned vacation, day trip or a certain day of the week that you set aside for some needed “me” time. During this time, work is not allowed. I know it can be difficult but you have to learn to allow yourself to take these breaks. You will find you are better focused and refreshed when you do return to your work.
© 2007 Kelle Arvay is the owner of Pattern Mart with offers customers access to thousands of craft patterns that they can purchase and download instantly. In addition to running several other online businesses, she is the co-publisher of a online magazine called Creative Times. She utilizes her own advice that she has gained over the years in her businesses.
http://www.PatternMart.com
http://www.eCraftClasses.com
http://www.CreativeTimesMagazine.com
You have permission to publish this article electronically, in print, in your ebook or on your web site, free of charge, as long as the author byline above is included. Copy and Paste the article including authors byline to use this article.
1. Organization
Staying organized is one of the first steps in avoiding burn out. Utilize all the resources at your disposal such as filing systems for tax information, payables, receivables, advertising, marketing, etc. This will help you keep your paperwork in order and easily accessible.Additionally, make sure you have a work place that is also organized. This could be your home office, studio or any other type of work place depending on the type of business you have. Making sure everything is organized and can be easily located will help you tremendously.
2. Time Management
Time management is probably the biggest challenge for most people. When you work from home it can be especially easy to get distracted from your work. While working from home allows you a lot of flexibility which is a good thing, it can also present challenges in regards to remaining focused. To help you, consider setting up a daily schedule for your self. Utilize calendars and tasks list to keep yourself on track. At the beginning of each week write out what you need to accomplish for the week. Keep the list handy in case you need to add to it throughout the week. It is also important to allow for those unexpected interruptions such as last minute doctors appointments or a trip to the office supply store. Additionally, consider setting up your weekly schedule based on what tasks you need to do on particular days. For example, Tuesdays may be a day you set aside as a marketing day. Every Tuesday your focus should be on tasks that have to do with marketing your business.
3. Hire Help
If you find that you are overwhelmed most of the time or getting close to being overwhelmed, it may be time to hire some help. Help can come in the form of a virtual assistant, marketing manager, mailing list manager or simply from setting up a auto responder. Anytime you can automate certain tasks, the better. But for those times you can’t, consider hiring someone to do those tasks for you. You may find that even the small, menial tasks like sending out an email to your mailing list, is a task that you could hire someone else to do. Even all the small tasks that seem relatively simple add up and before you know it, you are spending a great deal of time on these things.
4. Joint Ventures and Partnerships
If you have a large project or new business idea, consider looking into establishing a joint venture with another business owner in a similar niche. The benefits of sharing the work load can be enormous. Also consider partnerships with other similar businesses in the areas of cross promotion and marketing. This could be in the form of exchanging web site links, mailing list advertising or other types of partnerships where the results benefit both of you.
5. Work Ahead
It is so much better to be ahead then to be behind. The pressure you begin to feel when due dates for finished work is upon you can be stress inducers. Avoid this by working ahead if you can. One example of work that can be completed in advance is article writing. When you have completed your daily tasks, consider taking a few moments to work on an article your writing. Another one would be blog posts. The nice thing about blogs is you can write a post in advance and save it for later. This is very true for several of the blog programs out there today. If you host your own blog, you can always save the post as a word document and post it later when your ready. Think of some of the other things you could work on in advance.
6. Take a Break.
One of the best things you can do to avoid burn out, is to take breaks. Don’t wait until your in desperate need of one either. Take breaks regularly. Each day you should take breaks throughout the day. Also you need to set aside breaks that consist of either an actual planned vacation, day trip or a certain day of the week that you set aside for some needed “me” time. During this time, work is not allowed. I know it can be difficult but you have to learn to allow yourself to take these breaks. You will find you are better focused and refreshed when you do return to your work.
© 2007 Kelle Arvay is the owner of Pattern Mart with offers customers access to thousands of craft patterns that they can purchase and download instantly. In addition to running several other online businesses, she is the co-publisher of a online magazine called Creative Times. She utilizes her own advice that she has gained over the years in her businesses.
http://www.PatternMart.com
http://www.eCraftClasses.com
http://www.CreativeTimesMagazine.com
You have permission to publish this article electronically, in print, in your ebook or on your web site, free of charge, as long as the author byline above is included. Copy and Paste the article including authors byline to use this article.
5 Reasons To Offer Online Classes
If you have a online business there may be plenty of opportunities for you to teach others what you know. Online classes can create a huge wave of free marketing for you as well. Take a good look at your business and the niche your in to see if you could benefit from offering classes to others. If your business deals strictly with retail items that you purchase wholesale there likely isn't much need to teach a specific type of class unless it's teaching others how to break into the wholesale business. Explore the idea of offering online classes. You may be suprised to find an abundance of things you can teach others, others that are hungry to learn!
Let me share several reasons why you should consider offering classes.
1. The Demand and Need.
There are many reasons why you should offer classes. The main one would be because there need which you can fill and profit from at the same time. As the Internet continues to grow and more people seek resources, online classes become a natural learning option. Many individuals may find it more difficult to attend a live, in person type of class locally, so taking a class online in the comfort of their own home is a very appealing option.
2. Benefits the Visual Learner.
There are many people in the world that are better visual learners. This means they learn easier by “seeing” than reading instructions alone. Those that struggle with written instructions such as tutorials or eBooks, will benefit greatly from being able to see the steps and read the instructions. This doesn’t mean you have to do away with creating tutorials or eBooks, it just means you could reach a even wider audience by also offering online classes.
3. The Ease of Creating a Class.
Let's say for example your a crafter. You are already creating your finished pieces so creating a class would be one additional step. Creating a class is very easy and simply involves using your digital camera to take step by step photos as you create the item. Since you will be creating a finished item anyway, it makes sense to take the small extra step to take photos as you go along. The other thing you will need to do is type out corresponding instructions that go with each step photograph. Finally, if you plan on offering a pattern template to go with the class, you’ll want to create the PDF for that. Or you can offer the full version of the pattern along with the class. Once your class is ready you would simply upload it to a craft class site. Regardless if you are a crafter or your business niche is something completely different, you likely can create a class for what you specialize in.
4. An Ongoing Revenue Source.
The work involved in creating an online class involves setting it up. Once you take step by step photos, typing out the step by step instructions and make a PDF template (optional), and upload it, your work is done. The class can now produce ongoing revenue for you from new customers purchasing it. If your classes cost $10 for example and over the course of 3 months you sell 60 classes. That is an extra $200 per month in revenue with no additional work involved on your part. Of course this example can vary tremendously based on the number of classes you have available and the actual number of classes you sell each month. It’s very possible to do much better than the example!
5. Additional Business Marketing.
Offering classes can create a great stream of hidden marketing for your business. When people take your class and enjoy it, they are likely to tell other people about it, either directly or indirectly. Directly would be that they seek to tell others. Perhaps they may post about your class on their blog or rave about it on their newsletter. Telling people about it indirectly would be if someone on a forum inquired about learning something and they tell them about your class. Offering free classes from time to time is also a great way to gain some additional marketing for your business. Customers will enjoy the class and be more likely to share the free resource of your class with others. The additional traffic of customers taking your free class can result in those customers also purchasing one of your other classes.
© 2007 Kelle Arvay. Kelle Arvay is the owner of Pattern Mart with offers customers access to thousands of craft patterns that they can purchase and download instantly. In addition, she is also the owner of eCraft Classes which is a site dedicated to all types of online craft classes. In addition she is the co-founder and co-publisher of Creative Times, a downloadable bi-monthly craft magazine. Kelle has been working with customers for over 6 years.
http://www.patternmart.com/
http://www.eCraftClasses.com
You have permission to publish this article electronically, in print, in your ebook or on your web site, free of charge, as long as the author byline above is included. Copy and Paste the article including authors byline to use this article.
Your Friend and Fellow E-preneur,
Kelle Arvay
Let me share several reasons why you should consider offering classes.
1. The Demand and Need.
There are many reasons why you should offer classes. The main one would be because there need which you can fill and profit from at the same time. As the Internet continues to grow and more people seek resources, online classes become a natural learning option. Many individuals may find it more difficult to attend a live, in person type of class locally, so taking a class online in the comfort of their own home is a very appealing option.
2. Benefits the Visual Learner.
There are many people in the world that are better visual learners. This means they learn easier by “seeing” than reading instructions alone. Those that struggle with written instructions such as tutorials or eBooks, will benefit greatly from being able to see the steps and read the instructions. This doesn’t mean you have to do away with creating tutorials or eBooks, it just means you could reach a even wider audience by also offering online classes.
3. The Ease of Creating a Class.
Let's say for example your a crafter. You are already creating your finished pieces so creating a class would be one additional step. Creating a class is very easy and simply involves using your digital camera to take step by step photos as you create the item. Since you will be creating a finished item anyway, it makes sense to take the small extra step to take photos as you go along. The other thing you will need to do is type out corresponding instructions that go with each step photograph. Finally, if you plan on offering a pattern template to go with the class, you’ll want to create the PDF for that. Or you can offer the full version of the pattern along with the class. Once your class is ready you would simply upload it to a craft class site. Regardless if you are a crafter or your business niche is something completely different, you likely can create a class for what you specialize in.
4. An Ongoing Revenue Source.
The work involved in creating an online class involves setting it up. Once you take step by step photos, typing out the step by step instructions and make a PDF template (optional), and upload it, your work is done. The class can now produce ongoing revenue for you from new customers purchasing it. If your classes cost $10 for example and over the course of 3 months you sell 60 classes. That is an extra $200 per month in revenue with no additional work involved on your part. Of course this example can vary tremendously based on the number of classes you have available and the actual number of classes you sell each month. It’s very possible to do much better than the example!
5. Additional Business Marketing.
Offering classes can create a great stream of hidden marketing for your business. When people take your class and enjoy it, they are likely to tell other people about it, either directly or indirectly. Directly would be that they seek to tell others. Perhaps they may post about your class on their blog or rave about it on their newsletter. Telling people about it indirectly would be if someone on a forum inquired about learning something and they tell them about your class. Offering free classes from time to time is also a great way to gain some additional marketing for your business. Customers will enjoy the class and be more likely to share the free resource of your class with others. The additional traffic of customers taking your free class can result in those customers also purchasing one of your other classes.
© 2007 Kelle Arvay. Kelle Arvay is the owner of Pattern Mart with offers customers access to thousands of craft patterns that they can purchase and download instantly. In addition, she is also the owner of eCraft Classes which is a site dedicated to all types of online craft classes. In addition she is the co-founder and co-publisher of Creative Times, a downloadable bi-monthly craft magazine. Kelle has been working with customers for over 6 years.
http://www.patternmart.com/
http://www.eCraftClasses.com
You have permission to publish this article electronically, in print, in your ebook or on your web site, free of charge, as long as the author byline above is included. Copy and Paste the article including authors byline to use this article.
Your Friend and Fellow E-preneur,
Kelle Arvay
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