Every Page of Your Online Store is Important!

October 30th, 2012
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Happy Halloween!Every page of your website is a sales page, just like every page of your website can be your “home” page.

Let’s break this down and say that you have an online store and you are selling Holiday Party Supplies. For your customers easy navigation through your site, you use different categories like; New Year’s Party Supplies, Valentine’s Day Party Supplies, Easter Party Supplies, Halloween Party Supplies, Thanksgiving Party Supplies, Christmas Party Supplies etc.

If you are doing your SEO (search engine optimization) correctly, each page has been optimized for the search engines. How do you do that? Please see my recent post about driving traffic to your site.

Let’s take the Halloween Party Supplies category landing page for example. You’ve got your meta tags in place; Title, Description and Keywords;
• Example Title: Your One Stop Destination for Halloween Party Supplies
• Example Description: Get all your Halloween Party Supplies Here! From Scary Halloween Decorations and Halloween Party Supplies to Funny Halloween Decorations and Funny Halloween Party Supplies.
• Example Keywords: Halloween Party Supplies, Halloween Decorations, Scary Halloween Decorations, Scary Halloween Party Supplies, Funny Halloween Decorations, Funny Halloween Party Supplies, Kids Halloween Party Supplies, Children’s Halloween Party Supplies, Adult Halloween Party Supplies, Party Supplies, Party Supply

You’ve got a write up on the main category page about Halloween Party Supplies and the keywords you selected for optimizing this page  are scattered throughout your copy. Your copy is what your customer actually sees and reads. So you want to make this as detailed as possible, but in as few words as possible too, you want your customer to start shopping!

So the copy on this page that the customer sees could be:
Vampires and Witches and Zombies oh my! Planning your next Halloween Party? We have all the Halloween Party Supplies that you could need! If you are looking for Scary Halloween Party Supplies, Funny Halloween Party Supplies, Kid’s Halloween Party Supplies,  Adult Halloween Party Supplies or many other Halloween Party Supplies and other Holiday Party Supplies you’ve come to the right place! Click a category to start shopping!

The customer could then have different categories to choose from to narrow down their search even more.

That’s enough for potential customer copy and SEO. So, what does this have to do with every page is a sales page or my “home page”. Well, if you read my other blog post about driving traffic, you will understand that the search engines don’t just point to your “home page”. Depending on what the customer is looking for, this Halloween Category main landing page might end up being the page that many customers come into your site with. So if the customer types Scary Halloween Party Supplies into a search engine, this page could be the one that comes to the top of the results and the customer comes directly to it!

So every page needs to be optimized, clean and easy to read, easy to navigate from any starting point on your site, easy to get from one category to another, easy to locate the shopping cart, easy to locate contact information and etc. Don’t just save the great stuff for your home page, because any page could be your “home page”. Every single page of your webiste needs to sell the customer on purchasing from you. So look at each and every page as treat them as if they were all valuable, because they are!

We hope that everyone has a safe and enjoyable Halloween 2012!!

photo by: wwarby

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Posted in Copywriting, Creating Content, Marketing, Online Business, Online Business Advice, Product Pages, Recommendations, SEO, Website | 4 Comments »

An Intro to Closeouts: A Product Channel Worth Considering?

October 23rd, 2012
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For the online retailer, closeouts present a tremendous opportunity to buy brand name items for less-than-wholesale prices. It’s a billion-dollar-a-year industry that continues to expand, fueled by the growth of large retail chains.

Where Do Closeouts Come From?
Closeouts, refer to brand new merchandise at the end of its life cycle and can result from a variety of situations:
• A large chain store may order 100,000 items and cancel the last 20,000, sticking the manufacturer with that excess inventory.
• A retailer may refuse to accept large quantities of items due to small packaging mistakes.
• A factory may over-anticipate the demand for a product and be unable to meet their sales goal forecast.
In these situations, to move the extra merchandise, the manufacturer is usually willing to sell at deeply discounted prices.

Why Buy Closeouts?
No matter what your store sells, you can find complementary closeout items and benefit from their low prices. There are many obvious advantages to adding closeouts to your product mix:
• They provide high profit margins, which enable you to sell for hard-to-beat prices without losing money.
• They act as terrific promotional vehicles. You can use them as free gifts, fantastic bargains, featured items, or “loss leaders”. These tools are especially effective for bringing traffic into your eBay store.
• They offer constantly-changing, fresh inventory to supplement your core products.
• They give you a reason to stay in contact with your customers. You’re letting them know what new merchandise you have, rather than just saying, “Come back to my store” without giving them any incentive to do so.

Where Do I Find Closeout Dealers?
Tradeshows and gift shows are great places to find closeout suppliers, who often have representatives there. You can also find them online, but beware of middlemen. Investigate any company before transacting business with them. Find out about their minimums and payment terms. Even if they’re legitimate, they may have purchase minimums that are out of your range, and you don’t want to waste your time or theirs.

Some companies will allow you to buy quantities as small as one case pack, which enables you to try different products without putting a lot of money into any particular one. You can offer numerous items to your customers, and see what sells, with a minimal investment risk.

Closeouts are a great addition to your current product sourcing base. The fact that you’re buying closeout merchandise at heavy discounts off of the original pricing allows you to be competitive with major retailers and still make a nice profit.

photo by: sergiodmt

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Posted in dropshipping, Online Business, wholesale tips | 2 Comments »

Driving Traffic to Your Website (The Simple Free Way)

October 16th, 2012
by

So you’ve done your market research and picked your first product to sell online. You’ve contacted your first drop ship supplier and setup your wholesale account. You even have your website or auction started and your merchant account setup. What’s next? Driving traffic to your site!

There are several options you have:

1. PPC’s: Pay per click advertising (Google Adwords, Yahoo Search Marketing, Bing PPC)
2. Social Marketing (Sites like MySpace, Facebook and Twitter)
3. Natural Search results (Getting your website to the first page of Google)

I’m going to discuss the option that is simple and free, but it does take a little bit of your time and patience: Natural search results.

To get yourself to the first page of Google you need to focus on SEO (Search Engine Optimization). There are several companies out there who will help you with SEO. But before you even start considering outsourcing your SEO, there are several basic steps that you can do that cost you nothing but your time to implement.

Let’s focus on what you can do with your website starting today. The first 5 main areas of your website to start with are:

1. Title of the webpage
2. Meta Description
3. Meta Keywords
4. Images
5. Product Descriptions

Each one of these you need to focus around your main keywords for that particular product page. So let’s use “Pet Couch” as our example for each of these 5 areas:

Your title needs to have what the product page is about at the very beginning of the line.
Example title: Pet Couch for Large Breed Dog – MyCompanyName.com

Your meta description should include that main keyword and don’t get too wordy. Remember this is what people see under the first line in the natural search results.
Example meta description: A Pet Couch can stop your large breed dog from taking over your living room couch. This dog couch is available in red, green and blue.

Meta Keywords are all the important keywords that your customer is typing into the search engines. Five to seven keyword phrases is a good number to focus on per product page. Hint: make sure to use the keywords you find when doing your market research.
Example: pet couch, pet couches, dog couch, large breed dog bed, giant breed dog bed, large dog bed, large beds for dogs

Images: Name your images with the keywords that are important. Because how you name your images, is how someone can also find your site doing an image search. So instead of img001.jpg is should be pet-couch.jpg.

The Product Description that is displayed on your site next to the image of the product, is the first main area that you can provide a lot of content around your keywords. Make sure to answer who, what, when, where, why and how and relate the product to your customer. Try not to use too much of what the supplier provides to you, as you, and everyone else selling that product will end up with the same description!

So there you have it, 5 simple and free things you can do to your product pages right now that’s going to help you get to first page of Google.

photo by: zoonabar

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Posted in Marketing, Online Business, Online Business Advice, SEO, Website | 13 Comments »

How to Start a Dropship Business

October 5th, 2012
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If you are interested in starting a dropship business, ask yourself this… do you want to sell products online from dropshippers or do you want to become a wholesale supplier that drop ships? Yes, these are two entirely different things.

A retailer that sells products online, can work with drop shipping wholesalers to supply products to them.
A wholesaler that dropships, supplies products to online retailers.

The easiest entry into the world of dropshipping is to become a retailer that sells products on your site or online auctions that are drop shipped. In order to work with genuine wholesale companies, if you are in the USA, you will need the following;

1.  A registered business name
In order to get a registered business name, you will need to either; make a visit to your local county clerk and let them know you want to setup a sole proprietorship or many states have forms you can fill out online by visiting your state’s Department of Revenue.
2. A sales & use tax ID. This is also called a seller’s permit or a resellers certificate.
You will need to contact your state’s Department of Revenue to obtain a sales & use tax ID. Many times they have forms you can fill out online, but you need to get your registered business name first.

It isn’t free to start a business and get a business name and tax ID, but it is relatively cheap. Usually around $50.00

Real wholesale suppliers will always ask for this information. The only exceptions to this rule are; wholesale suppliers that are located in tax exempt states, or wholesale suppliers that are offering products that aren’t taxed in their state.

To work with a real wholesale supplier that drop ships, you supply this information to them, and they will then provide you with images, descriptions & wholesale prices so you have what you need to post the products that you want to sell in your online store or auction listing.

To become a genuine wholesale supplier that dropships, you will need to have a lot more money on hand. You will need a wholesale license, purchase in VERY large quantities from manufacturers, stock the products in a warehouse, have an inventory system, setup accounts with shipping companies, purchase a lot of packing and shipping supplies, individually pick and ship the products out. There is a lot involved to wholesaling products.

So most new to the world of wholesale and online sales, choose becoming an online retailer and sell products from genuine drop shippers for their dropship business.  After your business grows and you see the need to expand your business, then you should start purchasing multiple quantities of the products that are selling well for better profit margins. Then after that, you could consider buying direct from manufacturers and open a wholesale division as well. Your business can always grow, you just have to work hard at it, and set it all up the right way, the first time.

For more information about starting your online business, read this free eBook: Starting Your Internet Business Right No strings attached 🙂
For more information about genuine wholesale suppliers that drop ship, please visit our site at; Worldwide Brands, Inc.

photo by: bsperan

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Posted in dropshipping, Online Business, Online Business Advice | 2 Comments »

Wholesale Trade Shows are Still Important for Retailers!

September 13th, 2012
by

wholesale trade showWhy they are important:
Searching online to locate wholesale suppliers is easy to do, but how can you be sure that the company is legitimate? You can either buy a service like ours where we verify & certify wholesale suppliers & manufacturers and place them in our Directory of WBI Certified ™ Wholesalers or you can also visit trade shows.

Having that face to face interaction with a wholesale supplier is still important, especially with the amount of scams that run rampant on the Internet. Get to know who is supplying you your products! Because with drop shipping, you are placing a lot of trust in your supplier.

For an online retailer, going to an industry trade show, is where you can touch and feel the products, this is great for online retailers that want to drop ship. You can understand the quality of the products to be able to offer good descriptions for your customers without having to buy the products first.

Another benefit to trade shows, is having hundreds of wholesale suppliers in your industry all under one roof!

Get the most out of a trade show:
First, choose a trade show that will represent the product types that you are interested in selling. There are all sort of trade shows, from jewelry to toys, pet supplies to sporting goods. There are great resources online where you can search trade shows by trade, date and/or location. One of our favorites is http://www.tsnn.com

Second, have an objective in mind. You could get caught up in all the bright lights and shiny new products on display. Study the exhibitor directory and map and work up a game plan to get the most out of your visit. It can get expensive going to a show, so with a proper plan, you will be sure to see and talk to the suppliers that you REALLY want to talk to first and then look at all your other options later.

Third, there are quite a few trade shows that also have eduaction segments and guest speakers and sometimes even workshops where you can learn to improve your business in that particular trade. Pick up tips and ideas on how to sell those types of products better.

Be Prepared:
Here is a list of some things to make sure to take with you.
1. Comfortable Shoes – it’s a lot of walking!
2. A roomy bag for brochures, samples and business cards. A bag on wheels is great!
3. Business Cards
4. Stapler – after the day is over, stapling the business card to any brochure from the same company helps keep you organized.
5. Ink pen and paper for notes.
(other things I like to stuff in my bag, are hand sanitizer, a bottle of water and I use my cell phone to take pictures)

I love going to trade shows. Talking with many different people about their products, and getting to see the new things that havn’t hit the market yet. I have been to quite a few trade shows where they have large displays of new products that aren’t available for sale yet, so I can get an idea of what is coming out to be able to be one of the first to offer them.

First and foremost with a trade show, have fun with it!

photo by: ArmyStrongPA

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Posted in dropshipping, Online Business, Online Business Advice, Recommendations, wholesale tips, Wholesale Trade Shows | 2 Comments »

Is Dropshipping Right for My Business?

September 6th, 2012
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If you don’t have a lot of money to invest in your business, don’t have inventory space and not sure what you want to sell, then yes, dropshipping could be right for your fledgling business.

With dropshipping, you don’t have to purchase any inventory, stock, pack, label or ship the products yourself. This can save time and money for the beginning online business. There are of course, pros and cons with dropshipping and using a Wholesale Supplier that offers a drop ship service.

First, let me explain what dropshipping actually is. Dropshipping is not something new or something that has been invented in the last 10 years. Many wholesale suppliers started offering this service decades ago. Remember mail order catalogs that you used to get or still continue to get in the mail? Most of those products were dropshipped. See those ads on TV? Most of those products are dropshipped. Simple explanation of dropshipping is; you don’t hold inventory and your Certified Wholesale Supplier will ship the product on your behalf to your end customer. You just collect your retail cost and shipping from the customer, order from the supplier and they will do the rest. Simple right?

The biggest pros with dropshpping, is that it keeps your initial costs down & saves time. Renting warehouse or storage space can cost you more in the long run. You will have overhead costs that can quickly run you into debt before you even really get started. You don’t have to take the time to pick, pack and ship the products. Time = money.

The biggest cons with dropshipping products are wholesale pricing and loss of control. You see, when you are purchasing one product at a time at wholesale, your wholesale costs are higher because you are not buying in VOLUME. Wholesale pricing has different structures, but it always comes down to… the more you buy, the cheaper each individual item gets. So it’s hard to compete with large retailers that are stocking brick and mortar stores that need to purchase hundreds or thousands of the same product to fill their warehouses & store shelves. The other con is loss of control. You do not have control over your shipping costs or when products are shipped out, which if you sell on eBay or Amazon, could mean bad feedback for your business.

So how do you soften the cons? Well, when you are looking for what to sell, test products that you can’t find in your local Wal-Mart or other chain stores. Wal-Mart doesn’t carry everything! There are thousands and thousands of products and brands that they just don’t sell.  Once you find those products, then check your competition online to see if you could compete in that market. Loss of shipping control.. choose wholesale supplier that will ship 24-48 hours after ordering. Choose suppliers that offer tracking numbers and stay on top of what was ordered, and what was shipped out. Communication with your wholesale supplier is key when using a dropshipping service.

If you don’t feel that dropshipping is right for you, then you always have the option to purchase inventory and ship the products yourself. We invented the term light bulk wholesale that means that you can purchase at better wholesale prices with minimum orders of $500.00 or less. Our Directory of WBI Certified Wholesalers  contains thousands of wholesale suppliers that offer these lower minimums if you want to have that control.

photo by: z287marc

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Posted in dropshipping, Online Business | 2 Comments »

Made in the USA! Find American Wholesale Companies at WorldwideBrands.com

August 6th, 2012
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As Americans, many of us feel that it is important to keep the American economy alive and strong by purchasing products Made in the USA. As a business owner yourself, you feel that it is important to offer products in your online store that are Made in the USA as well. Outsourcing is a sore spot for many Americans, because of our struggling economy.

WorldwideBrands.com is an American company and the majority of companies that we list in our Directory of WBI Certified Wholesalers are based in the USA as well. Most of our member base of retailers are USA home based businesses. We should all support each other to help grow our economy by not outsourcing products and keep jobs available in the USA by purchasing great Made in the USA products from American Manufacturers.

Diane Sawyer of ABC’s Good Morning America, recently said that if every American spent an extra $3.33 on USA Made Products , it would create almost 10,000 new jobs in the country.

Showing your American pride by  buying Made in America products is a great start to getting our economy back on track! Are you a USA based online retailer? Focus on marketing and advertising your Made in America product lines and spread the word!

photo by: paulinaclemente

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Posted in Beating the Recession, dropshipping, Marketing, Online Business, Recommendations | 14 Comments »

Sell Products Online Without Inventory

July 13th, 2012
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Starting a business online is easier than ever, but there are still aspects of running a business that can bog down a business … and even bring it down without proper management.

One in particular is shipping — it’s not uncommon for businesses to attract negative reviews due to their performance actually delivering goods their customers purchased online. In addition to poor reviews and overall customer experience, the cost is often what prevents people from really expanding because it’s so risk intensive.

This is where dropshipping comes in.  Dropshipping means not having any inventory and relying on your wholesale supplier to ship the products out for you. This helps your business because you:

1. do not have to buy in bulk and have room to hold your inventory
2. do not have to worry about packing and shipping the products
3. do not have to hire staff to help you out with your inventory

Having warehouse space means more money spent. Packing and shipping the products yourself means more money spent. Also, as your business grows and more customers are buying from you, you will not have to hire staff to pack and ship items which means more money spent.

Dropshipping saves time and saves money!

We here at WorldwideBrands.com maintain a list of over 8,000 wholesale suppliers that dropship and sell in bulk. We certify the legitimacy of all of the wholesale suppliers that we list and make sure that they are willing to work with new online businesses. We add new wholesale suppliers, manufacturers products and/or brands every business day for our members.

Want to get started right? Visit us today!

photo by: Skrewtape

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Posted in dropshipping, Online Business | 6 Comments »

Certified is BETTER!

July 11th, 2012
by

It’s true! Working with certified wholesale suppliers are the best for your online business.

What is a certified wholesale supplier?
A certified wholesale supplier is a wholesale company that has been thoroughly verified by WorldwideBrands.com to be the genuine manufacturer or factory authorized distributor of the products they offer. These companies must be willing to sell to online retailers, ship from their own distribution centers and stock their own inventory.

Why are certified wholesalers better?
When you work with a certified wholesaler, you are working with the genuine company that offers these products. That means no middlemen, no sub-wholesalers and no fake distributors that are taking your profits with mark-ups.  Certified Wholesalers offer true wholesale prices and you would be working with the SOURCE!

How do I find Certified Wholesalers?
We here at WorldwideBrands.com provide a directory of our WBI Certified™ Wholesalers on our website. We currently list over 8,000 wholesale suppliers that dropship, sell in light bulk, large volume and importers. We research every day to locate new companies to place in our Directory for our members and add new wholesale suppliers/ products / brands every business day! Check out how we do this here.

How do I find Certified Wholesalers on my own?
If you have the time, money and energy to contact companies to find your own genuine Wholesalers the best place to start is with the manufacturer. Locate the company making the products and then contact them to ask if they wholesale to online retailers or if they don’t, ask them if they have any authorized distributors that will. You usually have to do a lot of phone calls in order to get this accomplished. We know, we do it 5 or more days a week for 8 to 10 hours a day! After you have done all of your contacting and you get refused, then you have to go back to the drawing board and start looking again for other products you want to sell.

As you see, this does take a while. We were contacted not too long ago from one of our members. The member decided that they wanted a refund of our lifetime membership and to start finding their OWN wholesale suppliers that drop ship without our help. This member contacted us back 2 weeks later to tell us that he changed his mind and he wanted to keep his memberhip. He said that he tried contacting 24 companies he found on his own and after 2 weeks of trying to get answers or to  setup any accounts he gave up. He told us that he made so many phone calls to these companies without replies or with getting turned down that he was extremely frustrated and didn’t have that kind of time. So he is a happy member still today. 🙂

Browse our Directory of WBI Certified™ Wholesalers HERE.

photo by: Gwan Kho

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Posted in dropshipping, Online Business, Recommendations, Website, wholesale tips | 2 Comments »

How to Become Financially Independent with your own Home Business!

July 3rd, 2012
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money_dollarsBecoming financially independent doesn’t happen overnight. It’s not a get rich quick scheme, there is no such thing.
So don’t quit your day job! Not yet anyway! 🙂 It takes time, money, hard work and the willingness to keep trudging through the trenches until it happens.

We recently received a couple of emails from some of our long time members. One of our members, it took them 4 years to reach financial independence! 4 years of hard work and dedicating time to his online business. Now he is hiring employees and creating jobs and won’t ever have to work for someone else again.

Don’t you want to be in that place?

Many people think that starting a business online means instant riches. This is definitely not the case! But here are some tips to get you started on the right path;

1. Don’t fall for get rich quick schemes! They don’t work. I have never met a person that purchased into one of these that actually makes money from it & I have been in this business a long time. They spent a lot of money for the schemes and will never get that money back.

2. Make an effort! “Never give up! Never surrender!” Famous words from Buzz Lightyear 🙂 Again, most times it takes YEARS to get to the place you dream of. But you can’t give up! You have to keep trying and working hard for it. No one is going to magically hand you everything that you need to know to become successful. You have to be self-sufficient enough to keep educating yourself and keep working at it.

3. Accept failure! It’s rare that someone hits on exactly what they need to sell online to become successful. Test different product markets, keep trying new things and always, ALWAYS, learn from your mistakes.

4. Be creative! Work the right side of your brain and flex your creative muscles. You may just think of something that no one else is doing or you may creatively put it in another way. Being creative means to not over-analyze something. One of the things I do is stop and think about what the problem may be for a little while, and then do something else – read a few books, or browse online and look at completely unrelated things to what the issue may be and while doing this, still have the issue in the back of my mind and stop and think about it from time to time. It’s amazing the ideas that can be created by doing something unrelated to what the issue is. If you are not a creative thinker, this may be hard at first, but the more that you flex your creative side, the easier it’s going to be.

5. Get Started on the Right Track!  If you get started right, it only helps in the long run and you don’t encounter a lot of the difficulties that other people do when they start wrong. Our CEO, Chris Malta, has written an eBook called “Starting Your Internet Business Right”. This eBook has been downloaded and read millions of times and we always receive compliments about it. It’s because all the information in this book is true and honest and it’s not a book written in fantasy land, it’s real advice from a real person.

Go HERE to get it! It’s Free!

We hope that everyone has a safe and happy Independence Day and when you reach your financial independence, that is YOUR own Fourth of July!

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Posted in Beating the Recession, Online Business, Recommendations | 9 Comments »

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