In online business, a large amount of your marketing efforts are directed at bringing traffic into your dropshipping website.  One way that you can do this is through a Direct Domain Navigation marketing strategy.

What is Direct Domain Navigation?

Instead of performing a Google search, many people looking for a specific product simply type a generic word into the URL field of their browser.  For instance, if I was looking for mittens, I might type www.mittens.com into my browsers instead of doing an actual search for mittens.

How can you use Direct Domain Navigation to bring traffic to your dropshipping website?

By registering multiple generic domain names that all feed into your dropshipping website, you can capture traffic from Direct Domain Navigation.  The point is to bring traffic from multiple addresses into one website.

If I type www.mittens.com into my web browser, where will that take me?  Hopefully to your website.  Your main URL might actually be www.themittenshop.com, but because you’ve registered other similar addresses, you get traffic from Direct Domain Navigation.

Other reasons why registering multiple domain names is important:

• Though it’s preferable that your main URL be a .com address, you will want to register the .net, .ca, etc. addresses so your traffic won’t accidentally go to somebody else’s site.

• Registering common misspellings of your domain name can also prevent lost traffic.  Wal-Mart lost a huge amount of visitors until they registered www.walmart.com as well as www.wal-mart.com.

• Some major brand names also use the multiple-domain strategy to build websites for a specific promotional event.

What is the downside of Direct Domain Navigation?

Many of the most common generic domain names will already be owned by someone else.  However, with the advent of domain marketplaces, you can often purchase URLs from current owners for reasonable prices.

As I mentioned in Friday’s news post, online sales saw their best day on December 15th 2009 when they reached a record $900 million in one day.  However, the e-commerce increase is not equally spread across all retailers.  While the top 25 biggest online retailers enjoyed an 11% increase over the holidays, smaller retailers saw only a 7% jump.  The divide between mega-retailers and the little guys seems to be widening as the big dogs expand their online presence.  Amazon and Walmart alone accounted for 13% of online spending over the holidays.

Competition from mega-retailers bumps up the cost of advertising campaigns like Pay-Per-Click.  To carve out their own presence, smaller retailers are increasingly turning to social media sites.

Why is Social Media Marketing so important?

1. Social Media Marketing has a heftier influence than you might imagine

The surprise news from ComScore’s analysis of 2009 online-shopping was the level of influence social media sites like Facebook and Twitter have on people’s shopping habits.  A whopping 28% of people surveyed said a social site had influenced their purchase decisions.  At least 7% discovered a favorite online retailer through Facebook, and 5% regularly followed an e-business on Twitter in the hopes of receiving coupons and other promotional offers.

2. Social Media Marketing remains an inexpensive marketing option

While other marketing venues like Pay-Per-Click have risen in price, Social Media Marketing remains affordable.  Many methods of promotion on Facebook, Twitter, Stumble Upon, etc. are actually free.

3. Social Media Marketing allows you more creative liberties than some other forms of advertising

Your average Pay-Per-Click ad can be well-worded, but it’s a limited medium in terms of grabbing your customer’s attention and show-casing the personality of your business.  When you post an ad on Facebook or other social media sites, you can include images and even animation.  If you recall my blog post on how Threadless became the first company to capture my business on Facebook, the reason I clicked the Threadless ad was because of the excellent picture of a Little Red Riding Hood t-shirt they displayed above their ad.  Social Media Marketing often offers more creative and personalized advertising options than other venues.

ComScore has posted the results of its analysis of 2009 online spending trends.  While online shoppers spent 5% less on holiday purchases last year, the over-all number of online consumers rose by 10%.  The 2009 holiday season also included the first day in history to see more than $900 million in online sales.  Tuesday, December 15th 2009 was not only a record-breaking day for e-commerce, it was also a 21 % increase over last year’s sales on the same date, leading some to predict that 2010 could see the first billion-dollar sales day.

When the Segway PT was under development, known only to the world as the mysterious “IT” or “Ginger”, speculation ran wild that this product would revolutionize the way cities were designed, that everyone would clamor to own one, that Segway would reach $1 billion in sales faster than any other company in history.  While the actual success or failure of the Segway since 2001 is debatable, it’s name has become practically synonymous with hype, and the company has only shipped about 50,000 units to date.  Now you can argue it took airplanes, microwaves, and diesel engines a long time to reach common usage as well, but that is beyond the scope of this article.  What I want to talk about is targeted marketing.

The Segway failed to target a specific market

When the Segway was released, creator Dean Kamen thought everyone would want to own one.  And apparently he thought the $5000 model was appropriate for every need and purpose.  In fact, the Segway PT does not fit every need and purpose.  Had a variety of models been designed, the company might have been more successful.

For instance, one of the main uses to which the Segway is currently put is a transportation device for security guards and postal workers.  Obviously, a unit with a much longer battery life would have been preferable for professionals who have to use the device continually for 8 hours.  The postal workers might also have appreciated some kind of umbrella attachment for rain.

Students looking for an inexpensive commuting option and people who want to purchase the product as a toy would need a basic, cheaper model.

Elderly users might require a seat attachment, larger controls, or perhaps an automatic stop mechanism to prevent them running into trees and telephone poles.

The Segway was marketed to everyone, but it didn’t particularly appeal to anyone.  I’m a big believer in target marketing.  You can’t please everyone, so pick a demographic you can impress.

How do you target market dropshipping products?

1. Everything should be done with an eye to your target market

Who are you trying to attract with your web design?  What do these people want to know when they read your articles?  What is important to them in terms of product quality/style/shipping speed/return policies?  What kind of promotions will be the most effective with your target audience?  People are not looking for the same things when they purchase a product.  Some demographics will value the quality of a certain product, others the trendiness.  For some people, the most important thing will be your return policy (ie pregnant women purchasing bathing suits online).

2. Your target market will not always be the obvious choice

Let’s say you’re dropshipping do-it-yourself products like car-repair kits, plumbing kits, bicycle-repair supplies, etc.  You might be temped to market to your average handy-man.  But that market might already be saturated.  Consider targeting an untapped segment of the population.  If you set up a do-it-yourself site for the single woman, complete with educational articles and plenty of instructions, you could have much more success.  Remember Cathy Curtis who marketed her financial planning services specifically to women who don’t know much about financial planning.  Just make sure your un-tapped market is vibrant enough to support your business.

3. You can’t market to people you don’t know

Why are mom-preneur and stay-at-home mom sites so successful?  Because they’re usually designed by actual mom-preneurs and stay-at-home moms.  These women know their market – they know what needs to fill.  If you don’t understand your market, you’re not going to be able to target correctly.  So if you’re trying to dropship products to the Spanish-Catholic crowd and you’re an Alabama Baptist, you’re going to need to do a lot of research.

Maybe I’m way off and the success or failure of the Segway had more to do with how nerdy you look riding one, but I think targeted marketing is a necessity for almost every dropshipping product.

We’ve talked before about how PPC (Pay-Per-Click advertising) can bring traffic to your dropshipping website.  But did you know that you can also use PPC to drive traffic to your eBay store?

The benefits of bringing outside traffic to your eBay store are more than a simple increase in sales:

1. When you bring someone directly to your store from outside of eBay, eBay credits 75% of your store fee.

2. If you are a member of eBay’s affiliate proram and your customer is a first-time buyer, you can actually earn commission on top of your eBay credit.

How can you get affordable PPC for your eBay store?

As anyone who has used PPC knows, it can be very expensive to purchase more common keywords like “shoes” or “boots”.  However, more specific long-tail keywords can be very affordable – say “embroidered cowboy boots” or “hand-made Chinese boots”.  This will bring in traffic with a better conversion rate anyway – if I’m searching for Chinese boots, I’m not going to buy anything from your cowboy boot eBay store, and I’ll just cost you money in PPC.  Thus, specific long-tail keywords can result in more profitable traffic as well as being less expensive to purchase than general, popular keywords.

So you want to start an online business, and you’ve decided dropshipping is the best option for you.  How can you find the best dropship products to sell online?

Step 1: Brainstorm Multiple Product Ideas

Think of 5-10 products you could successfully sell online.  It’s important to have a few different products in mind, because you may not be able to find a dropshipper for your first idea.  After all, not all products are available through a dropshipper, or you may not be able to get your product at a price that allows you to make a sufficient profit.  If you have 5 or more products in mind when you start looking for suppliers, you can compare the results for fishing rods, magic tricks, calligraphy pens, chemistry sets, and baby carriers to make a final decision.

Tip: If you are having trouble brainstorming product ideas, check out this list of products you can sell online for a profit, or simply examine your online purchases over the last month or two.  You should come up with some solid ideas by thinking of the products you yourself like to buy online.

Step 2: Find A Legitimate Supplier – No Middlemen!

If you type “dropship products” or “find dropshippers” into a Google search, you will come up with literally millions of results – educational articles, links to databases and directories, and a mountain of companies purporting to offer dropship services.  Some of these companies may be legitimate, but a huge number of them are actually middlemen.  When purchasing products to resell online, it is extremely important that you get as close to the source as possible – this means you need to purchase directly from the manufacturer or distributor.  Why is this so important?  If you don’t, it will be very difficult for you to make a profit.  You may not be able to sell your products at all, because your prices won’t be competitive.

Let’s imagine your competitor is puchasing food dehydrators directly from the manufacturer.  He gets each dehydrator for $84, then marks them up $20 and sell them for $104.  You, on the other hand, are purchasing from a middleman.  You get the food dehydrator for $99.  You are then forced to either sell it for a $5 profit, which wouldn’t even cover the cost of your overhead, or try and sell it for $120, in which case people will simply buy from your competitor.  You need to get your dehydrators direct from the manufacturer, just like your competitor does.

How can you tell if a dropshipper is a middleman?

Ask these 3 questions:

1. How many different products do they dropship?

You may think the fact that they dropship everything from kitchen faucets to baby clothes is a good thing, but in fact that’s the sure mark of a middleman.  They obviously are not manufacturing all those different products – they’re purchasing them from a manufacturer and marking up the price.  A real manufacturer or distributor focuses on one particular kind of product, like anti-aging skin products or bowling balls.

2. What does it say on their website?

Most legitimate suppliers will proudly post on their website where their products are made.  But be aware, not everybody offering an online service is honest.  Many middlemen post success stories of clients making thousands of dollars selling their products, but that doesn’t mean a thing.  You are always better off buying direct from the source, no matter what a middleman tells you.

3. Do they charge a fee?

Legitimate dropshippers don’t charge an annual, monthly, or sign-up fee for their services.  Only middlemen do this, because they know once you figure out you can’t actually make money selling their products, you’re not going to buy anything else from them.  The fee is where they make their money.  A real dropshipper only charges a small dropship fee, commensurate with the price of packaging and shipping the product.  This means that when you order your food dehydrator from them, they only charge maybe $2-$10 to cover the cost of packing and shipping the item.

How can you find legitimate dropship suppliers?

Wholesale Match operates a database of quality dropship and wholesale suppliers.  If there is a dropshipper available for your product, we’ll find them.  All you have to do is submit a list of products to our Research Team, and they will email you back a list of dropshippers and/or wholesalers in 1-3 business days.  We also provide a variety of educational materials for people who need help starting their online business.  Finally, we are the only supplier database that offers a 100% money-back guarantee on our annual membership.  If you don’t make back at least the cost of your membership, we will refund it in full at the end of the year, as long as you give us a chance to work for you by calling, emailing, or submitting a Research Request at least once a month.

The Wholesale Match Research Team is dedicated to finding the best dropshippers and wholesalers for members.  You are probably familiar with our Research Request process: members submit a list of products they would like to find dropshippers and/or wholesalers for, and the Research Team emails back a list of suppliers within 1-3 business days.  Our Research Team is working hard to make sure these Research Requests contain the best results possible.  One of our current initiatives is to check and double check each link we send to make sure there are no broken links  in our Research Requests.  We welcome your feedback during this process, so if you receive a Research Requests with any broken links, please email customer support at support@wholesalematch.com so we can ensure that all results are of the best possible quality.

One of the absolute most important aspects of website design and online business marketing is improving your SEO, or Search Engine Optimization.  The whole point of SEO is to get your dropshipping website listed at the top of the search engine response pages for keywords relevant to your business.  If you are operating a chocolate-dipped fruit store, you want your business to be the first one that shows up when I Google “chocolate fruit”, “chocolate-dipped fruit” and even more obscure keywords like “gourmet gifts” or “wedding shower treats”.  Efficient SEO will bring in a ton of business, often more than you could pay for through Pay-Per-Click advertising, banner ads, flyers, etc. – that’s why it’s so important.

I’ve talked a lot about basic SEO techniques in previous posts, but you should be aware that search engines are constantly tweaking their algorithms to make the search experience better for users.  This means that you need to stay up to date with what the search engines are looking for.

One aspect of SEO that has become increasingly important is video.

Posting how-to and instructional videos is a great way to improve your SEO and get your business noticed, particularly for new or smaller businesses that have a hard time competing in traditional SEO.

3 things to remember when adding video to your website and your marketing efforts:

1. Video files need to be properly titled with keywords so they’re searchable.

Search engines often can’t read anything other than text (for instance they can’t read your logo if it’s an image instead of text).  Titling your video and posting a short summary or description is helpful both to search engines and to people visiting your site.

2. Your video needs to be valuable.

Your video needs to provide valuable information, blow people’s minds, or at the very least make your visitors laugh their socks off.  If your video has no value, nobody will want to watch it, link to it, or recommend it to friends.  Informative is probably the easiest note to hit, so film a video on how to perform an amazing card trick, how create the perfect rosettes for a birthday cake, or a review on the latest ergonomic bicycle helmet.  Obviously the video should be related to your product line, so the aforementioned videos would be on websites selling magic tricks, cake decorating supplies, and cycling gear.

3. Promote your video and your website on other venues

Post your video on YouTube and other popular sites.  By including a link to your website, you can bring in traffic.

To reserve or not to reserve, that is the question.  Should you set reserve prices on your eBay auctions?  If so, how high should you set them?  How will a reserve price affect your auction and fees?  You thought there would be a simple yes or no answer here, but as usual there’s more to consider.

4 things you should know about setting a reserve price on your eBay auctions:

1. Lots of eBay buyers won’t even look at an auction with a reserve price

By setting a reserve, you are cutting out a hefty chunk of your potential customers.

2. Setting a reserve will raise your eBay fees

EBay wants you to start everything at 99 cents, because that makes auctions exciting for people.  To save money on fees and to increase interest in your auction, don’t set reserve prices for items that you know will sell for a decent price.  If you’ve already sold four laptop bags for $29-$35, you can be fairly certain that your fifth laptop bag will sell for the same price (assuming you are posting it in relatively the same way).  Trust that products which have been good sellers in the past will continue to sell, and start the bidding low.

3. Setting a mid-range reserve price could hurt you

If you do set a reserve price, make sure it actually represents the minimum amount you want to take.  Don’t try to compromise by setting a reserve price somewhere in the middle where you’ll lose money on the product.  Because an item with a reserve price is likely to get less traffic, it may well sell for just over the reserve.

4. Making your reserve price visible can help

When setting a reserve price, at least make it visible.  There is no benefit to hiding the reserve price; people can figure it out by placing incrementally higher bids.  By being upfront about the lowest price you’ll take for your product, you may lure back some of the bidders who don’t like dealing with reserve auctions.

Obviously it’s important not to lose money selling products on eBay, so there may be times when a reserve price is appropriate, but try to avoid it when possible, and at the very least make sure people can see what the reserve is.  When your auction does not have a reserve price, including “No Reserve” or “NR” in your title can help attract bidders.

Did you know that China will soon be the #1 English-speaking country in the world?  Or that the top 10 in-demand jobs in the US did not exist in 2004?  How about the fact that it took radio 38 years to reach an audience of 50 million and TV 13 years, but the Internet required only 4 years, iPods 3 years, while Facebook reached 50 million people in 2 years?  (Check out the YouTube video Did You Know? at  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cL9Wu2kWwSY for these and other facts about the crazy world we’re living in.)

How is this relevant to your online business?

The world is changing at an exponential rate, and e-commerce is one of the most swiftly adjusting industries.  If you can’t keep up with changes in customer demands and marketing techniques, your online business will fall by the wayside.

How can your online business adapt to changes?

1. Don’t pay for services, pay for training

Many e-business owners are tempted to hire SEO companies and marketers to promote their business online.  The problem is, if you don’t know anything about online marketing and SEO, how do you know you’re getting your money’s worth?  How will you know if you’re getting results at all?  And how long will you have to keep paying these people for?  Instead of hiring someone to do the work for you, find someone who will train you on how to improve your SEO and market your online business through venues like social media.  This will save you money in the long run, and the information you learn may alter your entire plan for your online business.

If you do hire a service, make sure you communicate clear goals and expectations to the company, and carefully monitor their results (for instance, know what keywords they are optimizing your website for, check how your site is rising on the search engine response pages, and confirm that your traffic and conversion numbers are improving).

2. Don’t be afraid to experiment

Try using a foreign supplier, try branching into social media marketing.  Maybe your venture won’t be a success, but you’ll never know until you give it a shot.  Just remember not to leverage yourself too much in risky ventures: it’s okay to try ordering $500 worth of bowling shoes from a Chinese supplier, but don’t risk your entire $8000 savings.

3. Look for new opportunities, not just tried-and-true techniques

E-commerce is a trend-oriented industry.  If you jump on the bandwagon of an established success, you’ll probably be too late to reap any real reward.  Entering a saturated market or advertising on a tired venue isn’t useful to your online business – if you’re only just now thinking of selling iPods on eBay or marketing your business on MySpace, you’re a little late.  Instead, look for fledling products and venues.  Not every new auction site or every new trendy product is going to take off, but if you get in on the ground floor in a few different areas, you have a good chance of riding the crest of the wave instead of chasing after a dying trend.

4. Don’t forget classic business techniques

The emphasis of this article is adapting to change and jumping on fresh opporutnities, but don’t forget business fundamentals.  I ordered a fruit bouquet today off the Edible Arrangements site, but I didn’t find it through Facebook or a texting campaign or a blog article.  They hooked me with a tried-and-true marketing campaign that’s been popular since the 1050’s: a simple TV ad.  Don’t forget that t-shirts, car decals, flyers, yellowpages ads, and business cards are still effective promotional tools.