It’s All About You

Before you start your Twitter account or create your Facebook Fan Page, take a moment to reflect on your branding strategy. Lock yourself in a room and don’t let yourself out until you’ve clearly defined who you are as a business and what makes your business unique. Consider how you fit into the marketplace against your competitors. There’s your simple and straight-forward branding strategy. We’ll return to this later to help guide our decision about which social media services to pursue. But let’s spend some more time reflecting on you and how you should approach social media.

Your Social Media Approach

Not everyone can be a Twitter rock star with thousands of followers and witty comments that whip the twittersphere into a frenzy. You should be much more realistic with your social media strategy. Wrapping the Internet around your finger is not your goal. In a vast network of users, the goal of social media is to simply create links between the nodes. In other words, your intent is to build meaningful relationships with other users. Anyone can achieve this goal of building relationships, but it may be helpful to pick an approach to your social media strategy that fits your style and your business goals. Let’s cover a few suggestions.

Be the Leader

An entrepreneur such as you may have some leadership qualities that can flourish in the right social networks. It’s seems natural that you should take on a leadership role in these communities by providing your insight and expertise. Or you may even carve out your very own community. For example, if you run a store that serves an obscure niche online, you may be able to lead this group by connecting them together. A great deal of information about forming online communities has been discussed within the sphere of social media itself. Take a look at Seth Godin’s blog post on leadership as a strategy.

Good Will Goes a Long Way

Aristotle defined one’s ability to be persuasive by several key attributes of their character (i.e., ethos—Wikipedia). Such characteristics are one’s phronesis, arête and eunoia—that’s Greek for wisdom, virtue and goodwill towards the audience. Are you someone who enjoys helping others? Social media is a perfect way for people to connect with other good people. Look for opportunities where your character can manifest in the social arena. You might be able to start a how-to blog with helpful demonstrations on a particular subject relating to your store. Or, join a forum or social network group in support of a charity. For example, if you run a store the sells pet products, you might create a blog on dog grooming or join a forum for your local Humane Society.

Be Yourself

Another wise philosopher had this to say:

“Here’s some simple advice: Always be yourself, never take yourself too seriously and beware of advice from experts, pigs, and members of Parliament.”
-Kermit the Frog

While being a leader and being virtuous are great qualities, make sure you “keep it real” and be yourself. There are thousands of smart, helpful people online, but there is only one you. Use this to your advantage.

As you build your identity online, you’ll find that you may use all of these approaches at times.

Your Social Media Mix

Connecting your business goals to the needs of your customers will help you define what social media services to use and how to use them. Here are a few tips that will make the social media selection easier.

Find Your Niche

There’s a good chance your customers are already out there, socializing with other users, huddling around a forum, blog, or what have you, and geeking out. Your first task is to find these places and join the party. Be a good listener and see if this community would benefit from your participation. Start out by looking at Facebook and MySpace. These are the two most prominent social networks. You may find another social network that is more popular in your region or industry. Do a Google search or ask someone you know if they belong to any social networks or forums. You might be surprised at what you’ll find.

Build Your Own Niche

If you haven’t found the right network, you might consider starting your own. Social networking platform Ning is a popular choice for leaders of small niches. This might be your best choice if you want to create a unique social network experience. You can also create your own forum, or group within a social network. You don’t necessarily have to start from scratch. Find some friends who share a common interest that relates to your store and start that group together.

Engage and Contribute

These days everyone has a Twitter account [http://twitter.com/]. Twitter has become more common than business cards or so it seems. Many influential people are on Twitter and it is likely there are at least a few in your field already there. Start a Twitter account and do a keyword search to find out who has influence. Follow these people, read their tweets and learn about how the whole system works. It may seem like you’ve landed on another planet, but it won’t take long to assimilate. Get started now and follow our Twitter account.

Blogs are another great social medium that influencers use to connect to their audience. You can use Technorati to search for keywords and find blogs within certain categories. If you find a blog that covers your field, add their RSS feed to your RSS reader. Read their posts, find out what topics attract “buzz” (the number of comments on a post is a good signifier). Feel free to engage in the discussion and leave comments too. Get started by subscribing to our RSS Feed by clicking on the orange Subscribe icon at the top-right corner of this page. And, consider starting your own blog with Blogger, WordPress, Live Journal, TypePad or another service. You may want to consider adding your blog to a subdomain of your custom store domain (if you have one). For example, you could have a blog at blog.mydomain.com and your storefront on mydomain.com or you could put your blog on mydomain.com and the store on store.mydomain.com. Then, build links between the two web properties.

The most important aspect to social media is contributing. After you’ve found these relevant communities, start interfacing with the influencers, participants and critics. Reflect on your branding strategy, find your approach and run with it. Don’t expect overnight success. The traffic you pull onto your storefront will not be very profitable at first. As you build more and more valuable relationships within your field, you’ll see greater returns in time. As an added benefit, you’ll also be at the forefront of your industry, learning about trends and perhaps starting a few of your own. You might find yourself becoming social media rock star with a following of your own. Just remember to not let it go to your head.

Where Are You?

Leave us a comment if you’re on Twitter or have your own blog. We’d love to make a connection with you!

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Creating a New WebPage

Let’s create a new page for the About Us information. Most web visitors look for this information when they want to learn about who they’re buying from.  We’ve got a step-by-step tutorial for creating a new WebPage that you can read or just follow the abbreviated instructions here:

1. Log in to your Auctiva Commerce administration.
2. Hover your mouse over the Store menu and click on the WebPages option.
3. Then click on the Webpage icon in the Add WebPages box.
4. In the Page Title field enter “About Us” (without quotation marks).

Now let’s turn our attention to the actual content in this page. This information goes in the “Page Content” field. You can click on the HTML Editor icon if you want to use this tool to format your content.

About Us Content Approaches

Your About Us page is another store branding opportunity that allows you to communicate who you are and your business values to potential customers. This opportunity shouldn’t be taken lightly. Let’s sharpen our pencils and get ready for a quick writing workshop. First, let’s reflect on our store branding rules:

• Keep It Simple
• Keep It Brief (this is the Internet after all)
• Be informative, Be Yourself

With these rules in mind, let’s aim at writing about 150 words or 6-8 sentences for our About Us page. You can certainly write more if you like, but remember the most basic purpose of this page is to prove to skeptical buyers that you are a real person and not a scammer. That can easily be done in a few sentences, especially when you focus on being yourself. Make sure to personalize this text where possible and also clearly illustrate the benefits of doing business with you. To achieve this goal, let’s take a look at a few examples.

Writing Styles

Consider writing your About Us page in a first-person narrative if you run a very personal storefront. This is a much better writing style that can legitimize store owners who pride themselves on personal customer service. When writing a first-person narrative, you will use “I” rather than your proper name. You may also consider writing your About Us as a personal letter addressed to your customer. Here’s an example:

Dear Valued Customer,

Thank you for visiting my store. I started Fishermen’s Cove Online in 2002 to bring my 25 years of fishing experience to customers across the Midwest region. If you’re fishing the Great Lakes, I can help you find what you need to make your trip a great experience. I also fly fish many small streams throughout the year. But even when I’m gone fishing, I always put my customers first. My commitment to customer service means that you’ll always get your gear on time. I guarantee to ship 1 business day after payment has been received or I’ll pay your shipping charges for you.

Please email me <EMAIL ADDRESS GOES HERE> if you’d like recommendations or if you have any other questions. I’m always available to help you with your purchase.

Sincerely,
Ed Troutman
Owner, Fishermen’s Cove Online
Walled Lake, Michigan

In this example, we personalize the narrative and reinforce the benefits for shopping at this storefront in less than 150 words. Now it’s your turn. Ask yourself what kind of store owner you are and what benefits you provide to your shoppers. Make sure to connect your personal qualities to the needs of the customer. In the example above, Ed’s extensive fishing experience (especially within a specified region) is essential in his business serving his customers.

You can add a photo to your letter to if you want to personalize the About Us page even more. Feel free to try other approaches. You don’t have to write a letter. You could break the page down to different sections, such as “About Me” and “My Customer Satisfaction Guarantee.” Whatever you decide to do, make it consistent with your store branding found in other parts of your storefront.

Finally, check your spelling and grammar. Keep an eye out for typos. Click on the Finish button when you’ve completed your new About Us WebPage. Now it’s time to add this page to the footer of your storefront so that a web visitor can find it anywhere along the shopping experience. Click on the Preview icon for the About Us webpage and copy the URL of that page. We’ll need this for adding the footer link. We’ve got a step-by-step tutorial for adding a Footer link or you can follow the abbreviated instructions here:

1. Hover your mouse over the Store menu, then choose Theme> Customize Store Theme.
2. The Customize Store Theme view will load (it will look like your storefront). Click on the Customize Links button. A modal will load.
3. In the Link Text column, add “About Us” (without quotation marks) in the next available field then paste the URL into the Link Path field.
4. Click on the Save links button to finish.

Go to your storefront and make sure the link is working. It’s a good idea to update this page every so often with new information. Perhaps your business goals will change. You’ll need to make sure your store branding evolves with your business. This will give that personal touch that shoppers appreciate.

If you’ve created an About Us page and you’d like to share it with us, please leave a link in the comments. We’d love to see more examples of how store owners are customizing their shopping experience

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The Myth of the Perfect Store Logo

Auctiva Commerce store owners are a diverse group of online sellers that sell everything from vintage collectables to personalized doormats. Each store owner will have their own unique online identity (or brand). In this way there is no wrong way to create a store logo. But, we’d like to throw out a few pointers that will help create a shopping experience that inspires buyer confidence and ultimately generates more sales.

Rule #1. Keep It Simple, Keep It Tasteful

A store logo needs to be recognizable and unique, but it also needs to be readable and digestible. That means the logo itself shouldn’t be so eye-catching that it distracts the buyer from their main goal of making a purchase. And it should not take more than a split second for a buyer to decode its meaning. Designs that make you scratch your head are distracting for the wrong reasons. Ornate store logos are fine as long as it’s readable and fits in with the theme of the store. But often times, less is more.

Rule #2. Small Is Better Than Way Too Big

The ideal dimension of you store logo is 270 pixels by 100 pixels. This is the dimensions that our Store Theme Designers use to layout all the store themes. You can use bigger logos (up to 900 pixels by 400 pixels in fact), but if you go too big you may end up pushing other store content below the fold. Wait a minute, what’s “below the fold” mean? In the world of Internet browsing, any webpage content that is positioned below the viewable area on a buyer’s computer screen is called below the fold. This means that the buyer will need to scroll the browser down to see that content. Usability experts know that the odds that an average e-shopper will scroll down to see more content is not in the favor of the store owner. If your store logo is gigantic, the featured products on your home page will be less likely viewed by web visitors. That can mean fewer sales per month.

Rule #3. Be Informative and Be Yourself

Using descriptive language is a good idea to help inform buyers who you are and how you conduct business. Are you a mom and pop shop? Do you have a large sales and service staff? Do you do business worldwide? Ask yourself what kind of seller you are and how does the benefit your shoppers. This will become part of your branding narrative that tells potential customers that you can be trusted.

Examples: We Got ‘Em

Let’s take a look at some real life examples from the Auctiva Commerce network of store owners. Keep in mind that these are are hard working store owners. Any criticism is meant to be constructive.

Check out the Books To Go store. This store logo is simple, yet unique. It’s bigger than the ideal size, but not too big to block out the Featured Products section. (Keep in mind that every browser displays differently, so you might not be able to see the Featured Section while other can.) Perhaps the logo can be a wee bit smaller. The logo also has some nice descriptive text. The “your friendly Internet bookstore” line should help with buyer confidence. There’s even more descriptive text on the homepage that does the same.

Now let’s look at The Postcard Attic store. Here’s nicely designed store logo. Nice colors and tasteful art. The “A” in the “Attic” comes close to breaking Rule #1 as it’s a little challenging to read that word. Although, you could argue that it makes it more unique. Don’t buy into the myth that there’s a perfect logo design. Sometime it’s best to go with your gut and my gut says this looks good. The only down side to this store logo it that it’s pretty big. The Featured Products section is pushed further down than most stores.

Finally, let’s look at the Tic Toc Comics store. This is easy to read, a good size and it has great descriptive text in the content of the webpage. The only down side here is that the store logo lacks any unique quality, personalization or artistic flair. This could be the best opportunity to brand the store.

Let’s Hear It

I’m sure you know of a store or two that has a terrific store logo. If you do, please leave the URL in the comments and tell us what you like about it. Don’t be afraid to share your own store with us either.

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