marketing strategies

[Globetrotter1]

Apologies for the long post!

We have a new drop shipping niche store that has been online for about 3 months now.  We have been tweaking the site, fixing product entries, adjusting prices, setting weights to be as accurate as possible, doing cosmetic changes etc.  We are just about ready to start some kind of marketing program and wonder if some of you might share what you have done that has been successful in any way.

I will give a bit of background -- I am familiar with web site design and have build a number of sites over the last 10 years or so.  I have a background in wholesale in a brick and mortar environment for about 40 years, so I am not unfamiliar with how this is "supposed" to work and am capable of various tasks that would get this to work efficiently.  What I would like is some feedback on what are some of the better ways to drive visitors to our store.  Just starting out we have a VERY limited budget so this is what we are thinking:

• We have a Facebook business page and have made a couple of test campaigns to get an idea of how that all works.  I am NOT a fan of Facebook, but it appears to be a necessary evil. The 2 small campaigns we ran supposedly targeted several hundred users, but resulted in zero visits to our store, just a bunch of "likes" on the page.  So what ides are there to make the best use of it without spending a lot of money that does not drive traffic and conversions?
  • Not a fan of Instagram, as I do not see any advantage to that platform as a business tool.
• We have a Twitter account and so far I think that is absolutely useless.  We have made a few posts about some products to drive a little traffic, but no results.  We have about 65 followers and get nothing to indicate that it is doing anything for us.  Fortunately, it has not cost so far so we can take it or leave it, unless there is a strategy that we can use to make it more effective.  There are Twitter ads and the cost is not unreasonable (promoted ads run about $100/month) but we as yet have not seen Twitter as a viable vehicle.
  • We have a Google account (Adwords, Adsense, Analytics etc)  and have not used them yet for marketing.  We did not want to start any campaigns until the site looks and acts the way we want so that visitors have a good experience and are not turned off.  I "think" I can work out the details of a campaign to drive traffic via display ads.  We don't want to do a product sales promotion because that requires a Google Merchant account and products listed on Google Shopping.  We tried that process with the Shopify Google Shopping app and it was a nightmare!!  That app is junk and simply does not work.  So we are going to stay away from that until such time as Shopify can get that working properly.
    • As I said, we have a very limited budget for this at present.  So we can put about $200 into this to start.  If there is any return to it then we can increase that as we go.  I understand that there are people spending thousands of dollars on this to get a big return and we are just not there yet!  It is like going to Vegas.  Only take what money you can afford to lose!
  • There are some other actions we have investigated that are relatively inexpensive and promise a variety of actions and potential ROI, like expressflux.com with a $15 investment for a 30 day program that could give us some idea of what the possibilities are before we dump money into a Google ads campaign that would be poorly thought out and doomed to failure.  Has anyone used Expressflux.com, and what were the results?

So, while it might seem that we are being cheap, we have a limited budget and want to get the most bang for the buck with the best potential for good return.  We know that there are no guarantees and that we will have to try a few variations, or combination of things. to see what works.  Just like the stock market, we need to get the most information about where to put our money that can give us the most informed return on the investment. 

It would just be helpful if some of you that have had varying degrees of success, or failure for that matter, would be so kind as to give us some ideas and insights about what has worked or not worked that you have tried.

Thanks in advance! 

The Globetrotters Outfitter

https://globetrottersoutfitter.com

[Emmanuel_Flossi]

Please note that you can use Google Ads, Google does not allow for drop shippers to advertise on Google Shopping. Only if you have the products in your warehouse is it allowed.

You can read more on unavailable promotions in this link: https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/6150127?hl=en&ref_topic=2701536

Hope this helps.

[DuaneBrown]

You can use Google Shopping for a drop ship site as we know many who do it right now. However, $200 is a low monthly budget and it's not even worth trying to run ads on that budget. You would be better to look at PR, SEO and maybe even influnencer promo to drive sales in your early days. Looking at your store, you are going to need to put in more work as it's not going to meet the minimum standard people expect when they show online. Your product images being one big area that needs work.

[Emmanuel_Flossi]

I want to emphasize that being able to advertise on Google Shopping does not mean you have followed Google's Policy.

My replies are always intended to educate and to avoid policy violations. I do a disservice by advicing merchants knowingly going down a path of policy violations as the ramifications can be severe as in lifetime suspension. Not only that, advicing merchants to advertise on Google Shopping by allowing them to spend there hard earned money on setting everything up, to paying for advertising to only be suspended when caught by Google's review team.

The policy clearly states: Promoting products that are not stocked, promoting a deal that is no longer active, call-to-action in promotion that isn't easily achievable from the landing page

Reference: https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/6150127?hl=en&ref_topic=2701536

Products that are not stocked in your warehouse, cannot be advertised.

I see lots of videos explaining how to advertise on Google Shopping, but noone, seems to care or understand Google's policies.

With all my clients, I always advise to follow policies, this allows them to grow there business in the correct way without the fear of losing everything in one day.

Hope this helps.

[jackyle]

I think with a budget of 200 usd / month, it will be very difficult to compete with other competitors. Why don't you choose the way Seo, PR this way low cost but effective compared to your limited budget

Looking at your store, you will need to put in more work because it will not meet the minimum standards that people expect when they display online.

[Globetrotter1]

Good to know.  Since we will never be stocking anything, we will never be using Google Shopping.

[Globetrotter1]

Can you elaborate on specifically what more we need to do to the site?  You mention images and that is mostly beyond our control as they come from the suppliers.  We know some are crappy but we cannot change them.

[Globetrotter1]

Can you offer any suggestions on how to improve the site? I have studied some regarding SEO, and I consider myself fairly knowledgeable, but how to accomplish that with Shopify has me stumped.

[Globetrotter1]

Just to clarify something I said earlier.  We have a $200 budget for marketing, but if spending that gets us some kind of measurable return where we can evaluate to potential for success, we can add to that.  But we are simply not in a position to throw good money after bad just to experiment

[Galaxy_Media_Co]

I've had the most bang for my advertising dollars with Google Adwords since you can highly target your ads. I run a wholesale company so I've found Google to be effective; however, we've also see some success with Facebook at driving traffic, but have not had a high rate of conversions.

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Charles

Owner at Hotel Bath Items