Why are my online store sales low after launching?

Topic summary

A new Shopify store owner launched their streetwear site on Black Friday but is experiencing disappointing sales and seeking advice on improvements.

Current Challenges:

  • Only stock images with Photoshopped designs are live; actual product photography pending
  • Limited budget preventing paid advertising
  • Email marketing setback after Flodesk flagged and canceled their account (had ~3000 emails from previous blog)
  • Uncertainty about SEO implementation and Google indexing

Community Recommendations:

Technical SEO Fixes:

  • Submit sitemaps directly to Google Search Console for faster indexing
  • Fix H1 tag structure (currently showing logo instead of descriptive text)
  • Optimize product titles, descriptions, and meta tags
  • Add schema markup to header section

Marketing Strategy:

  • Focus on organic social media engagement rather than paid ads given budget constraints
  • Plan influencer outreach (sending products to 3 supporters) and giveaway to build community
  • Use free email marketing tools like Mailchimp (500 contacts free)
  • Create valuable content and answer related questions on Quora with website links
  • List business on Google Shopping (free), Google Business Page, Yellow Pages, LinkedIn, Yelp

Site Improvements:

  • Update color scheme (current appears dull)
  • Add coupon codes and favicon
  • Maintain 60:40 image-to-text ratio with attractive banners
  • Optimize navigation bar
  • Consider pricing adjustments (products noted as slightly expensive)

Caution: Be skeptical of Fiverr SEO services—SEO typically takes 4-12 months to show results, and cheap services may use harmful techniques that increase spam scores.

The owner is actively working on site improvements for 2024 and remains open to further guidance.

Summarized with AI on November 13. AI used: claude-sonnet-4-5-20250929.

We launched our website Thursday night for Black Friday, but things don’t seem to be going as planned. Can it be the designs, the website (Sense theme), SEO? I would love to get some opinions from the Shopify veterans. Our designs have not come in yet, so only the stock images with the Photoshopped designs are in the store. I plan to do a photoshoot once the designs are ready. I plan on sending a couple of tees and hoodies out to 3 influencers who show support frequently.

Is the SEO for Shopify different from that of other websites? How do we get Google to index our website? My budget doesn’t allow for ads, so social will be my only avenue.

There are people on Fiverr doing Shopify SEO with great reviews.

Be honest and let me know what I need to change.

www.shopdulcecandy.com

Edit: I am planning on doing a giveaway to draw attention to the streetwear and I will continue engaging with my audience. We had flodesk for over a year and a list of emails (~3000) from our old blog, and When we sent out a newsletter about our merch line, Flodesk flagged them and asked for proof of how we acquired so many emails. Long story short, we ended up cancelling the Flodesk account.

Hi @jesse310 ,

I understand that you’re facing some challenges with your Shopify website and seeking advice on various aspects. Let’s break down the key points you mentioned:

  1. Website Launch and Design:

    • Since your designs haven’t been implemented yet, it might be a good idea to wait for the final designs to be live before assessing the overall impact on user engagement.
    • Stock images with Photoshopped designs may not provide an accurate representation of your products. Once the designs are ready, the photoshoot will add authenticity to your product pages.
  2. SEO for Shopify:

    • SEO for Shopify is similar to other websites in many aspects. Ensure your product titles, descriptions, and meta tags are well-optimized with relevant keywords.
    • Submitting your sitemap to Google through Google Search Console can help with indexing. Also, focus on building backlinks over time.
    • Utilize social media to drive organic traffic to your website. Regularly post engaging content and interact with your audience to boost your online presence.
  3. Influencer Marketing:

    • Sending products to influencers is a great strategy. Make sure to choose influencers whose audience aligns with your target market for better results.
  4. Email Marketing:

    • It’s unfortunate that you faced issues with Flodesk. Consider using a reputable email marketing platform[I recomend klaviyo] to rebuild and engage your email list. This can be a valuable channel for marketing promotions and updates.
  5. Giveaway and Social Engagement:

    • A giveaway is an excellent way to draw attention. Ensure the mechanics of the giveaway encourage participants to share and engage with your brand on social media.
    • Continue engaging with your audience on social media platforms to build a community around your brand.
  6. Budget Constraints:

    • If ads are not currently feasible, focus on organic methods like social media engagement, influencer marketing, and optimizing your website for search engines.

Regarding Fiverr for Shopify SEO, you should first know about your own requirements before hiring a freelancer. It typically takes 4-12 months for SEO to work, according to a Google video. In most cases, SEOs need four months to a year to help your business first implement improvements and then see potential benefits. So, you don’t want to spend on things that you cannot review. I recommend you make changes on your site, make them as SEO-friendly as possible, and then hire a copywriter/SEO specialist to optimize your store.

Regarding your site http://www.shopdulcecandy.com/, I would like to suggest the following points:

  1. Update the color combination of the store. The current color combination looks dull.

  2. Add attractive banner images. Maintain a 60:40 image text ratio.

  3. Add a favicon.

  4. Add offers by providing coupon codes.

  5. Optimize your navigation bar.

  6. Write page titles and descriptions for all your products.

I you require someone to make above changes on the site, you can directly message me.

1 Like

Social media is your best bet. This will be way better than throwing money at ads. You want to make a connection with your customer as the market is flooded with clothing. You can sign up for Mailchimp and at least add 500 people on the free plan. They also have integration with Shopify in the app store.

For SEO be very very very skeptical of people on fivver or really anywhere lol. SEO is an ongoing thing and people that promise to get you ranking high could be using lousy techniques that end up increasing your spam score & could possibly get your ranking higher temporarily but you could easily loose it just as quick.

Focus on content and creating content for your customers. Create helpful content that people will love to share with others. Use Quora to answer questions people may have that is related to your brand image or products. Answer their questions and link your website.

  • Sign up with yellowpages, LinkedIn, every social media site, yelp, and any other place that offers a place for you to insert your URL. This is just an easy way to get more footprints out there.
  • Create a Google Business Page if you haven’t already and fill it out completely.
  • Sign up with Google Shopping, it is free to list your products.

Doing these things and getting your URL sprinkled everywhere will help with your Domain Authority. Once you have your site indexed you can keep an eye on your DA by going to https://moz.com/domain-analysis.

Moz created the Domain Authority (DA) to grade sites on what they believe Google is looking for in terms of rank. I huge thing that increases DA is backlinks.

Summary of Backlinks:

A backlink, also known as an “inbound link” or “incoming link,” is a hyperlink that points from one website to another. In simpler terms, when a webpage links to another webpage, it creates a backlink. These links are essential in the field of search engine optimization (SEO) and play a significant role in determining a website’s authority, visibility, and ranking on search engine results pages.

Getting you site set up with google indexing:
The fastest way to get them to do it is by submitting your sitemaps directly without having to wait for crawlers.

Step 1; Sign up with google search console: https://search.google.com/search-console/about
Step 2: In the left side menu click sitemaps.

Here are your sitemaps; you can copy and paste these individually into the section to add them in:

Once you have them inserted it will take some time for the bots to scan your site typically 1-2 weeks but they usually try to at least have your main page scanned within a few days.

Some meta data you may want to think about for your header section (you already have some filled out but more information the better):


Some more technical things to fix:

  • tag is your logo. I have no idea why Shopify and other theme builders do this but this is empty useless information to Google. Google uses your

    tag as the absolute most important tag that lives on your pages. You can only have 1 per page and you want to put what you feell customers are searching for within that tag. Often I hide this tag so that it is not seen by people but by Google. I usually do this because what I want to put in the tag is often too long or not very fun for the hero section.

Keep researching your customer. Building a brand takes time but if you always keep in mind how to serve your people you will do just fine. If you need help with things just let me know and I can lend a hand.

1 Like

I guess price of your items a little expensive

@jesse310 If you’re putting out some great social content, we’ve got a widget that will allow you to repurpose it on your site as a shoppable, scrollable experience. Shoppable Stories can be deployed in minutes and help you extend the useful life of that awesome content, allowing it to be seen by people that might not be following you on socials.

Here are two Shopify brands using it:
Soho Poms
Friday Atelier (seeing 30% higher AOV from purchases made directly from this experience)

Look for the customizable Instagram-like content circles (see below for Friday Atelier examples).

If you’re interested, I can let you play with it for a bit. Just let me know.

Gary [email removed] hello-lisa

Thanks for all the feedback. Lots of great tips on indexing sites. I am glad that I did not pay for the SEO yet. My wife and I are working on our site now to get it ready for 2024. A price adjustment is something that we’re going to do, too.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

I would love to connect to get some help with our website. I tried to send you a message; it seems you have the direct messages disabled.

Jesse