Hey guys my name is Nora. My name is
Marianna and we are with Printful's
marketing team so we've been with
Printful for a few years now and over
the course of this time we have had the
pleasure to work with a lot of really
inspiring and fascinating store owners
and over this time we've noticed that a
lot of people are doing really great
things for their stores, but we've also
regularly noticed a lot of
don'ts or mistakes that we see people
doing as well that come up pretty
frequently. So in this video we want to
talk about some of these 10 mistakes
that you're doing in your online store
and how you can fix them, so you can you
sell more and grow your store even
more. Let's get started! Mistake number
one - store isn't optimized for mobile.
Whatever it is that we're looking on the
internet we're used to looking at on a
big screen on our laptops or whatever,
but as soon as you put it on a smaller
screen - whole another story. Make sure
that it's optimized for mobile. It's
important because people are becoming
more and more used to shopping on their
mobile phones. Almost 40% of all
ecommerce purchases during the 2018
holiday season happened on a
smartphone. So this isn't a trend that's
going away. It's just gonna get more and
more popular and more and more people
are gonna shop on mobile. One good way
how to test if your site is
mobile-friendly is to check... What's
it called again?
"Google mobile-friendly test". You plug
in your URL and then Google will tell
you right away whether or not it is
mobile-friendly and if it's not
mobile-friendly, what are the things you
should work on. You can also just
test it yourself by opening your store
on different devices like a smartphone,
different size smartphones, tablets. You
get the picture. Exactly, and if you
you're a bit too close for comfort
or getting too accustomed to your site
you can also give your store or your
device to a friend and see how they
interact with your site. Because that's a
very good way to figure out what works
and what doesn't. You can also
have your friends test and actually make
a purchase on mobile. Because it's one
thing whether or not it looks good on
mobile, it's a whole other ballgame
whether or not you can actually check
out and follow through with a purchase.
That's also an important thing to
test out. Few other things you can do
to make sure your store is
mobile-friendly is making sure all the
icons are fitted to the screen,
the
size isn't too small. Make sure your
image sizes are high quality, but also
not super huge, so they load quickly
enough and generally you want to make
sure that you also have responsive
design. What that means is that the
design of your store expands and
retracts depending on the size of the
screen you're looking at. Any developer
could help you do this, but you can also
take a look at the themes that your
ecommerce platform offers and make sure
you go with a theme that is also
responsive and looks good on mobile.
Mistake number two - No "About us" page. In
this day and age, you may have heard, that
storytelling is a big deal. You have to
tell your story to be heard, because
you've got a lot of competition out
there, a lot of e-commerce stores going
after your click, so you have to tell
your story. One great way how to do
it is through "About us" page.
That's a way to build credibility, to
build this connection with your audience
and just tell your story. A lot of
people might think it's just an
overlooked page, people don't actually
read it. but that's wrong. People do read
the "About us" page and it does help
build credibility, because if your brand
isn't well known then people
don't know is the store legit, who am I
buying from, what is the idea behind the
store? And it also gives you an advantage
over the big-box retailers. They
maybe don't have a unique story that
you do and it's like a David and Goliath
thing, where you can stand out because
you're a small business and you can
share your story and who you are.
Some of the things you can talk about in
your "About us" page - who you are, about
your brand, about your brand values, maybe
some brand history. Is it family
owned? Are you building your
business with a friend or is it maybe for
charity? What's the reason for you
creating this business? It also helps
to add a few pictures just so people see
that there's a real human being behind
that store. Mistake number three - poor
quality product photos. In the digital
age media is primarily visual. People
are still attracted to pretty photos and
the eye is immediately drawn to
colorful visuals or just aesthetically
pleasing visuals. It's very important
to integrate things like that on your
site as well. It also helps to sell
your products, because you're selling the
vision of your brand, you're selling an
image of your end
customers wearing your products. When
you're shopping online you can't
actually try on a product or touch
it, feel it, see what it's like, so it
helps your customers get an idea of what
they're buying and what they're shopping
for exactly. It's also useful to add
details like the size of the model and
comments on the fit. Maybe it's a
bit tighter, maybe loose fitting?
Remember, your customers can't touch or
try on the product so it's very useful
to provide as much as these details as
possible.
You can try lifestyle photos for the fit,
for the overall look of the garment or
whatever product that you're selling and
also flat lays are cool, they just
look nice and they build this
environment, this vibe.
Make sure your photos are also
generally zoomable so people can zoom
in on the details that they're
interested in. Mistake number four - boring
product descriptions. What we're
trying to say is product descriptions
that don't really stand out and don't
really inform the customer about
anything, that's what qualifies as
boring. As we mentioned earlier
storytelling is still very big, people
want to know you, they're interested and
invested in telling and learning stories.
So that also applies to your product
descriptions. You want to sell
your story and really sell your products
to the customer using language and
imagery to help visualize themselves in
your product. Make sure to add
information which is relevant to the
customer, remember, there's nothing wrong
with adding that technical information.
Do mention the fabric for a
t-shirt, wash instructions,
wash and care instructions. On some
of the well-known ecommerce sites out
there you'll notice that the product
descriptions have this balance of
the creative side and the technical side.
Sometimes they're split up in these two
little tabs with shipping or care
instructions and then they have the
brand language description. Then,
going along with your product
descriptions, you also want to include a
size guide as well. Then pay
attention also to grammar
or spelling mistakes. You need to use
this opportunity to show off your brand
and show how legitimate your store is.
When you're writing product
descriptions make sure to include those
key keywords
about your product. If it's a t-shirt,
make sure to add the actual word "t-shirt",
if you're selling, I don't know, a mug, a
coffee mug, do mention the words "coffee
mug" in the description, because that
makes your description and your product
that more searchable. Next step, mistake
number five and that is confusing a product
catalog. Basically, when a customer lands
on your site, they should know just
intuitively where they want to go or
where they have to go to find the products
that they want. That means laying them
out andn all of your products out in
understandable categories or creating an
understandable collections, just so
customers can easily see "Okay, I want a
men's t-shirt - where do I go to find that
exactly?" You don't have to get too
elaborate, if you're running an apparel
business, I think, for starters you can
just go with "men's", "women's" or maybe
"t-shirts", "bottoms", "accessories" just
something super simple so there isn't
too much overlap between categories.
That's something we see often
where people want to simplify the
process by making several
categories thinking that you'll just
click just the one you need, but if the
product appears in several categories it
gets a bit confusing. That's
another thing we also notice - a lot of
categories, but also too few categories.
When you land on a page and it's
just like a huge list of products and
then it's a little bit overwhelming,
because there's so many products
here, I don't know what I actually am
looking for, I don't know what I want, how
do I get through all of this? So it's
finding that balance of okay what
products do I have and how do I show
them and organize them in a way that my
customers will be able to find what they
want? It actually goes hand in hand with
product photos, so make sure they're
all similar, that they're of the same
style so when the person gets to see
your product grid, when they've opened a
category, it's not too chaotic, so there
aren't photos with white backgrounds
and suddenly there are lifestyle photos.
So it's just more easy on the eye.
Mistake number six - no social proof. Just
to get started a quick reminder on what
social proof means. It's some kind of evidence
of people enjoying your product. These
days it takes shape of social media
posts that are incorporated in the site.
Those could be testimonials,
user-generated photo.
For example, reviews things like
that, just evidence of people using your
product and it's important because and
this kind of ties back to your "About us"
page, where if you're an unknown brand
people don't know who you are, they might
not want to buy from you if they just
don't know if your products are actually
gonna be legit and quality. It just
helps lend your store credibility if new
customers can see "Oh! This other
person brought this product and loved it
so I must be on the right page
and I could buy from the store as well."
Customers are generally gonna trust
real people over a brand telling them
that this product is quality. Because
of course we're gonna be telling
everybody that you're great, but that's
for people to decide. The easiest way to
get more customer reviews and social
proof is just to ask for it. People, if
they are fans of your product and they
want to help your brand succeed, they're
probably gonna be more than willing to
help you out, especially if you're
a little brand just getting started.
You can send out an email.
In Printful we have our
packing slips, we can add custom messages
so even there you can say "Hey, leave
a review, I would love it!"
You can even offer a
special incentive to everyone who leaves
a review by giving them X
percent off for example. Another cool
thing you can do is just make your
social proof a bit more personal.
Try to connect your story with your
customers story. If you see somebody
who's particularly interested in your
brand or maybe sharing a lot of your
products on social media, share
those photos again, give them a shout-out.
Maybe send them thank-you note or
something, just built that bridge,
make it more solid. It's
also always a good idea to reach out to
maybe an influencer or
celebrity because
they also have a lot of clouts. If
their fans see that they are wearing one
of your products, that's also gonna
really help spread the word. Mistake
number seven - no incentives to buy. People
aren't going to want to necessarily
spend their money, especially if it's
their first time on your store. It's
really a good idea for you to help nudge
them in the direction that you want to
go in. There's a lot of subtle ways,
or not so some ways, of doing this so you
can also, for example, in your product
descriptions make the product sound a
little bit more exclusive. "It's
unique product", "handcrafted" or if you do
hand design for example. You can also
drive the sense of urgency by saying
that it's a limited time collection.
Offer free shipping, this is huge, we
always recommend offering free shipping.
We've seen it ourselves in our own
EB tests for our "Startup
Vitamins" store - people are going to
be more likely to buy even if you
increase the price to take into account
the shipping. People are more likely to
buy a product with free shipping.
Make sure that people know about your
free shipping offer as soon as they get
on that page. You see this all the
time with the little free shipping
banners on the top of the page. I'm sure
you've seen those,
it's super effective. Holding
some kind of a sale or promotion
discounted prices that's also been how
to motivate them to buy more.
Those are all good ways to boost
sales, but make sure not to be a bit too
eager. Especially for things like
pop-ups and and emails. Don't
get too excited, don't jump all over your
customer as soon as they land on your
store just give them a few minutes to
take it all in and then go "20% discount"
For pop-ups especially we
recommend doing like a scroll kind of
pop-up or a time to pop-up so it's not
like your customer lands on your page
immediately and "Uh 20% off? But
I don't even know why do I want
this!" Let them browse a little
bit, let them get to know your store or
see your products, peak
their interest a little bit first.
Another good idea in terms of pop-ups is
an exit intent to pop-up. That is
when pop-up software can tell based on
where the cursor of the mouse is going
if they're about to leave a page, then a
pop-up will appear "Hey, are
you sure? You know you can stay put on
this page buy something, get a discount."
It's kind of a last-ditch effort to
make them stay.
Mistake number eight - too much stuff
going on. This ties in a little bit with
what we just talked about in terms of
creating incentives for people to buy
things. Like we just said, you
have to incentivize a little bit, but you
have to be careful with that balance and
make sure that you're not overdoing it.
It's a good idea to keep your
store kind of clean and
minimal. You don't want a lot of
different gifs, or
little illustration pop-ups
happening. Keep your store very
neat, clean and easy to navigate. Another
thing that sometimes is a bit annoying
is that people want to get you to
subscribe or log in too eagerly, create an
account to check out. People are
really, really sensitive about what data
or what information they share about
themselves and surprisingly enough they
may not be willing to share their email
address with you. If you do, and
again this also ties in with the last point a
little bit, if you do ask for an email
address at the check out, then make sure you
also understand what value they get out
of it as well. Think
of it as currency. You're not just
gonna give your email away for no reason
at all, you have to offer something
that's gonna be of value. Whether that
is a discount like we mentioned in the
last point or like a free ebook,
if you're selling phone
cases like a free home screen.
Something like that, just something that
makes them kind of want to actually
offer their emails. Mistake number 9 -
broken links and broken things. Why
is it important? Because it just
bums you out to go on a site and
see a broken link. You want to buy
something and you can't, so you just leave.
It also kind of damages your
reputation and your credibility if a
first time customers on your page
click a button and it doesn't work,
it's not a good look. They might
not think that you're credible, your
business is legit and they're probably
not gonna want to leave their credit
card information with you. That's just
a very basic bottom line thing that
you should do - make sure everything
works. You should test
your store on your desktop, on your
mobile device, make sure there's no bugs, all
your links work and they're all clickable
when they should be. You can also test
your checkout process to make sure that
you can go through it that it's smooth,
that it's quick and you know it actually
works. Make sure that people can submit their payments
and get their orders. One
little thing we've also
noticed are these little social media
icons that tend to appear at the bottom
of the page. Make sure that they go
somewhere. If you don't have an Instagram
or a Facebook account or Twitter, then
just don't use them.
If you do have one make sure that
you actually have some content on there
because that's another level of sort of
sketchiness.
That's an example of social proof,
somebody scrolls down to the bottom of
the page see your Instagram account
click and there's no posts, no nothing. "Oh,
do I want to buy from this store? I don't think so."
We've arrived at mistake number 10 which
is difficult checkout flow. Which is
arguably the most important one.
In this case let's imagine a customer
has landed on your store, they're really
into it, they love your products, they
actually click on one, add it to their
basket and they're on their way to
checkout and they expect that "okay,
couple clicks and this product is gonna be
mine." But then they're asked to
create an account,
they're asked to
do something else. Check this box and
type this information. "I don't
want to, nevermind this is too much
effort I'm putting this product back and
leaving."
You're so close to the finish line,
with the checkout you almost have that
sale. You just really want to make
sure that the process is super smooth.
You want to ask for the least amount of
information as possible to get that.
If they have to type a million
different things, they're just gonna
get annoyed, they're gonna get lazy and
they're not gonna do it. So make sure
that it's as few steps as possible, as
easy as possible. Make sure that
you have the payment methods that
they're used to paying,
accepting credit cards, PayPal that
kind of thing. Exactly and another very
important thing is that the checkout flow is
like the Holy Grail.
It's just super focused, no distractions,
no sales, no promos. Your customer
has already placed a few items in their
basket and now you got to get
them to the finish line, no distractions.
That's the one CTA - purchase.
And that's all you should be focusing on
at this point. A thing you can do
to make sure your checkout is easy
and seamless and we've already touched
on this before throughout this talk,
is to test it out yourself
Make sure that you can buy a
product you know give it to a friend,
make sure they can buy a product.
Go through the
process yourself and then make sure that
the product also works in the
backend as well, that it actually syncs with
your e-commerce platform with
Printful and that it actually goes
through. Remember to check if it's
easy to buy in Mobile. Alright and
that's it from us guys! We hope you found
this very helpful and we'd love to hear
from you as well. If you have any
questions about what you might be doing
wrong, what you might be doing right. If
you have noticed what others are doing wrong
we'd love to hear it, so post it in the
comment. As always keep hustling,
keep doing your best and keep working
hard and good luck! Good luck! Hey, there!
It's a Wes from Printful! I hope you liked
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