How to Generate Maximum Sales When Launching New Products

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• How to Generate Maximum Sales When Launching New Products
• Apple Doing Just Fine in the Post Jobs Era, Per Mobile Stats
• The Benefits of Giving Your Staff a Raise
• Doorman Startup Allows You to Arrange for On-Demand Delivery
• 4 Ways to Encourage Online Reviews

How to Generate Maximum Sales When Launching New Products Posted: 04 Feb 2014 04:00 PM PST Who doesn’t like new things in life? Well, I assume the majority of us do and eCommerce sites are no exception. Online merchants have to add new products frequently to engage their customers and make them loyal towards their products and services. This can be as simple as adding a new handbag to the women's section on the site or putting a new electronic in the automotive category. There can be thousands of reasons to market specific products in a big way. However, you need to ensure that the products you are launching reach your consumers. Most importantly, potential customers need to know where to buy the products they need. If you are introducing a new product on your site, below are a few important actions that can help. How to Generate Maximum Sales Great Product Pages Often Do Wonders There are a few things to look into besides providing impressive product pages. When you plan to launch a new item, be certain to include compelling photography and catchy product descriptions. Follow best practices for building your eCommerce products pages. There should be several high-resolution photographs of the products that allow shoppers to zoom in and see every tiny detail. Detailed product descriptions are helpful to give your customers information about the size, fit, look, benefits and other specifications of the product. Develop a Unique Selling Proposition (USP) USP is a brief thought-out statement that shows why your customers should purchase their products from you and not from your competitors. Your site should contain a tagline that contains a part of your USP or positioning statement. For instance, M&Ms has, “Melts in your mouth, not in your hand.” Wonder Bread has, “Helps Build Strong Bodies 12 Ways.”  To ensure a profitable business, the USP should be compelling, promising and specific. It can be about your product, services, stores or other capabilities. Take Help of Email Support For driving your new product sales, email marketing remains an effective option. As soon as you plan to launch your product or have already launched a new one, send the announcement to your email subscribers at least once per week for minimum two weeks. If it is feasible, you can also include some special offers for your premier customers. If you are planning to conduct a contest before the launch of your new product, email can be used to make the announcement. Content Marketing is the Best Strategy Product publicity is incomplete without content strategy. Through blog posts, videos, podcasts and articles you can get the word out about your new product. Content marketing requires constant research and creation of valuable content topics, optimization, sharing and continuous networking for links and shares. Remember, content marketing only works if it can entertain people with useful and impressive content. Gather Testimonials and Reviews Testimonials are one of the best ways to build hype for your new item as shoppers tend to rely on other shoppers. Send a free product to your top five customers and ask them to review it. If these five customers actually like your product, use their reviews in content marketing, promotional videos or even on the product detail pages. Customer testimonials discover what does and doesn't work with your products and what should be the solution to satisfy your valuable customers. Utilize Every Mode of Promotion Once your product is launched, it's time to educate prospects about it and drive sales. In addition to social media networks including Facebook and Twitter, opt for paid promotions such as banner ads, streaming video, pay-per click campaigns, streaming audio ads, radio, print publications or television ads that support new product launches. Once you understand how to successfully launch your new product, getting it to the doorstep of your customers becomes much easier. Sales Photo via Shutterstock The post How to Generate Maximum Sales When Launching New Products appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Apple Doing Just Fine in the Post Jobs Era, Per Mobile Stats Posted: 04 Feb 2014 01:30 PM PST When Steve Jobs passed away in 2011 after a battle with cancer, it didn’t take long for people to predict Apple’s decline.  For instance, Larry Ellison, founder of Oracle, suggested that Apple would slip into a period of long-term decline. But two and a half years later, one might question that.  While Apple’s stock price has had its ups and downs, it is higher now than during the Jobs era.  Company sales have grown, too, although net profits have come under some pressure. Judging from the latest comScore statistics, the Apple platform is picking up market share, both in terms of subscribers and as a mobile platform. Apple smartphone subscribers now count for 41.8% of the market, as of December 2013.  Back in June when we reported the numbers, Apple had just 39% of subscribers in the United States.  Those numbers had grown from the earlier quarter, also.  In other words, Apple is still growing. By contrast, Motorola’s phone share declined a bit.  Only Samsung showed growth among the big five manufacturers — Apple, Motorola, Samsung, HTC and LG. Those numbers measure subscribers by smartphone maker.  In other words, out of the 156 million people in the U.S. who owned smartphones, nearly 42% or roughly 65 million of those were Apple devices. When you look at the operating platform, the picture’s a bit different.  Google’s Android platform (spread out among different manufacturers) is still number one. It has 51.3% of the market, but showed a slight decline of 0.3%.  Clearly, Google owning Motorola didn’t do much to grow Android in the near term.  What will happen to Motorola now that Google has spun it off to Lenovo, is still a question, however. Blackberry, once the darling of entrepreneurs and small businesses everywhere, continued its sad slide.  Its market share has been halved in the past year, and now stands at around 3.4%. Apple, despite predictions of its decline, appears to be doing fine under CEO Tim Cook.  So if your company needs to invest in new mobile devices or make platform choices, it seems like Apple is still a strong growing platform. Image: Wikipedia The post Apple Doing Just Fine in the Post Jobs Era, Per Mobile Stats appeared first on Small Business Trends.

The Benefits of Giving Your Staff a Raise Posted: 04 Feb 2014 11:00 AM PST Are you trying to keep your key employees happy by offering them perks like work-at-home days, cross-training and flexible hours? That's great and I encourage you to keep offering those extras, but a new study shows that they may not be enough to retain workers. What matters more than feel-good, work-life-balance extras? You probably don't want to hear this, but – it's money. Why You Should Consider Giving Your Employees a Raise Dr. Greg Willard, a Harvard University professor and executive at Cangrade, a job candidate screening company, reviewed studies of the causes of workplace stress and found some important insights. First, Willard says, the majority of people are stressed at work, with studies by the American Psychological Association consistently showing 70 to 75 percent of employees reporting workplace stress. What's the number-one cause of workplace stress? Low salary – which is closely related to the second leading cause, which is financial worries. Clearly, making more money would go a long way toward relieving most employees' stress. If you think you can't afford to pay employees more, consider this: Employee stress is already costing you. The APA studies found that 33 percent of workers lost as much as 10 percent of their productivity due to stress, while 20 percent lost up to 25 percent. And nearly 60 percent of employees have looked for new jobs or quit their current jobs due to stress. If you're on a tight budget, like most small businesses are, you may decide that bonuses or other one-time incentives are the best way you can relieve employee stress while still keeping your bottom line healthy. Unfortunately, Willard says, research shows paying a higher salary upfront is more effective than bonuses or incentives that the employee may or may not receive. When employees feel their financial needs are met, they feel more secure in their jobs, more likely to be open about their opinions as to changes that can help the company, and more engaged and enthusiastic at work. "That's great" you say. "But I just can't afford to pay higher salaries." Below are some options to consider: Look for Other Places to Cut Costs to Free Up Money for Higher Salaries Get your employees together and brainstorm ways you could streamline processes or eliminate waste. If they know that the savings will go into their pockets, they're likely to come up with quite a few ideas they have not mentioned to you before. Focus on High Performers and Key Employees Frankly, you may have some employees on staff that you don't care if they look for another job. Focus your efforts and salary increases on the high performers you want to retain and the key employees you couldn't do without. It's easier to squeeze out a small amount to increase one or two people's salaries than to do it for the whole team. Adjust Benefits Perhaps it's more cost-effective and motivationally effective to eliminate some of the employee benefits you currently offer and use the savings to give your staff salary increases. For instance, if you have 50 or fewer full-time employees, under Obamacare you don't have to offer health insurance. Depending on where you live and your employees' age and health status, if you give them raises, they may be able to afford insurance more cheaply on their own and still enjoy a higher salary. Talk to your benefits provider and accountant to figure out the cost-benefit here. Job Consolidation In some cases, you might want to consider consolidating job duties. While some might think this means laying off employees, that's not necessarily the case. If you do lay people off, make sure you give your remaining workers raises and that they understand the reasons behind the change. Be mindful of relationships among employees. No one's going to be happy about a raise if it means their closest work buddy lost his or her job. And no one's going to be engaged if they're worried about the next round of layoffs. Attrition can be a far better recourse, when someone quits or retires, distribute his or her duties and salary among your  employees. Happy Employee Photo via Shutterstock The post The Benefits of Giving Your Staff a Raise appeared first on Small Business Trends.

Doorman Startup Allows You to Arrange for On-Demand Delivery Posted: 04 Feb 2014 08:00 AM PST Great business models often solve a simple problem. Logistics startup Doorman aims to solve the problem of packages arriving when you’re not at home. The startup has a smartphone app downloadable for iPhone and Android. If you’re expecting a package delivery and know you won’t be home when it arrives, you can use Doorman to arrange for a special delivery later that day. Doorman gives its users an address where they can direct packages. That address is a local depot operated by the company. Once a package is received at the depot, users can arrange a convenient time for home delivery. CEO Zander Adelle told Fox Business Network recently that for many residents living in apartment buildings with no doorman, the service fills a vital need. FedEx and UPS are likely to leave a sticker telling these residents to arrange for another delivery time anyway. Usually, the only other available times are when recipients are at work. Adelle said one solution open to many recipients is to have packages delivered at the office. But this means they have to lug the packages home with them in the evening. Doorman charges $7 per package delivery. It makes deliveries between 6 p.m. and midnight. That’s a time when the major carriers are done for the day. Users currently can earn a free delivery from Doorman if they post a positive review of the company on Facebook or Twitter. Doorman will even sign for packages that require it, the company’s website says. Doorman is currently only operating in San Francisco but has plans to expand to other metropolitan areas in the future. The company notes on its site that it works with all the major shipping carriers, including the U.S. Postal Service, UPS and FedEx. Image: Doorman The post Doorman Startup Allows You to Arrange for On-Demand Delivery appeared first on Small Business Trends.

4 Ways to Encourage Online Reviews Posted: 04 Feb 2014 05:00 AM PST Sponsored Post Have you ever been in the mood for a certain type of food and hopped on Yelp to look for a new restaurant to try? If so, then you know that online ratings and reviews from customers are key to driving new customers to your business and growing your sales. The more reviews you have, the more trustworthy your business will appear to be. But too many small business owners aren't doing all they can to encourage online reviews and get customers to post them. As a result, they have few or no reviews and get passed over in favor of businesses with more feedback. How can you encourage customers to leave reviews? Encourage is the key word here, because actively soliciting or requesting reviews is frowned on by review sites and providing incentives such as discounts or freebies in exchange for reviews can get you in trouble. Try these steps below instead How to Encourage Online Reviews Give Them a Sign Posting signage in your store, restaurant or office is a simple and subtle way to remind customers that your business is on review sites and that you'd love a review. For example, Yelp has downloadable "Find us on Yelp" banners you can print out as signage for your store window or point-of-sale counter. Provide Postsale Reminders Your store receipts or restaurant checks could say, “Like us? Review us on [list the review sites where you have a presence].” An eCommerce company can send follow-up emails after the sale to make sure the customer was satisfied and include a reminder that your business is on review sites to further encourage online reviews. Spread the Word Put icons for the review sites where you have a presence in your print marketing materials, on your website (you can use the downloadable Yelp banners there), in your email signature and anywhere else you can think of. Make it Easy Everyone's more inclined to write a review if it's not a big hassle. So if your site says, "Like us? Review us on Yelp," make sure there's a clickable link so they can do so in a minute. Whatever you do to encourage online reviews, there's one big “don't.” Don't fake them or have friends and family write them because you're worried you don't have enough. Use the tips above to grow your online review status organically. This article, provided by Nextiva, is republished through a content distribution agreement. The original can be found here. Feedback Photo via Shutterstock The post 4 Ways to Encourage Online Reviews appeared first on Small Business Trends.

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