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There's no such thing as #1
Published: October 12, 2006
The chase to be #1 can often overshadow the goals of the business with any online enterprise. The problem is #1 means different things to different people.
One thing's for sure, never lose sight of the business objectives.
#1 Ranked
The often thought interpretation of being #1 is getting listed for a phrase in Google that you've worked towards for a long time. Great! Eventually, you've made it! You're going to be rich!
But, are the sales rolling in? Some. Is that #1?
When it comes to search engine traffic being #1 in a pile of results nobody searches for is useless. A true #1 spot is a result that generates sales. This takes far longer to establish than you think and doesn't necessarily mean top rank for a phrase either. Market exposure / saturation / dominance is far more important.
#1 Repeat Business
You don't need the search engines to run a successful business on the web. It is easier and far more cost effective to sell to existing customers. This is a test of your product quality, customer service and support. If existing customers enjoyed shopping with you then they likely will again.
Do you have their details? Have you categorised their interests? Do you know what you're customers are likely to buy? Have you the tools in place to inform them of latest editions to the product range or special offers coming up?
Too many online businesses fall short in this area. The temptation is to chase new business when there is often substantial money to be made with existing customers.
How much repeat business do you do? Don't know? Maybe you should find out.
#1 Sales
Jackpot! You're #1 because sales are up and climbing. Well, although that's a great thing, you still need to track the weaknesses. What this means is identifying what tools you need to convert every new customer into a repeat customer, identify customers interests, means of communications and their needs as a long term customer.
The most important aspect of seeing your sales increasing is knowing what is driving this and measuring the cost of driving this.
A good recommendation for people starting out is to use the tools you have. Did you know that Microsoft Outlook and Business Contact Manager can be a very powerful customer relationship management system?
If you currently have this facility and wish to go further, why not look into some of the open source customer relationship management tools such as OpenCRM or SugaCRM.
Finally
There is no such thing as #1 in the world of retail, unless of course you're Tesco. What we need as etailers are the tools, the knowledge and the information to provide a better service to the customer than our competitors. Good customer relationships through service and support will always win in the end. By far the biggest referrer of business is good old word of mouth, it can't be beaten and there's no amount of CSS tricks in the world that will achieve that.
Take a look at what you can do to improve your customer relations.