Have You Tried Google’s New Keyword Research Tool With Insights For Search?

desmond — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 07:23:25 +0000

For those of you who are new to the realm of ecommerce shopping cart solutions, keywords are a very big deal unless you do not want your site to be easily found. For instance, an online shopping cart Canada web store selling running shoes would do well to select heavily searched long tail keywords that best represent its target market.

We’ve written at length in previous articles (How to Pick Good Keywords, Long Tail Keywords) about how to select keywords and what kinds of keywords are best. In this post, we’ll explore Google’s Beta version of their new Keyword Tool.

Those of you who are familiar with InstanteStore’s handy SEO Wizard free ecommerce shopping cart software service feature will have noticed that the SEO Wizard asks that you choose 3 keywords for each of your product, category, and content pages — 1 primary keyword and 2 secondary ones. It also insists that you use these keywords a minimum number of times throughout the key areas of your page — headers, content, etc. in order to meet a minimum keyword density for each keyword.

To help select the best keywords, traditionally, a lot of merchants could make use of the Google Adwords Keyword Tool or Wordtracker. Since ecommerce is getting more competitive, choosing the right keywords has become more important than ever and Google has now added more depth to their keyword tool by linking it to Google Insights – a tool to view search trends.

Now, with the aid of the Advanced Options tool, you can tweak your search criteria further by selecting language or location and even show statistics for mobile devices. At the Keyword Ideas section of the page, you will find a magnifying glass icon. Clicking on that icon will open the Google Insights For Search page. This is where it gets interesting.

Information is broken down into various categories here. Let’s go back to that online shopping cart Canada web store selling running shoes. If you type “Running Shoes” in the search, you’ll get a whole list of keyword ideas. The first to appear on the list is “Brooks Running Shoes”. Click on the icon next to that keyword. Once you’re over at the Insights For Search page, you’ll notice that Google were kind enough to break down the search term into categories: Shopping (75-100%), Recreation (0-10%). That tells you that this term is mainly used by shoppers; some would call it a conversion keyword.

Below that is a graph that displays interest or keyword usage over time (1 year). This is followed by a list of locations where the keyword is most used. A graph is included on the right for a quick once-over. The Top 10 related search terms as well as related Rising Keywords are displayed at the bottom of the page.

If you are the owner of an online shopping cart Canada web store selling running shoes, and you sell the Brooks brand, the information from the Google Insights page tells you that your biggest market is the US. But although “Brooks Running Shoe” is a heavily searched keyword, it’s also very competitive. In such a case, it’s probably a good idea to consider one of the rising keywords like “Brooks GTS9″, which is actually a new model from Brooks, as a better alternative.

Pick Good Keywor

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Cross-sell Your Products To Better Sales

desmond — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 08:29:52 +0000

Cross-selling is an awesome way to improve sales without much effort. Amazon has been credited as the innovator in Internet cross-selling and because of their (heavy) investment in this sales technique, the rest of the ecommerce world has found a winning way to improve sales.

It’s obviously worked for them, so why shouldn’t it work for you?

Sales facts:

Repeat customers spend 30% more on average than new ones.
Merchants report that referrals among repeat customers are in excess of 100% more than non-customers.
Studies have shown that it can cost up to 6-10 times more to sell something to a prospect than to sell that same thing to an existing customer.
Up to 65% of a company’s business comes from existing customers.

That’s great, but how do you go about taking advantage of the power of cross-selling? Read on to find out…

Most secure ecommerce shopping cart solutions offer cross-selling features. At InstanteStore, this feature can be activated at the Feature Activation page (it’s under the Manage Your Store heading on the Admin Control Panel). There you can decide to either manually or automatically select products to cross-sell.

The manual selection process involves selecting specific products to cross-sell, allowing you to customize the products that will be shown as cross-sell products. For example, you can cross-sell specific bicycle helmets that would go best with particular bicycles.

The automatic selection process will automatically group products that are purchased together by customers at your store as cross-sell items. This is especially useful if your store features products or services that customers tend to buy in bundles.

Cross-sell items are prominently displayed at the product page as well as on the shopping cart. This gives customers the opportunity to easily add products that they may find interesting to their shopping carts.

Cross-selling tips:

Cross-sell products that are naturally related. For instance, if your customer just bought a bicycle, you could suggest mobile pumps, carriers and lamps.
Timing is key. The InstanteStore shopping cart application features a cross-sell on final payment page option that will show cross-sell items at exclusive prices on the final payment/thank you page after a customer has just completed an order. Research shows that customers who’ve just bought something are probably in the mood to purchase even more, so offering customers who’ve just bought something related products at a discount is a great way to fully capitalize on their buying momentum.
Try offering a mix of product prices. You don’t necessarily have to always cross-sell only low-priced products. Low-priced products are good for impulse buys but products that meet customers’ needs head-on can go for higher prices.

If you are using a top web site ecommerce hosting shopping cart like InstanteStore, then you should make good use of the tools that are offered. The cross-selling feature has proved extremely useful for many merchants over the years. If you already have a good customer base and want to increase your sales figures, this feature is certainly something you should try.Recent Posts:

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Ecommerce Shopping Cart Blog by InstanteStore » ecommerce shopping cart solutions

Have You Tried Google’s New Keyword Research Tool With Insights For Search?

Pick Good Keywor

Cross-sell Your Products To Better Sales