Spruce up your site for holidays

Dear Karen: I’m gearing up to sell holiday products on my website. Any tips?

Answer: Your website should prominently address holiday gift-buying concerns. “Point out ways consumers can use your products to make their shopping easier,” said Erin Presseau, strategic interactive manager for SilverTech Inc., a website development and interactive marketing agency.

Offer some prepackaged gift items and let shoppers know how they can help cross recipients -- such as teachers and coaches -- off their shopping lists. Package your gift cards with an inexpensive gift item and a nice box. “It makes giving your gift cards more alluring for those who like to put packages under the tree,” Presseau said.

Anxiety about shipping delays accounts for a significant number of abandoned online shopping carts. “Add simple notes to your home, product and cart pages to remind shoppers how many shopping days remain and when they need to order from you in order to get their gifts on time,” Presseau said. “This will jolt them into action.”

Tips on building a successful brand

Dear Karen: I’m a business development consultant recently contacted by a client who’s starting a company. How can I brand and develop it with them?

Answer: Creating a memorable brand is the first step, followed by consistently reinforcing that brand. A brand is more than a slogan or logo -- it should define the basic and unique values of a company. A branding expert can help your business owner crystallize her brand if she’s unsure how to do that.

Once you’ve got the brand, use it in everything your company does, said Sondra Ames, co-founder of Wonderland Bakery in Orange County. “We go through a process we call ‘wonderizing’ everything we do. This means using our logo and the same pastel colors on everything we create -- signage, shopping bags, ads, website, business cards, you name it.”

Blogging for art (and profit)

Dear Karen: I have an unusual multimedia art product and would like to market it directly to the public. Can a blog help me spread the word?

Answer: A blog gives you an avenue to communicate your ideas to people around the world. If you use it to discuss your ideas about art, it might spark interest in people who may want to buy your work.

Of course, your challenge is to find a reason for entering the blogosphere. Just selling a product is not good enough, said Gur Tsabar, vice president of the interactive strategies group at Ketchum Inc., a New York-based public relations agency.

“If you think of your product as not just a product, but rather as a culmination of thoughts and ideas -- and if you begin to think of yourself as not just a seller, but rather as the person who had those thoughts and ideas -- then you’ll begin to have the content you need,” he said.

Along with blogging about your ideas, go to related blogs and offer comments and input as well as links to your site, Tsabar said. “Provided that what you have to say is of value, you’ll eventually engage an audience -- an audience that will then be more likely to take interest not only in what you have to say, but also what you have to sell.”

If you touch a nerve based on what else is being discussed online on any particular day, your idea might be written about more broadly online as well as in the mainstream media.

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