Attracting customers

When you start an e-commerce website, the most important thing is to attract customers!

There is no such store that will sell just by opening. To be honest, there are a certain number of people who think that they will sell if they create an EC site.

However, I have never seen a store that made a profit just by opening. If you don't attract customers, you will never sell anything!

In this article, we will cover what methods are available to attract customers.

Even if I write it roughly, it's this much text... Yes, attracting customers is difficult.

Attracting customers through social media

The number one way to attract customers is through social media, which is free and easy for anyone to start using. Those who control social media will control the EC site. I think we are living in such an era.

Fans are likely to continue purchasing from you over the long term, and as your followers increase, you can expect to see big sales.

The most popular SNS are

• Instagram
• X (Twitter)
• Facebook
• YouTube
  
• Tiktok

Would it be around there?

However, social media is not growing as easily as one might think.

A momentary buzz can lead to a sudden surge. Relying on such things is just gambling.

Social media professionals know the importance of calculating and growing the number of followers, and that simply having a large number of followers is not enough.

The quality of followers

There is also this.

I think it's less common these days, but a while back people used to sell followers with things like "10,000 followers for XXX yen." Companies have lists, and people on those lists will follow you, but these people will almost certainly not press "like" or visit your website.

From an appearance standpoint, you may be able to advertise that you have "over 10,000 followers," but your sales will not increase at all in relation to the number of followers, and social media may view your account as a "suspicious account" and you may receive fewer views.

On the other hand, if you have a lot of followers who are of higher quality than quantity, for example, even if you have 500 followers, 300 people will access your content each month, and 150 of them will make purchases.

Such accounts actually exist. If the average customer spend is 5,000 yen, then you can make 5000 x 150 = 750,000 yen in sales through social media alone, so quality is extremely important.

The X account that I personally have has around 3,400 followers, but I am blessed with high-quality followers, so I would say that sales are extremely strong.

Of course, the ideal is to have a large number of followers and high quality . To achieve this, you need to constantly provide the information your followers want to see and want in order to turn them into fans. Whether you can do this or not is a big key.

With over 100,000 followers and high quality followers, it is becoming increasingly common for EC sales to exceed "billion yen." Moreover, there is no advertising cost involved.

I've written a few dream-like things, but in reality, it's not that easy to gain a lot of high-quality followers!

What is needed to achieve this is to "continue to deliver the necessary information to the necessary people on the necessary platforms ."

The platforms you need to know are "Instagram," "YouTube," "X," etc., and you need to understand which one is the best solution.

Ideally, it would be nice to be able to do all of them, but there is a limit to the amount of effort that can be put in.

There are platforms that are more suitable for different products, so think about that first and then choose which SNS you will use as your main one!

For example, it's not going to be easy to grow an account for "men's clothing for men in their 50s" on the young-oriented SNS "Tiktok". In the first place, men in their 50s rarely use Tiktok, so that customer base is not there. Don't start with "Tiktok is popular, right?"

Naturally, video content requires more effort.

If you're a man in your 50s, I think "Facebook" would be a good choice. "X" would also be good.

There are people out there who need it !

Attracting customers through advertising

To be honest, SNS doesn’t have an immediate effect, but advertising does! On the other hand, it’s also very expensive .

However, many EC businesses put a lot of effort into advertising. If it is managed well, advertising can be very cost-effective. If it is not managed well, it is often said that money will be wasted.

There are several types of advertisements. Here are some of the most common ones:

• Listings, display ads
• Pure advertising
• Affiliates
• Influencer

Listings, display ads

I often see them explained separately, but I'll write them together here because they are often done at the same time when placing an ad.

And when it comes to web-based advertising, this is by far the main focus !

Listings are the ones that come up when you search on Google. Display ads are the ones that are often displayed as banners or images when you visit a website.

It's ok to think of it this way.

This type of advertising is classified as "CPC", which means that advertising fees are incurred when a link is clicked .

On the other hand, if no one clicks on an ad, it doesn't cost anything, but there's nothing more pointless than an ad that isn't clicked.

In addition, the cost per click is determined through an auction format , a rule that can be difficult for beginners to understand.

For example, if you search for "dress shirts" and it appears first, it seems like it will sell well. But everyone thinks the same thing.

So you can find out the approximate cost per click in advance.

As you can see, when you click on "recommended custom-made shirts," you can see some results with a high click-through cost of 1,242 yen.

On the other hand, "dress shirts" are surprisingly cheap.

This is an important consideration in advertising strategy , but when someone searches for "dress shirts," it's unclear whether they want to buy a dress shirt or just want to know what a dress shirt is.

People who search for the words "recommended custom-made shirts" are likely to be people who want to buy dress shirts , so from an advertising perspective, there is a higher chance of them making a purchase! This calculation must also be taken into account.

And because it becomes a popular word, advertising costs may increase.

If it costs 1,242 yen just to get a click, you won't be able to make a profit on a shirt that costs around 5,000 yen. Not everyone who clicks will buy it.

Pure advertising

Speaking of advertising, this was overwhelmingly the mainstream in the past. Basically, it was something where you signed up for a monthly ad space and had it displayed in the same place for a long time.

Going back to the previous example, if you want to sell "custom-made shirts", it would be effective to advertise in a men's fashion magazine, right? That's exactly it!

If you can place your ad in the right location, you can expect it to be highly effective, but the better the location, the higher the monthly fee, so that's something to consider.

With major sites, you may only be able to apply through an agency, so be sure to consider this as well.

Affiliates

This is a type of advertising where you ask bloggers or others to introduce your company's products, and if a sale is made through the introducer, you pay a certain amount as a reward.

Most of the comparison sites that come up when you search are affiliate sites.

If you search for "recommended custom shirts," the sites that appear at the top of the ad space below are exactly these types of sites.

You look at comparison sites, don't you? And then you choose from there. That's why it sells!

Affiliate marketing can be a powerful tool depending on how you use it, so it's something to keep in mind and consider.

In most cases, you will have to go through an intermediary company called an ASP service. "A8 Net" is probably the most famous one.

Influencer Advertising

This is one of the methods that has been growing in recent years. It is very difficult to grow your own social media presence, so this method involves getting influencers who already have a proven track record to promote your products.

However, there are now very strict rules against "stealth marketing," so influencers must also clearly state that "this is advertising."

Still, the power of spreading information is amazing, so if you have 100,000 followers, there is a high chance that your content will be seen by more than 100,000 people.

Of course, the cost will vary depending on the number of followers you have.

On the other hand, there are also companies like influencer agencies that have a large number of followers of around 2,000 to 3,000 people.

You can use a technique of having several influencers in each genre introduce products.

If they are in the same genre, there is a high possibility that they will have overlapping followers. If you like weight training, there is a high possibility that you will follow multiple weight training influencers.

This means that the same people will see it multiple times, which could potentially take advantage of something called the "mere exposure effect."

Although regulations are becoming more stringent, it is still a growing and effective advertising method .

There are many other types of advertising, but for now, keep in mind the four types listed above.

Also, if you operate it in-house, there is a high possibility that you will waste money. However, there are few companies that will accept a monthly budget of less than 100,000 yen. If you are going to do it, we recommend that you try it with a serious budget.

SEO measures

Another effective way to attract customers is through SEO.

In order to rank highly in search results, measures must be taken both within the site and off the site...there is even something called domain power, and various other factors are intricately intertwined.

The first thing I want to say is that it's not easy.

When creating a website, we often hear people say, "Please take SEO measures." As a production company, we will of course take the usual measures to the extent possible, but it is not easy to advance to the top with just SEO.

That's why there are so many specialized companies out there, but I think most of them are probably much more expensive than you first think.

Also, the algorithms that rank high in SEO can change drastically every few years!

There was a time when people would say, "Just put in a lot of keywords." (I think it was about five years ago.)

Everyone will use the technique that is said to be "good at the moment," but as a result, the number of malicious websites that exploit these algorithms tends to increase, so Google always makes major changes to the rules and takes measures against such malicious sites.

The "affiliate site" introduced in the previous advertisement is likely to be displayed at the top. Affiliate marketers rely on SEO measures, so they try all sorts of SEO measures, and as a result, affiliate sites are overflowing, and Google search is becoming less attractive... and then Google changes its algorithm.

I often hear stories of affiliates whose income suddenly went to 0 yen one day. This is exactly what Google's changes bring about.

So, if you are doing business with a long-term perspective, be sure to develop the universal aspects!

The journey of SEO isn't built in a day

I think it's fair to say that the universal aspect is "content that is steadily developed."

If you can ensure that you deliver high-quality information to those who want it, your ranking will naturally improve to a certain extent.

Among these, it is a good idea to think about which search terms you want to rank for.

Even if there are some strange parts in the sentence, I just forcefully mix in the words.

Sites with many quality articles tend to rank higher.

And since updates also affect the evaluation, post new blogs and update articles. For EC sites, product registration is also an effective method!

Large companies have an advantage

Google believes that large companies are better at guaranteeing the reliability of information, so to be honest, they can't beat them! There's nothing you can do about this, so avoid a head-on battle.

Domain authority and backlinks

Domains have a history, and domains with a history (that have been used for a long time) tend to be highly rated. Also, domains with a history are more likely to have "backlinks" from external sites, right? (Not all of them are like that, though.)

These kinds of aspects also affect SEO, so to be honest it's not easy to aim for high rankings with a newly acquired domain.

That's why there are websites that specialize in selling "used domains."

This domain, which may have once been used as a different site, still has many inbound links on the Internet and has a long history, so it has a high SEO effect from the start.

When purchasing, the domain must have been used in a similar way before.

y-shirt.com

If a used domain like this was being sold with the claim that it was "highly effective for SEO," and you were to operate a toy store with it, it would be so far removed from the "backlinks" you had up until now that its ranking would plummet, and the backlinks you had gained would have no effect at all. (If you click on a link on a shirt promotional site and it leads to a toy store, no one will see it.)

Other Attractions

Of course, there are other ways to attract customers.

You can advertise it in a local free paper, or if you have a storefront, it's a place where you can attract customers.

Word of mouth is a great way to attract customers, and you need to consider it in more detail, so with that in mind let's move on to the next section, "Business Plan."

Back-end operations

Finally, we will cover back-end work. There is a lot to do up to this point, so you might be tired just reading this, but we are almost there!

Back-end operations include the parts I mentioned a little earlier in the business plan.

• Purchase
• sell
• send
• Accounting

That's the general trend.

From purchase to delivery

Once you purchase a product, you have to store it, and it remains in stock until it is sold (it is possible to run a store without inventory, but few are doing so successfully).

And only when a product is sold does revenue occur and the product needs to be shipped, but how do you ship it?

At first, you will probably handle delivery in-house, and in that case you will most likely use Yamato, Sagawa, or Yu-Pack.

Make sure you know which delivery company is easy for your company to use! If you already have a business relationship with them, you may be able to negotiate a special price, and if you use Shopify, you may want to consider a service called "Plus Shipping" that can reduce shipping fees a little!

However, in any case, be sure to check within your company the question of "Who will pack the items?"

How to prepare "shipping slips" is also something to think about. If you sell a few items a day at first, you can write them by hand, but I don't want to write 20 shipping slips by hand a day.

So we need to think about ways to automate this.

Anyway, how do I write the invoice and send it?

This is surprisingly crucial in the backend.

Accounting

Finally, any business that has sales must carry out accounting procedures.

Where will the sales figures come from? How will the money be deposited? Let's check that as well.

Please refer to the article above for more details, but for customers, "a variety of payment methods available" means it is easier to make a purchase, which contributes to sales.

However, when you think about it from the perspective of someone who handles accounting, you come across a huge number of deposits that make you wonder, "What is this money for?"

It's not hard to imagine the accounting staff getting angry.

Let's find out where and how the money is coming from.

Customers may also ask for a receipt. You will also need to think about how to issue this.

There are several ways to do this, including manually issuing the data or spending a little money to automate it.

Let's find the operation that suits your company.