Website traffic

[herndonflorist]

Ok Guys...I need some help here. I have had a website for a long time now, but we do not get much traffic thru it. I am hesitant to go the pay for click-thru route because I don't have unlimited amounts of $$$ to spend. I have done all of the free advertising thru google and yahoo and such that I am aware of. 2 of my local competitors show up in google as sponsored ads. Can anyone tell me what kind of money I am looking at if i go the pay per click route. I know it varys depending on what you bid for words, but a rough idea of what you all are paying would be a very big help! Thanks,
Anne

 

[spellham]

Basic attention to site SEO...

A somewhat less expensive option (if your website has the capabilities) would be to address some simple on-page SEO problems with your current site. Check the following site reviews in other posts here and here and take a look at the same things on your current website. Taking a quick look at your pages indexed in Google here - the main issue I see are many duplicate title tags - CHR links out to a couple of really good articles here.

Getlisted.org also shows that you've claimed your local listings in G, Y, and MSN (or someone has) so that is a positive step as well - buy your site itself needs attention to some very basic on page SEO issues.

Again, I know this isn't the question that you asked, but I would certainly advise that you have a good handle on organic SEO before jumping into a PPC campaign as it can cost you plenty if not optimized and monitored properly.

 

[theRKF]

I'll echo everything Spellham said, and add that you need to implement an analytics solution (Google Analytics is good and free) immediately. Without proper data, you can't build an actionable plan, and you can't measure results.

Some other items:

• Asthetically, your site looks and acts very dated, which may contribute to people not staying long or converting
• The pull-down navigation on the left sidebar is bad for search and usability (although Google started following forms a couple years ago it still isn't nearly as good as a proper link)
• The pull-down is also excessively long - do you really need Easter in the list right now?
• You have almost no content on the site, only products. Search engines need text to build context and match against user queries. You're starving the bots.

We could go on, but really the site needs a complete overhaul. Spending money on PPC right now would be a waste, IMHO.

There are plenty of affordable florist ecommerce solutions available, aside from the wire service options. You can check these out to get you started:

• Florist 2.0 (ya, that's my company)
• Flower Shop Network
• Media99

Ryan

 

[twiggy]

Thanks Spellham for putting all that information in one place- I checked my site and was a little proud that I had 180something pages listed!
....until I looked a little closer and starting at page 2 all had duplicate content. .. I'll be working on that- writing new meta tags for 3-5 pages a day until they're done.
Thanks to Ryan for that review-Sac florist (and the many other tips you always give) I'll be going through each and grading my site too.

 

[herndonflorist]

Ok so I see what you mean. I see I do need an overhaul of the site. So I will be looking to some of the sites you gave me for help. Thanks....just not a great time (summer) for spending money

 

[twiggy]

Ok so I see what you mean. I see I do need an overhaul of the site. So I will be looking to some of the sites you gave me for help. Thanks....just not a great time (summer) for spending money

but it is a great time to get one up and going- get yourself llisted and ranked before the fall and upcoming holidays!

I have Media99 it's very affordable and worth every penny, as well as the others Ryan listed -

 

[spellham]

Google WMT

Thanks Spellham for putting all that information in one place- I checked my site and was a little proud that I had 180something pages listed!
....until I looked a little closer and starting at page 2 all had duplicate content. .. I'll be working on that- writing new meta tags for 3-5 pages a day until they're done.
Thanks to Ryan for that review-Sac florist (and the many other tips you always give) I'll be going through each and grading my site too.

Google Webmaster Tools is a great tool to identify some of these issues, they report duplicate/short/missing title, description, etc...

This would give you a quick view into the immediate issues that need to be addressed.

Ryan - Ditto on Google Analytics - great tool.

 

[theRKF]

Google Webmaster Tools is a great tool to identify some of these issues, they report duplicate/short/missing title, description, etc...

This would give you a quick view into the immediate issues that need to be addressed.

Ryan - Ditto on Google Analytics - great tool.

Thanks for mentioning GWT - I meant to include it in the list and forgot.

 

[Eric S]

Thanks Spellham for putting all that information in one place- I checked my site and was a little proud that I had 180something pages listed!
....until I looked a little closer and starting at page 2 all had duplicate content. .. I'll be working on that- writing new meta tags for 3-5 pages a day until they're done.
Thanks to Ryan for that review-Sac florist (and the many other tips you always give) I'll be going through each and grading my site too.

Hmmm. Who told you this the first time?

 

[twiggy]

Hmmm. Who told you this the first time?

Thank you Eric!!
:grovel::grovel::grovel::grovel:

 

[duanermb]

It doesn't get much better than this for results in Google for Herndon. (Maybe some, and I am currently in the US on Google.com)

What they said above for sure!

I make a small assumption that Herndon isn't your only delivery area. If it is, then disregard the rest of this post.

I would also do some other research on your entire delivery area, and find out what people are actually searching for on Google.

I checked out the map, and you are close to Dulles Airport, and Washington, DC and perhaps some other towns or landmarks that are in your delivery area that may suitable optimize for.

I find that researching competitors is the best way to start in this regard. Worldgate, one of your top competitors is optimized for many areas that you may also deliver to.

<meta name="keywords" content="Worldgate Florist - Herndon, VA, 20170 Florist, Florist in, Florists, Flowers, Flower Shop, Flower Delivery, Send Flowers, Buy Flowers, Order Flowers, Fresh Flowers, Online Flowers, FTD Member, Wedding Flowers, Wedding, Funeral, Sympathy, Gift, Gifts, Basket, Baskets, Gift Basket, Gifts Baskets, Bouquets, Roses, Birthdays, Anniversary, Gourmet, Herndon, VA, Ashburn, VA, Chantilly, VA, Fairfax, VA, Great Falls, VA, Leesburg, VA, McLean, VA, Reston, VA, Sterling, VA, Vienna, VA."/>

<meta name="description" content="Worldgate Florist - Herndon, VA, 20170 Flower and gift ordering locally to Herndon, VA, Ashburn, VA, Chantilly, VA, Fairfax, VA, Great Falls, VA, Leesburg, VA, McLean, VA, Reston, VA, Sterling, VA, Vienna, VA or worldwide via our international delivery. Buy flowers online for same day and next day local florist delivery."/>

In searches, they aren't doing a very good job of it, but they do have the meta tags in place.

 

[goldfish]

Can anyone tell me what kind of money I am looking at if i go the pay per click route.

I'd say you start with a monthly budget of a few hundreds, or even less, to practice first. There are many factors you need to optimize: ad texts, keywords, negative keywords, geo-targeting, etc. It takes a lot of time.

Many popular but common keywords (e.g., florist herndon va) may turn out to be too expensive, especially in Google, to profitably bid on, though.

 

[laticiarose]

OK

If it were ME...

I would look at the BIG picture...

Firstly...

What is Herndon, VA -- My home town...
It is a town with a waning population base - 28% since the 2000 census Median age is 37 average income is very high -- 92,000 - very hi percentage of latino population...

Knowing this there is no way I would consider spending the likes of a 'few hundreds a month' on adwords -- this would mean I would have to increase my sales 3 or 4 fold over this few hundreds (I think virtually, impossible to do) to get the revenue to support this adwords budget.

I would strongly consider building a new web site that would cater to the latino community -- a multi language web site that would serve as a marketing engine as well as ecommerce and be able to serve as a CMS solution as well -- There is no such thing catering to this indusrty so far...

In your city -- Latino - Whities -- 29.9 - 31.3 %s

You have allot to consider if you want true success I know the buying habits of these groups of folks are very different

I would forget any adword campaign and get a fresh start with a custom web site tailored to your specific needs -- Your population base is not that of a metropolis -- Like our area - some 3 million -- Don't Over Spend on your www

 

[herndonflorist]

I am sure there is a wide range here, but on average how many orders do you guys generate thru your websites?

I am just trying to get a feel for where best to spend my advertising money. We dropped all yellow page ads (which after years of fighting them over deceptive listings I am more than thrilled not to give them more $$$)

We all know the wire service is no longer a reliable source of profit, so if all the traffic has moved to the internet as I suspect, I guess my question is "How much of an investment of money here is reasonable?"

If some of you don't mind sharing info....I am trying to get a feel for how many orders your really nice websites are actually driving to your businesses.

Also thanks for all the feedback yesterday, I learned a lot!

 

[goldfish]

I am sure there is a wide range here, but on average how many orders do you guys generate thru your websites?

I depends on the volume of search traffic.

For example, please take a look at the attachment. Each number indicates the search volume per month for each keyword in Google. You can assume similar numbers for Yahoo/bing search though in a smaller volume.

From this, you can reasonably assume that about 1,000 (give or take) searches are done for 'florist/flowers herndon va.'

Now, because your website ranks #1 in Google/Yahoo search, you should be able to capture ~30% of these searches. That gives you approximately 10 visitors a day (again, give or take). If your conversion rate is 1 in 10, including call-ins, you will get approximately one order a day.

Not much.

PPC (per-per-click) is one way to increase the traffic. However, it's going to be expensive.

First of all, there is not much reason for you to bid on 'herndon va florist' because you are already #1 in organic search.

You could bid on other cities, or more specific keywords, such as 'peace lilies' 'xyz funeral home' 'casket cover' 'wedding florist' etc, etc. And then set up your get-target to your local areas.

By selecting clever keywords and negative keywords, you could increase your web traffic.

As to the budget, it depends on how much you are willing to spend per order for PPC ads. If you are willing to spend, for example, $5 and your conversion rate is 10%, you could in theory bid up to 50 cents.

Hope it helps.