1Build a Real Business

Selling on third-party marketplaces (like eBay) is a great way to get started, and to get your products out there fast... but it is not without its problems.

If you have spent any amount of time as a seller on these sites I think you know what I’m talking about here...

First of all you are up against perhaps the most extreme price competition imaginable. And then on top of that, you pay a hefty fee from your top-line revenue for the privilege (9% plus listing fees on eBay last time I checked).

The combination of both fees plus extreme price competition makes it an almost impossible task for many new sellers to get their foot in the door.

Add to that an ever-increasing number of rules and regulations to follow, and a feedback system heavily biased towards buyers, and it’s no small wonder that so many people give up on their dreams so quickly.

2Build Trust and Increase Profits

Even today, shoppers are more skeptical about buying online than through any other media.

So if you want to win their business, not only do you need a product that they want, you also need to pass all of their ‘trust filters’.

With your own (professional) website you signal to buyers that you are serious about what you do, and not likely to up and vanish overnight.

But having a website that looks ‘wrong’ or (even worse) is broken is a big red flag to most buyers.

There are several things that all sites should have. And these include:

• Secure payment processing (see pic)
• Prominent display of trust-inducing symbols
• Easy to find contact details, including a street address and phone number
• Professional privacy statement, and
• Seamless design

3More Options. More Traffic. More Profit.

Having your own webstore does not mean that you have to give up selling in other markets.

What it does mean, is that you have many more options and places where you can get traffic from.

And more traffic = More money.

Because your Store is designed from the ground up to be easily optimized for the search engines (like Google) you can start getting free traffic from the beginning.

Your Store will even send out automatic messages to the search engines that act as little boosters that help you get noticed faster.

But that's not all: With the freedom having your own webstore gives you, you can explore other powerful ways of promoting your products. And with SaleHoo Stores Traffic Training (see bonuses further down the page) you'll be miles ahead of your competition.

4Turn Visitors into Buyers

Each SaleHoo Store is designed around a framework that makes it as easy as possible for a customer to make a purchase.

On the internet, your customers are always just one-click away from leaving your store.

We’ve spent countless hours perfecting all those ‘little things’ that can mean the difference between that ‘one-click’ and a successful purchase.

These include...

• Simple, logical navigation layout
• Intuitive and common-sense shopping cart
• Prominent 'breadcrumb' navigation so visitors never find themselves at a dead end or 'lost' on your site
• Easy to grasp category structure
• Well laid-out and readable product descriptions and images

Want to see examples of what SaleHoo Stores really look like? Get a sneak peak here.

5Point-and-Click Setup

Setting up an e-commerce website used to be a complicated affair, requiring knowledge of web-design, hosting accounts, SSL certificates, HTML, CSS... or at least having the money to pay others to handle all of this for you.

If you were going to open a bricks 'n mortar store, would you start by learning how to build a warehouse or office block before you got started?

Of course not! So why do it when starting an online business?

You don't have to re-invent the wheel. We’ve taken care of all the boring stuff so that you can spend more time on what really matters.

Your store will be based on proven designs, while keeping enough customizability to give it a personal look according to your preference. And all without breaking the bank.

6Repeat Customers = Steady Profits

It always costs much less to sell anything to an existing customer than to go out and try to sell to new customers all the time.

That’s why the smartest businesses do everything they can to build up a group of repeat customers that come back over and over again.

The absolute best way to do this online (and you can do it direct from your SaleHoo Store) is with e-mail marketing.

As soon as someone makes a purchase from your Store, their contact details are recorded, giving you the ability to follow up with them later, to make sure they are happy with their purchase, and to make them offers on related items.

And with our SaleHoo Stores Traffic Training (see below) you'll learn some more advanced email techniques that can realistically double the amount of revenue per customer you can expect to make.

7Coupons and Promos

One of the cool things about a SaleHoo Store is that you have built in functions to create promotions and special offers. This makes it easy for you to offer percentage-off or fixed price discounts on multiple or single products (and control how long you want the offer to last) without any complicated programming.

All it takes is 3 easy steps...

• Decide what you want the special offer to be (a percentage-off or fixed dollar amount)
• Decide on a start and end date for your promotion (time limits increase the urgency and get people ‘off the fence’)
• Give out your coupon code – your options here are limited only to your imagination. A few ways you might do it include: by email, posting on Facebook, giving out coupons in the real world, using them in ads, or posting them in forums related to your product.

8Effortlessly Keep Track of your Data

Your Store comes with built-in features to keep track of your inventory, manage orders, and keep everything running smoothly.

Not only do you get automated reports which show exactly what customers have purchased and when...

You can also tie in with Google Analytics (or other tracking software like Crazy Egg, Optimizely, and others) with no fancy programming required. You’ll be able to see exactly where your customers are coming from and which pages on your site they are most interested in.

Also included is eBay listing importing using Turbo Lister (for those sellers who already have a lot of listings and want to quickly populate their Store).

9Say "Goodbye" to Transaction Fees

When you sell items on major online marketplaces you end up paying upwards of 9% of the final value of every item you sell.

Even on some of the cheaper hosted e-commerce websites, you pay a ‘success fee’ on every item you sell. With a SaleHoo Store you only pay a flat-rate subscription. And that’s it. No hidden hosting costs. No listing fees. No success fees.

As you sell more, the cost of running your SaleHoo Store stays the same.