If you liked my blog post
Virtuemart: 32 Tips for Increasing Conversions from more than 2 years ago, then you will like this one even better with over 100 fresh actionable tips for your Joomla shop. So let’s get started:
If you’re still using Joomla 1.0 with Virtuemart 1.0/1.1 Shop: Don’t make significant financial investments in visual or functional changes until a major site overhaul.
If you don’t have a better business plan and financial resources, wait to migrate your website to Joomla 1.6 and Virtuemart 1.5 Personally, I’m the most excited about the Virtuemart’s plugin system and performance improvements but the final version is likely not to happen for another year.
Tighten your security.
Test and address critical browser compatibility issues with the latest browsers (Example: Chrome might have not even existed when your website was made).
Want to take advantage of new business and Internet marketing opportunities right now? Continue reading and
migrate your Virtuemart shop now.
If you’re migrating from Joomla 1.0 or looking to build a fresh new Joomla 1.5 & Virtuemart 1.1 shop: Prepare your
website strategy. Redesigning the website without increasing conversions and sales is just a
waste of money.
Don’t duplicate your efforts. I have one experience where our client had 2 sites selling the same product for years. It’s much better to have 1 outstanding site than 2 average sites. For experimenting figure out how to do A-B testing with Google Site Optimizer.
Before migration, create an inventory of your valuable virtual assets (content, keyword ranking, URLS, metadata, incoming links, rss feeds, email lists) and make sure they are preserved.
Develop a mobile strategy and create mobile friendly version of the site. According to Gartner research, in 2014 there will be more users accessing the web from mobile phones than regular computers.
Play some Jazz! Don’t get into a business area that is too narrow, not creative and where you may only compete on price. Differentiate. Don’t make it easy for your customers to compare you to other shops.
Identify your target audience. Write it down who your ideal clients are.
Complete a competitive worksheet.
Complete a keyword worksheet.
Complete a Google rank tracking worksheet.
Complete a link tracking worksheet.
Complete a business goals worksheet.
Complete a customer satisfaction survey of your ideal customers.
Request a free estimate from your developer or company.
Find a good development company you can easily communicate with. This could easily determine your overall satisfaction with Joomla and Virtuemart.
You can lose a lot of money by going overseas because your developers may not understand your target audience, have an idea of what looks pretty in your culture or cannot help you with the strategy. They also may not work your hours, may disappear some day and you cannot sue them easily.
You can save a lot of money by going overseas. Find a company with references and registered internationally specializing in Joomla CMS and understanding your special needs. In my experience, those small businesses exercising a balance of local and international talent get the best ROI.
Hire quality
Joomla help. Money you save on cheap development is likely to cost you in lost sales and leads. I recently talked to one guy who only hired oDesk developers for $20/hr max. When he asked me to review his shop, it was all screwed up and insecure. Don’t put your site visitors in danger. Competing on price for Joomla devs as well as Joomla shop owners is the race to the bottom, not the top! :-) Let’s work together instead! :-)
Don’t build a shop thinking that you will spend 2 hours installing plugins and configuring Virtuemart options. OGO Sense statistics show that with a help of a professional development team where you need to think only about shop content and training, it’s necessary to invest some 100 quality hours for a good Joomla shop. Doing average or amateur work will just sink your time and energy later because your prospects will run to your competitors.
Use
8 Pillars of a Successful Joomla Project to ensure a solid project foundation.
Use
OGO Sense Secret Joomla Development process to ensure project success every time!
Keep the design simple.
Implement a nice design. There are ugly shops that make money but most of them don’t. Here are some nice new Joomla shops:
makeuptouch.eu,
paintbrushcorp.com and
mycraftwork.com.
Improve website loading time (ideally under 3 sec) during your site redesign.
Deploy simple payment processing such as
onsite credit card processing with PayPal Pro.
Implement customer reviews.
Implement start ratings or likes + don't likes.
Implement product images gallery.
Figure out who will
maintain technical aspects of your site. It’s better for you to concentrate on marketing and selling.
Don’t set a maximum budget before you know what it will take to be #1 in your niche market. For example, adding just a little air into your flat bicycle tire won’t make your bicycle go faster. Predict how much time and/or money is necessary for your shop to run optimally. If you cannot afford what it takes, then change your focus or break up the project in phases.
The price is an important motivator for shoppers but don’t compete only on price. All shops that I saw compete on price died by price because there was always someone else cheaper. See
sales guru Alen Majer for more sales advice.
Visually improve your Virtuemart checkout process. Take screenshots of step by step checkout process and consider possible ways to optimize it.
Correctly configure your shipping options. There are plenty of great options.
Test your website very much before and after you release.
Don’t delay your implementation too long. Incremental improvements are much better than one big overhaul. See below for tips that you should consider after your site release.
If you’re looking to improve your Joomla 1.5 with Virtuemart 1.1 shop: Update your Internet marketing plan.
Apply Joomla 1.5.x, Virtuemart 1.1.x and other security updates.
Improve site backup system. Read more on
frequency,
location and
password protection of your backups.
Create a related industry site for more potential revenue.
Implement an automated product feed for affiliate sites.
Implement a possibility for users to quickly doublecheck delivery dates.
If possible, automate a manually sent ‘have you had a problem’ email for those that fell out of the checkout funnel.
If you have one product that you sell, you probably don’t need Virtuemart. Instead use NanaCast, PayPal buy now buttons or another payment method.
Find a better solution for packages over 70 lbs if you’re using an automated UPS calculator. UPS will charge you arm and leg unless you develop a custom solution to break down the shipping order into multiple packages. This of course assumes that the order contains multiple items under 70 lbs.
Review your Google Webmaster Tools.
Set up Google Analytics sales funnel.
Determine abnormal changes with your website sales funnel.
Discuss possible ways to increase store revenue, conversions and conversion rate with a Joomla expert.
Improve relevant search engine traffic.
Save time on printing shipping labels.
Implement "Product Compare" if appropriate.
Complete
monthly SEO plan based on actionable, recommended and approved items.
Implement custom advanced search. Example:
bulletinbag.com/ Analyze reduced conversions and act.
Analyze spikes in conversions and figure out how to make them repeatable.
Implement retweet, Facebook like & rss buttons. They establish a communication channel with your target audience.
Identify a list of SEO priorities for next 12 months.
Identify previously profitable and conversion keywords. Improve their ranking again.
Improve highest entry pages. Reduce bounce rates. Automated testing works the best.
Implement multiple product images with zoom in/out feature.
Implement an option to log website/product searches in Google Analytics.
Improve the usage of automated keyword link plugin to improve internal linking.
Implement another payment method (example: iDeal in Netherlands).
Spice up your shop with related videos.
Act fast on any credit card processing issues.
Improve home, category and landing pages.
Periodically check on your RSS, product and other feeds for possible issues.
Improve checkout experience.
Add captcha to the registration and form pages.
Remove duplicate and unnecessary pages from the search engine index.
Implement payment options image or module.
Use security badges if appropriate.
Free shipping is attractive if financially viable.
Implement 1 page checkout if it works for your site.
Allow for manual order entry for those that order via phone or email.
Automate order reporting with Quickbooks in the US or your tax program for tax purposes.
Get resellers and affiliates to sell your products.
Develop a VM custom sync component for affiliate sites.
Develop readymade websites with all the products for partners and distributors.
Implement "How did you hear about us?"
Speed up the website (server side caching). Example: gzip compression.
Set up site security policies and procedures.
Create redirects for duplicate pages if any. Regularly check your 404 logs.
Improve your highest exit page.
Build better (higher converting) landing pages for paid keywords.
Set up Google Analytics ecommerce option.
Verify Google Analytics ecommerce data against the actual site sales (make sure you are not making decisions based on false info).
Improve menu navigation and site architecture.
Implement live support module.
Utilize a Virtuemart also brought module.
Implement a wishlist module.
Make regular SEO improvements.
Complete regular Google Analytics reviews.
Market your site not just online but offline as well.
Think like a customer.
Don’t rely on single particular source of generating your traffic. (Example: google, etc).
Create
linkable content pages.
Store leads in the website for a later CSV download if you don’t use a CRM.
Implement a
closed loop marketing system.
Marketing often does not work, so optimize, redo and improve your
closed loop marketing.
Import already generated leads into
your integrated CRM.
If you don’t think you need a CRM, then read my post “
Why Joomla & Google Analytics Suck on Measuring Your Marketing ROI?“
Marketing, marketing, marketing. Building a product in today’s world is 100 times easier than selling it. There is just too much good stuff already on the market and it’s hard to create dissatisfaction with what your clients already have.
Implement a lead nurturing program.
Learn from pros at Hubspot.
Rank higher for local SEO. Examplle:
avcfurniture.co.uk for Stockport, UK.
Experiment. Apply constant customer feedback. Know what your visitors are interested in. If a certain strategy does not pay off, revert back.
Don’t sell boring and all too familiar products. Selling on the edge is what makes money today. Guys, what about these special
Christmas stockings for this holiday season? :-)
Watch out for PCI compliance. Who cares? What is the worst that could happen? A lawsuit leading to point where you go out of business or suffer an extreme financial hardship for several years. Read more on
PCI compliance.
Check for https:// on information sensitive pages. You MUST use https:// on your website if you’re processing credit card transactions. Seriously, I have seen way too many shops with this problem. Don’t hire a neighbour to do your ecommerce site. You know, there is a dirty joke that says: “A man who saves on a hooker, pays extra to his doctor.”
Now that you’re using https:// make sure that you’re not triggering false security warnings because your logo or something else on that page may not be encrypted as well.
Watch out for browser compatibility issues. While you may see what you’re doing, some of your users may not be able to. I repeat this tip again because I see the issue too often in real life due to inexperience and lack of testing.
Use proper checkout button colors, etc. I like orange, red and anything else that stands out.
Allow for product images to be indexed in search engines. HINT: It’s not as easy as making images/ directory indexable by robots.txt
Create regular and outstanding blog content on your website shop.
Optimize your content for search engines.
Promote your site content using social media channels.
Be #1. Being #1 is 10 times more valuable than #2 based on my experience working with clients. If you’re not #1, then figure out what it takes to be #1 in your niche market or narrow down your focus or region or exit your market completely and do something else.
Delight your target customers.
Think big. Don’t settle on small or tiny profit margins or safe and proven online shop techniques. You’ll just keep busy and not make any money.
Think along the edges of what your dream customer wishes for. What is edgy about your products and what makes them remarkable?
Get to know and love your customers. If you don’t love working with your customers, adjust your marketing plan to your ideal target audience. Treat your customers how you would like to be treated.
Automate your order fulfilment as much as possible. Let a machine do boring and manual work.
Create amazing offers.
Time your offers when they will resonate the most.
Cyber Monday is coming up!
Be the top expert in your industry. Learn and educate.
Be personal. Don’t be a faceless company. You don’t have to pretend to be an enterprise to make money. Doing just the opposite may be a key to your success.
You can succeed if you are creative enough. I personally know one guy who lives in the middle of nowhere with satellite Internet access making tons of money on his Virtuemart shop!
Life is short! Have FUN with your shop! :-)
For more on increasing your Joomla shop effectiveness, subscribe to the
RSS Feed,
follow me on Twitter or
connect to me on LinkedIn. If I can help you or your business,
contact me at OGO Sense.
