Finding success in e-commerce can really be boiled down to one theme. Identify the needs of your prospects and provide a solution for them. It is that simple. You should write out that statement, print it out and hang it over your monitor. If you stray from this theme, you will have problems making money.
Keyword research is the key to identifying the needs of your prospects. When doing the research, you should identify the phrases they are using to search for solutions to their needs. Most people understand this concept, but fail to take the process to the next step.
More than a few people have said they do not want to pursue rankings under a set of keywords because they do not carry such products or provide such services. If you have ever said the same thing, you are blowing it.
Remember, we are identifying the needs of prospects. If we do not have products or services oriented to an easily identified need we identify through keyword research, what should we do? We should get products or figure out a way to supply the service!
Assume we have a site selling hiking and backpacking gear. We have backpacks, guide books, tents and so on. When doing our keyword research, we find out our prospects are also looking for writing journals in which they can record their hikes. Since we don’t carry hiking journals, we want to avoid those keywords, correct? NO! We want to find a line of writing journals for hiking and add them to our catalogue of products. We value our prospects and that means providing them with solutions to all of their needs. By doing so, they will return to out site again and again when they need new hiking gear.
One of the more difficult things for online businesses to pick up is the fact that you should never design your site based on your view of your business. Your prospects should design it. By this, I mean that you should look to keyword research to identify all the product lines and/or services you are going to offer.
Find out what your prospects are search for and ignore everything else. Follow this guideline and your site will evolve into a revenue producer.
