And i'm back! - Now How about a Weekly Challenge?

Don't ask me how 8 days have passed since the last post.....i just don't know LOL

I did get some feedback that the daily challenge was proving difficult to keep up with and i thought maybe a weekly one might be better? What do you think?

I know several people did secure some sales and orders as a result of taking part in the challenge (including me i have to say) which is fabulous to hear!!! We were obviously making headway - did you secure any sales or orders? Do let us know by leaving a comment below - its good to get feedback on how the challenges are working for you all! It also helps me to develop more successful challenges :)

So, i was trying to think about a weekly challenge for us all to do and something i have been trying out on my own page is product of the day posts.  Basically i pick an item from the selling albums on my page and i focus on promoting that.  Personally i am doing this every day but you could just do it as frequently as suits your own schedule.

So lets have a go at that for this week shall we? Starting tomorrow choose an item to focus on promoting, just as we did before with the selling album.  You could add a discount to it if you want etc.  Its up to you if you want to choose a different product each day or focus on the same one all week but i would suggest you try to come up with a way to engage people with the photo - ask a question about it, play a game with it, whatever you would like to do.  Personally i will be sharing that product in various places - some selling groups and networking pages for example, aiming for around 5/6 per day.

I will work on setting a challenge each week now and post on a Sunday so we can start the week with a new challenge - sound good? If you are going to give it a try let us know below :)

Did you enjoy the day off yesterday?

hahahaha sorry about the unscheduled day off from the selling challenge yesterday.....I really wasn't very well and my head certainly wasn't with it enough to set any challenge tasks! It was a challenge for me just to post on my page.  Anyway, here i am back again to continue with the challenge!

Don't forget to let me know if you have had any more results from the challenge - it might be new likers have joined your page, more comments on items, enquiries or of course sales ;) Am keeping my fingers crossed for you all to sell lots!!!

So our last challenge day involved a few little tasks didn't it? How did you get on? Did you manage to share something on your own page with a way of getting people to interact on the post?

This is an example of what i did on The Selling Cafe Page:

The result was every picture i shared for the game was commented on and people enjoyed the game.....it also meant these pictures got seen by about 4 times the number of people they usually would have. 

I also checked back over the posts i added to the selling groups......the album did get some extra interaction in the form of likes, comments and i had 3 enquiries to follow up on.  

Today then, the challenge is to once again check your posts in the selling groups, respond to any comments and add another comment to the post to bump it back up to the top of the group.

I would also like you to share some of the items from your selling album to your own page again.  This time though i would also like you to share the album to your own personal profile and just ask your friends to give you a hand with getting your products seen by liking, commenting or sharing :) 

Following up on the last task from the previous challenge post i would also like you to take some action towards adding your own products from your selling album to at least one of these additional places.  This could be an online place such as Etsy, Folksy, Wow, Pinterest, Twitter, Ebay, Gumtree......or it could be offline such as a local shop, a craft fair, a house party........basically wherever it is you have come up with as somewhere suitable for selling your products i would like you to take at least one step towards doing it.  Remember facebook is only ONE of literally hundreds of places you could be selling from........

Ok thats us for today.......hope it goes well! xxxx

Interesting Responses to Yesterday's Challenge....

So yesterday i set a little challenge to find some local selling groups on facebook and the response to this was very interesting indeed.  You seemed to be split right down the middle in your views of doing this, some of you thought it was pointless and thought your time would be better spent on craft networking style pages, and some of you simply took the challenge on and went for it.....

I will say that my tasks for the challenge are extremely clearly thought through and are based on my own experiences of selling as well as info i have gathered from years of being on facebook while involved with selling by others in some form or another.  I can only provide some guidance however so obviously if you choose not to do the tasks that is entirely your choice :)

So far participants in the challenge have reported some interesting results:

1 seller practically sold everything from their selling album and has had so many orders she has had to close her order book.

Another seller has had 2 enquiries in the past couple of days on her own page.

On the selling album i have been sharing from The Selling Cafe Page there have been 3 enquiries and lots of comments left on the product pics.

On the selling album on my own page i have had 1 enquiry and lots of comments left.

So it seems to be having an impact! Many of you seem to be generally enjoying the challenge and learning quite a bit, that is as well as seeing an increase in interest in products which is fab news - i am glad its proving useful! So who is ready for day 4 then?

Ok so today we have a couple of tasks again.....

First of all i'd like you to share some of the products from your selling album on your own page......but i want you to do so in a way that encourages people to interact with the pictures - this could be by asking a question, playing a game, asking people which their favourite item is etc etc.

Second i would like you to go back to the selling groups you posted in yesterday, check for any comments being left there or other interactions such as likes being left (and use these as an opportunity to interact), but i also want you to leave a comment on your own item (which effectively bumps the image back to the top of the group).  Please leave a comment that means something and use it again as an opportunity to encourage people to look at it (writing bump is usually completely ignored!).  BTW the easiest way to find your own post again is to use the search option at the top of the group and search for your own name!

An additional task for today is to write a list of other places (outside of facebook) you could advertise your goods.  Again we will be adding a list of these places to the Business Pages Advice Group 


Do you have any other comments or results to report? Have you had more 'likes' or comments on your page since we started? Have you had more interaction? Do let me know :)

Ok Now its Serious Selling Time!!

Yep, we have pondered and put our brains through enough to perplex a platypus :D hehehe, we have identified our target markets and figured out when to share things on our pages so far (haven't we???) if you haven't done day 1 and day 2 yet it might be worth having a read back over them before moving on to today's challenge tasks.

If you are raring to get selling though its time to get those albums out to the relevant people.  The best place i have found for selling goods on facebook is via established selling groups and pages (not networking pages).  This might take a bit of research though and plenty of searching......there are usually several local selling groups for each area so its worth searching for your own town.  There are many many selling pages which also work mostly on a local basis.  Finding these on fb is easy enough to do - just enter the town name in the search box and filter results by group and you should find some ;) Do take your target selling market into consideration when choosing groups and also check down the page to look for people responding to posts with questions.  A good group to post in will be one that is frequently updated and has a decent amount of people in it (1000+ is good to look for)

So today's challenge is to find around 10 local selling groups/pages and add your albums to them - just be careful about posting your links in quick succession in different groups.  

I would also advise not just posting a link without saying anything - try to think about what might attract someone to looking through your album and write that as an intro (PS things like please check my album DO NOT WORK!) 

There are also many networking pages which are worth adding an album link to as well - again be careful about posting in quick succession ..... If you are unsure about either networking pages or selling groups please feel free to view the lists in our Business Pages Advice Group. 

Good Luck :D and don't forget to let me know how you get on!!

Is your Selling Campaign Album Ready?

Ok so did you read yesterday's post? Are you joining in on the challenge? If you haven't read it yet you might like to do so now: its-a-challenge.

So far you should have a selling album ready with the products you want to focus on this week in it.

Today there are a couple of little tasks to do:

First, check the sales album has a good description included for each product.  This should include information such as:

• materials used, 
• how it is used, 
• the size,
• if it can be custom made or not, 
• the colours available

Also check there is a price clearly visible, information about payment methods accepted and if the item can be posted the costs for this as well.  

Think about the type of questions a potential customer might have about your product and answer them before they are asked.

The second part of the task is to identify your target market. 

 

When selling on facebook often sellers do not even think about their target market and simply advertise everywhere they can.  This practice however is frowned upon by many users and facebook itself and is highly likely to end up getting your account restricted.  It may not cost you anything financially to advertise in 100 different places on facebook but that does not mean it is a good idea to do it.  

The other reasons for spending a bit of time on this is because many people are not advertising their business products in the right places at all.  You need to think about who is likely to buy the products you have in your selling album.  For example, the album i am using for the main page is Valentine themed, but it is important for me to look at if the products would appeal to men or women to buy.  If it is full of jewellery there is little point in advertising in a group of mum's unless i use a tactic which encourages them to tell their partners......

Spending a little time identifying your target market will also save you time in future, and help with developing other products, so despite there being a lot of free advertising options on facebook it is still worth doing this.  I know its not always the easiest thing to do and i'm expecting this part of the challenge to lead to quite a bit of discussion in our Business Pages Advice Group

The final little task for today is to share your album on your page.......BUT do not just click share without thinking about it.  Plan a couple of shares, maybe 3 at the most again by using the idea of targeting - what time should you share at? who will be likely to see it? how can you maximise the reach? Will the people who see the album link be able to open it to view other items? Will they know to do that?  Basically i'm saying engage your brain before you hit that share button! 

Ok, thats it for today......don't forget to let us know how you are getting on so far by commenting below! 

Its a Challenge......

I was running a little challenge in our Business Pages Advice Group a few weeks ago and it went really well. We started the challenge by looking at facebook page reach and engagement and within a few days all who participated reported great results!  As it worked so well i thought i would put together another little challenge to help direct and motivate those with business pages on facebook towards increasing sales.  This challenge will follow on directly from the previous post selling-from-facebook-page-methods-to.increase-sales.

So this challenge is going to last for a week which in my view is a good time scale to work on a sales campaign.

Each day for this week i will post a little task here on the blog which will hopefully help to get some sales happening for those who take part - Obviously i can't guarantee results, i will simply be talking you through the type of actions i personally take when creating and implementing a sales campaign for either my own page Truly Quirky Me or for the main page The Selling Cafe.

So if you would like to take part in this challenge simply comment below :)

Day one of the challenge is today.....

Its an easy starter honestly - the only thing i would like you to do today is to create an album on your facebook page with some products you want to focus on selling this week.  I would suggest you choose some sort of a theme for these rather than completely random products.

I would also suggest you add at least 4/5 products to this album and not more than 10/12.  Personally i will be working on a larger album for the main page but this will be from several different sellers.  I will also work on a smaller album with my own personal page.

Each day just come back here to find out what the task for the day is and let us all know how you are getting on :)

Right then lets go :) and good luck for sales xxxxx