Want Remarkable Ecommerce Success? Learn and Implement These 2 Important TIPPPS™

According to Wikipedia, "Electronic commerce, commonly known as e-commerce or eCommerce, consists of the buying and selling of products or services over electronic systems such as the Internet and other computer networks. Modern electronic commerce typically uses the World Wide Web at least at some point in the transaction's lifecycle, although it can encompass a wider range of technologies such as email as well."

Almost everyone in business these days conducts eCommerce to one level or another. Even professionals like dentists, lawyers and accountants. Our observations however reveal that many eBusinesspeople are failing to achieve the level of success they want to achieve because they’re making two grave mistakes.

As stated in my email signature, I’m an "eBizzBooster" and an Internet Marketing Advisor. My wife (the other eBizzBooster) and I teach businesspeople how to boost their business, particularly their eBusiness.

To be effective teachers, we need to be good students. We are. We study eCommerce pretty much ALL the time. We do that to learn what works the best currently, and to observe the harmful mistakes people make in their eCommerce strategies for the purpose of teaching our customers and clients how to avoid those in order to boost their eBusiness.

By "boosting their eBusiness", we mean making things easier, saving time, saving money, beating the competition, driving more traffic to their Web site, generating more leads, prospects and customers, making more sales, more money, and ultimately, more profit!

If those are results you aspire to in your eBusiness, read on because the 2 eCommerce Tips (we call them TIPPPS™) I will talk about here will help you avoid two of the god-awful mistakes we observe all the time that cause eBusinesspeople to fail—or at least underachieve. I promise you that eCommerce will be a lot more profitable for you when you practice these 2 tiptop TIPPPS™ (Thoughts Ideas Principles & Practices for Professional Success).

Here’s the first TIPPPS™ compliment of Zig Ziglar: "You can get everything in life you want if you help enough other people get what they want."

Lets follow that nugget of wisdom with a brilliant observation by Robert J. Ringer, and then by going back to Wikipedia for their definition of marketing: "If you want to do well, sell people what they need; if you want to get rich, sell people what they want."

"Marketing is a societal process which discerns consumers' wants, focusing on a product or service to fulfill those wants, attempting to move the consumers toward the products or services offered. Unless it pays due attention to its products and services and consumers' demographics and desires, a business will not usually prosper over time."

Have you spotted what those three statements have in common? Wants. Wants and desires (which are synonymous), but not "needs". Unfortunately, way too many businesspeople out there (eCommerce or otherwise) still believe the anachronistic suggestion to "Find a need and fill it."

That statement made sense 100 years ago, but not today. Everything that people really "need" to live long and prosperous is pretty much available – at least in the developed countries. Everything else is stuff people want. Cater to those "wants" in your eCommerce venture and you’ll do very well.

My second TIPPPS™ sounds very much like a twin of the first one, with an important add-on.

TIPPPS™ #2 (courtesy of Robert J. Ringer): "The simplest, safest approach to financial success is to make it a habit to sell people what they WANT, NOT what they need, NOT what they THINK they need, and especially NOT what YOU think they need."

There’s a subtle difference between the 2 TIPPPS™, but a difference worth paying attention to nonetheless. The first deplorable mistake marketers make is trying to sell what people "need". The second ruinous mistake is to try and sell people what YOU think they need. Here is Robert J. Ringer once again:

"People want to smell better, look better, feel better, be more sensual, work less, make more money, play more. The fact is that people don't need beer, cigarettes or thousand calories triple burgers. And they don't need pick-up trucks that go from zero to 100 miles per hour in five seconds. Try to sell people what they need (vitamins, education, insurance), and you're liable to end up in bankruptcy court.

However, if you try to sell people what YOU think they need you might also go broke in the process. The problem with selling people what YOU think they need – even if they really need it – is that it takes too long and costs too much to educate them, i.e., to convince them that they need your product or service. The simplest, safest approach to financial success is to be an accommodating free-enterpriser and make it a habit to sell people what they want."

Let’s demonstrate. A few years back, I was very involved in a MLM that marketed fantastic health supplements. Great stuff! But I almost lost my marbles and all of my savings trying to "educate and convince" people online that they needed those supplements to stay healthy and live long. The only person who got an education was me.

I got that education partly from my failure to make headway with my supplement business, partly from watching a good friend of mine making a fortune selling video-games (aka something people "want").

Then I came across the text above by Mr. Ringer. One part of the sentence was flashing in my head like a neon sign on Times Square: "People want to… make money." Following that enlightenment, I put aside ALL my literature about the products and focused solely on showing people how they could make money with my business opportunity… money they could spend on video-games, big-screen TVs, and pick-up trucks that go real fast.

As a result of that change of approach, my eCommerce enterprise took off like a Ferrari on steroids!

I’ll conclude by repeating the wise words of Robert J. Ringer, bestselling author and entrepreneur extraordinaire: "If you want to do well, sell people what they need; if you want to get rich, sell people what they want." These are words you can take to the (virtual) bank.

I hope the "knowledge" you gleaned from this article will be helpful. Remember though that knowledge is power ONLY when it’s combined with ACTION! If you think the TIPPPS™ above are valuable, DO something with them, and seek out more of them.

I wish you ALL the business success you desire and deserve. (Just remember that…what you "desire" is a function of your ambition, what you "deserve" is a function of your ACTIONS…Are the two aligned?)

Daniel G. St-Jean, BB, IMA, AMA, FBMI, SEM
(BizzBooster, Internet Marketing Advisor, Article-Marketing Alchemist, Firm-Base Marketing Instructor, Successerenity Exponent & Mentor)

P.S.: This article was inspired by a very informative and enlightening 5,500-word article which you can read by following the link listed in the Resource Box below.

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A Breakthrough Tip For eCommerce Success: Add THE Essential Ingredient To All Your Marketing

It’s very possible — more like probable according to the latest statistics — that as an eCommerce entrepreneur you’re you having PROBLEMS…

• Grabbing and keeping surfers’ attention…
• Driving lots of targeted traffic to your Web site…
• Generating scores of quality leads and prospects…
• Building a huge, responsive mailing list…
• Making enough sales to cover your expenses (even though your goal is to make lots of money to do the things in life that you and your loved ones really want to do).

If you’re experiencing ANY of the disheartening problems mentioned above, a big reason for your lack of success could be that you’re making a marketing mistake of Xorkian proportions.

Many of you (especially baby boomers) will remember "Mork & Mindy", the popular and funny sitcom of the late 70’s. Mork (Robin Williams) was an alien from Planet Ork sent to Earth to study human beings. He looked just like an earthling (though he did not behave like one) and lived in Boulder, Colorado, with beautiful Mindy (Pam Dawber).

I want you to imagine for a minute that Xork (Mork’s brother) and his girlfriend Xindy arrived on earth a couple of days ago. Now they’ve decided it’s time to learn to drive a car – the one parked in your driveway.

Having seen TV commercials about "filling up", the first thing Xork does is to grab the garden hose and fill your near-empty gas tank with water.

What do you think will happen next? How quickly do you think Xork will learn to drive? How far will he go? You can pretty much figure out that the whole project will be a disaster.

Yet, the car is in great working order (except for the content of the tank), the keys are in the ignition (tsk tsk tsk…), the roads are fine, the weather is great, the instruction manual in the glove compartment is very informative and user-friendly, Xork and Xindy are patient students and they really want to learn. And yet, disaster looms. Why is that?

Because the ‘essential’ ingredient for the success of this endeavor is a tank full of gas. And in the scenario I just described, there’s no gas – just water. No matter how good the car, the road, the weather, the manual, the student or the intention, without gas Xork & Xindy ain’t gonna go nowhere.

Does that sound like some of your eCommerce marketing endeavors?

Here’s why that’s the case: no matter how many people are on the Internet, if you don’t have the ‘essential’ ingredient, you won’t have a whole lot of traffic. And without the ‘essential’ ingredient, the little traffic you’ll get will be made up of poor quality leads, they won’t sign up for your newsletter, they won’t join your business opportunity, they won’t buy your products or retain your services. And you might go broke as a result.

Now, let’s juxtapose your situation with the Orkans’ to bring the point home. No matter how good the car (your computer), the road (the Internet), the weather (the Marketplace), the instruction manual (all the eCommerce marketing strategies and techniques available), the student (the Internet surfer) or the intention (looking for a product or a service), without the ‘essential’ ingredient, your marketing – no matter what method you use – will be a flop. Without "gas", you’re SOL – just like Xork & Xindy!

Well, if the ‘essential’ ingredient for Xork is gas, what’s the ‘essential’ ingredient that will make your eCommerce marketing take off like a Ferrari on steroids? It’s simply this: knowing precisely what makes people tick. If you don’t know that, you’re up a creek without a paddle.

Some of you might be slightly disappointed that the ‘essential’ ingredient is something so "ordinary", so… common sense. It IS that, but as you are well aware, common sense is not common practice. What is baffling is that no sane person would think of starting a road trip with a thank full of water, and yet, those same "sane" businesspeople will start an eCommerce marketing campaign with messages full of the wrong stuff, stuff no one really cares about – like features for example.

Look, do you want to succeed with your eCommerce marketing campaigns so you can make tons of sales so you can make lots of money so you can have some time freedom to enjoy your life? Do you?

Good answer! The sure-fire way to do the aforementioned is to be "in-the-know".

What does "in-the-know" mean? It means knowing precisely what motivates people to act – to click, to subscribe, to sign-up, to join, to buy – to do anything, really. It’s knowing WHAT to say (or write) and WHEN to say it, and it’s knowing what NOT to say (not that you want to hide things, but for example, telling people all the details of HOW you would complete their tax return – aka the features – before you tell them WHY it’s important that it gets done properly – aka the benefits – will be a big waste of everybody’s time).

Now, as an eCommerce marketer, your chances of success at selling – as in trading goods or services for money, but also as in convincing, persuading, influencing – will improve significantly, perhaps even dramatically, if you are selling what the surfer is wanting to, ready to, and agreeable to buy! And to do that well and consistently, you MUST be "in-the-know".

Here, for example, are three irrefutable and undeniable facts of life you become acutely aware of when you’re "in-the-know":

• The most listened-to radio station on Earth is WIII-FM: What Is In It For Me?
• People buy on emotions… and then justify with facts.
• Everything people do, they do either out of their need to avoid/reduce pain, and/or their desire to gain/increase pleasure.

A successful eCommerce marketer is one who uses that knowledge – and the many other facts of life one learns when "in-the-know" – to design every element of his marketing campaign, keeping in mind at all times that the best possible selling-buying scenario is the one where, at the end of the deal, EVERYBODY WINS!

So, if succeeding with your eCommerce business is key for you and your family living the Richer Life you all desire and deserve, do your research and your due diligence and find out all you can so that you are "in-the-know" about what will grab the surfers’ attention, what will make them get off their (key)board long enough to read your material, internalize your message, and follow your command – click, buy, join, subscribe – now!

The information is out there. Find it, and be "in-the-know": it’s a matter of (Richer) life or (eCommerce) death!

I wish you ALL the business success you desire and deserve. (Just remember that…what you "desire" is a function of your ambition, what you "deserve" is a function of your ACTIONS…Are the two aligned?)

Daniel G. St-Jean, BB, IMA, AMA, FBMI, SEM
(BizzBooster, Internet Marketing Advisor, Article-Marketing Alchemist, Firm-Base Marketing Instructor, Successerenity Exponent & Mentor)

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