STORES Magazine - January 2009 - (Page 54)

NUTS AND BOLTS / WEBSITE STRATEGY Master Your Domains Multiple names can boost e-commerce traffic and sales BY D. GAIL FLEENOR B uilding a successful online business entails many factors, not the least of which is ensuring that current and potential customers can find you. Retailers that possess only one domain name – a website bearing the company name – may be missing out on potential sales from online customers who misspell the company name or use a search engine to seek a retailer by category or geography. Conversely, purchasing domains with names that attract the kinds of customers a company covets significantly boosts opportunities for website visits – and sales. With a background in technology, Keith Riewe is not your typical small business owner. After purchasing 34year-old Bice’s Florist and closing all but one of its stores, Riewe managed to increase sales 38 percent – or more than $1.5 million. Realizing that customers “don’t walk into flower shops anymore,” Riewe focused on developing a strong web presence with multiple domain names. With reduced labor and operation costs and reduced in-store product expenses, Riewe achieved the sweet smell of success. Riewe spent 12 years as a computer consultant to businesses such as FritoLay, but always wanted to own his own business. Bice’s, he says, “was a top 100 [seller] with FTD and was well-known in the Fort Worth, Texas, area.” The business was far behind technologically, however, with only three PCs and a website that was informational only. The previous owners had secured the domain name “Bicesflorist” but not “Bices.com,” Riewe says. “When people in the Dallas/Fort Worth area think of our shop, they think of it just as Bice’s, Sales Bloom at Bice’s Florist Up 38% so I had to get that domain name.” Problem was, it was owned by a German man who didn’t want to discuss a sale, so Riewe contacted Sedo. The company undertook negotiations between Riewe and the seller: “It was relatively simple,” Riewe says. “It took six weeks to acquire the domain.” Sedo is a German company that bills itself as a global marketplace for buying and selling domain names and websites. “Domains are your piece of online real estate,” says COO Jeremiah Johnston, and with 800,000 users in 120 countries, “we are the eBay for domain names.” Speculators have already purchased most domains with any potential for business, he says, so Sedo helps connect buyers and sellers through auctions of 54 STORES / JANUARY 2009 WWW.STORES.ORG http://www.Bices.com http://WWW.STORES.ORG

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of STORES Magazine - January 2009

STORES Magazine - Jauary 2008 Contents Executive Editor's Page President's Page Mechanical Marvel P&G Invests in Ocado Now I Remember What Shoppers Think 10 Things You May Have Missed Numbers Worth Counting Full Price/Markdown Retail People Breaking the Monotony Multi-Channel Concept2Watch E-Commerce Analytics Category Management IT Systems In-Store Technology IT Systems Communications Website Strategy Communications SOA Energy Video Surveillance Employee Theft Online Fraud Industry Perspective Loeb Retail Letter ARTS Update Point of View NRF News Retail Crossword End Cap

STORES Magazine - January 2009

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