Why Does More Products = More Kisses?

Sat around the dinner table a night or two ago, the reply to a question which was asked almost choked everyone the table.

So what was the question?

Does having more products available online equal more sales?

The thing is I was being serious in my reply and to share with you, we need a little story.

Intrigued? Read on…

 

The Direct Answer

The question was “Does having more products available online equal more sales?” and from experience the answer is simply “yes”.

If we look at Amazon then there is no price difference between having 1 item and 1,000,000 items listed if you have a Amazon Pro merchant account for a flat £25+VAT. With eBay if you have more than 6000 listings, then you should be on the anchor shop subscription level and you get free listings too (see here for why) and for websites… well that is really down to the tech behind the site being able to cope.

The Real Answer

If the answer is a plain “yes”, but what on earth does this have to do with kisses?

Well that needs a little story to explain it. Between the ages of 19 & 21 I completely missed the drug scene and instead we used to just get drunk and chat up women. Not being a huge sports fan, that was to all intents and purposes “our sport”. One night we decided to mix things up a bit and instead just  to “cut to the chase” and ask the simple question:

Do you fancy a snog?

Then round robin the entire bar or club that we were in until receiving the answer “yes. Crudely put, the law of averages just worked and unbelievably we never got slapped once either.

Now we just didn’t ask the question with no sense of style, we mixed things up.

This could be the entrance to the group of the unsuspecting, by sliding in to the chosen party or following up with the cheesiest of grins or just a tongue & cheek smirk and waiting for the response (silence with friendly smirk/smile worked best if you fancy trying this yourself). There was only ever two outcomes, yes or no. And even no wasn’t a point blank no, it was an entrance and opened up the conversation, so we were winners all-round (and at worst we got the piss taken out of us).

So how does this relate to more products?

If you don’t ask you cannot be told “yes or no”. This directly applies to making products available online. If you don’t make inventory you have available for sale, then how on earth can you make a sale?

The reason why we were never slapped was simple, we flirted at the same time. We weren’t butting in and not following up with a “follow up” of some form. We were making a light hearted gesture that sometimes got results.

When it comes to products, if we put up the barest of listings then our chances are still better than not having that item listed at all, but we can at least one a few extra steps and provide that tongue & cheek smile and provide:

  • Semi decent titles of products so that they can at least be found in the first place
  • Add in an image that is more than a thumbnail
  • Do our best to document the item with the information we have available
  • Bolster this with a half decent listing template
  • Cross promote our other products
  • And have accurate pricing

Now you maybe concerned about being uncompetitive with the pricing and that is a fair point, but at least we had the item listed and gave the buyer opportunity to make the purchase (this is comparable to flirting with the potential customers). After all if it means that the customer then gets a combined postage discount and a single delivery, they might just take it and that ultimately means more money for you.

Now before you leave this page thinking that I’m a just a womaniser, if we don’t ask, we won’t get.

That worked for us and opened up untold amounts of conversations we would never have had. When we compare this to making more products available for sale online, the same is true. Even if the browsing buyer ends up not buying a the product that they found us by in the first place, they weren’t looking at someone else’s and we’ve just introduced them to our business  and gave them the opportunity to say no.

Start more comnversations, take more rejections, just make more products available for sale, the worst they can do is just click away, but at least they met you and you got to say hello.

Matt

12 replies

Trackbacks & Pingbacks

  1. @iwoca says:

    the more products the more sales. Really? Yes – according to @matthewogborne http://t.co/iz3WfcrGfW

  2. Why Does More Products = More Kisses? #eCommerce http://t.co/YGYy7HItwV

  3. RT @matthewogborne: Why Does More Products = More Kisses? http://t.co/FfE9u42Q1A <= A cheeky Friday post :)

  4. Why Does More Products = More Kisses? http://t.co/FfE9u42Q1A <= A cheeky Friday post :)

  5. @day2dayebay says:

    Why Does More Products = More Kisses?: Sat around the dinner table a night or two ago, the repl… http://t.co/sm3BSq6EvA @lastdropofink

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