How are you getting people in?
Some imagination-provoking ideas about getting people shopping in real stores instead of on the Internet in this New York Times article. (Not sure about the booty cam though.)
After all, if you Google “online consignment” just for the past year, you get 1.7 million hits.
Yes, 1.7 million.
Comment, below, about how YOU market the advantages of in-person resale shopping in your business. Or how you will be, this fall selling season. Ideas for attracting consignors, suppliers, and donors as well as shoppers would be great, if you have something to share.
All commenters will be entered into a drawing
for a free Sponsorship ($49 value!) at HowToConsign.com. If you are a current HowToConsign.com Sponsor , you’ll win DOUBLE that: $100 worth of Products for the Professional Resaler of your choice, in celebration of International Resale Day!
Photo from http://formula4fashion.blogspot.com/
Auntie Kate The Resale Expert 
Hi Auntie Kate,
Just getting ready to open a fine home furnishings consignment store and I ordered a few books from you including your Operations Manual…Wow, what a fabulous book – so well written, full of helpful information, easy read, easy to understand, full of information I wish I’d had when writing my business plan. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the manual and how much I’ve highlighted in it and will refer back to it often I’m sure. I’m so glad you came before me and are generous enough to share your wealth of knowledge with newcomers like me. I’m sure I’ll make mistakes along the way however, I’m sure they’ll be a lot less having read & studied all the materials I’ve ordered from you. Love your newsletter as well. Thank you so much Auntie Kate.
Jeanette Turner
Thank you, Jeanette, for the kind words, and best wishes on your new business. I’m sure, as you get comfortable with your shop, other aspects of the business will arise, and I hope that the 40+ other Products for the Professional Resaler will help you even more! I always say that the manual is like “Resale 101” and the other Products are “Resale 201, 301, 401!”
If your marketing is still featuring the ” features and benefits” of your products or services you’re missing the mark! Consumers today want to know the “outcome or result” of your products and services.
Think about that for a while and how it can be used in your marketing and promotions?
I’ll be back later to share my ideas about “outcomes and results”….
Thank you Linda, “Outcome or result” is precisely what benefits are, right? Greener lawn? Would love to see you back, and we would love to know who you are, via Gravatar or web site, rather than being a “mystery man”…
We post pictures just about every day on our Facebook page of new merchandise, and put a tip of the day on Facebook every day. We’ll be launching the store blog verrrrrrrrrrry soon, where we will do these things. I send out a newsletter to customers and one to consigners once a month, and update my website monthly with activities and new arrivals. The first Saturday of every month, I give a percentaqe of the profits to a local charity, which helps bring in those who support the charity and causes good buzz (I always get new customers in on these days, and I have found that a number of these customers return). Word of mouth helps enormously, and the charity days help that word of mouth. We launched our frequent buyer club this month, and several of our best customers have come in several times. I advertise on school folders, in craft fair programs, on church bulletins–all local–and use our local Patch page to advertise our activities like lipstick parties with Avon. I am very new at retail, only open 9 months, but I’m learning so much from Kate and the rest of you who generously share your ideas!
Nancy, that’s a great mix of marketing that involves not only your loyal followers, but new faces as well. We’ll look forward to your blog (and since your business is a Treasured Sponsor of HowToConsign.com, we’ll be adding your blog to ours!) I am intrigued by your once-a-month Saturday support of charity. Are these different charities each month? How do you choose them, and what do you ask of the charity in return vis-a-vis promotion and advertising?
Every other day photos of new arrivals posted on our blog have attracted alot of attention. We post regularly on Craigslist, do Constant Contact emails about once a month, have a Facebook page and Twitter account. Our sales this summer are fantastic, so something is working. This is our 8th year in business and word of mouth has been invaluable. We have several new customers every day, and many of them have been referrals by current customers. We’ve done after hours parties, artist openings and we participate in local community events like, parades, antique faires and the like. Thinking of chalk sidewalk drawings that can be rinsed off with water to get folks walking by to stop in. We’re in a very vibrant shopping district in the historical part of Petaluma and get lots of folks heading to wine country or the coast for getaways. We are also contemplating holding a contest for creative front window display ideas. We’ll award a budget of $200 and let the entrants have a go at proposing a wonderful display appropriate to the season. Of course, the local press will be invited. We are planning to promote this at the local state university art department.
That’s all for now
Dana, you’re the personification of what I am always preaching: “If you want word-of-mouth, you have to GIVE THEM SOMETHING TO TALK ABOUT!” Sounds like you do a LOT! (Folks, to see Dana’s Red Umbrella blog, look in the lower right column here on this page… since they’re a Treasured Sponsor of http://HowToConsign.com , their blog is linked to mine here!)
Ok, Miss Kate! (Yes, I want to win.) Enough said, but…getting back to the initial topic…For the past 14 years, since I started this shop, the name of the game is to drive customers in. I have a degree in advertising and you must advertise your business, no matter what, especially, if you’re a small business, like mine. I think you can have all the gimmicks and promotions in the world, and they will attract customers for a few days, but if you don’t have a great product at a fair price, if you don’t have great customer service and take care of all your customers, as they come in the door and if you don’t have a consistant, great business plan, you might get customers in the door, but they won’t come back, nor will they give YOU what you really want, which is “word of mouth” advertising. THAT gets customers in and keeps them coming in. You can never have enough customers, ever, especially, in the down months of summer, such as now. Now, is when I do the Constant Contact email promotions. (Basically, I do a promotion a month with Constant Contact, which does bring customers in.) We do have a website and will be going toward social media at the end of the month, which I think is crucial…(I’m older and slow…what can I say? I need a 9 year old to show me the basics)…but, if you don’t have the basics of business, you won’t be in business, long. You need to know your demographics and what they want and what they buy, whether low, middle or high end, and deliver. Yes, I do think social media is the way to go, which is where we’re going, but I think it’s important that one can see, touch and try on what they are buying, and I think, more and more people are realizing that, as they buy and are disappointed with what they buy online, especially, with clothing and accessories, from what my customers are telling me, especially, when you are dealing with high-end merchandise. You need a reputation and a good one. You can hold and feel my Louis Vuitton bags and know that they are authentic. You can’t do do that on ebay. That’s reputation and word of mouth. Free food and wine helps, for a day or two, but If you don’t have the basics down, nothing else really matters in the long run.
You had me at free food and wine 🙂
Congratulations, Sherry! Your comment was randomly chosen as THE WINNER! Watch for Encore Consignment Boutique’s free, 12-month listing on the Clickable Directory and Zoomable Map at http://HowToConsign.com, “Turning your Cluttered Closets into Cash”!
Hi Kate-
Ours is a fairly new business, however, I have been surveying folks about a “Craft Club”. We try to promote recycling, reusing, and repurposing and I thought it would be fun to have a “special event” so that crafters could come together at our shop to share ideas about repurposing, have some fun, and do some crafting, as well as, shopping!! So far, I have received some good feedback as well as some different ways to go about this. We have not started as of yet, so I will keep you posted.
Crafts are SO big, Vicki… this idea could be a great way to get folks in!
I am not opened yet but I plan on allowing some independant sales people (think Thirty-one, Avon, Alloete, Mary Kay etc) to host parties after hours to bring in different crowds. Being in a small town I hope this draws out diverse groups depending on the party hosted.
I’m sure that the sales reps and potential customers will enjoy this, JoAnna. Good luck with it!
We have not tried using special events to their full potential, it is somewhere on the long list of To Dos.
We are however, starting to use the internet to help us in a new way. In my area, there are a bunch of Facebook pages where people are selling items (think Craigslist separated out by category). We have started putting up listings with pictures for everything from new arrivals to clearance lots (several items in the same size and similar styles in a group for one price). We are finding new customers and driving a lot of new traffic to our website and Facebook page.
Molly
Clearance lots, great idea… have you come up with a better name than “clearance lots”? I couldn’t figure out what FB pages you’re using, but I am sure you’ve got an imaginative twist to this!
From time to time we have live music set up outside our shop (it helps being married to a musician) and invite guest musicians to join in. We do this in conjunction with our sidewalk sales. On these days we stay open later and always draw new customers.
Jam sessions! How fun!
This may work for getting stores into the mall and 1 day mini sessions may be a good idea for getting people into resale shops. In my area where there are literally thousands of stores, these specialty businesses never last more than 2 or 3 years. Because they are experience based, when enough people have “been there done that” they’re done. I think more important than the experience is the feeling your customer gets by being at your store whether shopping or for an event. Promote your benefits and then deliver on them. Your customer must first feel comfortable, then intrigued or inspired and then happy in some way. Make her happy by first acknowledging her presence and be happy that she took the time to come to your store. Help her find things for herself or others or show her where she can look for herself. Offer sincere compliments when possible or quick tips or tricks, make a personal connection. Be nice at checkout. Don’t treat customers like just another transaction. Ambiance is very important too, but if you or your employees don’t treat her well it won’t matter what your store looks or feels like. You’d think this is common sense and then you go to a new store only to be greeted with an 8×11 sign saying by appointment only, visit our website. Really??? Yes, Really! I have a sinking feeling about this one. Back to mini sessions I think those that are relevant and informative would work best with Resale or for a charity’s benefit possibly. I know some stores already do them and it would be interesting and to know which types work and which weren’t worth the cost and effort.
As for the contest if I win, lol, I’d love more of your “Products for the professional resaler” as I am still daring to dream and learn but have not taken the plunge yet. P.S I love your fat free, guilt free cookies!
Thanks Andrea, your customer service ideas are very sound, but how exactly would you go about telling folks that coming INTO your business will be so worth it? I think the key might be what you said above… “intrigued or inspired”…
We use Facebook heavily with pictures of new arrivals…our TV ads always encourage shoppers to stop in for the constantly changing inventory. Also, we now do a call in show with the radio station that caters to our demographic where we discuss everything from what we have in store to our current events.
Kathryn, when you get a chance, tell us more about the talk show… something I’ve not heard of shopkeepers doing!
Hi Kate
We call in and do a “recorded live” interview with one of the DJ’s for 2 minutes each and 2 different shows (one Monday, one Friday) that feature anything from events we are participating in to what we are looking for consignment-wise to featured new arrivals. If we run out of things to talk about, we might comment on current fashions, etc. 🙂 Kathryn (Fireweed Consignment Boutique)
What a neat idea… I wonder if other radio stations have similar programs/advertising opportunities other shopkeepers could take advantage of.