Articles by Jon

Are you selling more today than you were two years ago? Or are sales down?

Selling auto parts online might be the easiest way to bring back those sales you've lost over the past couple of years. The technology to sell online is now widely available. Besides, many of your customers already research parts online or look for inventory before coming through your door. If you're considering selling online here's a checklist to follow:

1). First, decide how you'll sell online. You basically have 3 choices: either use a turnkey solution to sell online through your own site; sell through shopping sites like eBay; or build your own site from scratch. Even if you're undecided, each way has similar requirements. (To learn more, see my earlier blog comparing these 3 options in detail).

2). Don't forget the data! No matter how you plan to sell online you'll need data: part numbers, prices, descriptions, weights, dimensions, hazardous material information, and so on. And if you sell products specific to certain vehicles you'll need to know all the variations of year/make/model as well as submodel or engine. Fortunately, product data is one of the easiest things to obtain if you plan ahead.

Why not just create data yourself? Look at the numbers: The average online store sells about 5,000 part numbers. Even retailers making a living selling on eBay usually have 2,000 to 4,000 auctions at one time. Doing data yourself means keying thousands of part numbers, writing thousands of descriptions (don't copy someone else's copyrighted words), finding out thousands of dimensions and weights...well, it goes on and on. If you could create one complete listing every 20 minutes, it would take one person a staggering 41 weeks to create 5,000 part numbers, at 40 hours a week! And industry-wide, an average of 300 existing part numbers are changed or updated per week!

3). You need a shopping cart to process credit cards. A shopping cart is software that lets your customer "check out" with their purchase. If you're not selling through eBay you need one and you need to be able to process credit cards. You can either buy your own shopping cart software and integrate it into your store, or use a turnkey solution that includes it.

4). Your customers need shipping info. When your customers buy, they want to know when a product will be shipped and if it will cost extra. If you sell on eBay this is built-in. But if you sell online through your own site, it needs to be displayed for your customer in real time, otherwise you have to hand-calculate every order--including the ones you get at 3:00 am! (The weights and dimensions I mentioned in #2 product data above are needed to calculate shipping.) A turnkey solution should have this built-in.

5). Market your online store. When you sell online you're competing around the world! That might sound scary but shouldn't. For example, if your online store has a built-in blog it will help bring in shoppers. If your online store is configured correctly, shoppers will find you by searching for part numbers or descriptions online (that's the importance of product data, again). The number of part numbers you sell has a direct relationship to marketing because more part numbers will not only make your store more attractive, it will make it easier to find through search engines. Another good marketing tool is having new part numbers available quickly.

6). Site search. When customers can find something in your online store easily, they're more likely to buy. This is one of the top secrets of the biggest online retailers! Sites with well-designed search functions have seen sales increases of 10% to 30% or more. A turnkey solution should have search built-in, otherwise you'll need to have your programmers build this for you. If you're having a programmer create your search function keep in mind you may want your customers to be able to search by keyword and you may also want them to be able to search by part description so your programmer will need to design a database structure with that in mind.