Sell more Basket Gifts with a blog and social media

Probably you’re asking yourself what is this basket gift all about and more important why. Well, I thought to apply what I preach and to explain to you how to use a blog and social media to promote your online business. First of all we’ll talk about what you can sell as a basket gift , how you can promote it by writing on a business blog and how you can use social media websites like twitter, facebook, youtube or social bookmarking sites like digg, delicious, technorati, stumbleupon to boost your brand and your sellings.

What does a Basket Gifts e-shop could sell

Maybe at a quickly look you won’t realize the potential products and services you could provide on such a website. But let’s think a little bit. You are selling Basket Gifts and there fore you need special occasions where a basket gift could be appropriate to offer. This is not about people is about situations and occasions. Why it’s not about people ? Because it’s not a service that can make their life easier to live and it’s not something you can use or consume everyday. As any gift you have to offer it in some special moment and it also has to mean something. So in order to see what products you might wanna sell lets think of these moment. When you can offer such a gift ? The first moments that come to my mind are when a family has a new baby or they’re moving in a new home, at someone’s birthday or as a thank you gift. Other situations are when someone is in the hospital or it’s sick, at a anniversary or before a romantic dinner, at a picnic, for Christmas and any other religious celebrations. As you can see there are plenty of moments when you can give a basket gift. Another way to think of new products are themes : and by that I mean to group related products like wine and cheese, coffee and chocolate, fruits, tea and fruits and so on. There are so many basket gifts that you can create and it’s only a matter to identify the perfect moment when you could offer it.

How to boost up your selling with a blog

Now that you have figure out the products you can offer and you have your website setup it’s time to think of how to market your website. You just can’t make it without some kind of promotion. You have to spread the word about yourself and you must market your products and services in order to sell. The first thing you should do is establish a business blog for your website. Your first article should be a presentation of your store and what you sell, the advantages and what is so great about this website. The following articles should help you market the products. How !? Write about the situations on which a basket gift should be appropriate to offer. Say why a basket gift can be the perfect gift for that moment. Be inventive : choose real situations from news or your life and add your personal twist to the story and say something like : “if he would’ve thought of a romantic basket gift maybe the evening would’ve been more romantic and she wouldn’t said NO “. You can describe a perfect sunny day and how a basket gift can create the perfect picnic. Again you can relate to some kind of story about an unsuccessful picnic because of the picnic basket. So it’s all about your creativity and your ability to create articles that would indirectly sell your products.

How to use the social sites to promote your blog

I’m sure you know about the social websites and the social networks. You can use it to market your blogs articles. Here are some websites and how you can use it to promote yourself and your business :

• Twitter : here is about microblogging in 140 characters. You can use Twitter to promote your own links, theme related links, help others decide what gift to buy and for what occasion, offer tips and tricks on how to create your own basket gift, what to be careful, talk about the gifts in general and so on.
• Facebook : you can use it to upload photos and videos about your products; you can present the latest social event where you were invited and what basket gift you have offered, videos about how to make your own basket gift or how to create the perfect bow; the list here is unlimited
• Flickr and Youtube(after Google Youtube is on the second place on volume of searches) : you can use these two for images and videos also, only that now you have specialized websites for each type of content
• Digg, Delicious, Technorati, Stumbleupon, Reddit, Google Bookmarks, Yahoo Bookmarks : all these are social bookmarking websites; your content has to have an easy way to be social bookmarked. You can make the first bookmark yourself to ensure you have at least one. Social bookmarking will help your content to spread much more faster and your website or blog to be indexed much more quickly and more frequently by Google and other search engines

Here are some general rules of thumb for your activity on any of these social websites :

• don’t try to sell in your posts; people come to these websites to share content, links and to talk with other people about common interests; not to be pitched
• offer as much as you can free advices and content : this will help you establish yourself as an expert in your market niche
• participate to the discussions that are theme related
• make new friends but never beg for attention
• don’t spam
• don’t post too frequently : there are few that post so much that gives me the impression that he’s some kind of a robot and that he doesn’t pay attention to others
• good things come to those that wait

Conclusion

You’ve seen what products and services a Basket Gift e-shop could offer and what types of articles you could write in order to promote your products. You’ve scratched the surface about how to use social media websites and why you should bookmark your articles, what to do and what not to do on these social communities. Now it’s time to get to work and remember : be patient, creative, plan ahead your articles and your actions and in time you’ll see good things starting to happen to you.