Seasonal Scheduling and Regional Trade Shows are Value Price Expo opportunities to enter the extreme value marketplace … leveraging off-price buying, staying competitive through a rougher economic climate, and meeting regional preferences.

1.   Leverage Off-Price Product Sourcing

Exhibitors at VPExpo NYC represent major manufacturers/distributors across 30 product categories — housewares, consumer electronics, toys, hardware, health and beauty merchandise, sporting goods, apparel, luggage and gifts/novelties.  Sellers include Mazel Company, Leon Korol, CWC Inventories, Wisconsin Toys, Consolidated International, X-S Merchandise and Liss Global … among many wholesalers, importers and manufacturers.

Timing is The Point:  (1) Connect with sellers in Manhattan during the second week after ringing in New Year’s 2009. (2) Pick and Choose among the best Excess Inventory, Store Returns, Overstocks, ReSale Merchandise.

·  If you doubt the off-price power of sourcing both new and resale value-priced products, take a look at advertising for Target chain stores and Burlington Coat Factory discount warehouses. Both crow about resale deals their buyers struck with over-stocked toy or clothing manufacturers. Who wins when returns/overstock merchandise is available through off-price product sourcing? Buyers, both wholesale and retail.

·  Spend some time, post-Holiday Season 2008, at Value Price Expo NYC, and leverage the same value-pricing opportunities for your customers. Register by clicking Lady Liberty:

Value Price Expo NYC

                                                   http://www.vpexpo.com/#VPX_NewYork

 2.   Multiply Contacts and Buy/Sell Opportunities

 Value Price Expo the first week of May is timed to take advantage of related trade shows also running in Las Vegas:

Ø National Hardware Show

Ø Gourmet Housewares Show

Ø Off-Price Apparel Show

 ·  Increase your return on investment – in contact/sales management, product sourcing strategy, buy/ sell opportunities – by entering the growing value-priced marketplace in the epicenter of North American conventions. Profit from proximity and co-located shows.

 ·  Check out VP Expo Las Vegas by clicking the casino marquee:

Value Price Expo Las Vegas

                                                    http://www.vpexpo.com/#VPX_LasVegas

 3.   Meet Regional Preferences and Seasonal Buyer Needs

 New to the Right Coast (East Coast), Value Price Expo Atlantic City is timed to the pre-Summer buying season (mid-May 17 to 19).

 ·  Exhibitors/Sellers in Atlantic City are manufacturers or distributors whose inventories match regional demands – hottest-selling products — of Northeastern / Mid-Atlantic chain, retail and end-customer buyers.

 ·  Tap Summer Season and East Coast buyer needs at VP Expo Atlantic City. Click the seashore:

VP Expo Atlantic City

                                                    http://www.vpexpo.com/#VPX_AtlanticCity

“Once seen as immune to economic slowdowns, the online advertising sector has now become the downturn’s latest victim,” noted Jeff Meisner in Online Ad Sector Showing Signs of Strain in E-Commerce Times.

However, such a “down” statement was only on first glance. Advertising’s budget pulse is weaker, stronger or holding steady … depending on where you measure it.

·  Slower Growth: After predicting 2009 online advertising growth of 14.5% in August, eMarketer recently revised its projections down to 8.9%, following collapse of real estate, financial and domestic auto markets. Pushing into the next two years, eMarketer is still projects growth, but at slower rates: 10.9% increase in online ad spend for 2010; 13.5% growth in ad spend for 2013.

 ·  Still Looking for Bottom: Slowdown has not yet hit bottom, according to a Click Capital Research analyst via E-Commerce Times. Click Capital’s Colin Gillis predicts a five-to-ten percent decline in the 2009 ad budget, hitting bottom in first quarter, which Gillis says is always a weaker ad spending period.

 ·   Online Still Grows: Now, for some good news: While overall online advertising growth is, indeed, slowing, it still is growing compared to ad spending in print, radio and TV. (All offline ad channels continue to slide down budget priorities.)

 ·   Search Ads Best Display Ads: Saving the best for last, eMarketer analyst David Hallerman cuts search advertising – pay-per-click and paid-inclusion campaigns that pull in prospects from online keyword searches — away from display advertising, the online equivalent of printed display ads that feature banner and graphic space buys on web pages.

     o  Display Advertising tends to show lower conversions, or customer responses, than more cost-effective Search Advertising

     o  Because of lower rates of customer conversions, display advertising tends to have less ROI in ad campaigns

 Or, as eMarketer’s Hallerman told E-Commerce Times:

 “When budgets are tight, companies look to make the most cost-effective purchases they can. That’s one reason why display advertising will be far flatter than search.”

 This also explains why remaining ad budget funds are being re-directed under difficult economic conditions to search advertising over all other channels, on and offline.

 Have a look at search and display advertising options targeted to wholesale merchandise buyers and sellers (served by Top Ten Wholesale’s network of sites) at Advertise with TopTenWholesale .

1.         Use Site Search as a Service

A Site Search Box is a must-have for your corporate web site. You never know how potential customers land at your site: Some click deep into a seller’s site from a listing on a SERP (search engine results page); some land on the Home Page after typing your web address into a browser; other prized visitors jump into ANY page on your site from a link at their favorite blog or recommendation from a trusted users site.

Every page of your web site needs a Search box in the same position. Then, no matter what product, search or link brought in a prospect, the visitor can navigate to exactly what they’re looking for. No going back through your product directories. No puzzling out how your web designer decided to label special product subcategories.

Let’s say, for example, your company logically placed special width shoes and heel styles in sub-pages under main category, Women’s Footwear. If buyers come searching for “narrow women shoes low stack heels,” what are the chances they get to the EXACT landing page for that item on a first click? And, how hard must buyers work to get to the right page?

Don’t expect a prospect to navigate through your directory structure, hunting in high-level product categories or directory trees. If, however, a buyer can refine the search in only one more step — from a Site Search box — then you still have their attention. Not a bounce out.

2.         Use the Key Words That Buyers/Sellers Use

You can use Key Word tools to build lists for your web site products. Some KW tools offer the most popular requested terms indexed by major search engines during the previous 30 days. Most will suggest “stemmed” or “refined” key word groups, such as jewelry … gold jewelry … wedding jewelry … gold wedding rings … custom jewelry. But, what about typos? Misspellings? Slang?

Best way to gain visibility is use the search terms your own buyers and sellers actually use to source products. You won’t find customer-used terms in a general key word tool. You will find exactly how buyers search from your network administrator or web site manager. All search terms entered in Site Search Boxes (above), in queries from other sites, or in click-throughs from a pay-per-click search ad show up in Web Server Log Files or Web Analytics reports.

By scanning log files and key word analytics for the actual search terms buyers/sellers use, you refine lists for the most frequent words, misspellings and abbreviations in your product category. Then you know 400 searches for “prado” do not signal interest in a Spanish walk or public space … but a common misspelling for men’s and women’s fashion accessories from the Prada line. You’ll also see key word patterns, like entries for “urban clothes” in buyer searches for hoodies, hip-hop men’s sportswear, specific T-shirt styles and Accessories > Belts > Buckles OR Jewelry > Body Piercing. By using the key words that buyers and sellers actually use (misspellings and all), you can redirect and cross-reference to the right product pages, before a prospect asks or, worse, bails out of your site.

3.         Tap Long-Tail Key Word Searches

Long-tail key words are the string of narrow terms product searchers enter that do not show up on highest frequency key word reports. If you sell Footwear, the most requested – and most competitive or expensive – key word will be shoes. Maybe, womens shoes or mens shoes. However, serious buyer prospects are more likely to enter a string of words, such as narrow women shoes low stack heels, noted above under Site Search.

These less frequent searches are called Long-Tail Key Words from that old bell curve shape in statistics, showing how something measurable (grades, key words, IQ, sales) are distributed in the whole group. Most fall under the big bulge of the bell; predictable numbers fall under the shorter tails of the bell curve. Here is a distribution of the Top 100 financial search terms (total group is 14 million) from a Hitwise Internet search study.

Source: Hitwise

This odd-looking bell curve has only one tail, the less frequent search terms at right side of the distribution. But that is exactly where buyers and sellers in the wholesale-to-retail merchandise sector gain visibility among their most serious customer prospects.

The bulge in the bell curve at the left edge is where highly competitive and more costly (for paid-ad marketing) search key words land; and that bulge is where very large eCommerce ops dominate profits. (Amazon, eBay, Google, Yahoo, Overstocks, Big Box Retailers, etc.) What you can’t tell from a simple chart like this is that the long-tail — longer and less frequent key words searches — goes on f..o..r..e..v..e..r. The long-tail covers over 89% of all 14,000,000 key word searches studied by Hitwise.

Tapping that long-tail key word search potential is where buyers and sellers with savvy SEO tactics want to be.

Holiday Spending Pulse Check To Date:

·        Ditto 2007? Online retail sales trackers are revising their predictions for November-December 2008, now seeing “same level of overall holiday sales as 2007.” Flat-line predictors include comScore’s holiday season estimate of $29.2 Billion (same as last year), and Forrester Research’s downward revision of web sales growth of 12% (October 2008) to 7 or 8% (Cyber Monday December 1, 2008).

·        Cyber-Monday – online equivalent of offline retailing’s Black Friday – is the first Monday after Thanksgiving. Considered the biggest online shopping day of the year, early results from online totals Monday December 1 hint it may not increase overall holiday sales compared to 2007.

·        Special Promotions are Way Up. According to an eHoliday survey from Shopzilla.org conducted in Fall 2008, almost 84% of retailers planned special Cyber-Monday promotions (vs. just over 72% last year); almost 25% of those surveyed planned one-days sales and free shipping.

·        The biggest eCommerce players – including Amazon, eBay, Best Buy, department store Nordstrom and sports goods store Eddie Bauer – offered deals, discounts and incentives … some from the week before Thanksgiving.

·        In spite of flat or same-as-last-year holiday sales, major online retailers noted strong Electronics sales – from GPS devices and large high-def TVs, to iPod music- and Blu Ray disc-players and Kindle (Amazon’s wireless “book” reader).

·        Use of credit cards is down substantially during holiday season 2008 compared to last year. This decline is predictable fallout from increasing unemployment rates and higher credit card interest charges. One beneficiary of lower credit card usage this season is the alternative online payment method PayPal (owned by eBay).

For more data and predictions on holiday season online sales, see Despite Hot Deals, Cyber Monday Sales Tepid by Jeff Meisner in eCommerce Times.

1.         Put New Business Development into the Plan and Budget

You have business health trackers in place – Marketing Plans; metrics and measures of return on investment, pricing strategies, revenue/cost margins; P & L statement pulse checks.

Ensure that developing new business, accounts and product lines is an item in the budget, too. Instead of assuming that all marketing and advertising expenses are the sum total of your New Business Development strategy, earmark resources and time towards the goal of finding and building new product lines or customer segments.

NBD activities:  Offer commissions or bonuses for new business acquisition by any staffer (not simply Sales & Marketing staff); Assign personnel to follow social media sites, special interest blogs and industry news releases for tips on new product trends, new potential accounts.

2.         Get Listed and Get Found

Build a list of product directories and search sites specific to your product category. For low or no-cost, upload a brief description of your company, products and unique selling points … such as off-price or below-wholesale merchandise, low/no Minimum Purchase Requirements, hottest or newest season styles, deeply discounted Returns or Liquidation merchandise.

Examples: Wholezilla for clothing, accessories, dollar store inventory. ThomasNet for industrial supplies. Business.com for business services, such as accounting, legal and marketing.

 · Choose Directory Category and Key Words carefully. Even free listing sites have editorial reviewers who approve or reject directory listings. The key words you use in your listing’s headline or description are “key” to potential buyers (searchers) being able to find you.

 · Don’t overlook Local Search Directories. According to online research from Marchex and comScore, local search queries have increased more than general searches; and 61% of local searchers follow through with offline product buys. Get listed on Yahoo Local for low, flat-rate monthly fees, depending on how many business categories your listing displays and whether or not you want guaranteed listing in Yahoo Local Search Results. Google offers free listings, with registration to Google Local Business Center.

 3.         Hawk Trade Show Calendars

No one can exhibit at or attend every trade show in their industry sector or product line. But you can track trade show and convention web sites for lists of who shows and who goes: New manufacturers, wholesalers, distributors and their agents; New niche market-makers; Emerging buyer demands.

 For apparel buyers and sellers: See Infomat Worldwide Show Calendar . You’ll find tradeshows staged in fashion centers like Milan, Paris and Tokyo. And, you can search geographically for regional fashion shows … such as the SIA SnowSports Trade Show in the Rocky Mountain West in January, for snow sports apparel and equipment buyers and sellers. See also listed shows to highlight contemporary and young designers of sportswear, shoes and lifestyle clothing at the Designers & Agents Fashion Trade Show in NYC (late January) and then Los Angeles.

 For trade show and trade mission information: See ASAP Global . ASAP launches two major U.S. shows every year in February and August. ASAP also hosts trade mission visits to China and Asian Economic Development partners for Buyers (manufacturing facilities; contract and licensed wholesalers) as well as Sellers (introducing department store purchasers in major Chinese urban areas to sellers in Western Europe and North America).

 4.         Learn from Buy / Sell Experience of Others

Crisis Management is a specialized area of corporate public relations. How a company or industry deals with crisis often predicts whether or not they survive in the marketplace.

 For example, look at Import Toy Safety. For all the disaster headlines and product safety recalls on “toxic” toys (toys containing lead paint, toxic stuffing or components, ingestion hazards like magnets, poor product designs that caused child injuries or death), toy manufacturers, wholesalers and distributors stepped up to the plate and addressed this crisis.

 What They Did:

(a)   Keep Customers Informed. Though the toy industry did not yet know which factories in China were cutting corners on which toy imports, executives still held regular press briefings and created consumer web sites and/or hot lines to answer concerns.

 (b)   Ask for Enforcement. Listen to any business lobbyist and you’ll learn that government regulation is the death of everything. Why, then, would the Toy Industry Association of America and its member execs call for new inspection regimes at off-shore toy manufacturing sites? Or production line audits? Or legal certification?

 Because the toy buying public was already tossing “good” companies (like Mattel’s 50-year track record manufacturing Barbie in Japan) in with bad apples (exporters of lead-laced, contaminated or toxic toys). The result was hostility to all imports, regardless of source. During a crisis, not fessing up to a problem, ignoring buyer fears or fighting attempts at enforcing quality control do spell commercial death.

 (c)   Act Accountable. Toy companies stopped talking about the “very low probability” of injury from toxic toys or that less than 1% of all toys manufactured in 2007 actually had to be recalled. (Hard facts and low probabilities of harm mean nothing if your child is the one.) Toy executives apologized for the toy scare and looked at the toy recalls as proof that the inspection system was, in fact, working. They also promised stricter inspections and enforcement of safety standards; and they made good on those promises. (See “b” above.)

 5.         Seek Import / Export Guidance

Getting into the Export Market is a sure-fire way to open up new Seller channels. Good News: If you deal in US dollars, its weakness against other global currencies makes domestic dollar-based exports a bargain to foreign buyers. Bad News: Negotiating foreign shipments, customs and tariffs, payment through Letters of Credit (very tight currently), can seem daunting.

 The answer is to get an intermediary as a trade guide.

 (a)   Find tips on doing business abroad, developing an international business plan, finding foreign agents, and more at the International Business section of Smaller Business Knowledge Base.

 (b)   Work through an established Trade Mission intermediary, like ASAP Global. (See above, 3. Hawk Trade Shows)

 (c)   Export Source Guide is an exporting tutorial from the Canadian Government.

 (d) Check trade leads and purchase requests at the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Export.gov site. A seller of plus-size lingerie or men’s parkas might never know that Mexico seeks to import large-sized women’s undergarments, or that Russia needed a large shipment of cold weather outerwear.

Gathering a reasonable cross-section of international respondents in the targeted youth group would also be a massive research effort that would probably take months to plan and implement.

Yet, a Finnish company, Sulake, did all the above in only two weeks. Sulake had already created a virtual world for teens in the late 1990s called Habbo. It is a trusted site among teenaged users worldwide. So, Sulake had no difficulties getting responses from youth in 22 countries.

In fact, the virtual world developer from Helsinki found 42,000 teens were eager to participate; and they felt comfortable revealing spending habits and preferences to Habbo virtual world avatars.

Some virtual teen findings on music preferences:

· British teens prefer rap and hip-hop music over any other music styles

· Japanese youth prefer pop music

· Brazilian teens and tweens prefer rock

“Trend watching in virtual worlds makes sense for any business in today’s environment,” said Robyn Waters, a former trend and product developer for Target stores who now runs a trend-watch agency. According to Waters: Interacting in a virtual world is not simply a trend for the teen and tween-aged group; rather it is their life. Trend watchers take note.