New ecommerce site! I want to do this RIGHT!

Very pretty site, but a few basics have been missed. Hopefully this will point you in the right direction:

Don't even think about adwords and driving traffic until you have a site that works and converts, or you'll just be throwing money away.

*Important: All your text is rendered as a graphic; for example on your about page, everything is in contacttext960.jpg This is a very bad idea for getting your site visible, as the search engines are being given no words to index, just images, so how can they know what keywords the site is about? The product pages are at least text, but returns policy is a graphic again.

If the aim of the site is to sell, then you'd also benefit from more copy generally, as even if it was all created as text there is not enough copy on the site for it to do well in the search engines, though of course that will change as the site grows.

Adding some of the usual indicators of an eCommerce site (For example paypal / mastercard / visa logos), and other indicators of trust, such as having an address (I couldn't see one), telephone / email within the banner on every page etc. Take a look at a selection of other eCommerce websites and you should find ideas.

People are going to be uncomfortable buying as there's no address, no reference to secure ordering and the like. They're used to seeing that on pretty much every shopping site out there.

I'd also recommend you have the blog on your own domain as ./blog rather than across at blogspot, as that will then give you a better chance of being picked up by searches. As is, as it grows it will start helping blogspot get traffic, then people will have to click across to the store via the link you provide - better to have them in the right place in the first place! This will also make the whole domain more visible to the search engines. Regular blogging is important of course, to build that content.

Once you've done all you can in getting the on site conversion and trust sorted, and started to build regular content, and started your own efforts getting the name known via social and blogging, then you can turn on adwords to bring in an extra boost of traffic.

I wish you the best of luck.

I very much enjoyed going to your website -- and seeing lots of legs. Long legs. Long legs with hosiery! :) It seemed like a wonderful product. I agree with many of Mark's comments about the UI of the website. I also not that the site has not been Search Engine Optimized at all. In fact a google search of the website name only turns up 378 response. As far as I could tell on the first page two of them have anything to do with you -- one is your twitter feed and the other was your "Whois" record in Domaintools. Not good.

In the end the site may not be configured as a B2C commerce site. I do believe that it may be better situated with minor tweaks as a B2B site for distributors and retailers.

Which is where I would propose that you concentrate your marketing time. The costs to bring customers to you is extraordinarily. And it does not sound as though that is in your business plan's launch budget. So go to where the customers are.

• Contact successful sites that sell to your customer and offer to provide them your product.
• Set up free online stores in "shopping malls" like EBay, Amazon, and the like.

You will sacrifice in margin -- and gain in market penetration and hopefully happy customers that start to spread the word that AvantChic is where to go for high fashion hosiery.

I see "public relations" and "marketing" as the email addresses on your site. I would add a clear invitation to reseller that want to carry your product line.

All that being said -- I would like to comment on this statement:

"We did the business plan the "right" way- figuring out ROI's, Cashflow analysis, etc... we spent money on re-branding the product, studied our price points, and it seems that people are interested in the product."

In the end -- who cares? There are thousands of great ideas and great products that can generate gorgeous financials. In the end it only matters if you connect with customers. People who are interested because they know you and are a friend feels awesome -- but customers are people who purchase the product because it is a product they want. The harsh reality is that in today's business market -- especially in a hyper competitive industry like fashion -- the name of the game is marketing. The most important part of your business plan was how you were going to connect your product with customers. It is also where 90% of your total launch budget should have gone or should go. Advertising cost money. Article placement cost money. Product placement on key websites cost money. Getting floor time at a fashion show costs money. Connections with key people in the industry to dress the magazine model in your hosiery and give you a shout out will go a long way. But in the end -- it takes money.

And that money needs to be in a budget. A launch budget-- not just as a cost of good moving forward.

Getting a super cool model to wear your hosiery when the paparazzi snap her picture and splash it across the tabloids -- priceless.

Okay -- one last comment -- it takes time. You aren't launching a jet plane -- you are lifting a hot air balloon. Keep feeding the burner, let the air heat up, have faith that it will lift off!

Put your products in alternate places where people can discover it that are higher traffic than your current site. Examples are ebay, amazon and etsy.

Put together an affiliate program, using commission junction or a custom program, so people will earn money for selling your stuff. It's like having commission only employees so you really have nothing to lose doing that as long as you can still profit.

Poke around and see if you can find some fashion blogs that you might be able to advertise on.

Also of note, there might be some problems with your campaign and/or landing pages that are causing people not to buy from your advertising campaigns. With a budget that small I would focus on the absolute highest converting keywords and ads possible, as long as you're still able to make money off them of course.

Drive customers to your site: You can dump tons of $ into PPC (which would jump start things considerable) OR you can invest more time/energy into guerrilla marketing efforts.

Agree with Kort: Get yourself linked/listed on complementary sites, blogs, etc. These links will bring direct traffic AND have a significant impact on your SEO rankings to drive more natural search traffic.

Use the social trend: Get a FB page, twitter account and post relevant, honest and useful info. Follow / favorite those connected with your industry (both big companies and indivuals who just like to talk about relevant fashion). You'll find that most folks you follow/favorite will do the same in return.

Getting folks to your site is only the beginning, though...

Subscribe to UX (user experience) experts. There are many and some of their thoughts are not consistent with others - don't stress about finding what you think is the 'perfect' one, any of the big names will be 1000% improvement over none. Read their blogs, books, posting and if you can afford, hire them at some level. @Amyafrica is a one that we build our solutions around (www.amyafrica.com).

Checking out your site I see many basic changes that could have significant results: * Offer a subscription option to collect email address - please on every page and highlight it - offer a freebie or something in return for registering. Collecting email addresses for marketing will be huge for you * Remember that most customers will not read below the fold- the shop page with long huge images for products will probably result in most products never being seen by visitors. * Show more information in your shop page with the listed products and entice visitors to click for more information - showing price and a big bold buy now button may seem tacky but it will get your more activity to the product pages (REMEMBER: good design DOES NOT equal good sale conversion - so don't be afraid to do things that may not be pretty in order to get more sales) * Return Policy / Size info in product pages should be pop ups (Google colorbox for a great solution here) not redirects to other pages. The less links that exit the purchase process the better. * Consumer confidence - write more reasons why consumers should trust/buy from you into the product page and cart copy. * Phone number - put it prominently on every page - at the top of the page. One of the most overlooked and easiest way to get people to trust you is to show them they can call you. * Move your purchase options/button higher in the product page - lower resolution / smaller monitors will put that info below the fold. * Speed up your site! I selected to buy an item and waited > 12 seconds for the cart page to completely load. Visitors will leave your site after 2/3 seconds. Load times should be < 1 sec for every page. * Secure your site! In the checkout process the security icon shows security errors: items on the page are not secure. This will cost sales until it is fixed.

The above are just a few of the dozens and dozens of little changes that can lead to a better user experience and more sales. Of course these are all generic ideas and these, like all potential improvements should be AB tested as every site and every site's visitors are different - there is no one size fits all solution!

Sharpen the saw: use analytics (Google Analytics is great and free) to identify where on your site you are losing your customers, and focus on redesigning those steps using A/B testing to measure success. In addition to the purchase process, you can focus on other site goals, such as collecting email addresses for marketing, or searchability.

Remember: When you don't have a ton to invest up front, your activity will start slowly but it will increase at an accelerated rate if you offer a good product, at a good price, via a good store.

Finally - these are strategic level ideas. HOW you implement each one is as, if not more important then the idea itself - and anyone of them will have volumes of books and online content available about it. So spend some time researching each one before you invest time in implementation - an hour of research could save you days/weeks of trial-and-error.

Affiliate/affinity programs can come later - you have to have a good starting customer base before those are effective.

A website is only as good as it converts. It has nothing to do with how good it looks.

1) Get a user-experience designer to re-do your site. 2) A/B test until you find a layout / buying experience that converts at a solid percentage 3) Then and ONLY then, increase marketing.

All the marketing money in the world will not help you if 1 & 2 aren't done.

The good thing about 1 & 2 is, you just have to do them once, then you can focus on your business.

Mark's 'basic changes' suggestions are right on the button. Easy to do and really worthwhile.

What are your visitor stats like? So many people get caught out by the 'build it and they will come' problem. The single most important thing you need to do is get people to come to your site (oh, and IMO I think your 'shop' page needs to be your homepage. Get people involved in buying the product right away).

But leaving all web design/development aside for now, take a break from your computer, and start doing some smart offline marketing - this isn't my field, and if it's not yours either find someone to help, even if it's just brainstorming ideas. One that occurs to me (a reasonably low cost one) is get your model into the most eye-catching hose you stock, a t-shirt printed with a seriously sassy slogan (also ensure your business name and website is printed on it), a killer pair of heels, and take your product for a walk around town. If it works, hire students in other towns to do the same. You can even turn it into a photoshoot and kill two birds with one stone.

Forget the site for now, just get your offline marketing machine working, and best of luck - I hope you succeed!

As someone in the fashion industry myself, what I can tell you is that for you to have had an active ecommerce site for only three weeks and expect people to be buying in large quantity, your expectations are completely unrealistic. You don't have enough time on the web to get any penetration and just because you buy adwords and do facebook advertising and other things like that, it takes time and remember... getting a 2% conversation rate on your ecommerce site will be considered stellar success, so do the numbers and figure out how much traffic you need to generate a 2% conversion rate that actually makes you profitable. It's staggering the amount of traffic you need to generate for your site to become profitable so the more active you are on the social media, which means all day every day AND getting your product reviewed by influential bloggers AND getting as much exposure as possible via other ecommerce sites and retailers, the traffic will come, but recognize that it won't come in three weeks or three months, it comes over a long period of time and that's where your cash flow is going to be most important. Make sure you're spending your money where you'd going to get the most bang for the buck and part of that is going to be to determine exactly where and who your customers are and where they are most likely going to get information about the kind of product you have. One thing to note... in the fashion industry, the design and manufacturing of a product will cost you about 10%, the other 90% will be spent marketing the product so get ready for an eye opening experience in terms of what it will cost you to get market penetration... no one ever teaches THAT in fashion design school! Hang in there and be patient and have faith... if it's a really good product, it will find it's place in the market and will find it's consumers, it's just going to take time and money to make that happen.