Power Sellers Unite

The Painted Daisy · Joined: 14 Jan 2011 Posts: 20

Hi there. I'm new here and very grateful to have found this site.

I am building a Google [free] Site. I am NO techie. I know just enough html to be dangerous. I am using one of their pre-designed templates, which limits me on some things. There is so much I don't understand, mainly in the Checkout cart vs. Google gadget department.

I wanted to implement a Google Checkout shopping cart, but it seems I cannot use their shopping cart program with their Google Sites program. I have no idea why. I've asked on their forum, but no one has replied in 12 days.

So I had to create a 'gadget' which really can't be customized much at all. All you have control over is the pixel size, font style and whether you want lrg, md, sm or beta (which I have no idea what that even is). To make matters worse, the 'gadget' program says it can't be used on a colored background. I'm assuming that's because I can't change the font color from black so that it can be seen on a dark background, but perhaps there's a different reason?

Anyway, I could really use some advice on this. Maybe my only option is to go with PayPal? Thanx SO much for your help. Robin

xbaystores · Joined: 30 Oct 2006 Posts: 562

I have played with the Google cart and the GC widgets and they are OK, but don't get picked up well by search engines.
Your best bet for a free site would be Vendio Stores. They offer full integration with Google Checkout and Paypal and have plenty of site templates to customize your store. They also feed to Google shopping and have a good Facebook store feed widget.
http://www.vendio.com/ecommerce/stores

The Painted Daisy · Joined: 14 Jan 2011 Posts: 20

Awww Man. :( I've spent a month working on figuring out this site and editing all my artwork, etc. thought I was on the homestretch!

Thanx xbaystores, I will definitely check-out vendio!

Would you be up for a barter exchange if I have questions while developing (if I opt for Vendio), a nude mermaid print for your assistance?

TTFN~Robin

IllinoisGal · Joined: 01 Jun 2007 Posts: 203

Why would a google site not be picked up in the search engine when Google is the search engine. Doesn't make sense.

xbaystores · Joined: 30 Oct 2006 Posts: 562

It's not that a Google site won't get picked up by Google, but the Google Checkout store gadget and shopping carts don't show well in search engines.

I did try setting up a blog on Blogger with single "Buy Now" buttons from Google Checkout but didn't like that someone could only buy 1 at a time and there was no inventory control.

IllinoisGal · Joined: 01 Jun 2007 Posts: 203

I set up a store on Vendio and found it easy to use and the store looks nice (I think). Don't have a lot listed yet. Sure hope it is worth the labor. Xbaystores do they get uploaded to all the search engines? I don't think I've seen any Vendio products when I'm searching.

xbaystores · Joined: 30 Oct 2006 Posts: 562

Here are the results in Google Shopping:
http://www.google.com/search?q=site:vendio.com&tbs=shop:1&aq=f

As far as the indexing in Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc, here are the indexed pages in Google:
http://www.google.com/#sclient=psy&hl=en&q=site%3Avendio.com%2Fstores&fp=1

highdesertdetails · Joined: 20 Dec 2006 Posts: 548 Location: Great Basin

Google sites wasn't really created or intended as an e commerce platform. A free google site though could be used as an info or ad site, directing to your other sales on a better storefront. I haven't found too much success with anything 100% free.

The Painted Daisy · Joined: 14 Jan 2011 Posts: 20

Ummmm....okay....I'm feeling kinda...IDK...dumb xebay stores. What am I looking at in your "results" post? I'm not sure what I'm supposed to see from those two links (sorry~you're talkin' to a rookie here!)

Let me just show you what I had been working on, but have since scrapped to try another avenue, perhaps Vendio, and [hopefully] someone will have some great insight for me/or not. :wink:

https://sites.google.com/site/paintingsbyrobincochran/

Thanx everyone!

P.S. There's a REASON they call us 'Starving Artist's!" LOL

xbaystores · Joined: 30 Oct 2006 Posts: 562

Just a couple more suggestions...
1. Join up with communities of artists and art lovers and become active in the conversations, always include the link to your own art in your signature. Selling art at the prices you are asking will take a little trust from a buyer and this will help.
2. Sell on Etsy like this artist (and hundreds more)
http://www.etsy.com/people/mattsart/feedback?ref=ls_feedback
A good way to get a reputation like that is when someone contacts you about buying a painting, ask them to buy it on Etsy and leave feedback after the transaction. You'll pay a fee on the sale but get the feedback and trust. Then you can add to your site "100% positive feedback on Etsy!"

And the 2 links were responding to IllGal, just showing that Vendio uploads to Google's shopping engine and submit to search engines, those are all the indexed products and pages in Google.

The Painted Daisy · Joined: 14 Jan 2011 Posts: 20

Morning. I understood you were answering ILLGal xebay. What I didn't understand was what did you search to bring up those two pages? I see they both show 'Vendio' in the search. But wouldn't you only get that if you intentionally put Vendio sites as a search criteria?

Anyway, THANX for the 4-1-1 on getting 'feedback' to add to website. Invaluable tip there.

I USED to get between $1,500 & $4,000 as a mural artist before the bottom fell out of the housing market 2+ years ago :( So when you said, "for those prices" I had to stop and think, hmmm....are my prices high?

I have this old website that I want to take down, as it is a .net and getting very little traffic www.eclecticwonders.net Someone told me that having a looping slide show hurts the search. Do you feel that is true?

highdesertdetails · Joined: 20 Dec 2006 Posts: 548 Location: Great Basin

I like the site - simple, clean, void of tons of ads. The looping mural is okay - moving thing on websites are usually a no-no. But yours is moving slowly, and it's not on the front page. I think it's still more preferable to have a static slide show that the user can control, or a bunch of thumbnails that someone can browse quickly and get a good overview without waiting for a loop to get done. I am a former web developer and designer (Intel and ScanSoft). Just my two cents. Beautiful art. Sad during economically depressed times that people devalue art pieces and artists' work.

highdesertdetails · Joined: 20 Dec 2006 Posts: 548 Location: Great Basin

Oh, slideshows are hard for google to pick up and index. Put in static images with tags in the html code - or at least images with relevant names like, flower.jpg or bluemountain.gif. Google can find that much easier.

The Painted Daisy · Joined: 14 Jan 2011 Posts: 20

I'm jealous Highdesertdetails. Wish I was more of a "web developer." Thanks for the compliment on the .net site.

That site used to have static pic's, but then I read about copyright theft and that slide-viewers made it harder to steal images, blah, blah, blah. I'm to the point I don't care. If they want a 300x400 pixl image they can have it. I currently have copyright slogan's on new images, but again, read that that's not cool. So WTF am I to do? It's funny, no one is stealing pictures, but I've noticed from my stat counter program that my "price guide" is most likely being copied. Good luck to 'em. I'm not getting any mural work.

The website in discussion here is this one https://sites.google.com/site/paintingsbyrobincochran/ which, I don't think I'll be able to utilize now :( unless I can figure out how to get some sort of checkout in place. I'm SO not good at this!

Thanx SO much for looking/commenting. R~

xbaystores · Joined: 30 Oct 2006 Posts: 562

The Painted Daisy wrote (View Post): › docWrite("quote")
I USED to get between $1,500 & $4,000 as a mural artist before the bottom fell out of the housing market 2+ years ago :( So when you said, "for those prices" I had to stop and think, hmmm....are my prices high?

I have this old website that I want to take down, as it is a .net and getting very little traffic www.eclecticwonders.net Someone told me that having a looping slide show hurts the search. Do you feel that is true?

No, your prices aren't high but I know before I give anyone a few hundred bucks I want to know what quality I am getting, or know the person a little. Chatting in art related forums can help with that, and the Etsy feedback won't hurt either. Many more people that wouldn't normally spend that much online will if they know the quality. Like me, I personally wouldn't buy ANY art over about $20 online unless I could see that others were satisfied, but if I really liked something and saw the good rep of the artist I may. I was just thinking of ways to expand your potential customer base.

About your .net site, you could add a link to your Vendio shop (or other shop) where people could buy, and add a link back from Vendio. You could use it as more of a gallery like you have it already.