Latest Shopster Release

Ahh.. Friday afternoon after a mid-week launch. The perfect time to reflect on what went right, what went wrong, and what can wait till Monday... :)

So, in case you haven't received the latest Shopster Newsletter, a major release went out mid this week. I worked on two key features, the ability to export order data out of the Shopster system, and into your own data analysis application (a.k.a. Excel), and the ability to reactivate your account.

Before now, to reactivate your Shopster account, you had to call customer support. Now, you can do so by simply trying to log in again with your email address and password. The system will tell you if your account is currently cancelled, and ask you if you want to reactivate.

Currently, if you reactivate through the automated system, you get an additional 1 week trial. Note that there is a limit on the number of times you are allowed to reactivate, so please don't abuse this system thinking you can cancel and reactivate every week for free service.

For the order export utility, we had to made some hard decisions in how the data should be formatted for export. Currently, the system lets you export order data out for the last 3 months. You can choose to export out in Excel, PDF, or comma delimited format (CSV). An interesting report is the Product Statistics report which gives you summary product information over all your orders in a given month. If this feature is well received, I hope to be able to offer more analytical reports for export, rather than just raw data.

For the first time, a Shopster e-Commerce subscriber can export out their customer's full information related to an order, including the email address, billing and shipping addresses, and contact information.

If you are a e-Commerce subscriber, the reports are available through:
Storefront Channel, Manage Store, Download Reports

If you are a Product Source subscriber, the reports are available through:
Product Export Channel (or eBay Channel), Manage Orders, Download Reports

Now that the release is out the door, I'm going to have to address the backlog of business intelligence requests sitting in my Inbox.

Shopster Super Release

As of right now, the newest release of Shopster is live.

There was a ton of navigation changes to make getting around the site easier.

More importantly through, there are new ways to get access to interesting products to sell. On the main page of the Shopster Virtual Warehouse are a bunch of boxes which feature products.

By far the most interesting is the Price Drops box in top right can corner. Clicking this box will show you all the products with price drops in the last 24 hours. Currently, this list is not sortable by price drop amount (but hopefully will be in the next release), but it gives you a good indication of products that have good margin.

The 'What's New' box gives you the latest products added to the Shopster system. Since we get new products in every day (in reality, multiple times during the day), you can check this box every day and see new products. New products are great because it is less like they are already saturated on eBay or other storefronts.

Speaking of storefronts, we are finally dropping the term 'RShop' from the Shopster vocabulary. It makes a great database table name, but not so clear of a name for our subscribers.

Is Shopster Any Good?

* Is Shopster any good?
* Is there a link to a Shopster review?
* How does Shopster compare to Doba, Megagoods, Dropship Direct, etc?

As you know, I work for Shopster, so I can't provide an unbiased review. I would suggest however, before you trust any dropship / wholesaler review, make sure to check the authenticity of the review site.

Check out a list of biased dropship reviews here:
http://www.scamreviewsites.com/

My best advice is to try the 1 week free trial. Make sure to cancel before the end of the first week, or you will be charged. The first week is 100% free. This means, if you cancel before the week is up you won't be charged a single penny.

Increase RShop Traffic with Sitemaps

Updated Oct. 17th, 2008: Good news! There is now a feature within Shopster to general the sitemap.xml file for you. After logging in, go to Promote Store, Submit to Search Engines

RShops and Sitemaps

One of the toughest problems you'll face in creating a profitable RShop is generating traffic to your website. The first step is to make sure Google, Yahoo, and all other search engines are aware of your site. That way, if a person is using Google to search for products, there is a chance your RShop will be in the search results.

Google, Yahoo, and MSN Live become aware of new web sites by following links from existing pages. Unless you've linked to your new RShop from a personal website or blog, and a search engine has followed the link to your RShop, your RShop may be never been found by the search engines.

Creating and uploading a Sitemap solves this problem. A Sitemap is a file which contains all the links in your website. You manually direct a search engine to your Sitemap file. Best of all, it's free!

While not technically difficult, there a number of steps to use a Sitemap.

1. Register a search engine account (i.e. www.google.com).
   
2. Verify your RShop with the Search Engine.
   
3. Generate and Upload the Sitemap file to your RShop.
   
4. Get the Search Engine to Read the Sitemap File.
   

For my example, I will use www.google.com. At the end of the post are links to other search engines which can also read Sitemap files.

Step 1: Register a Search Engine Account

1. Go to Google's Webmaster Tools page (http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/)
   
2. If you don't have a Google account, you'll have to create one.
   

Step 2: Verify your RShop with the Search Engine
While not technically a prerequisite for Steps 3 & 4, the first thing you should do it verify you are the owner of the RShop. This will let you see if your site is currently indexed by Google or not.

1. Login to Google's Webmaster Tools (http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/)
   
2. On the Dashboard page (https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/dashboard) under Sites, add your RShop's site. For example: 'thryva.secure2u.com'
   
3. Under Next Step, click the Verify your Site link. (The same link is also available on the Dashboard page next to your site's name.)
   
4. The page will say, Verification status: NOT VERIFIED.
   
5. For 'Choose verification method..' choose the Upload an HTML file.
   
6. Open Notepad, or any other text editor, and save a empty file with a file name specified by Google. Mine looks like "googleced35171b031861b.html". What is important is the file name, and not the actual contents of the file (it makes no different if the file is empty or not).
   
7. Open a new browser (will be returning to the current page later), and log in to your Shopster account (http://service.shopster.com/).
   
8. In the top navigation bar, click the EDIT RSHOP link.
   
9. From the left navigation panel, click the RShop Settings label to expand the menu choices.
   
10. Click the File Manager link.
    
11. You show now be on the RShop Settings: File Manager page. If you aren't, cheat by pasting this URL in your browser (http://service.shopster.com/retailer/designer/managefiles.aspx).
    
12. Make sure under the Current Folder panel, you see "/ Root /". If it is longer than this, make sure to click the Root link.
    
13. Under the Files panel, click the Browse button, and select the file you created in Step 5 (the empty file whose name is like 'googleced35171b031861b.html').
    
14. Click Open and the path to the file should now be in the text box to the left of the Browse button.
    
15. Click Upload File link to the right of the Browse button.
    
16. Your verification HTML file is now uploaded.
    
17. Switch back to your original browser displaying the Google Webmaster Tools - Verify a Site page.
    
18. Click Verify.
    
19. If all went smoothly, your RShop should be verified. You can check this by going back to the Dashboard page and looking at the Verified? column. It should be a green checkmark.
    

Step 3: Generate and Upload the Sitemap file to your RShop
I'm ashamed to admit Shopster does not generate this file for you. You'll have to user a third party tool. I used xml-sitemaps.com.

1. One xml-sitemaps.com home page, in the Starting URL text box, enter in your RShop's URL. In my case, 'http://thryva.secure2u.com/'.
   
2. I choose Change frequency to 'Monthly', but choose what most actively describes how often you will be updated your RShop.
   
3. Leave default choices for the rest of the options and click 'Start'.
   
4. Note that the 'free' version of their generator will only allow up to 500 pages.
   
5. Once it finishes, download the sitemap.xml file to your computer.
   
6. If you have more than one RShop, you should name the file to -sitemap.xml, because the files you upload to your RShops are stored in the same directory, and you will need one sitemap file for each RShop.
   
7. You will now want to upload the Sitemap file to your RShop exactly in the same way you uploaded your verification HTML file in the previous set of instructions. (go to http://service.shopster.com/retailer/designer/managefiles.aspx and upload file to root directory).
   

Step 4: Get the Search Engine to Read the Sitemap File
By this step, you have now verified your RShop with the search engine, and make available a Sitemap file available on your RShop.

1. Log in to Google's Webmaster Tools. (https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/)
   
2. From the Dashboard, choose your RShop's site and under the Sitemap column click Add link.
   
3. For 'Choose Type...' choose Add General Web Sitemap.
   
4. In the text box, enter the file name of the Sitemap you uploaded to your RShop. This is either 'sitemap.xml' or '-sitemap.xml'.
   
5. Click the 'Add General Web Sitemap button'
   
6. Google should now tell you your Sitemap status is 'Pending'. Google will eventually use your sitemap to add your RShop to its search engine. Once done, you can use Webmaster Tools to see how your site is being found through Google searches.
   

Now that you have a Sitemap for your RShop, you should let the other search engines know about it. Here are some links:
Yahoo! Site Explorer (https://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/submit)
Microsoft's MSN Search (http://webmaster.live.com/)
Ask.com (http://about.ask.com/en/docs/about/webmasters.shtml#22)

New Everything

Today is Friday, Calgary is finally getting warm weather, and my belly is full of burger from The Ship and Anchor.

You may be have noticed that www.shopster.com got a huge update. Both our web price, pricing, and application all go overhauls. Note that our subscription fees did not increase for existing customers.

One of the cool features I worked on was product lists. After you login in, on the Home page:
http://service.shopster.com/home/default.aspx you'll notice a new scoller which shows various product highlights.

I wrote a system where Dan, our regular Shopster supplier blog writer, can pick and choose products from the warehouse, and publish them to retailers in a product list form. So, for instance, if a supplier is having a special, we can highlight those products for you. I'm hoping this system will also be used to provide easy access to the newest products in the system, which we get every day.

For new retailers, the biggest shift is catering the product to different customers. Basically, we have retailers who want to use Shopster purely as an eBay product source, and others who want to use Shopster as both a product source and online store solution. By splitting the product, we can better cater to each group as the product development moves forward.

We also have lots of new faces around the office, and issues which I think have previously been overlooked are now getting the attention they deserve. I think the Shopster E-Commerce solution will be getting lots of customer facing improvements in the near future.

Supply-Side Week in Review

If you are a Shopster retailer, or on a free trial, make sure to read the 'Supply-Side Week in Review'. It's both informative and hilarious.

http://forums.shopster.com/blogs/support_blog/archive/2008/04/04/18972.aspx

The Supply-Side Week in Review posts are you best source of information on new products in the system, as it is written by the guy who actually loads the products. I don't think his posts pass through any type of corporate communications departments, so the hilarity is left untouched.

Shipping Costs

People are naturally suspicious of shipping charges. Our retailers often have questions about shipping:

1. How are shipping charges calculated?
2. Is Shopster making money on shipping?
3. Why is the shipping different today from yesterday?

First of all, Shopster has no margin built into the shipping options. Anything we charge for shipping is purely cost recovery. We calculate shipping differently, depending on what information the suppliers provide us:

• flat rate shipping
• product weight
• product size

First off, if the supplier has a flat rate set shipping domestically, we use that. If they don't, then we use the product weight the calculate the shipping using a linear shipping estimator. This would be a base cost, plus a variable cost per weight unit of the product. For example, if a book is 1 LB, and the shipping rate has a base cost of $5, with an additional $1/LB (not an actual shipping rate in our system), the shipping would be $5 + $1 = $6.00. Similarly, two books would be $5 + $2 = $7 shipping.

In addition, each of our suppliers have different shipping rates because of which carriers they use, whether or not they combine handling costs with shipping, etc. When the supplier's rate is off from our base estimator, we adjust the rate up or down to make the shipping cost more accurate.

Finally, if we have historical information on shipping costs for an item, and the same item and quantity is going the same distance for a new order, we use the last invoiced shipping cost as the shipping cost for the new order.

So, the reason shipping can change from day to day can be due to three reasons:

1. Supplier corrects the product weight, size, or flat rate.
2. Supplier's shipping adjustment is changed to make the shipping estimate more accurate.
3. Historical information becomes available, so more accurate shipping cost is used.

Note that as a retailer, if you ever come across shipping numbers which look way wrong, that gets escalated to me in a hurry if you contact customer support. It's a very large problem, but we do our best to make our shipping costs as low as possible without losing money.

Boy is back!

Boy is finally back to normal, so off to daycare he goes, and I reported dutifully to Shopster. Rosie got back today too! All is good, and all that is missing is an XBox 360.

In Shopster news, we have a bunch of internal reports of new products in the system by supplier, as well as products which have dropped in price. My challenge now is how to make that available in the Browse Warehouse page.

The main challenge with the Browse Warehouse page right now is that it is geared for finding a specific product, rather than 'browsing products' (ironic, given the tab's name). There is some internal debate what the starting navigation point into the products should be, by supplier, or by product category. While being able to filter on multiple dimensions is good, any more options would make it too cluttered for a new user.

Personally, I would like to see supplier specific pages which show a show description of the supplier, the turn-around and fulfillment statistics, the new products, and a list of the products which have dropped in price. (Retailers, I wouldn't object if you drop suggestions of just such a feature in the Shopster forums. *wink*)

For instance, we have a brand new supplier in the system called Tiffany-style Lamps, but you'd never know it from the Browse Warehouse page. Here's the link: http://service.shopster.com/warehouse/browseproductwarehouse.aspx?sid=97707
They supply stain glass lamps, shades, etc.

Here's another brand new supplier that is 'buried' in the warehouse:
http://service.shopster.com/warehouse/browseproductwarehouse.aspx?sid=97161
The have some really highly specialized and hard to find computer and home AV cables.

Poor Kid

So, my boy Elliot is sick. He had a high fever for 5 days on and off, and now has both ears infected. We started him on Amoxicillin, and developed a rash after 24 hours. Doctor suspects he is allergic to it, so switch to another antibiotic.

Elliot can't be put down for one second, which is way different from his normal, run away and explore. Today he threw up, and is flat out refusing to eat, but will still drink milk (thank goodness).

It's like I have a newborn again...

Rosie, my wife, if currently away on a pairing (flight attendant), and so it is just me. It's rough. I don't know how a single parent survives.

When he gets better, and Rosie gets back, I'm buying myself an XBox 360 in celebration, and plan to be very negligent dad.

Our CEO has a blog?

I had no idea our Shopster CEO, Sarath Samarasekera has a blog:
http://lifeatshopster.blogspot.com/

No mention of me. I'm offended.

Finally, a Shopster Blog Update

I'm taking a little time out of my work day to give this blog an update, as well as to step back and view Shopster from a high level. Shopster is ramping up fast. For the first quarter of this year, our retailers have seen sales quintuple (5x) from the same period last year.

Last Christmas was busy here, as we chased down every delayed order with the suppliers. We need lots more people, and lots more efficiency to survive the forth quarter of 2008. There are a lot of new faces around here already, and we are forced to become an efficiency driven organization. Given that many of those systems are under my responsibility, I've been busy. One side effect of having more people around it the company culture changes. Before, there were no set rules for when you had to be in office. As long as the work got done, hours were flexible. There were 4 of us. Now, when you have to coordinate meetings with 12 people, you have to start coming in at a regular time so meetings can be scheduled. That kind of sucks. What also sucks is that when the organization was smaller, your work, or lack of work, was immediately obvious. Therefore, you never had to worry about not appearing busy, cause everyone knows what you contribute. Some days, I'd just go walk around for awhile in the sunshine, and get the coding done later. Now, in an office environment, there is more pressure to 'appear' busy, even if you just want to slack for awhile (like say, writing a blog post... heh heh)

One interesting thing about last Christmas was Wii sales. Because Wii's were hard to get anywhere, Shopster actually went above and beyond with a particular supplier, to ensure our retailers had first dibs on any Wii stock that supplier got in. Some retailers were making $40 profit per Wii sale (even after the supplier raised the price on us).

Currently, the top 10 list of RShops by sales is crowded by a lot of electronics stores. Wii's and mobile phones are generating the highest sales and profit margins. I have a couple of theories of why that is. First of all, we have good prices on many electronic products. Secondly, I think a lot of those customers already know everything about the product they want to buy, and are just looking at price. The store doesn't have to 'convince' as much as other products.

The stores themselves are attractive, but fairly basic. One store is still using our logo generator's logo as their store header. That made me chuckle, because the logo generator is a good way to get your shop looking presentable, but I always assumed our retailers would eventually replace it with a less generic looking logo.

I would prefer it if our sales would be a bit more spread out among product categories. We have some successful shops in inexpensive jewelry, perfumes, and health products, but given the huge amount of products in our warehouse, the top selling stores should have more diversity. In that vein, we are having some internal discussions here at Shopster about starting a retailer acceleration program. When we see shops that have had a few sales, and are on the verge of success, perhaps we should reach out to those retailers to really get the sales going.

RShops I would like to see Shopster help grow:
1. Non-electronics stores.
2. Stores concentrated around new suppliers in the system.
3. Stores making sales, but with margins set too low.

For all retailers, I would like to see the product information presented better. I have internal reports which show me which products have dropped in price, as well as the new products in the system. Our browse warehouse functionality is designed around finding a single product, as opposed to 'shopping' the products to find interesting, sellable items. Hopefully we can get that improved soon.