Web stores are a surefire way for screen printers and other decorated-apparel providers to grow their revenues in 2020. They’re veritable one-stop e-commerce shops for your clients, along with their employees, team members or supporters. Even better? The personalized shopping experience a web store provides”“and todays’ shoppers expect““can turn your business into a profit-generating machine making sales 24/7.
Just ask some of our customers, Envision Tees, who uses InkSoft Stores e-commerce platform to bring in more frequent and even higher-volume purchases.
Dubuque, IA-based Envision Tees has launched more than 1,000 customer web stores using InkSoft’s e-commerce platform””and even brought on a full-time staffer to manage them. “Everyone’s so used to Amazon: simply clicking to make their purchase,” said Tom Rauen, CEO of Envision Tees, in a recent article about the revenue-building power of web stores on S&S Activewear’s The Press blog. “A web store takes a lot of friction out of a regular transaction. You show the customer what you can offer””and they can buy 24/7.”
Even better, easy-to-use, cloud-hosted, plug-and-play applications like InkSoft Stores help you manage inventory, artwork options, payments and even track visitors who left items in their shopping carts. Here are three benefits to setting up and managing web stores for your clients:
1. Virtually any client is a candidate for a web store. Since InkSoft Stores is so versatile, decorators can use the e-commerce platform for almost any type of organization or event. “We build corporate stores, team spirit stores and fundraising stores, so we can meet almost any customer need,” Rauen says. “InkSoft Stores makes it so easy for our customers””and their customers””to buy.”
For example, if a school sports team wants to sell team jerseys or spirit wear, you can create a web store that takes all the pressure off the school, because InkSoft Stores automatically processes the transaction after a buyer has selected their items, size and artwork. Additionally, you can keep a web store open for a corporate client all year long, and update it with new or seasonal items. You can also accommodate a school sports team, club, organization, or any other fundraising event needing a specific timeframe for their offerings.
2. Say good-bye to paper catalogs (and complicated e-stores). Think of a web store as an extension of your shop, which allows your clients to sell their logoed items. These buyers””whether they’re corporate employees, team members or fundraiser supporters””never need to visit your shop or look through a paper catalog to order gear. InkSoft Stores allow buyers to log on to the web store you created specifically for your client, select from a curated set of products and then pay online.
On the backend, you’ll decorate the apparel and ship the goods directly to the buyer. InkSoft Stores makes it easy for you to manage the process from beginning to end, so nothing drops through the cracks. For example, you can see all the pertinent information about an order in one place, and you can move orders through the system as they’re completed.
3. Setting up your client’s web store is almost too easy. InkSoft Stores makes it a quick, three-step process to manage the products you offer via your clients’ online stores: Select the blanks you’ll offer. Choose and upload your clients’ artwork. Decide how much to charge for the products you’ll offer in the store. You can even customize each web store with your client’s logo and colors.
One rule of thumb that Rauen has learned? Don’t try to sell every product in a web store. “Focus on your core products and make sure those sizes and colors are in stock,” Rauen told The Press. He suggests offering 10 core products for web stores and offering additional items à la carte. “We have core pieces that always sell well, so we offer those as our “˜stock’ items to our web store clients,” he says.
Even better, when you present a desirable, curated selection, buyers upsell themselves beyond just purchasing the polo they went online to buy””and opt to add on a hat, hoodie or lanyard, as well.
The bottom line? Web stores simplify the process of ordering logoed items””and they’re an excellent way of creating additional income streams for you and your clients.
