What exactly is Loungeluxe?
Loungeluxe is an advertising co-operative. That means it is a site that enables
its members to pool their promotional dollars to purchase advertising they
could not afford on their own. Every month, our members contribute membership
dues to participate in Loungeluxe.com.
What do these membership dues pay for?
First and foremost, these dues pay for advertising the site. Each month, the
membership dues collected are mostly spent on the purchase of
online banner advertisements for the website.
These banner advertisements link to Loungeluxe, which links to
our members' websites. Shoppers find out about our members' fabulous
products by clicking ads for Loungeluxe and then shoppers are forwarded to our
members' sites to make their purchases. In addition to funding our ad campaigns, a small portion
of the
member dues also pay for administrative expenses such as web
hosting, banner design and mailing list management/distribution.
In addition to the advertising you get as a Loungeluxe member, you also
gain access to our blog and newsletter. Members may submit news about their
product line or discount codes to our monthly newsletter, which reaches
over 800 opt-in subscribers. Members may also submit stories to the Loungeluxe
blog.
Where does Loungeluxe advertise?
Loungeluxe mainly advertises
with celebrity gossip blogs like Dlisted and
and fashion and design oriented blogs
like Design Sponge, Indie Parade and Modish.
So, how much are these membership dues?
Membership is $15/month.
We also offer mailing list only advertising.
Our opt-in "discounts and deals" newsletter is sent to over 800 each month. To advertise on the mailing list we'll need a discount code or a deal to
share for your
site. You can share a discount code or deal on our mailing list for $8.00. All
submissions for mailing list ads must be approved. To advertise this way
please contact us. Please note that Loungeluxe members are able
to share deals and sales on our newsletter free of charge, this is a perk of Loungeluxe membership.
How come it is so cheap?
Loungeluxe aims to make advertising very affordable for independent designers.
Our advertising budget is based on membership. The more designers that participate
the more we can spend on advertising. Each month the funds collected from the members
go into a pool that pays for the site's advertising.
How much traffic can I expect from Loungeluxe and how much traffic does Loungeluxe get?
The amount of traffic you can expect depends on how large the site's ad budget is and
what you post. Certain items are more popular with Loungeluxe visitors than others.
Luckily, you will have access to your click-through data so you can see
which of your products are most popular. You can replace items with fewer click-throughs
with different items and experiment to see what brings you the most traffic.
As for how much traffic Loungeluxe receives, it depends on our ad budget. More members
means larger budget and more ads, thus more traffic. Fewer members means the site has
a smaller budget and less traffic (the up side to this is that you are sharing the
site with fewer designers so when traffic is lower, it will be easier to get noticed by
our visitors).
With zero budget, this site averages around 1000 visitors per month from search engines and
other links. As our budget grows with our membership, so does our traffic.
Why should I trust you guys with my advertising dollars? How do you know what
you're doing?
We started our first advertising co-op (IShopIndie.com) in February of 2006 because
we were frustrated with the astronomical expense of promoting our own handmade
goods and wanted to share the expense with other designers facing the same issue. Since
then we've dealt with a variety of advertising media and venues and learned a lot about
what it takes to bring shoppers to a website and where the best places are to do it. Since
we received such an overwhelming demand from designers hoping to participate in
I Shop Indie, we launched some new sites to accomodate more designers. Thus Loungeluxe was launched in August 2007.
What makes Loungeluxe different than all the other sites out there?
We understand that the indie designer has many options when promoting his or
her brand online. There are lots of great marketplaces, like Etsy and blogs
geared to indie designers with affordable rates. We certainly do not aim to
replace these outlets for promotion. Loungeluxe was designed to work in tandem
with your other promotional efforts by increasing your brand's visibility to an
audience you might not be able to afford to market to on your own. Our goal is to
make consumers aware that buying from our independent designers is an
alternative to buying from large chains like Anthropolgie or Urban Outfitters.
In order to make that happen, a well-funded, highly visible advertising and
promotional campaign for our co-op is essential.
The perks of participation in Loungeluxe and the other sites in our network are
- Our ads are targeted to a specific demographic.
We bring together designers with products that complement each other. The designer
selling resin pendants is an ideal advertising partner for the shop that sells
luxurious bath salts and moisturizers. We bring designers like this together
on Loungeluxe and then advertise to consumers who are most likely to be interested
in products such as these.
- Our advertising and promotional efforts reach out to a large audience.
Because we pool together advertising dollars from our membership, we are
able to put together a well-funded promotion and advertising campaign. We also
have experience with both, since we've been at this a while and know what
produces results.
- We enforce quality control on our sites.
Loungeluxe and the other sites in our network exist to help indie
business people succeed. We do not accept members with unprofessional product
photos or products that are a poor match for our websites.
- Self-service, real time management of your own content.
You post your own product images and descriptions and make changes at
your convenience. There's no waiting for help from a web developer to get the
job done. Our account management tool is user friendly, so you can manage your
site membership day or night with ease.
- We offer performance data.
You will always know how many click-throughs your products and website
have received, and you will even be able to keep track of the number of sales
you've received as a result of your membership with each site.
- We correspond with our fans via newsletter.
Each month Loungeluxe sends a newsletter out to our website's newsletter subscribers.
As a member of Loungeluxe you will be able to submit news about your products to this
newsletter. This feature is just another way we help you promote your business.
OK, maybe I'll give this a shot. How do I sign up?
Visit our parent website's sign-up page
and fill out all the requested information. Once you've created your account, log in and
click the link on the top right that allows you to add websites to your account. Choose
Women's Interest from the first menu and Loungeluxe from the second one. Then click the
"add me"
button.
What if this doesn't work out for me?
We can't promise advertising with us will bring you traffic or sales. We've
had great success in the past with co-op advertising and many of our current
members have been very happy with the results they've seen. We do hope your
participation in Loungeluxe will be a success for you, but if things do not work
out you can cancel your membership by logging into your account, clicking on the
Loungeluxe link under Websites, checking the checkbox to make your Loungeluxe membership inactive,
and clicking the save button. Should you decide to try again at a later date you can
always log back in and reactivate your membership with Loungeluxe.
What if I have an Etsy store or I don't know how to check my website's traffic counter?
How do I know if customers are visiting my site?
You can check the number of click-throughs your products and website have received by
logging into your account on our parent website and clicking on "Loungeluxe" under the websites
header. You will have a section on that screen that links to your traffic information.
Generally, the more products you upload the more traffic you will probably get.
What if people are clicking though but not buying!?
Sometimes people click through to read more about a product and find some detail
that turns them off, sometimes people click through and check out items
they wish to purchase at a later date. All kinds of things can affect
a customer's purchasing habits, from how difficult it is to use your site to
how much detail you provide about your products. Having great quality photos,
detailed product descriptions, good customer service policies and an easy to use
website with an easy to use payment system will maximize your sales.
How do I know if people are buying?
Although it is possible for us to tell you how many sales you've received from your membership,
this depends on a few things. First of all, sales tracking requires the use of cookies.
If your customers prevent us from setting a tracking cookie, we will not be
able to track their purchase activity. We also will not be able to track any purchase
activity if you do not implement sales tracking on your own website (view the User Guide
located on your account manager page for details about this). Lastly, cookies do
expire, so if your customer makes a purchase based on seeing your products
on our site but the purchase takes place a month later, we will not be able to record that
as a sale associated with your account. So in short, sales tracking will give
you a pretty good idea of how many sales your membership is producing but
it's not an exact science.
If I don't see a huge spike in sales does that mean this is just a waste of money for me?
Not necessarily. Although many things can have an effect on your sales, advertising
here (or anyplace else) and not seeing a dramatic increase in sales overnight
does not mean the advertisement was ineffective. Advertising is not only about
selling things, it is also about building brand recognition. Snapple does not
expect that when they advertise on a highway billboard passing
motorists will pull their cars into
the nearest convenience store to get a Snapple iced tea. The idea
is to make consumers aware of their brand so that when the consumer is thirsty Snapple will
come to mind. Advertising for you will probably work similarly. A person who visits
Loungeluxe today may not need a new bag or moisturizer or much of anything right now, but the idea
is that when that person does need something, they'll think of Loungeluxe (because it is
widely advertised) and come buy something from our members.
|
