Quote:
Originally Posted by Wayne Doenges
Please tell me how you like and give me feedback (good or bad). I will forward it to my brother.
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The business will have to figure out what they offer that goes beyond what Amazon and/or SparkFun and online tutorials can offer (at a much lower overhead cost).
Is this primarily an online business, or a brick-and-mortar shop? It sounds like it's primarily the latter, and I'll assume it is.
In that case, judging by the website isn't going to be very informative. The best indicator is
this image and "Our mission is to provide Superior Customer Service by helping you find exactly what you need and want at an affordable price." "Affordable price" is going to be a non-starter, because (as mentioned above) online outfits will do it cheaper*. Thus, I would suggest that the target markets are:
- People who know exactly what they need to complete their weekend project but don't want to wait 3-5 business days for shipping
- People who saw some cool project on TV/in a magazine, but need some help getting started
- Anybody in the community you can get interested in Making who wouldn't be otherwise.
So I would focus the website toward:
- A single, more exhaustive page showing what inventory the store has, to cater to the (1) crowd - they want to know quickly whether the store will have what they need. For pictures of the items, include small thumbnails in the list that open larger images when clicked. The slideshow is not a good presentation format, in my opinion, because it hides too much (you have to wait for it to scroll through or push the button a bunch of times).
- Make the store address in the header a link to a map/directions how to get to the store
- Please, please get rid of the clipart. The site looks enough like it was made it 90s.
- Tailor the landing/home page to be more friendly, person-focused. In addition to including some pictures of the merchandise, include pictures of the store staff (perhaps smiling, but not creepily).
- Include some examples of the kinds of projects that you can help with, to reassure the (2) crowd that you can help them. Maybe offer an incentive (small ~$5 discount coupon?) for people who send in pictures of projects they've made with parts bought at the store.
- Change the dominant color from rainy-day gray to something more friendly. The same color advice could be given for the store attire itself
In addition to the website, hopefully there are more local-focused advertising efforts as well. A fun idea might be to offer workshops (maybe the first Saturday of every month/every other month or something) where community members can come in and learn how to build a small gadget. This will help expand the (3) group and push more of them towards being in (2) or (1).
Regardless of anything else, some of my favorite memories from when I was a kid are weekend trips to stores like this one, so I hope the business is successful.
* You might argue shipping costs, but the business won't survive on people coming in to buy individual $0.20 components. Also, Amazon Prime.
You wrote a PID control loop for your coach? Whoa. - meatmanek [more] 
15-05-2015, 11:57
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