Making a Z product website - worth it? SEO?

[Mistica]

I have been stopping and starting working on a website with my Zazzle products for a while. (4 years)

I have created posts displaying quite a few same theme products.
I also have direct links to various categories on Zazzle.

A friend told me that the search engines overlook such “list” “affiliate links” sites unless there is lots of content and maybe 1 or 2 products for one post.

I might do that too…but right now I have pages with lots and lots of products.
Each click takes them to Zazzle.I do have about a paragraph describing the contents of the multi product page.

I am using WordPress and a plugin that is no longer for sale…so it’s days might be numbered. 

Question: Has anyone who has their own website found a increase in sales (and referrals) by having such a site?

Right now I just have a coming soon page with some links to Zazzle while I build in the background.
All my in progress pages re-direct to the coming soon page.

[Fiorenzo]

I have stopped working on new products and switched to work on my website which is under construction for years now. After trying to promote my works purely through my FB page, I came to the conclusion, that this path doesn’t work well. IMO, you definitely need a website if you want to seriously promote your works (or referred third-party products).

Having a website offers many advantages: you can design it so it fits perfectly your niche and audience, you can optimize SEO, you can organize and showcase your products at will, you can redirect your visitors to Zazzle’s local domains without losing affiliate revenue by customers switching to a different domain directly on Zazzle (your affiliate ID is not forwarded in that case), you can make your own mockups, you can offer additional info and services, your links on socials will be shorter, you create your own brand, etc.   

In terms of SEO, pages with tons of product links are not the best choice, because search engines rely on content those days, and having tons of different products with different short texts on the same page equals having practically no dedicated content the search engines can use to optimize their results. Plus you can’t write strong metatags because the content is widely spread.

What you should do - and what I’m doing - is to create specific product pages, such as “Fleece blankets”, “Pillows”, “Mugs”, etc., fill these with a suggestive banner (for your visitors’ eyes), a product description (both for your visitors AND search engines), product-related meta tags and finally with the related products linking to your Zazzle product pages (better if done with your own mockups and short description but also viable through direct linking/sharing from your Z’s product page). This way, you give the search engines product/niche-specific content and keywords, and make it also easier for your visitors to navigate, besides incentivizing purchases with a beautiful presentation. Adding also themed pages, e.g. for holidays and occasions, gift ideas, etc., and creating collections will improve your chances of success, too. And if you use Pinterest, a website comes in handy, too.

The drawback is, it’s a whole lot of extra work you have to deal with. But it’s worth the effort, IMO.

Good luck!

[Mistica]

Thanks so much for your input Fiorenzo. I am using the WP blog functionality. The plugin I have is old and no longer available so I had to structure the site so that if the “Sneak Peak” area (display of lots of plugin products) crashes in the future..(due to the plugin failing), it would not destroy my entire site. I will have pages with specific links… like Birthdays with links to specific subgroups…like 1st etc. and then I will have posts for featuring  small 1 or a couple products using the share feature z has (no plugin)
The single item posts will be created as life permits.
The plugin does pull in the title and price so I will have some key words build in the sea of products. I also will have an introductory paragraph. My theme allows for a dynamic tag area which might help with SEO.
I read about archive pages having no follows..which is beyond me at this point…let alone implement it.
I will have a few large groups … like wedding invites…and then more nitchy pages like floral wedding invites.
Concerning mock ups… I have color coded featured images such as blue for invites, yellowish for holidays etc. I started off with unique lovely featured images but that just takes waaay too long.
Yes..the job is HUGE. I have to not give up this time and take it to completion…which is going to happen
Thanks again.

[randysgrandma]

Just my honest opinion, having a website might work if you have lots of time to devote to it. I have never had a Zazzle website, but I did have one when I sold vintage toys. The main problem is; to have a successful website, you have to promote it. SEO has changed a lot since I had a website, but you used to need links to a lot of different sites that often meant being an affiliate for other sites and even sites with products that were had items like your own. I did make some money being an affiliate to other sites, like Oriental Traders, for one. Another way to rise to the top of search engines use to be to trade links with others with similar interests. I am not sure that is allowed anymore, but I traded links with a lot of other people who sold or wrote articles on vintage toys. To ever get to the top of a search engine or even on the first page, you have to have lots of visitors, which means a lot of promoting, lots of time and lots of waiting for search engines to find you. The way I look at it, promoting can be done just as well from the Zazzle website as your own website. 
Like I said, that is just my opinion, not meaning to rain on your parade. If you want to give it a try go for it.

[Mistica]

Hi Randy, Thanks for the input. I actually remember those days of link swapping. I had entire pages devoted to that.  As far as today goes, it is one of those projects that I dropped and picked up…over and over again. I will be updating my other websites as well…so when that is done I will be cross linking when appropriate. I did do a google search for certain key words. I noticed, of course that Zazzle should rank high for zazzle
..but I did manage to find a few sites featuring zazzle products. At this point I will just move forward. I have invested too much time in it already.
I do find that those wanting to promote zazzle products  are still actively seeking other designers to promote.
I am guessing that whatever they are doing…they are either just starting out OR have been successful being a Zazzle affiliate. As with everything…time will tell. Thank you for taking the time to respond. 

[Fiorenzo]

Always glad to help where I can, got helped a lot, too, by fellow designers. I know well your pain, it’s a HUGE work, and you need a ton of will and self-discipline to accomplish it. There is a reason, my website is still under construction, lol.

It seems you already have split your products into categories and themes, that’s halfway to success.  Make sure, all your dedicated main pages have a good description section and appropriate tags/keywords and you will be fine in terms of SEO. There are nice SEO plugins available for free for that little extra boost if your actual theme lacks a bit in functionality, but using WP the indexing works pretty well and quickly in general. I personally use WP for customer websites so they can manage their content themselves, especially when it comes to e-commerce, and IMO it’s a good platform. My own site is developed by myself for max. flexibility and performance, but this comes at the cost of extra time.

Yes, own mockups take time, the trick here is a) to use Zazzle’s ones when they’re fine and to make only your own where needed, and b) to organize yourself with pre-masked templates etc.

One last tip I already mentioned: if you have a significant international audience, try to give your visitors the option to buy your products on their local Z domain (e.g. Germany or France), to make sure, they don’t switch on Z’s pages which will “kill” your affiliate/promoter share (the cookie doesn’t work cross-domain). Remember: international customers have quite some advantages if they buy from a local domain rather than from zazzle.com (where applicable): no hassle with custom fees which are handled by Zazzle and included in the international prices, and less expensive shipment costs. Be aware, tho, that prices are usually higher, and that the sales may differ on each domain. You have to find out by yourself if the extra maintenance and developing effort is justified, depending on your audience.

[Fiorenzo]

The old times are gone for ages in regard to search engine hacks and tricks. All these little games you used to do in the late 90s and early 00s don’t work anymore, you even risk getting penalized. Even keyword lists have become irrelevant for years now, at least on Google. Nowadays you have to stuff them well within your description. But yes, the key to success is traffic, traffic, traffic. Even if you have the best SEO, this doesn’t help you much, if no one visits your page generating traffic. And: everyone can get to the first page on Google’s search results, you just need to use word combos no one uses and search for them. That’s the trick of these “specialized” SEO companies which “guarantee” you first-page rankings for $$$. I guarantee, you will land on Google’s first page if you search for “I love my sweet little kittykat angeline”, this for free  

A website is mainly there to beautifully present your products to your targeted audience, optimize the success rate of your promotion efforts, and concentrate all your products from different PODs in one spot. At least on FB, direct shares from Zazzle have an awful reach and conversion rate. On that platform, your best bet is to create interesting/appealing posts for max shares and interaction and add a subtle line in the description that leads to your website or product/collection page on Z. And don’t use URL shorteners whenever possible, they have a bad reputation. Pinterest is different, and I don’t have experience there so I can’t say much, but from what I learned so far is that it seems to me that own pins look better and that an own site will 100% be useful to host these nice little extras and free gifts that you can pin to attract visitors - and hopefully potential customers. I m explicitly working on my website first to be able to optimize Pinterest when time comes.

This is my very own approach, tho, and it must not necessarily be the right one for everyone. 

[ColsCreations]

When I first started “getting serious” about setting up on Zazzle, I was trying to instruct family on how use links that would have my referral ID in them if they felt inclined to buy anything (from me or any other shop).  Didn’t go well so I told them, OK, if you want to buy anything from Z, email me the product first and I will send you back a link with my ID in it, LOL. Then it was ‘what if I want to send someone else to your store…?’ So OK, the logical solution was to make a website to filter people through so I did. I made a straight forward shopping site - no pretense of being a blog with helpful articles or such - that is easier to navigate then Zazzle and has my RF and a tracking code in every link. So whether I am talking to someone in real-life about my store or want to share something on social, I can just direct to my website, which is a short, easy URL  (colscreations) and from there they’ll pick up my RF ID.

My site basically mirrors my store organization on Zazzle where I use Categories for general product types and Collections for design themes so every product is in one Category and one Collection. My site is organized the same way, using same names for those Cats & Collections. Even with my small store (less than 500 products) it’s hard to keep up with when Z isn’t your full-time job, but it serves its purpose. Which for me was to have a convenient way to direct people to my stuff where they’d also pick up my RF Id on clicking through to Zazzle. Being randomly found on Google wasn’t my motivation but if that happens (I can only confirm one definite sale that came that way) that’s all good too.

[Fiorenzo]

You perfectly summed up the main advantages of having your own website as an intermediate platform from where you redirect the interested customers to their final destination, making sure they get not overwhelmed, they already have made their primary choice so they don’t play around on Z with the risk of getting lost, and you getting your deserved referral if you’re not unlucky that another referral cookie is already set on Z.

I will use free stuff such as e-cards, coloring pages, decorative initials that work with my templates, as well as documentation and tricks&tips to attract people to my site and get traffic. Because the more traffic I get, the more I get found, and the more sales I will make. 

It IS huge work, but if done right, your success rate will rise immensely.

[Mistica]

That is too funny. When I was an Amazon Affiliate yes…you are always trying to get credit for the sale via friends and family. Lots of work trying to explain to them how things happen.
It is smart to have a place to funnel them through. I have a pinterest account…but seriously…I have no idea if I get even got one sale. Plus Fiorenzo notes, you lose the referral if they go international.

On Pinterest, I have gotten clients for my other non-design sites and services. 

[Fiorenzo]

The fact that you lose your referral share when the customer you lead to Zazzle changes to  a local domain is plain and simple unfair in a time where promotion happens mostly on socials and addresses an international audience. And this is not a technical issue but works as intended. That’s one good reason why you should link your promos to your website first and then redirect your interested visitor wisely to the appropriate Z page and domain. I know that with every link you may potentially lose the visitors’ interest, but if they really like what you’re offering them, they won’t care about an additional redirect. 

[Mistica]

So…on my website there should be a link around the CTA saying click for your own country…etc.
So that is about 15 links should be on each page. Although if there were looking at chef business card on my website…well…it would be gone if I have about 48 products per page. Or..I can lead the to the home page or collections page of my Z store. These could be global so that if z adds another 5 countries it would update each page that has that global section.

[Fiorenzo]

It’s not an easy task, and there is no perfect solution. All comes down to your audience. If your potential shoppers on your website are 90% Americans, you may make things easier for you and your visitors by just linking to the US zazzle.com site and live with your referral losses on the 10% international audience that may occur if these switch to a local domain on Z. But if your audience is more international, you want to give your customers the option to head directly to their preferred local domain.

In my case, my main audience is in the States, but I also have a significant international audience, mostly in Europe but also elsewhere. So I focus on zazzle.com when it comes to sales and prices and the main link to my Z product page. So the large button heads to the com site. Underneath there will be a dropdown menu with all international links. There, customers can load the product page on their preferred domain, if the product is available. Users can also define a favorite international domain in their settings, which will then be shown first in this dropdown menu, Within the footer I’ll have a link to my Z store, again, the prominent one on zazzle.com and underneath the international choice. I know it’s harder to maintain but I code my pages myself so I handle this easily with scripts - the product link is the same, all that changes is the URL extension, e.g. “.de” for Germany, “.fr” for France, etc. instead of “.com”. I won’t show all domain-specific product prices and sales, tho, this would be overkill. prices and sales always refer to the US site (there will be a note).

In terms of promotion, you can mitigate this issue also by using targeted ads, e.g. only US, or only Germany - and link to the appropriate local domain, if you link directly to Zazzle. For normal posts e.g. on FB but also pins on Pinterest, a link to your website is practically mandatory if you have an international audience, if you link/pin directly to your Z.com product page, chances are high, you will lose a lot of international referrals. Also consider that if your customers use Zazzle’s international links (with the flags) to change language/domain, in some cases, they are not redirected to the related product page on the local domain but on Zazzle’s homepage, so you not only lose your referral share, but the customer isn’t on your product nor on your store’s page either. If this happens and if you have linked directly from an ad, that customer is lost in most cases. If you link from your website and show Zazzle’s page in a new window, your customer can easily head back to your website and retry.

I know, it’s a mess. Actually working on my page. As soon as I have the first page up I’ll show you my solution. Need a few more days for this.

[Mistica]

Wow. It sure is a mess. I do have lots of international. Today..50%. 
It seems that I would also have to know each language.
even a simple link like 

https://www.zazzle.com.ge/girly+square+pillows?rf=2222222222222&tc=“AREAsquarepillow”

would require some knowledge. 
I know that when I reached the next pro level about, it took forever to be notified  because my sales were often international so had to wait for more US sales to clear.
I think I just better keep doing what I am doing and accept that the site won’t have the power that it should…but it is better than nothing. It my international people make a purchase, how would I be tell which domain is being used?
Is that info in the report area available?

Oops…my link was erased due to “invalid HTML”   it must have been my sample link which included a search string and noting that I probably needed to be able to write in German.

[ColsCreations]

@Fiorenzo  wrote:
Also consider that if your customers use Zazzle’s international links (with the flags) to change language/domain, in some cases, they are not redirected to the related product page on the local domain but on Zazzle’s homepage, so you not only lose your referral share, but the customer isn’t on your product nor on your store’s page either.

Got some questions but wanted to comment on this little bit first. Took me a while to find the flags/links on the product page; finally spotted the drop-down menu to change domains at the very bottom of the product page. No wonder I never noticed the option before. Did a little testing once I found it, in two different browsers, signed-in and not-signed in, and the results were consistently the same:

If you start from any non-US domain , pick a product, scroll down, and choose a different domain, it always goes to the main zazzle.com.xx page for that domain instead of to the product you were on, even if the US domain is your choice.

If you start from the US domain (1), pick a product, scroll down, and choose a different domain (2), it always goes to that same product on the selected domain (2). But if from there (2) you then decide to choose another domain (3), then it always goes to the main zazzle.com page, even if you selected the US again as (3). Which meshes with the above since in going from (2) to (3) you are no longer starting on the US domain.

So you can either

A) share links to the US domain and if the customer chooses another they’ll stay on your product (unless they switch to a third) but you’ll lose the referral if they buy anything yours or not. So you might land a royalty from your product but no referrals on that or anything else they might buy since your RF doesn’t carry over to any of the foreign domains they might switch to.

or

B) share links to a foreign domain so your RF sticks for that particular domain for anything they might buy, but if they switch domains, you lose any potential referrals same as above AND the customer is taken from your product to the main page so you might also lose the sale/potential royalty on that product you were trying to lead them to.

This is all way beyond the level of promoting I do, LOL, but I don’t think I would ever use Option B unless I was in @Fiorenzo 's shoes where you KNOW your target would prefer, say, the German domain, with no reason to switch. That way odds are good at getting both a royalty on your product and referrals on everything they might buy in their visit since you know they won’t be switching domains.

[Fiorenzo]

You find the domain link easily on the title bar (on desktops):

 You are right in regard to the product page / home page landing after switching (from com to int. domain product page / from int. domain product age to different domain homepage). As so often you did even better testing than I. I switched first from com to local then directly to a different local and landed on the homepage. 

As I wrote, if your audience is mostly US-based, best solution is to simply stick to the US domain, but if your customer base is 50/50 US and international, you will lose a lot of referral cash, if you just stick to the com domain. In this case, it would be much better if you could handle the correct redirect on your website. If the customer chooses to buy your product on the local domain, they won’t instantly switch back to the com domain within Zazzle but stay on the chosen local domain. Consider also that an international customer will be confronted with extremely high international shipping prices on the com domain, so chances are high, you will lose the customer there (there was such a post here). Also consider that international customers will have to deal with customs fees and hassles when ordering from the com domain, and this is not a great experience and also expensive. Chances are high, that some customers won’t buy again. It’s always the best option to try to direct international shoppers to their local domain, if doable and the product is available there. Needs extra management, tho.

As I wrote, I also focus on the com site but give my visitors the option to switch to their local domain. I will also have notes about the pros and cons of using local domains, so people know what they have to expect and make the choice that fits their needs best. And while we are at the side notes, I will also have FAQs about shipping, including that the first shipping amount they see on checkout is the more expensive premium one. One thing I have learned on Z is to be creative - and I don’t mean this in terms of designing.

This whole thing is senseless in today’s times where you promote internationally. Technically it’s a no-brainer to carry a referral id to a different local domain.

[ColsCreations]

Huh! I don’t have that icon.

[Mistica]

I don’t have the icon either…although chances are I might have to stick to ,com anyway even though half on my people are international. The logistics of coming up with my best solution are way over my head
So obviously my intel. customer must have an easier time shopping on Z rather they would on  my oldest never launched site

[Fiorenzo]

Sorry, missed this one.

You don’t have to know each language, you can always use  the exact same URL, you only have to change the domain extension from “.com” to whatever it is, e.g. “.de”

You see currency used and country code in your royalty and referral history.

I agree that making it work is an overwhelming task if you’re not well skilled in coding and are relying on CMS, unless you put an enormous manual effort into it.  Even for me, it’s a headache, and I’m extremely flexible by developing the whole thing myself. The questions I also have to ask myself are, how much do I want to automatize with database and scripts, how much to simply code by hand and how want I organize it so visitors are not overwhelmed but still have choices. It’s definitely not an easy task.

Actually, my strategy is the “own store” approach, which means structuring my website as it were my own store with the only difference that people are sent to the various PODs to make final changes and their purchase. So the structure is: 

• Store - main page with category main listings
• Category/Collection - dedicated page with related subcategories and product listings, e.g. “Home Decor”, “Home Decor - Pillows”
• Product - dedicated product main page with product info and product listing, e.g. “Zazzle Throw Pillows” 
• Article - dedicated specific product page with “designer” info, tips & tricks, product and design variants, whatever else depending on product type, preliminary customization (e.g. choosing PNG monogram to send via API to Z), and link to the external store (zazzle.com + local domains or other related POD) 

You see, it’s a pretty hardcore approach, basically the same as having your own store. The positive aspect is, this allows me to have tons of dedicated content, which will extremely benefit SEO search results, resulting in more traffic and potential sales. Plus I can redirect all my social posts and ads to my website at will, either to the main page, a specific category or product, or a specific product. And I also have my own shortlinks which I also include in my Zazzle descriptions so people can head to the dedicated page on my website for custom requests and help. E.g. petsdreamlands.com/pid=productcode-designcode

I absolutely understand that this extremely work-intensive approach is not for anyone. It’s more suited for the ones who build up their own branding and sell a limited assortment of their own designs on different products on different or specific PODs. The artistic approach so to speak - I’m not on Z to sell as much stuff as possible, I’m on Z to offer my “fandom” my works printed on nice quality products.

I hope this helped a little bit on your way to finding out what works best for your needs. Good luck, whatever path and compromise you choose!

[Fiorenzo]

Strange, I have the globe icon on all 3 major browsers. Windows & desktop, though. Both logged in and not.