How to boost traffic the legitimate way?

finally was able to visit.

My views...

it is rather open, both good and bad, maybe just kinda sort stuff a little. Put the upper level as bedrooms and set up the furniture as a bedroom with the beds and table next to one another, add some one prim lamps, etc

the lower could be living room groups, and the small clothing section

I would not have the demo house at the same level as the store, maybe move it in the air a bit, like few hundred meters (I did not use the teleport to see where it went to)

I do like your builds, but the pictures of the builds show what appear to me to be more of a store look, with the nice open floor plans and lots of glass

over all nice work, I like it

Getting traffic is quite complex, the way I look at it is this:

There are a lot of variables and marketing methods, and for each one you can always make some small improvement.

- Classified adverts
- Search places listing with carefully chosen words
- Products with LMs installed
- Good word of mouth through good products and customer service
- Friends/customers with picks to your store
- Activities/information on your parcel(s)
- Go for niche market
- Go for multiple languages in adverts
- A clean lag free sim

etc., etc., etc.

Each improvement raises your odds above the competition and they build on each other.

You can brute force it with a 100 000 L classified, or with 100 bots, but you will get much further if you tinker, tinker and tinker, and it will be more satisfying that way too !

Last bit of marketing philosophy before I call it day....

I'm also a big believer in niche boutiques. Like the OP, I also sell both houses and furniture. However, I have them in two entirely different stores right next to each other because it is two entirely different markets. Traffic coming to look at the furniture also see's that there are houses right next to the shop. Traffic for the skyboxes see's that the furniture is available separately. The stores are branded differently and marketed differently.

I did this based on what I noticed in my own shopping preferences. I found that I generally liked to shop at places that specialized. I would TP to a "furniture" store before I would TP to "furniture, houses, animations, boats, kitchen appliances." So, I split my businesses up and take advantage of the cross traffic.

As Snowman said, it is a lot of little things that add up.

You have 3 types of people you are marketing to:
1) the person who is shopping for what you sell RIGHT NOW.
2) The person who isn't shopping right now but saw something you made and just *has* to have one.
3) The person who is going to be shopping for something you sell at a later point, even though they aren't shopping for it right now.

One might hold events to bring some people in to the place.

Get a live musician to use the store as a place to play at. Make sure people get landmarks to the place.

Put a landmark dispenser out.

Which Are The Best Furniture Stores In Sl?

The "best" furniture stores in SL are the ones that carry products in a style that you like at reasonable prices. Furniture is very, very subjective to individual taste.

One tip that was mentioned that I would like to bring up again. Be social on networks that work a lot like MySpace. The ones mentioned were rezzed.net and another (I forget and am lazy sorry) but there are many out there. The one I am addicted to has something that many may, which is a banner exchange. They will add one of your banners into their banner rotation in exchange for placing one of their banners up in your store. Free, and it gets your name out to hundreds of SLers that log in daily. (Thats slsociety.snappville.com) If you also use those sites, if they have a message board area for this, to post your new items this will also get you added exposure. Use the new products area of these forums as well, when you come out with something new. If you havent already, make a couple of examples of your work to include as a freebie. Dont make this just your worst piece of work, but something nice that will represent your store nicely so that people might ask where it was gotten and come to pick it up as well. Thus seeing the rest of the store to shop.

I probably just repeated things, but these came to mind. I popped over to your store and I am not sure if you did a lot of changes, but I cant find things that would lead me to conclude some of the other issues people had with the store. *shrugs* It clearly looks like a store to me and the moment I see the optional color swatches by the signs I knew to check there for prices and other information. It was open and easy to walk through, which is nice. No bumping into things almost stacked on top of each other. All in all I like the work you have done and the shop as well. I wish you nothing but success!

To follow up on what Dinalya said:

If you make a freebie, make it transfer, but no-copy. Anyone that sees one and wants one for themselves (or wants another copy of the one they've already got) has to go back to your store. There's no reason to keep someone from giving their only copy to someone that really wants it though. It gets your sample work into the hands of the person that wants it the most and is most likely to come to your store.

and there is nothing to stop people from coming back to the store and getting the transfer freebie over and over and over and selling it (it does happen)

I make my freebies no transfer, if someone likes it they come to my store to get it, thus increasing traffic and a chance to sell something. If I make it transfer that person may never come to my store, since they got what they wanted without ever having to visit

That makes sense too. My thought was that it was better to have it in the home of someone that wants it rather than the inventory of someone that just picked one up for the heck of it.

hehe I tend to do my freebies as copy only, cuz transfer is too easy for the no do gooders to take advantage of

and my freebies now are done via the subscription group, not mny things will be available in the store as freebies (I do have the 503 tshirt still, and plan to put another set of tshirts eventually)

of course demo's are in the store of the shoes and the kid shoe comparison thing