| Awesome! You're obviously not struggling, but before long it might be worth reworking the site's aesthetic and branding? I honestly don't know at all how much it matters, but I'm gonna throw out some unsolicited design critique in case it's helpful. - Tragically, King did sink their teeth into the word "candy", so using it in a candy-color outlined gradient logotype strongly evokes mobile games. May not matter, but it sends a mixed message. - Only use the good photography. If you're shooting in a studio now, you can cycle out all the iPhone shots, which are contributing to a kind of "man-of-the-people candy blog" vibe, versus a "place that will send me awesome candy" vibe. Images like this: http://www.japanstyle.info/wordpress/wp-content/images//2011... make me curious and hungry, images like this: http://www.candyjapan.com/static/japanese-candy.jpg remind me of being told to check Halloween candy for razors. - Lead with the photography. Right now, if I don't already have an idea of what "japanese candy" is, I'm not excited. It's cliche, but even just changing the title text to lightly shadowed white and sticking full-width high quality candy photos behind it in a carousel would be way more engaging. - Consider folding the "Are you still active?" section into the title pitch. If this is a concern people have, you don't want them to have to scroll through the rest of the page to resolve it. Could be worth testing something like "Order now to be included in the July 15th shipment!". - A more broad observation: The service (including the totally adorable "how it works" comic strip) seems to be pitched heavily towards something like American Otaku culture. In my experience, though, classmates would define social groups around being into manga, or wanting to learn Japanese-- but when a classmate would come back from Japan with some never-before-seen candy, everyone was excited. That's just my take, anyway. Good luck! |
Bemmu,
I do agree that the aesthetic of the site did not totally give me a lot of confidence. It does look a little amateurish. Seeing the pictures of the past shipments helped up the confidence and the YouTube videos did that as well. While I only watched one video, I think you could include more branding. Throw a 3 or 4 second blurb in the beginning with just your web address and tagline, and maybe a 15 or 30 second message at the end. These videos with show up for people who do Google searches Japanese candy. That's your target market. Also include a little about the service in the video description. I think you are missing an opportunity to be able to add unobtrusive advertising.
I'd slightly disagree with icushman's take on the logo, the photography and who the service is broadcast to. I think King's "claim" on the candy logo is fleeting and probably doesn't have must effect on a customer. The "man-of-the-people candy blog" guy is exactly the sort of person I would order something like this from. I have more confidence thinking this is legit if it is a candy aficionado behind it than someone who is in it for the business aspect. Also, I think that the anime/manga vibe of the cartoon is fine. I'd think that anyone who was turned off by that wouldn't have been interested in ordering Japanese candy to begin with.
Getting back to the web site, I'd say try to highlight the testimonials from other websites more. On first pass, I missed those at the top. Highlight them more, maybe run them across the page as is the trend these days. You also ask people to subscribe before they have seen anything of what the service is.
The "Are you still active?" section implies to me there was a problem. It makes it seem as if customers are asking you questions like, "Hey, it's been a while, am I going to get a box or what" or "You had an interruption in service, did you get back up and running again?"
Finally, maybe have a section for testimonials. Maybe even have your customers send a picture of themselves enjoying the box, preferably outside in a way which shows the different parts of the world you send to. It would speak a lot to legitimacy and even community.
Either way, congrats on passing the $10K MRR threshold, you are obviously doing a lot of things right. Cheers and best of luck!