Today I received an email from an entrepreneur thinking of starting her own gift shop. She wrote:

"I am 26 years old and my dream is to open up a gift shop. I have been a department manager at Nordstrom for the last two years. I know a lot about merchandising and selling, but nothing about running my own business. Any advice before I get started."
Thank you,
Courtney

I admire Courtney's ambition and vision! Here are five tips that I have for getting started:

1. Read about it and do your research
   There are lots of books and magazines (GIFT SHOP for one) dedicated to retailing success. These books go over all the details of getting started from marketing, to product selection, to inventory control, to visual merchandising. I'd also suggest that you stop by a few gift shops in your area (or in the next town over) to chat with some of the store owners. I'd be forthcoming about your dream and ask them each for three business tips they wished someone would have shared with them before they got started.

2. Create a mini business plan
   With any type of business it's essential to sketch out a business plan. You should answer all the important questions: who is your target market, what is your value proposition (how will you be different from the stores in your area), what categories are people buying in your target market, how big will your store be, how much money will you need to get started and how long can/will it take to turn a profit.

3. Line-up your financing in advance
   You'll need money to get your business started. With bank lending pretty tight right now, it will be helpful (if not critical) to have start-up money to get your business going.

4. Research your location
   As you put together your business plan, you'll need to plug in numbers for how much you'll spend on your store lease. You should start investigating available locations in the area, and get a feel for the pricing. Keep in mind that real estate prices are highly negotiable right now, so you should be able to get a great deal. Remember that your store location is critical to your success—you want to choose a spot that will bring in lots of traffic. And be sure to have an attorney review your store lease before you sign it.

5. Research products
   Choosing the right products is just as important as choosing the right location. There are terrific sources for products in the gift industry, including trade magazines, industry trade shows and product reps. Don't rush and order your inventory before you've done the research—you want to make sure you have a good understanding for what's out there.

Courtney, I wish you the best of luck opening your new store. Keep us posted on your progress.

I just gave a seminar at last week's New York Gift Show on email marketing, and one of the sub-topics I covered is the importance of having a strong website for your store.

While a basic website is a step in the right direction, I encourage you to have as much quality content on your website as possible. With quality content, you'll come up higher when potential customers search for a product or gift shop in your local market or if a potential buyer is doing a nationwide search for a product that you mention frequently. Plus, your email marketing will be more effective if your website is robust and reflective of your physical store, and your regular customers will visit your site often if there is a good reason to go there.

Here are three ideas for generating more content on your website:

1. Write a store blog—a blog is not just a great way to connect with your customers. As you write about the new products you've ordered for your store, the special events you're doing and all the exciting things that are happening, you're filling your website with great quality content. I recommend Wordpress as a great blogging platform (plus it's open source, hence free). Be sure you install the software on your site—if you use something like Blogspot.com, you lose all the wonderful traffic you'd get if you used YourStoreWebsite.com/blog.

2. Post information about store events and promotions—your website is a fantastic marketing tool to promote all of your store events.

3. Post pictures and descriptions for all the different products you sell and the types of departments you have in your store. Make sure your images are not larger than 72 DPI, and that your text runs as HTML (images do nothing for SEO).

Once you make an investment in your website (and the costs have gone way down for the total investment needed to get a good site going), it will help you increase your store traffic and sales.

Is your store blog working to help you drive more traffic and sales? If so, I'd love to hear about it.

This year I was invited by the New York International Gift Fair to participate as a judge for the EX*TRACTS show (the bath and body category within the NYIGF). We'll be announcing the winners of the contest next week in GIFT SHOP's Wrap Up, so sign up for it if you haven't already (it's free!).

Here were five of my favorite products from the show:

Sohum
Sohum offers more than 60 candle fragrances, cremes, soap cakes and perfumettes—plus they just launched a 100% natural organic candle line. As an added benefit, the low heat oil generated from the candle burning can be used as moisturizer. The packaging and fragrances were fantastic.

T.S. Pink
I fell in love with T.S. Pink's line of more than 19 essential bath minerals called Bath Whip!, whose light and wonderful scents make this product the perfect addition to your store's bath and body mix.

Tiny Tillia
Tiny Tillia sells a terrific line of bath products for children. All the illustrations are based on the owner's family members and each product is parabin free and comes with a poem printed on the side of the bottle. Matching bath book and washcloths make adorable add-on products. One cute product in their line is called, "magic creme." It's perfect for those kid scratches that don't warrant real medicine, just a little lotion "magic" to take away the pain.

Voluspa
Voluspa just launched a new candle line through collaboration with a five-star chef. The line includes two fragrances that can be paired with food, just like a wine. The Sommelier fragrance candle can be paired with food that would go well with a red wine, and the Vintage fragrance candle (with hints of almond and oak) would be paired with food that would taste great with a white wine. The goal of Voluspa was to introduce candle fragrances that wold compliment the tastes and smells of a meal and not interfere with it. The candle packaging is gorgeous—the box is made of palownia wood and is lined with decorative paper, and each box comes with a hand-embossed label made in France. Voluspa also launched a new hand scrub made of grapeseed oil and all-natural ingredients. The exfoliating scrub is perfect for removing tough kitchen odors on your hands while moisturizing.

Berjang
Berjang has created a new line called Vegetables. Named for the ingredients inside, the line is an all-natural skin care line formulated from organically grown vegetables. It's available in masks, mists, serums and cremes. The packaging is created from a natural wood called bakelite—after use, they can be crushed and planted in your garden to feed your plants.

Stay tuned for more finds from the NY Gift Show next week!

I just read a fascinating article in Business Week that revealed a major shift in baby boomer spending may happen sooner than originally predicted, due to the current economic environment. Right now baby boomers make up about a third of American consumers—as this shift occurs, boomers will drastically cut back in all areas of spending.

Here are four things to think about as you make important strategic decisions for the upcoming year(s):

1. Who is your average store customer now?
   If the answer includes a high percentage of customers who are 60+ years old, then you should think about shifting your product selection. Start tracking who's buying what merchandise by age, so you can start to get a better understanding of which lines are most popular by age group.

2. Make sure you analyze which price points are most popular.
   This will help you get a feel for the average ticket sale, and the average price per item by age group.

3. Think about shifting some of your marketing methodology.
   If you're not already, start embracing new technology including a store website, Facebook, Twitter and email marketing.

4. Expand the scope of product lines to attract a broader demographic.
   Two growing target markets are tweens and teens.

Have you noticed any shift in buying behavior by age group in your store? Share you experience with us.

GIFT SHOP magazine and GLM have partnered to create the gift industry's first eco-awards program. This exciting program will give retailers the chance to vote on their favorite environmentally conscious and socially responsible products in three categories: Most Innovative, Most Sensitive Use Of Materials and Most Sellable.

The judging is taking place here at the New York Gift Show. Please stop by if you're here and cast your vote in the registration area on the north side of the Javitz.

The winners will be announced online and published in the fall issue of GREEN Retailer/GIFT SHOP magazine.

Powell's is an independent bookstore in Portland, OR, that has attracted over 28,000 Facebook fans. But this isn't just any bookstore… it's famous in Oregon and beyond, and while they've had a website for years (and have been selling books to customers all across the world), Facebook has helped them reach a whole new generation of readers—for FREE.

The one big thing they're doing differently on Facebook? Creating copious amounts of content that people are interested in reading and seeing. Their updates include informative book reviews, photos, videos, regularly updated wall posts and store events.

Here are three tips for creating your page on Facebook:

1. Communicate your store's persona—Like your website, your Facebook page should help to reinforce what your store is all about.

2. Provide valuable content—Let your customers know what's going on at the store, from special events to store promotions to new merchandise.

3. Marketing vehicle—Offer special promotions to all your Facebook fans (aka, existing and potential store customers)

I'd love to add you as a friend on Facebook or follow you on Twitter. I hope to "meet" you soon!

I just returned home from a trip to the San Francisco Gift Show, which was very successful for me on several levels. I was excited hear the fabulous feedback on our summer edition of GIFT SHOP magazine, there was a wonderful turnout for my presentation on retailing innovation and I found great new products to show you (stay tuned later this week).

For the second year in a row, the SFIGF graciously organized a fundraiser accepting both donations and food to benefit Head Start, a non-profit organization that supports 160 different charities. While I always knew the gift industry was very generous, it warmed my heart to see how retailers and vendors lined up to participate at this year's drive despite the challenging retail environment.

This fundraising effort reminded me of the value of cause marketing, so here are three reasons why I believe it's so important:

1. On a philosophical level, I believe the more you give, the more you get back. Giving makes you feel great on many levels, and on a more spiritual note, I think you attract in life what you put out (i.e., if you're a good person, you attract more good people in your life).

2. There is a fantastic PR opportunity with cause marketing. Think about organizing a special food or clothing drive in your store, a road race to benefit a local charity (sponsored by your store and other local retailers) or creating a place in your store where shoppers can write/send a personal letter to the troops (an idea I saw in action at the National Stationery Show). You may be able to get an article published in your local newspaper about your efforts, or at the very least create an excellent reason to reach out to your customer database. Promote the event on Facebook, Twitter, through email marketing and on store signage.

3. It creates an additional way to connect with your customers as you come together for a common cause to help a local charity. You may even want to conduct a store poll (through your website, or in the store) to determine which charity you'll be helping. Don't forget to take lots of pictures during the event and upload them to Flickr and Facebook. You can also blog about the event, and include details in your store email newsletter (with a link to the photos on Facebook).

Have you recently organized a successful charity event at your store? Please share some of the details with us so we can all get ideas.

A fascinating study conducted on in-store sampling revealed that it delivers quite amazing results! On the day of the sampling event, items sampled over multiple categories showed an increase of 475%. Even more amazing, the study revealed that repeat sales are impacted positively long after the event—purchasing of the product increased 11% over a 20 week period, and other products in the brand also showed a significant increase in sales.

Here are three ideas I came up with after reading the study:

• Offer store sampling as frequently as possible to increase product sales—not only on the day of the event, but also as many as 20 weeks after.

• Think about offering sampling on lines that have multiple products in the brand (i.e., sauces, dips, cake mixes, etc. that have the same manufacturers' name).

• Market your store sampling through every channel available—blog, Tweet and write about it in your store's email newsletter.

Have you already been product sampling? Has it worked well in your store? Please share your success story with us!

By now I hope you're using email marketing as an effective way to promote special sales and events in your store, notify customers about new product arrivals and encourage them to shop at your store website.

Be sure you remember the rules as you send out your email marketing messages, you don't want to get blacklisted—

1. Don't use false or misleading header information ("From," "To" and routing information—including the originating domain name and email address—must be accurate and identify the person who initiated the email).
2. Don't use deceptive subject lines.
3. Give recipients an easy, one-click opt-out method.
4. Include your valid physical postal address.
5. Only send emails to recipients who have opted-in—or who have asked to receive your information personally.

I'll be speaking about email marketing this weekend at the San Francisco Gift Show in my presentation about retail innovation, and in two weeks at the New York Gift Show at a session dedicated to creative email marketing strategies.

I hope to see some of you there!

I recently received the following email from a gift shop owner:

I really enjoy your publication! I'm fairly new to owning a gift shop, so I'm hoping you can help me out with a problem. I am having a hard time organizing my office, specifically how to file orders received, orders placed, order not yet received, damages, etc. I would appreciate any help you can give me in this area!"

Sincerely,
Anna Mane Yoder
Yoder's Amish Gift Shop
Sarasota, FL

And since I had just discussed this with several retailers at a Retailer Roundtable I hosted at the National Stationery Show, I had ready a few suggestions for creating a system.

Invest in heavy duty lateral filing cabinets. You can purchase used cabinets (that are in great shape) inexpensively from office supply vendors, on eBay or find a local seller on Craigslist.org. What I like about lateral cabinets is that when you pull the drawer out, you can easily see everything at a glance.

Create an "orders placed" area in the filing cabinets. Set up a file folder for each vendor you work with, then after an order is faxed, written or emailed, place in the appropriate file folder. (Be sure to file each vendor alphabetically.) You could also keep an Excel spreadsheet of all orders placed so you can see a master list at a glance and have the total on hand for the dollar amount of inventory that is on order—you just have to remember to take it off your list every time an order is received.

Once you receive a shipment, pull the order from the "orders placed" file and check the items off on the packing slip. Be sure to "highlight" those products on the packing slip that didn't ship. You may want to call or email the company to find out the status of those items and when they expect shipment—you should then mark your calendar with the estimated ship date so you can follow-up if it doesn't arrive. (If there are still items to be shipped remaining on the order, I'd make a copy of the order so you can leave the original in your file cabinet in the "orders placed" area since there are still items to be shipped on it.) The second copy of the order will move to items received, not yet invoiced.

I use a Mac and I love the built in iCal because I can set up email reminders and alarms to remind me so I don't even have to check my calendar. Plus my iCal automatically sinks with my iPhone, so I always have the most updated version of my calendar with me.

After receiving the invoice, pull your copy of the order, staple them together and move them into a temporary folder labeled "bills to be paid."

File a copy of your invoice, check or check stub, in a separate section of the filing cabinet for bills that have been paid.

Another alternative to all the paper filing would be to scan in every order, bill, etc., and keep an electronic copy on your laptop. You could set up folders for each step of the process, and this would eliminate all the paper clutter. But be sure you're backing up your computer if this is the route you take.

You might also consider hiring a bookkeeper—you can hire one for a small project (five to ten hours) to come in and help you set up a system.

I know all the retailers who read this organize their paperwork—share in the comments so we can give her more ideas!