To our valued Specialty Toys Network members,

Welcome to 2011! Are you making big plans for the year? We are!

Starting the year off with a bang, we’re excited to announce that we’ve created a new, improved shopping cart checkout. The new cart has two primary, very significant improvements that you and your customers will love:

NEW CART FEATURES:
1.    Guest checkout – buy without creating a user account
2.    One-page checkout – customers can complete, view and edit all checkout information on one simple page

We’re confident these changes will reduce shopping cart abandonment rates and increase the numbers of orders you receive. Special thanks to go out to a handful of members who were the early users of this new shopping cart during December. We appreciate your help and feedback on it.

Look for an email from us soon letting you know that we’ve changed your webstore over to the new cart. If you have any questions or feedback, let us know.

Online Marketing Tips

In 2010, Google changed its search engine algorithm and many websites saw a drop in their search results ranking. If your website was lacking much site original content and hadn’t been updated in a while with new messaging on your home page and new products, you probably saw the decline in rankings.

What can you do? The goal of the new algorithm, according to Google, is to reward websites that deliver useful content. In English, that means give visitors lots of helpful and/or interesting information about a topic—in your case, specialty toys.

Adding pages of useful content to your website can be done in three primary ways:

1. Add products. Each toy you add to your site adds a page.

2. Blog within your website. Your Specialty Toys Network website has the built-in capability to host a blog within your URL. Each time you add a post to your blog, you tell Google that you’re actively creating useful content. The more you blog, the more Google will come back to your URL and the report to its search engine.

3. Add pages to your website. Informational pages add value to your site. Consider adding pages about the history of your store and who your staff members are. Archive press releases and newsletters on your website, too.

What’s the best way to add useful content to your toy store website? Whatever works best for you! In an ideal world, you’ll gradually and regularly be doing all three of those things to build your website’s search engine rank.

Questions? Email This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it If we have enough questions, we’ll do another webinar!

We are happy to welcome these manufacturers (including game makers and book publishers) as Official Partners of Specialty Toys Network. If you’d like your toy brands to include their new or updated product information in our STN Import Tool, refer them to www.stoysnetpartner.com .

The following Official Partners have been updated or added recently:

Toobeez International Uncle Skunkle Toys Schylling Toy Vault The Happy Kid Company EuroGraphics Mindwalk Inc Madame Alexander Doll Company Strategic Space, Inc. The Little Experience PB & J Toy Company Douglas Cuddle Toys Acumen Associates Anomia Challenge & Fun Prince Lionheart Playroom Entertainment Mini Me Geology

View the complete list of partner manufacturers as of Dec 31, 2010.

Are your favorite products in our master database? If not, contact the manufacturers and ask them to become an Official Partner of Specialty Toys Network. Your requests get results you can use!

We’re sad to announce that our Marketing Director, Tara Bloom, is moving on this month. The good news is she’s getting married this year. We wish her well in her new endeavors and adventures.

Every cloud has a silver lining, though. Please join us in welcoming This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it as our new sales associate and customer support representative. We hope you enjoy her sparkling telephone personality and positive energy as much as we do.

Many of you registered and attended our “Secrets of an Influential Website” webinar series that we held last year from August through October. If you missed it, or want to tune in again, you can check it out here. [Training Video Archives ] It’s filled with tips you can implement on your website now to improve online sales this year.