A rant on small online stores on Instagram, can you relate to any of the points? If you're an offender please repent ooo
READ FULL POST: https://mindofamaka./2017/06/27/buynigerian-or-nah/

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I love the internet and social media, it’s such an amazing place which provides so much opportunity for people – especially small business owners.

There are so many online stores which exist just on Instagram, no website or all those extra stuff (probably coming later on).

I like this, but then there are some repeated occurrences which annoy me to no end. Keep in mind that when I say online store, I don’t mean stores like the really popular ones. I’m talking the smaller yet upcoming ones which may not necessarily be an ‘official’ brand, but a side hustle for the owners.

Eh hen, you know It’s not good to complain about problems without offering solutions. That is why yours truly has proffered sensible solutions at the end of each point. Thank me later lol.

Here are three most prominent ones.
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Hiding Prices

‘DM for prices’, ‘For Inquiries/Contact, add +234XXXXXXXXX on WhatsApp’


Is there anyone out there who can explain this? I cannot for the life of me understand why some online stores don’t put prices in the caption for their posts. Life would be made so much easier If they did! I don’t want to have to DM you just to get prices (and then some take ages to reply) or even worse, add you up on WhatsApp before getting answers I seek.

If there’s a reason these shops do this, someone please shed light so I may understand? Is it that they feel putting the prices would deter customers? If one is deterred by high prices, when they go through all that hustle to add you up/DM you, won’t they still run away? It’s not like the price changes with the method used to contact the store.

Picture This: Those scenes in Nigerian/romance movies when two lovers are playing around, chasing each other and playing hide & seek with trees. THAT is what I look like chasing after these prices. I couldn’t find a GIF, so switch on your imaginations, please!

Please repent! (I’m all ears If people have explanations for why people do this)

Solution: Put your prices in your captions under photos! Those who want to buy will buy! Or upload a price list! This is one thing I like about Anike Herbal Solutions (they aren’t paying me o, I just thought of them off the top of my head), nearly every photo has the FULL price list under it. Isn’t that what life should be like?



Hijacking Other Photos


Bad bad bad. I hate this so much sometimes. Not only does it look so unprofessional and sketchy, it’s just plain wrong! If you have the product, try to take your own photos so we know what’s good!

From one blurry, hijacked photo which may even have the watermark of the original poster on it, how am I meant to trust you? How can I trust that I will get exactly what is in the photo? How can I trust that it will be that quality I seek? Please, repent.

Nobody is saying you have to invest in costly procedures for taking product photos. If you have a phone to use Instagram on, use your camera + cardboard (I’ll do a post on this in the future) and take those photos! I know this might not be easy for everyone, but at least try a little. I don’t want to get any scary surprises and disappointments, though I know even those original posters can deceive with their photos.

Not trying to be too harsh, I understand not everything can be so straight forward. Those who can try should just try. Stand out from the rest! Not everybody must snatch photos from Pinterest, Google and the likes. I get that sometimes you need other photos to show a different angle or something, but at least have some of your own If you can. Those starting out are exempted, but the bigger ones should behave. If you can’t get product photos done by yourself, tell your customers to spill the tea and send their pictures!

Solution: Those who can, glow up! A simple good quality phone camera (or official camera) and a nice background will do. I’ll show you how in a later post.
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READ FULL POST: https://mindofamaka./2017/06/27/buynigerian-or-nah/