2008-01-21T16:13:52-07:00 Practical Ecommerce info@practicalecommerce.com http://www.practicalecommerce.com/ Copyright 2007 Confluence Publishing DBA Practical Ecommerce http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/655/Widgets-Moving-Your-Web-Store-Into-The-Community 2008-01-21T16:13:52-07:00

Social media has grown to become a serious tool in a merchant’s marketing arsenal. Sites like Shopwiki.com, Thisnext.com and others provide excellent opportunities for merchants to gain favorable reviews and referrals, and other social networking sites like Del.icio.us, Reddit.com, Myspace.com and Facebook.com provide the opportunity for brand exposure. However, perhaps the greatest social media advantage to merchants is still emerging — the ecommerce widget. A widget is an application that can be embedded into a web-based application, such as a blog or a social network, though anything that is html-based. For ecommerce, a widget could embed a shopping cart, for example. Widgets are a tool for merchants to take their web store across the online community, placing products where like-minded communities are gathered. So far, the music and book industry has embraced widget technology via companies like Goodstorm.com and Random House. According to Goodstorm.com, its...

http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/481/Aligning-Keywords-And-Landing-Pages 2007-05-16T09:36:10-07:00

As a child you probably played "connect the dots," drawing a line from number to number to create a picture that answered a riddle. Pay-per-click (PPC) marketing presents a similar "connect the dots" scenario. The "dots" are points within the customer experience value chain. This chain starts with a keyword search, moves into an ad impression, a click-through, a landing page visit and finally a completed action. To illustrate: The user (e.g., your potential customer) is the driving force of the process. The merchant, however, is the driving force behind the user's experience and the value gained from that experience. The merchant's role is to motivate the user from point to point through increasing relevance to and consistency with the user's intentions. An intention by definition is "what one plans to do or achieve which simply signifies a course of action that one proposes to follow." At each dot (e.g.. step), the user is required to make a decision to continue...

http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/356/Do-Security-Measures-Boost-Conversion 2006-12-01T00:00:03-07:00

Achieving high performance for your ecommerce business is complicated. It requires building an effective combination of trust, convenience and relevance on your website using technology, design, usability and influence. If you consider industry statistics, you'll quickly realize why it's tough to achieve high performance (indicated by your average conversion rate) above the standard (although questionable) industry averages of 1 percent to 2 percent. Specifically for small and medium-sized ecommerce sites with less brand recognition, two more prominent studies uncovered alarming consumer insights. The first research study by Forrester Research, Inc., found that 84 percent of consumer survey respondents say they don't think retailers are doing enough to protect their customers online. The other finding fromLondon-based TNS PLC, a market research company, in April 2005 found that 75 percent of online shoppers surveyed say they have abandoned a retail site due to security...

http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/300/Gaining-Insight-Into-Live-Chat 2006-10-01T00:02:11-07:00

The irony of “live chat” is that there most likely isn't any “chat” at all. Live chat is usually a text-based communication that happens online between a customer and a merchant. It's akin to the instant messaging youmight do with a friend through Apple's iChat or AOL's InstantMessenger. From the seller’s perspective, online chat lets support staff reach out to a customer visiting its website in a one-on-one interaction to offer assistance or to push promotional offers. A “live chat” icon is placed on the merchant's website, and a customer clicks that icon to initiate a chat with a customer-service representative. For ecommerce businesses, live chat is a strategy for reducing shopping-cart abandonment which, from recent research conducted by www.marketingsherpa.com, averages 59.8 percent. Live chat extends communication opportunities between buyer and seller while maximizing the customer’s overall satisfaction with their website experience. According to...

http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/236/Integrating-Bricks-and-Mortar-with-eCommerce 2006-07-01T12:00:00-07:00

Today‘s shopper expects convenience. Merchants integrating brick-and-mortar stores, ecommerce sites and catalogs will increase repeat purchase rates and achieve higher levels of customer satisfaction. In any multi-channel retail consumer interaction, traffic and sales are being driven from one channel to the other. In "web-to-store" or "store-to-web" situations, the limitations of one channel are mitigated by the strengths of the other. Consider the potential revenue-maximizing opportunities with the following multichannel business processes. In-store Pick Up In-store pick up is a process allowing your customers to order online and pick up in your physical store. During the process, communication with the customer primarily happens via email and instructs the shopper of the steps necessary to complete the transaction. In most cases, the order is fulfilled at the "brick-and-mortar" store the same business day the order is placed online, with best practices showing most...

http://www.practicalecommerce.com/articles/228/Attracting-The-Right-Traffic 2006-07-01T10:16:16-07:00

Gaining just one percent more sales or leads from your visitors can significantly impact your bottom line, yet the common practice of improving website conversion often focuses exclusively on redesigning and optimizing your website. Website conversion — the process of turning website visitors into actions like phone calls, product purchases or coupon downloads — can only reach its full potential if your site is attracting the right traffic. Generating measurable website conversion improvements must start with the advertising channels you select to reach your target audience. A website realizes a lower conversion rate if the advertising channels attract the wrong audience or draw visitor attention using the wrong message. Recently I had a discussion with a new ecommerce client about his traffic volumes and expected conversion rate improvements. The client was thrilled with his top search-engine placements for his "primary keywords." Indeed the keyword placements were...