Category

Conversion

Fewer than 5% of visitors to an ecommerce site typically convert to customers. In this Conversion category, we offer insights to increase that percentage. Our expert contributors address ratings and reviews, social proof, site search, product page enhancements, product descriptions, checkout options, live chat, and much more — anything to help close online sales.

Analytics & Data | Checkout Tactics | Customer Retention | Customer Service | Photography & Video | Product Pages

Conversion
Five Tips For Improved Sales, In Good Times or Bad

December 19, 2007 • PEC Staff

Increase Focus On Existing Customers For many companies, the primary focus is on selling to new customers, and little attention is given to the tremendous potential in the existing customer list. But when consumers become more skittish and conservative in their purchase behavior, they ...
Conversion
Usability Report Card: Accepted.com

December 19, 2007 • Richard Kerr

Accepted.com is an admissions consulting and application editing service website. It has requested this usability site grade. Home Page Clarity To ensure credibility and trust, sites that gather customer information should include a “Privacy Policy.” Accepted.com has a link to its a...
Customer Service
Numbers Should Not Dictate

December 17, 2007 • Pamela Hazelton

They say the true measure of success for an online store is based on visitor and shopping statistics and analysis of investments for driving traffic to the site. The most common reporting method is Google Analytics, and with its recent integration with LivePerson (a live chat tool), sto...
Conversion
Websites For The Visually Impaired

December 17, 2007 • Joseph Monks

You put a lot of effort into making your website successful. You implement a strong design, you add features such as wish lists, coupon modules, gift certificates and perhaps even Flash and JavaScript functionality to attract customers and provide them an enjoyable shopping experience. ...
Conversion
Pay-Per-Click Advertising: Alternative PPC Venues

December 12, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

In the world of pay-per-click advertising, there are three well-known players: Google AdWords, Yahoo! Search Marketing and Microsoft adCenter. However, there are several other interesting pay-per-click sites you may not be familiar with, which you might find useful. Clickriver Clickri...
Conversion
Interview: Facebook Application Developer

December 12, 2007 • PEC Staff

Social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace generate huge numbers of visitors. Because of that, marketers increasingly are looking to those sites, and other social networking sites, as channels to promote ecommerce products. In May 2007, Facebook “opened up” its platform to ...
Conversion
Web Analytics

December 3, 2007 • Michael Stebbins

Web analytics is a looking glass into the health and productivity of an online presence. Your online presence includes your website, your advertising, and any blogs, forum posts or web pages that mention you or otherwise link to your site. If your website affects your revenue in any way...
Conversion
Social Site Search

November 28, 2007 • Pat Callahan

Fast, which may be a company best known for specializing in site search, has launched a product platform that is looking to socialize the ecommerce storefront search function. It’s called FAST Recommendations, and it is based on offering product recommendations similar to those of Amazo...
Conversion
PPC Report Card: Cheapbowlingballs.com

November 27, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

Cheapbowlingballs.com is a three-year-old ecommerce business that sells bowling balls and accessories. The site has Google and Yahoo! pay-per-click campaigns running with ad spend of $2,000 and $1,000 per month, respectively. Cheapbowlingballs.com has approached Practical eCommerce for ...
Conversion
Biggest AdWord Mistakes

November 20, 2007 • Mat Greenfield

Practical eCommerce asked Senior Contributor and website conversion expert Mat Greenfield, founder of Conversion Results, for his take on the biggest AdWord mistakes a website could make. If your AdWords' campaign is having troubles, it may be due to one of the following: Having too ma...
Conversion
Usability Report Card: Lucky-devil.com

November 20, 2007 • Richard Kerr

Lucky-devil.com’s tag line succinctly states its purpose: “Presents for Kiwis in the UK and NZ” (Kiwis being the nickname for New Zealanders, not the fruit). The site “soft launched” at the start of October before its official launch on Nov. 1, and the owners are committed to making as ...
Checkout Tactics
Be Sure To Simplify Checkout

November 15, 2007 • Pamela Hazelton

There have been many a debate about how to siphon shoppers into the checkout process quickly, and just as expeditiously get them to the final invoice page. The words easy, simplified and ‘lightning fast’ come to mind during such arguments, while retailers and advisers sight statistics, ...
Conversion
Google Expands Ad Reach

November 14, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

In another advertising venture offline, Google recently announced an extension of its Print Ads initiative. The program, which Google originally began testing in 2006, now includes more than 225 newspapers, with a circulation of roughly 30 million. It’s what is being promoted as newspap...
Conversion
Google Audio Ads Look To Make Some Noise

November 13, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

Have you ever considered a radio campaign as a method to increase awareness of your organization’s online presence? Recently, Google announced that its Audio Ads are available through the AdWords account interface. Not only could this present a viable marketing opportunity to reach cons...
Conversion
Conversion: Experimentation Is Key

November 7, 2007 • Mat Greenfield

Deep down, we conversion experts carry a secret that we don't want you to know. Even though there are proven conversion principles which apply to any website, as well as many best-practices, which could be applied to improve most sites, there is a large grey area where we experts are f...
Conversion
Ecommerce Facebook Applications

November 5, 2007 • Jeff Muendel

Facebook.com — a company that less than a year ago looked like fools for not accepting Yahoo’s bid to purchase it — has become the powerhouse of social media websites. It’s been said that much of the success is due simply to Facebook being the latest in a string of recently-hip online s...
Conversion
Holiday Sales: Make Your List, Check It Twice

October 29, 2007 • PEC Staff

1. Target The Right Buyers Selling more effectively throughout the holidays means targeting the right person, with the right offer, at the right time. Pretty easy in theory, right? In practice it’s a lot more difficult. Most e-tailers, through trial and error, get in a rut of going wit...
Conversion
Product Spotlight

October 17, 2007 • PEC Staff

Create Your Own Business Cards BusinessCards MX allows you to quickly and easily create your own custom business cards. Version 3.30 includes 400 examples of business card templates, and designing a card is simple through the program’s ready to use elements, which include a variety of ...
Conversion
PPC Report Card: POSSupply.com

October 10, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

POS Supply Solutions sells office and paper products at its website, Possupply.com. It spends $1,000 per month on pay-per-click (PPC) advertising with, exclusively, Google. POS says its PPC goal is to generate product sales, and POS Supply asked us to review its overall pay-per-click ad...
Conversion
Local Pay-Per-Click Opportunities For Small Businesses

October 3, 2007 • PEC Staff

It’s been over a year and a half since I last covered the local pay-per-click market for Practical eCommerce. If there is one thing you can depend on, it is that this industry does not stand still. It’s definitely time to go over the latest opportunities and trends in the local pay-per-...
Conversion
Usability Report Card: Babyplanetboutique.com

September 26, 2007 • Richard Kerr

Canadian-based Babyplanetboutique.com strives to provide parents with unique, useful baby products at affordable prices. The site’s owner Danielle Burgi is a nominee for Savvymom Mompreneur of the Year. An impending upgrade to the site, coupled with a new shopping cart system, which wil...
Conversion
Google AdWords: Get ‘Em Where You Want ‘Em

September 17, 2007 • Mat Greenfield

In the good old days (when Overture was the only paid search vendor) it was easy. Just bid one cent higher than the other guy, and get into position one, or two, or six, or whatever you wanted. Then Google came along. Now don’t get me wrong, I think Google is an extraordinary adverti...
Conversion
Quantifying Conversion Funnel Opportunities

September 12, 2007 • PEC Staff

In my last article, I discussed the practice of breaking the ecommerce conversion funnel down into four distinct transition points to help establish benchmarks and to locate and isolate the greatest opportunities for profitable improvement. Measuring these transition points is a valuabl...
Conversion
Product Spotlight: Photo Editing, AudioFlash And More

August 28, 2007 • PEC Staff

Web-based Photo Editing Picnik is a web-based photo editing service that is accessed through your computer's browser. Users can quickly fix underexposed photos, remove red-eye or apply effects to photos. Minimum hardware requirements are Microsoft Windows XP or Mac OS X, with a 1GHz pr...
Conversion
Actively Promote The Nuances Of Your Website

August 27, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

Many Internet-generated prospects need to be told why they should take action on your website, and often times online businesses don’t spend enough time on this issue — essentially generating fewer sales for the same cost of traffic. Below are some tips on how to get more bang for your ...
Conversion
Five Ways To Prepare Your Website For Universal Search

August 20, 2007 • PEC Staff

The way Google handles search is changing. You may not have heard of universal search yet, but it is going to affect the way your website and your company show up in search engine results, at least for Google. You may have noticed that pictures, videos and even press releases are showin...
Conversion
Google’s Personalized Search

August 18, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

With the launch of Google’s personalized search every user will now get search results tailored to his/her specific interests. More specifically, the algorithm will actually be taking into account what you've previously searched for on Google, as well as the sites you have visited i...
Conversion
Usability Report Card: Arenaflowers.com

August 17, 2007 • Richard Kerr

Arenaflowers.com is a United Kingdom based website that primarily sells fresh flowers. On the verge of its one year anniversary, the ebusiness wanted to get an external perspective on how its website was doing. Homepage Clarity Arena Flowers’ home page does a good job of stating its...
Conversion
Site Search: Increases Conversion Rates, Average Order Value And Loyalty

August 15, 2007 • Dave Young

If your online store has hundreds of products, you may want to consider implementing a more sophisticated site search to help your customers find what they need quickly. For those of you running shops with an inventory of less than 500 products, you may only need to make sure your navig...
Conversion
Advertising Online: A Variety Of Opportunities

August 13, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

You may find this hard to believe, but Internet marketing does not revolve solely around Google, Yahoo! and MSN. Whether you’re looking for fresh traffic, new business or just want to kick your marketing up a notch, there are other quality ad networks out there worth considering. Conte...

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