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
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...
Conversion
Consumers Want Merchandise Their Way

August 13, 2007 • PEC Staff

At the e-tailing group, we continue to believe a two-faceted convenience will drive new prospects to test the online shopping waters, which generally results in the web receiving a greater share of this customer’s wallet. Consequently, what follows are some of the highlights from the e-...
Conversion
Usability Report Card: Make These Tweaks Before Growth Occurs

August 8, 2007 • Richard Kerr

Artistream.com was formed to expand the artistic markets and opportunities for Native Americans and has ambitious expansion plans for itself. Currently, Artistream.com is a fairly basic website that lists all the prints and sculptures the artists have available for sale. The site was ch...
Conversion
Don’t Overlook The Essentials Of Business Startup

August 6, 2007 • Pamela Hazelton

I receive calls daily from store owners wondering what they can do to get ample returns on their investments in advertising and search engine optimization. Just when I think I’ve met my match, more calls pour in, and I’ve come to the realization that a good majority of small business ow...
Conversion
Maintaining Sanity Amid Multiple PPC Campaigns

August 1, 2007 • PEC Staff

Pay-per-click search engine campaigns are becoming sophisticated to the point that they frequently require a full-time resource to manage them. In the small-business world, that’s a problem considering most small businesses don't have the funds to hire somebody full time to do that work...
Conversion
Sluggish Sales? Consider Adding Additional 800 Numbers

July 29, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

As much people love the web, there are always those who prefer to use the phone number on the site to inquire about company’s products and services. An important question to consider is how accurately are you accounting for phone sales when planning your ad budget? What follows are seve...
Customer Retention
Online Loyalty Programs Can Increase Repeat Shoppers

July 22, 2007 • Dave Young

Online merchants want to find ways to increase revenues by encouraging customers to make repeat purchases. Using an online loyalty program will certainly help, but it must be done carefully and with the right tools. There are many factors involved in creating a successful loyalty progr...
Conversion
Photography: More Than a Decent Camera

July 18, 2007 • Pat Callahan

A picture is worth a thousand words. And in the ecommerce world, a product image can determine whether a customer makes the purchase, or not. But for potential merchant photographers, it turns out taking something as simple as a picture isn't really all the simple. The process often tim...
Conversion
Usability Report Card: Acihoist.com

July 18, 2007 • Richard Kerr

Alan Gonzalez at ACI Hoist & Crane, Inc. recently inherited the responsibilities for the company's website, Acihoist.com, and its ecommerce push. He is in the early stages of improving the site's navigation and content, but asked for a site review. Gonzales said the plan is “to do a...
Customer Retention
SMBs Should Consider Surveys

July 15, 2007 • Pamela Hazelton

The online store that makes me feel awesome even after my product(s) have been delivered will get my business next time around. Their URL will be committed to memory, and I’ll visit the site often just to see what’s new. This store must cater to my needs, treat me like a person and does...
Conversion
SellPoint Offers “Active” Product Tours

July 13, 2007 • Pat Callahan

Ecommerce businesses want to move more merchandise. A service called SellPoint can help with this, by creating, hosting and syndicating customizable product tours. These tours integrate detailed, 360-degree images, combined with video, animation, product statistics, data sheets and even...
Checkout Tactics
Lowering Shopping Cart Abandonment

July 11, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

As an ecommerce owner, you always want to make the checkout process as quick and smooth as possible for your own ecommerce customers. Here’s a quick checklist of simple website changes that could help you lower shopping cart abandonment. Prominent “Add to Cart” button Make sure that a...
Conversion
SERPs And Personalized Search

July 6, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

I know what you did last summer. Scared yet? Before you call 911 and report me as a stalker, let me assure you I did no such thing. However, by 2008, your search engine might. It’s called Personalized Search. I will leave it up to the lawyers to worry about privacy concerns, and will ...
Conversion
Six Surefire Ways To Boost Sales

July 2, 2007 • PEC Staff

I would venture to say that not a single website in the world has reached its peak of effectiveness or earnings potential. No matter the circumstances, every site can "better its best." If a "magic" formula for website success existed, you'd see the big boys like Google and Yahoo using ...
Conversion
Google AdWords: It Just Keeps Getting Better

July 1, 2007 • PEC Staff

Over the past few months, Google has announced a number of new features in the AdWords interface. Some are relatively minor and simply affect the interface; some offer new functionality and a lot of value to the advertiser. Either way, they can help you run your AdWords campaigns more ...
Conversion
Merchants Should Be Preparing For The Holidays Now

June 20, 2007 • PEC Staff

Just as most consumers begin to enjoy summer, it's time for savvy merchants to put the finishing touches on holiday sales plans. While it is difficult to estimate the volume of "gifting" purchases made online, there is no doubt about the customers' penchant for buying gifts via this cha...
Conversion
eBay Isn’t The Only Auction Site

June 20, 2007 • PEC Staff

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Curabitur et quam. Aliquam erat volutpat. Vivamus et elit. Fusce tincidunt nisl at arcu. Praesent dolor turpis, pharetra non, commodo eget, pharetra sit amet, nulla. Phasellus sit amet ante sit amet ipsum tristique tristique. Ves...
Conversion
Product Spotlight: Mercado 4, Surveys, And More

June 13, 2007 • PEC Staff

One Stop Site for Wholesale Products WorldwideBrands’ new OneSource is an online database of thousands of wholesalers representing millions of wholesale products. Users can search by product category for specific items and can export results to Word and Excel. The site contains market ...
Conversion
“Mobiwebolized” Search Marketing

June 13, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

If you're one of the big guys at the top of the search engine organic results, your business is probably doing pretty well. For the rest of us, there’s an “early bird” special. It’s called mobile search, and it just might be the search marketing redemption you were looking for. Why? Ev...
Conversion
Is Your Website Ready For The Holiday Shopping Season?

June 6, 2007 • Pamela Hazelton

Anyone’s who has talked with me for any given amount of time will tell you I’m adamant about testing sites for security and navigation. Summer is the perfect time to plot out upcoming holiday season sales campaigns, and it’s also the time to make sure things are running smoothly. With a...
Conversion
Critique Part Five: Customer Experience & Usability

June 6, 2007 • Richard Kerr

The Problem: A blob of home-page text greets the consumer. The Fix: The home page could be improved by relocating its long introduction to either the bottom of the page or, preferably, to the "about us" section. This would free up enough space to display twice as many products as those...
Conversion
Improve Email Marketing With Co-registration

May 29, 2007 • Dave Young

Email marketing can be a powerful means to boost your company's revenues. However, before you can enjoy the many benefits of email marketing, it's necessary to build a solid email list. One way to do this involves using someone else's newsletter registration to acquire your own new memb...
Conversion
An Analytics Consulting Model for Small Businesses

May 28, 2007 • Dr. Ralph F. Wilson

Nearly all small businesses have a measurement system in place for their website (though too many aren't aware of the analytics data available from their web hosting service for no additional cost).
Conversion
‘Exclusive Offers’ Help Retain Customers

May 24, 2007 • PEC Staff

Minding the Store is a classic book written by one of the all-time great merchants, Stanley Marcus of Neiman-Marcus fame. Its lessons were extensive, but taking care of the customer and delivering a well-merchandised experience were two of the essential components. Today, it is imperat...
Conversion
Comparison Sites Can Help Boost Sales

May 21, 2007 • PEC Staff

Shopping comparison sites enable merchants to market to the masses, but stepping into a competitive environment like BizRate, PriceGrabber or Shopping.com can seem pretty daunting to the owner of a small ecommerce business. However, three entrepreneurs say getting out of the comfort zon...
Conversion
Aligning Keywords And Landing Pages

May 16, 2007 • Kevin Gold

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...
Conversion
Show-Me-The-Money Conversion Ratios

May 11, 2007 • PEC Staff

When I begin an ecommerce optimization engagement, there are four key ratios that I immediately look for. And as strange as it might sound, the site's overall conversion ratio is not one of them — at least not directly. To be fair, the four ratios that I'm primarily interested in are a...
Conversion
Tools To Boost Conversion

May 9, 2007 • PEC Staff

Most ebusiness owners can find ways to increase traffic to their site, but turning a visitor into a buyer remains an ongoing challenge. To get a visitor at your site to do what you want him/her to do - whether it is signing up for a newsletter, buying a product online or some other des...
Conversion
Earn Affiliate Commissions

May 7, 2007 • PEC Staff

Say you run a smaller ecommerce operation that sells specialized running shoes, but nothing else. Your customers might request running apparel, but you don't carry running apparel, and you don't want to stock it. "There are dozens of large companies that sell running apparel," says Dio...
Conversion
Free Search-Marketing Tools

April 30, 2007 • PEC Staff

During the last few years, the search engine marketing (SEM) industry has grown significantly. Many new resources have popped up to offer all kinds of information and advice. However, many people find this avalanche of information overwhelming. How can you distinguish the truly useful a...

« Previous 1 2 3 … 40 41 42 … 44 45 46 Next »