Armando Roggio

Articles by: Armando Roggio

Armando Roggio

Armando Roggio is the longtime senior contributor to Practical Ecommerce. He's a global ecommerce authority and a practicing merchant, developer, and journalist.

Since 2008 he's written over 1,300 articles for Practical Ecommerce addressing all matters of ecommerce and presented dozens of webinars.

His previous positions include director of ecommerce for a regional retail chain and marketing publications manager at Micron Technology, a publicly-traded computer-chip manufacturer. He holds a B.A. in English Writing and Journalism from The University of Pittsburgh.

Contact Armando via email or LinkedIn. Follow his ecommerce tweets at @ecommerceboy.

Photography & Video
Sharing of Photos and Videos Fuels Marketing Opportunities

October 31, 2013 • Armando Roggio

As more consumers share photos and video online, marketers may find new or better ways to engage potential customers or simply be more helpful. This year, 54 percent of adults in ...
Shipping & Fulfillment
5 Things to Put in the Shipping Box

October 29, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Online retailers have a powerful tool for marketing to existing customers, potentially increasing sales, average order size, and profit. That tool is the shipping box merchants send to customers with ...
Business
7 Questions Before You Buy Software or Services

October 25, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Ecommerce entrepreneurs and managers have many options for software, marketing toolkits, and any number of retail- and marketing-related services, each of which promises to improve business operations and sales. While ...
Analytics & Data
How to Measure Lift from Promotion and Advertising

October 22, 2013 • Armando Roggio

In marketing, “lift” represents an increase in sales in response to some form of advertising or promotion. Monitoring, measuring, and optimizing lift may help a business grow more quickly. It is ...
Conversion
3 Ways to Improve Ecommerce Conversions this Month

October 17, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Banner ad retargeting, live chat, and a well-planned series of checkout abandonment emails could boost an online retailer’s conversion rates and sales immediately with a relatively small investment in development ...
Business
The End of Third-party Cookies Should Not Hurt Retailers

October 16, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Changes to some of the world’s most popular web browsers may impact how advertising networks and cross-site analytics tools monitor consumer behavior online. Although the changes could affect some marketing ...
Shipping & Fulfillment
5 Ways to Save Money on Retail Shipping

October 10, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Free or low-cost shipping is a mainstay in the online retail business. It motivates shoppers to buy more. But carriers like UPS, FedEx, and even the United States Postal Service ...
Payments
MasterCard Defines 5 Online Shopping Personas

October 8, 2013 • Armando Roggio

MasterCard, the payment industry leader, has defined five online shopper personas that defy traditional demographic boundaries and give online retailers a fresh way of looking at online marketing, personalization, and ...
Social Media
5 Ways Twitter Is Like Radio Advertising

October 3, 2013 • Armando Roggio

From a marketer’s perspective, Twitter tweets and radio promotions have a number of similarities. Thinking about what these marketing tactics have in common can reveal insights about content creation, message ...
Customer Retention
Understanding Consumer Search Behaviors

October 2, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Shoppers have many reasons to look for products online. They may want a particular item, seek a bargain price, or even compare similar choices. Understanding these basic consumer search behaviors ...
Email & Text Marketing
7 Ideas for Better Ecommerce Marketing Emails

September 26, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Email marketing is an excellent way to engage customers and increase both site traffic and sales. Not all email messages, however, are equally effective. In 2012, 44 percent of promotional email ...
Customer Retention
6 Ways to Market Gift Cards Online

September 24, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Gift cards can be an effective way to increase online sales, acquire new customers, and encourage return visits. Marketing gift cards can be easy during holidays, like Valentine’s Day, Mother’s ...
Business
Robust User Experience May Unlock Mobile Commerce

September 20, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Online sales from mobile devices are expected to exceed $41 billion in the United States this year, representing a significant opportunity for online sellers who are able to provide a ...
Customer Retention
Marketing to Affluent Customers, for High Margins

September 18, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Many online retailers compete on price. But selling luxury products to relatively affluent shoppers with annual incomes above $100,000 per year is an exercise in brand building and content marketing. Shoppers ...
Marketing & Advertising
6 Ecommerce Predictions for the 2013 Holidays

September 12, 2013 • Armando Roggio

U.S. online sales are expected to exceed $61 billion in November and December, making the holiday shopping season vital to small and mid-sized retailers. Six trends — ecommerce growth, mobile sales,
Inventory
7 Tips for Good Supplier Relationships

September 11, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Good supplier relationships may lead to favorable prices, generous terms, improved availability, and even the occasional buyback. With these sorts of opportunities at stake, it can be very important for ...
Fraud Prevention
Apple Fingerprint Scanner May Boost Mobile Commerce

September 9, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Next generation smartphones or tablets equipped with fingerprint scanners may provide shoppers with greater security and boost both online and in-store mobile commerce. Leading mobile device makers Apple and Samsung are ...
Cross-border Selling
6 Tips for Selling on Marketplaces this Holiday Season

September 5, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Marketplaces like eBay, Rakuten, and Amazon attract millions of eager shoppers during the holiday season. Online retailers, even small ones, can post products to these marketplaces and earn many additional ...
Marketing & Advertising
4 Facts about Mobile Commerce

September 3, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Shoppers are using smartphones and tablets to make purchases and research products and prices before making a purchase, meaning that mobile may be an important channel for both earning sales ...
Marketing & Advertising
2013 Holiday Ecommerce Preparedness Checklist

August 29, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Online Christmas sales should top $50 billion in the United States in 2013, according to some estimates. To get your store’s fair share, be certain that your ecommerce website is ...
Business
4 Reasons to Think About Brand

August 28, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Developing a brand for a small ecommerce store may help otherwise hurried and busy entrepreneurs and managers do a better job of managing the business, engaging customers and potential customers,
Conversion
6 Ways to Encourage User Generated Content

August 23, 2013 • Armando Roggio

User submitted content like product reviews, guest blog posts, and rich media provide online retailers with excellent and marketable resources that might boost site traffic and encourage additional sales. When online ...
Photography & Video
Mobile Image Recognition to Revolutionize Ecommerce?

August 21, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Mobile image recognition technology identifies objects like shoes, handbags, and golf clubs in images, videos, or directly through a tablet or smartphone’s image sensor. The technology may make a new ...
Marketing & Advertising
3 Christmas Ecommerce Marketing Strategies

August 13, 2013 • Armando Roggio

More than eight out of ten Christmas-season shoppers will look for gifts and gift ideas online before making a purchase, creating a significant opportunity for Internet retailers. But to cash in on Christmas sales, many merchants need to begin executing coordinated marketing campaigns n...
Email & Text Marketing
Text Messaging Effective for Retailers

August 9, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Short message service communications — text messaging — may help online retailers deliver better customer service and represent an important marketing opportunity. Worldwide there are more than 4.3 billion SMS-enabled mobile devices and in the U.S. approximately 96 percent of smartphon...
Fraud Prevention
What to Do When Your Site Gets Hacked

August 7, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Hackers attack sites of all sizes, from massive enterprises to small, family-run online retailers. When an attack occurs, there are steps any business owner can take to stop the attack, get things cleaned up, and get back to doing business. Having your site hacked is a painful, emotion...
Design & Development
Multiscreen Ecommerce: Dos and Don’ts

August 1, 2013 • Armando Roggio

Online shoppers use a variety of devices — smartphones, tablets, laptops, personal computers, and televisions — to discover and buy products online. In response, ecommerce businesses need a multiscreen strategy for both marketing to potential customers and providing those shoppers with ...
Local Business
3 Ways Showrooming Could Affect Ecommerce

July 30, 2013 • Armando Roggio

New survey data about “showrooming” may reveal weaknesses or trends that could have important implications for online or multi-channel retailers in at least three areas: product prices, product information, and customer service. About 43 percent of Internet-using American adults have “...
Email & Text Marketing
New Gmail Tabs Impact Email Marketing, Expert Says

July 26, 2013 • Armando Roggio

MailChimp, a popular email marketing solutions provider, says that the new Gmail tabs that are intended to help users clean up their inboxes have negatively impacted open rates for email marketing campaigns, but that there is no need to panic. Google began introducing its new tabbed Gm...
Local Business
Ecommerce and Brick-and-mortar Retail Converge

July 24, 2013 • Armando Roggio

While there may still be plenty of room for pure-play ecommerce businesses, retailers with physical stores should look to expand online as consumers stop seeing a distinction between shopping online and in a store. Increasingly, physical retail outlets are being transformed into a sort ...