Page 101 – Practical Ecommerce

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Design & Dev Tools
Google Lighthouse: Monitor Site Performance, SEO, Accessibility

May 8, 2018 • Armando Roggio

Lighthouse is Google’s free, open source, and automated site monitoring tool. It can help ecommerce businesses track site load times, accessibility, and search engine optimization. Lighthouse is available in a few ...
Analytics & Data
Getting Started with A/B Tests (to Drive Sales)

May 8, 2018 • Anna Kayfitz

A/B tests can improve conversions on an ecommerce site. There are many testing platforms — search Google for “A/B tests.” To run a test, identify a key conversion element, such as ...
Product Pages
Social Proof Is the Most Important Factor in Selling

May 7, 2018 • Pamela Hazelton

If I had to choose a single factor that is crucial to an online store’s success, it would be social proof. The term is often misunderstood. It doesn’t have much ...
Content Marketing
5 Content Marketing Ideas for June 2018

May 6, 2018 • Armando Roggio

The Stanley Cup playoffs, summertime weddings, Father’s Day, and old fishing stories provide content marketers with interesting topics to cover in June 2018. Content marketing is the act of creating, publishing,
Social Media
The Six Simple Principles of Viral Marketing

May 5, 2018 • Dr. Ralph F. Wilson

Viral marketing describes any strategy that encourages individuals to pass on a marketing message to others, creating the potential for exponential growth in the message's exposure and influence. Like viruses, such strategies take advantage of rapid multiplication to explode the message to thousands, to millions.
Technical SEO
301 Redirects May Save Your SEO

May 4, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown

A search engine professional’s lucky number is 301. That’s the server header status code for a type of redirect that performs many critical functions for natural search performance. What Is a ...
Marketing & Advertising
18 Mother’s Day Marketing Ideas for Lifestyle and Fashion Merchants

May 4, 2018 • Viktoria Kanevsky

Mother’s Day can generate substantial revenue for fashion and lifestyle merchants. In this post, I’ll offer 18 tactics and strategies to spur ecommerce sales during this important shopping holiday. Products and ...
Business > Merchant Voice
Why sell barbells?

May 3, 2018 • Peter Keller

I’m often asked why I started FringeSport. People inquire, “Of all the things to do, why sell barbells?” I tell them that if I wanted only to make money, I ...
Business
Net Promoter Score Is the Best KPI for Ecommerce Growth

May 3, 2018 • Armando Roggio

“Net Promoter Score” is a simple-to-understand customer loyalty indicator closely associated with sales and profit growth. Online sellers can use this metric and associated customer interactions to improve customer service,
Design & Development
WompMobile CEO on PWAs and AMPs

May 2, 2018 • Armando Roggio

Not long ago mobile optimization could provide a competitive advantage. But as the mobile internet has grown, responsive websites are no longer optional. They are essential to doing business online. WompMobile ...
Platforms & Apps
Ecommerce Product Releases: May 1, 2018

May 1, 2018 • Sig Ueland

Here is a list of product releases and updates for late April from companies that offer services to online merchants. There are updates on A.I., category search, online advertising, cyber ...
Google Ads
AdWords Smart Bidding: Dos and Don’ts

May 1, 2018 • Robert Brady

"Smart Bidding" is the umbrella term in AdWords for automated bid strategies. Smart bids can vary — from targeting page placement to outranking a competitor. There are seven Smart Bidding options. In this post, I'll address each one.
Business
April 2018 Top 10: Our Most Popular Posts

April 30, 2018 • PEC Staff

What follows are our 10 most popular articles for April 2018, recognizing that articles we published earlier in the month are more likely to make the list than later ones. 13
Design & Dev Tools
Pointers on Backing Up Ecommerce Data

April 29, 2018 • Eric Davis

Backups are an insurance policy for your ecommerce store that you hope never to use. Unfortunately, many backups aren’t adequate. The purpose of a backup is to recover the code and ...
Technical SEO
SEO: Managing Modern Algorithm Updates

April 27, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown

Google launched a broad core algorithm update last week that impacted web search appearance and rankings. Algorithm changes typically center on rankings improvements tied to determining the quality of a site’s ...
Local Business
Ecommerce Merchants Embrace Brick-and-mortar

April 26, 2018 • Marcia Kaplan

With all the talk of a “retail apocalypse,” you might wonder why any merchant would want to open a brick-and-mortar store. Yet several successful ecommerce companies are now operating physical ...
Business > Merchant Voice
Merging 2 ecommerce sites

April 25, 2018 • Elizabeth Hollingsworth

On April 23, 2018, the third anniversary of the launch of My Wedding Décor, I decided to merge that website into My Event Décor. I need to focus my energy ...
Amazon & Marketplaces
Former Amazon Exec on Maintaining Brand Control

April 25, 2018 • Armando Roggio

James Thomson spent six years as head of Amazon Services, which recruits sellers to Amazon’s marketplace. He is now co-founder and partner of Buy Box Experts, a consultancy, and co-founder ...
B2B
Does WooCommerce Fit B2B Companies?

April 24, 2018 • Lori McDonald

WooCommerce is among the fastest growing platforms. We've addressed it many times. B2C merchants, especially, value WooCommerce's flexibility and plugin options. My expertise, however, is with B2B companies. In my experience, companies with meaningful B2B sales should not choose WooCommerce.
Product Pages
9 Ways to Appeal to Millennial Shoppers

April 24, 2018 • Pamela Hazelton

Millennials may not have much disposable income but they tend to spend more freely than the generations before them. So it makes sense to update your online store to cater to this group. How does a store that doesn’t necessarily target millennials tap into their ever-increasing purchasing power? Here are nine ways to facelift a store to convert millennial shoppers.
Business > Merchant Voice
Europe-based merchant accesses GDPR

April 23, 2018 • Richard Stubbings

The E.U.'s new data protection law goes into effect on May 25. Many businesses here in Europe and elsewhere have ignored it. That is a mistake. Failure to comply could result in an eye-watering fine of $20 million. If your company does business or communicates with any consumer in Europe, you should comply, or at least take steps to comply.
Design & Dev Tools
16 Tools for Website Accessibility

April 23, 2018 • Sig Ueland

"Web accessibility" refers to content designed so that people with disabilities can access it. Accessibility involves a wide range of disabilities, including visual, auditory, physical, speech, cognitive, language, learning, and neurological. Here is a list of tools and plugins for website accessibility, including plugins and ecommerce themes for WordPress.
SEO
How to Implement SEO Tactics in Large Companies

April 22, 2018 • Jill Kocher Brown

There’s a perception that search engine optimization requires no resources. Executives sometimes think that SEO is simply a matter of editing existing content. As a result, they don't fund or staff SEO adequately to see real organic search performance gain. In reality, SEO isn’t about changing keywords here and there. It’s about optimizing a digital marketing presence to meet the needs of the business and its customers.
Product Pages
5 Product Page Differentiators for 2018

April 20, 2018 • Armando Roggio

Performance and superior communications set ecommerce product pages apart from the crowd in 2018. Thanks to established user-interface conventions, online sellers know the components of a good product detail page. They ...
Social Media
Getting Reacquainted with LinkedIn Ads

April 19, 2018 • Michael Stancil

Advertising on LinkedIn has come a long way. But the platform still isn’t getting the attention it deserves. Until now. With Facebook’s data controversy and the renewed concerns about online privacy, advertisers ...
Checkout Tactics
5 Ways to Increase Sales at Checkout for a WooCommerce Store

April 19, 2018 • Curtis McHale

Increasing sales from shoppers that are in the process of buying is easier than recruiting new customers. In-process shoppers have jumped the trust barrier. In this post, I’ll address five ways ...
Technical SEO
How to Optimize Mobile Search for Voice, Barcodes, and Images

April 18, 2018 • Hamlet Batista

The traditional behavior of typing keyword phrases in a Google’s search box is being replaced by searches for voice, barcodes, and images. It is impractical to type long-tail searches on mobile devices. But this difficulty also presents opportunities. In this post, I'll address how to optimize mobile searches for voice, barcodes, and images.
Platforms & Apps
Ecommerce Product Releases: April 17, 2018

April 17, 2018 • Sig Ueland

Here is a list of product releases and updates for mid-April from companies that offer services to online merchants. There are updates on video content and format, accelerated mobile pages,
Marketing & Advertising
Upgrading an AdWords Landing Page Experience

April 17, 2018 • Armando Roggio

The web page that potential customers see when they click on a Google AdWords ad could be affecting how much an ecommerce business pays per click and where it appears in search results. Google AdWords Landing Page Experience is a measurement of how well an ad's landing page serves potential customers. It describes whether Google believes the landing page is likely to meet user expectations.
Amazon & Marketplaces
How to convert Amazon buyers to your customers (without breaking the rules)

April 16, 2018 • Phil Masiello

An ecommerce brand has to decide whether to sell its products on Amazon's Marketplace, which is the dominant buying resource for today’s consumer. Independent brands can use Amazon as a tool to obtain customers. Through proper merchandising of their products, brands can turn Amazon buyers into their own loyal customers.