Page 157 – Practical Ecommerce

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Marketing & Advertising
Google’s New ‘AdSense for Shopping’ Mimics Amazon Product Ads

September 14, 2014 • Nik Rajpal

Google’s new AdSense for Shopping closely resembles a popular promotional product on Amazon: Product Ads. For six years now, merchants could display products on Amazon that click back to a merchant’s ...
Business > Merchant Voice
Analyze what visitors search for on your ecommerce site

September 13, 2014 • Richard Stubbings

A good ecommerce site needs watching. You need to constantly monitor what goes on. If you ignore it and expect it to continue earning you money, then you will probably ...
Technical SEO
SEO 201, Part 2: Crawling and Indexing Barriers

September 12, 2014 • Jill Kocher Brown

In “SEO 201, Part 1: Technical Rules,” my article last week, I posited three technical rules that are critical to tapping into Google’s ultimate power as an influencer of your ...
Conversion
Google Analytics Benchmarking Reports Return

September 12, 2014 • Armando Roggio

After more than three years, Google Analytics is bringing back its popular Benchmarking reports. This returning Google Analytics feature will allow business owners to compare site traffic and engagement to industry ...
Social Media
13 Emerging Social Networks to Watch

September 11, 2014 • Sig Ueland

Up-and-coming social networks can be good places to establish your brand, run an experimental campaign with highly-engaged users, and develop a following before a network reaches mass adoption. Emerging social ...
Business
3 Ways to Harness Big Data, for Ecommerce

September 10, 2014 • Jerry Jao

The use of Big Data by ecommerce companies is increasingly common. To stay competitive, many companies, especially larger ones, use extensive datasets to better understand their customers and provide services,
Marketing & Advertising
Marketing’s 2 Most Important Tasks

September 10, 2014 • Armando Roggio

The modern marketing department — particularly at small and mid-sized businesses — has two vital and distinct tasks. The first is to provide business and market intelligence to support decision ...
Social Media
Facebook Business Manager Helps with Pages, Ads, Admins

September 9, 2014 • Paul Chaney

Facebook released Business Manager earlier this year. It is the social network’s newest tool to help business owners manage their presence on Facebook. Primarily designed for large companies and advertising agencies that ...
Analytics & Data
10 Essential Google Analytics Dashboards for Ecommerce

September 9, 2014 • Kunle Campbell

Data is key to making informed decisions, especially in the context of ecommerce. But filtering through the maze of available data in Google Analytics can be daunting and time consuming. Custom reports and dashboards — two Google Analytics
Business > Merchant Voice
Theory of Constraints, for ecommerce companies

September 8, 2014 • David Sasson

Two or three years ago, in October, I left the office in the middle of the day and went to Starbucks to have a cup of coffee and think about ...
Business
Lessons Learned: Million-dollar Jeweler Launched with $300

September 8, 2014 • Elizabeth Hollingsworth

Robin Weber started his jewelry website when he was 18, with $300 from selling his high school textbooks and from tutoring classmates. He now runs a multi-million dollar business. In 1996,
Conversion
Using Google’s In-page Analytics, for Link Performance

September 8, 2014 • Armando Roggio

Google’s In-page Analytics shows users which links get the most attention on any given page, providing valuable information about how site visitors are interacting with the content. The report shows a ...
Schools & Resources
10 Google Tools and Resources for Entrepreneurs

September 7, 2014 • Sig Ueland

This summer Google launched Google My Business, a platform for businesses to manage their presence across Google applications, including search and Google+. The new platform is just one more example ...
Technical SEO
SEO 201, Part 1: Technical Rules

September 5, 2014 • Jill Kocher Brown

In my 8-part “SEO 101” series, I addressed the basics of utilizing content on a website for search engines, including keyword research and optimization. With this article, I’ll start a ...
Marketing & Advertising
Ecommerce Marketer: Part Hacker, Part Engineer, Part Creative

September 4, 2014 • Armando Roggio

Marketing, the act of communicating value to prospective customers, has changed significantly in the past few years, impacting not just how businesses must promote products or services, but the kind ...
Marketing & Advertising
2014 Holiday Ecommerce Marketing Checklist

September 3, 2014 • Armando Roggio

The 2014 holiday shopping season starts now. If you’re not ready, you are behind. Use this checklist to see where you stand. A survey of businesses using Experian merchant services found ...
Social Media
Twitter’s Tailored Audiences Improve Ad Performance

September 3, 2014 • Paul Chaney

Twitter has developed a way to make its ads more useful by displaying promoted content from advertisers to users who have shown interest. The new feature, called tailored audiences, enables merchants ...
Business
How to Create an Ecommerce Privacy Policy

September 2, 2014 • Elizabeth Lewis

Over the past few years, a series of stories have hit the press regarding online privacy — the biggest being about Edward Snowden and the NSA. However, smaller stories that ...
Business > Merchant Voice
Should merchants accept Bitcoin?

September 1, 2014 • Jamie Salvatori

I was recently asked if ecommerce merchants should accept Bitcoin. My answer is a resounding “yes.” I can think of only a few minor downsides and many major upsides to ...
Email & Text Marketing
13 Awesome ‘Welcome’ Email Ideas

September 1, 2014 • Pamella Neely

Welcome emails are one of the first key steps to long-term success with email marketing. They build trust, reduce opt-outs, and get sales upfront. Welcome emails typically get three times the clicks and sales as a standard promotional email. They’re also a terrific way to get ready for Christmas, which will be only 114 days away as of September 1.
Content Marketing
5 Ecommerce Content Marketing Ideas for September 2014

September 1, 2014 • Armando Roggio

Product reviews, gift ideas, and seasonal how-to articles are just some of the things ecommerce marketers could publish in September 2014 to help shoppers and build lasting customer relationships. Content marketing ...
Business > Merchant Voice
11 ecommerce SEO tips, from the trenches

August 31, 2014 • Erica Tevis

If you are a small ecommerce business owner, chances are your budget is limited for areas such as advertising, search engine optimization, email marketing, and website design. I’ve been in ...
User Experience
SEO: Mobile Devices Drive Future of Search

August 29, 2014 • Jill Kocher Brown

Smartphones and tablets are changing the way consumers search and purchase. With mobile device use catching up to and surpassing traditional computer use, organic search trends are rapidly changing as ...
Social Media
4 Alternative Social Sites for Ecommerce Merchants

August 29, 2014 • Samantha Collier

Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube are the social media sites most used by ecommerce merchants. Google+ and Pinterest are quickly gaining ground. However, these are not the only social platforms that ...
Marketing & Advertising
PPC Ads: Measuring Performance by Device

August 28, 2014 • Nik Rajpal

Internet devices can greatly impact the profitability of your pay-per-click ad campaigns. In this article, I’ll explain how to determine the profitability of PPC campaigns on specific devices. I’ll cite findings ...
Business
Lessons Learned: MyFootShop.com Renewed by Tech Incubator

August 28, 2014 • Elizabeth Hollingsworth

Jeff Oster’s friends thought he was mad to give away health care information for free when he launched his podiatry website in 1999. This was at a time when the ...
Social Media
How to Install Twitter Buttons, Widgets on Your Website

August 27, 2014 • Paul Chaney

Twitter for Websites is a suite of embeddable buttons and widgets that facilitate sharing a site’s content on Twitter, adding a layer of interactivity to websites that might not otherwise ...
Influencers & Affiliates
Affiliate Marketing: Holiday Action Items

August 26, 2014 • Carolyn Kmet

Just as you’re gearing up your ecommerce business for a busy fourth quarter, your affiliates are going through the same exercise for their own audiences. Many affiliates step up their ...
Conversion
Using Ecommerce Text Messages in 2014

August 26, 2014 • Armando Roggio

Online retailers can use text messages in much the same way that they use email, but with the possibility of much better results, since shoppers may be more likely to ...
Content Marketing
7 Storytelling Techniques and How to Apply Them

August 25, 2014 • Pamella Neely

Storytelling is everywhere. Some marketers say it's is the single most powerful business skill for the next decade.