Page 176 – Practical Ecommerce

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Social Media
10 Ways to Use Pinterest for your Ecommerce Business

August 14, 2013 • Paul Chaney

Social networking sites have become more visual. This is especially the case with Pinterest. The site, which consists of images and videos arranged in a bulletin board style layout, has become one of the largest social networks. Unlike Facebook and Twitter, which rely on content from ...
Marketing & Advertising
Multichannel Marketing Key for Reaching Online Shoppers

August 14, 2013 • Dale Traxler

Many ecommerce merchants are too reliant on Google organic search referrals. Some merchants depend on Google for 70 percent or more of their traffic. About five years ago that was fine, since that was where most shoppers began their shopping search. Today, this is simply not the case. ...
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...
Cross-border Selling
Cross Border Ecommerce Booming

August 13, 2013 • Marcia Kaplan

As populous countries such as Brazil, China, and India develop increasingly acquisitive middle classes, opportunities for online sales to these countries are growing. Except for small mom and pop outlets, the brick and mortar retail sectors are poorly developed outside of major cities. ...
Marketing & Advertising
Using Forums to Generate New Business

August 12, 2013 • Jerry Jao

As a small business owner, I am always looking for channels to reach a new audience. One way to do this is via established forums. Forums help many small businesses to profitably grow revenue. In Nielsen’s recent “Global Survey of Product Purchase Sentiment” PDF, web-based forums tied ...
Finance
eCommerce Business Valuation Case Studies : Effect of Inventory on Valuation Multiple

August 12, 2013 • Manish Shah

In this series, I will share my experiences selling online businesses for my clients and lessons learned. Effect of Inventory on eCommerce Business Valuation Multiple Some time ago I was selling an eCommerce business that had a large amount of inventory that needed to be sold with the...
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...
SEO Tools
SEO: Google Adds Manual Spam Actions to Webmaster Tools

August 9, 2013 • Jill Kocher Brown

Google Webmaster Tools launched its new manual spam actions feature yesterday, enabling verified site owners to check whether their site has been manually penalized by Google. Over the last couple of years, Google has slowly increased its communication to webmasters, with the goal of ...
Marketing & Advertising
4 AdWords Settings that Work Against You

August 9, 2013 • Melissa Mackey

Pay-per-click advertising is a good way for companies to grow their businesses. Whether they are selling products online or trying to generate leads for services, it is cost effective and typically generates a positive return on investment. Google AdWords is the leader in paid search advertising, with an 80 percent market share in the U.S. While there are other PPC platforms, advertisers seeking maximum reach should include Google AdWords in their PPC marketing mix.
Social Media
Facebook Announces Updates to Algorithm; Advice for Merchants

August 8, 2013 • Paul Chaney

In a press event on August 6, Facebook revealed how it determines which content gets displayed in users' News Feeds and announced changes to its algorithm. The event was held in response to criticism from both the media and Facebook users about the lack of visibility surrounding how t...
Analytics & Data
5 Ecommerce Metrics You Should Be Tracking

August 8, 2013 • Feras Alhlou

When it comes to ecommerce analytics, business owners and marketing managers typically focus on metrics like conversion rates, number of transactions, and average order value. These are valuable, and should be monitored. After all, measuring such outcomes is what directly impacts reven...
Marketing & Advertising
Prepare in August for Holiday Ecommerce Sales

August 7, 2013 • Dale Traxler

As we approach the end of summer, ecommerce merchants should start preparing for the fall selling season. It's time to identify new products, inventory and supplier issues, and pricing competition. Importantly, start planning seasonal promotions: Labor Day, Halloween, Veterans Day, Than...
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...
Google Ads
5 Pay-per-click Holiday Tasks to Do Now

August 6, 2013 • Matthew Umbro

The beginning of the holiday season is right around the corner. It is often the busiest and most profitable period of the year for ecommerce merchants. Now is the time to plan your holiday pay-per-click advertising campaigns. There are many pay-per-click initiatives that merchants can...
Social Media
Facebook Launches New Version of Insights

August 6, 2013 • Paul Chaney

Facebook just launched a new version of Insights, its analytics engine. One new addition is comparative, scorecard-style reports that enable businesses to evaluate positive and negative metrics together. Also, some elements in Insights have been renamed and the overall structure has ...
Social Media
How to Target Facebook Ads to your Audience

August 5, 2013 • Paul Chaney

One of the benefits of advertising on Facebook is its ability to target ads. Options include location, age, gender, interests, broad-range categories, and connections. This article outlines the different options in terms of their applicability and usefulness. Location Location incl...
Conversion
10 A/B Testing Tools for Small Businesses

August 5, 2013 • Sig Ueland

A/B testing is a simple process to test versions of your page and determine which produce positive results. It is a great way to remove the guesswork from your development and focus on what’s working. Here is a list of affordable A/B testing solutions for small businesses. There are ea...
Business > Merchant Voice
Which Cart Should I use ?

August 3, 2013 • Richard Stubbings

All too often these days I see posts on forums of the type "I want to open an ecommerce shop, what cart should I use?" Then there are dozens of different replies from people all recommending their favourite solution. Rarely does anyone ask the original poster what they are planning to s...
Business
8 Common Mistakes by Ecommerce Merchants

August 2, 2013 • Dale Traxler

In my articles I try to provide positive, practical advice on how ecommerce businesses can improve. With this article, however, I’ll explore common mistakes that ecommerce merchants make that harm their businesses. I learned some of these the hard way in my own company. Others are ones ...
Link Building
SEO: Google Devalues another Link-building Tactic

August 2, 2013 • Jill Kocher Brown

Google’s search result quality mission stands seemingly opposed to the search engine optimization practice of link building. For years, SEO professionals have worked to increase the number of external in-bound links to a site in an effort to build authority and trust, thus boosting orga...
Business > Merchant Voice
7 ways to increase newsletter sign-ups before the holidays

August 2, 2013 • Elizabeth Hollingsworth

Less than five months to Christmas Day, now is the time you should be growing your newsletter database as fast and effectively as possible. I just signed up - or attempted to sign up - to 14 online gift retailers' newsletters and here is what I'd suggest. 1. Put your newsletter sign-u...
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 ...
Influencers & Affiliates
Affiliate Marketing: How to Recruit Bloggers

August 1, 2013 • Carolyn Kmet

Bloggers are often the most sought-after affiliates in the affiliate marketing industry. This is because bloggers have unique content and targeted, loyal audiences, which drives solid conversion rates and new customers. According to statistics compiled by BlogHer, a publishing network o...
Social Media
LinkedIn Launches Sponsored Update Advertising Program

July 31, 2013 • Paul Chaney

LinkedIn's new Sponsored Updates is a form of advertising that resembles Facebook Page Sponsored Posts. Sponsored Updates are paid Company Page status updates that, according to LinkedIn, appear in members' home page news feeds along with organic posts. Sponsored Updates can be seen o...
Business
July 2013 Top 10: Our Most Popular Posts

July 31, 2013 • PEC Staff

Each month we compile a list of the 10 most popular articles we published that month, based on the number of page views. Here are our ten most popular articles for July 2013, recognizing that articles we published earlier in the month are more likely to make the list than later ones. 5...
Business > Merchant Voice
Thinking of starting a business? Think again!

July 31, 2013 • Jamie Salvatori

I’ve been running my own small business for over a decade and I often speak with people who are thinking about starting their own business. Listening to their expectations usually results in my shaking my head later and thinking, “They have no idea what they’re getting themselves into!”...
Conversion
6 Benefits of Predictive Analytics for Online Retailers

July 30, 2013 • Gagan Mehra

Predictive analytics is a process that uses machine learning to analyze data and make predictions. It has been used for a long time, though the adoption has been low because of the complexity and costs. With Big Data, both of these things are changing, as more affordable solutions are...
Conversion
Google Analytics ‘Events’ Track Downloads, Video Views

July 30, 2013 • Kevin Webster

Event tracking is one of Google Analytics most underutilized tools. From monitoring PDF downloads to video views, Event tracking counts the number of times a specific action takes place on a website, where that action might not create a unique page view.
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 “...
Photography & Video
Top 10 Cameras for Ecommerce Product Photos, Videos

July 29, 2013 • Jason Lawrence

One question I get asked a lot at Arqspin, my 360 product photo company, is, "What camera should I use for product photography?" With the right techniques, almost any camera can be used to take good product photography — even the camera on your smartphone. And if you’ve read "How to Tak...