Page 212 – Practical Ecommerce

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Schools & Resources
Reading List: Tomer Tagrin of Yotpo

June 7, 2011 • PEC Staff

In “Reading List,” we ask ecommerce professionals to name some of their favorite recent books and blogs and tell us why they read them. In this installment, we corresponded with ...
Social Media
How to Install the Google +1 Button on Your Site

June 6, 2011 • Armando Roggio

Google is positioning its +1 button as a way for consumers to leave recommendations for their social media friends, just when those friends are in need. "Sometimes it’s easier to find exactly what you’re looking for when someone you know already found it," Google said on the +1 landing...
Social Media
12 Popular Retail Companies on YouTube

June 6, 2011 • Paul Chaney

The most popular YouTube videos involve talking animals, pop stars and news channels. But retailers have found a home on the site, too. Here is a list of 12 popular ...
Customer Retention
14 Customer Feedback Tools for Small Business

June 3, 2011 • Sig Ueland

Feedback is essential to running a business. It tells you what’s working and what’s not. It provides you with fresh ideas on ways to improve your business. And it gives you insight into the needs of your customers. Here is a list of customer feedback tools. Some of the tools collect f...
Conversion
Dijipop Founder on Paid Product Placements, Digital Merchandising

June 3, 2011 • PEC Staff

Brick-and-mortar retailers often promote products with end-caps and special placements within a store aisle, and the retailer is typically paid for those promotions by wholesale suppliers. Ecommerce merchants can now merchandise products in a similar fashion, and receive similar payment...
Social Media
Selling to Facebook Fans and Twitter Followers

June 2, 2011 • Paul Chaney

One of the more controversial ecommerce-related topics is the use of social networks like Facebook and Twitter to increase sales. There is ample evidence to suggest that, in spite of its popularity, social media produces a dismal return on investment. Respondents to a January 2011 Pract...
Platforms & Apps
24 Ecommerce Plugins for WordPress

June 2, 2011 • Sig Ueland

Once WordPress was just a place to blog. Then came over fourteen thousand plugins. Today WordPress is a highly customizable platform, with everything you need to run your ecommerce business. Here is a list of 24 plugins to help you run your business on WordPress. These plugins will hel...
Social Media
How to Use Facebook’s Photo Strip; 7 Examples

June 1, 2011 • Paul Chaney

When Facebook added the photo strip to the Wall on Fan pages, it left page owners and administrators wondering just how to make use of the new feature. Not only that, the Fan page version lacked one attribute present in the personal profile version: the ability to arrange photos in a ...
Platforms & Apps
10 Essential Shopping Cart Features

June 1, 2011 • Armando Roggio

There are hundreds of ecommerce platforms that online merchants can choose from. The differences between these carts can be significant, so knowing what features matter is important. In this article, you'll find a list ten "must-have shopping cart features" that either improve the shop...
Social Media
Facebook’s 10 Social Plugins; Benefits to Merchants

May 31, 2011 • Sig Ueland

Facebook social plugins are a quick and easy way to extend your social reach and engage your website’s visitors with social interaction. The Facebook social plugins are easily installed. On each plugin’s page — noted below — in the Facebook Developers section, the configuration tool le...
Payments
Google Wallet to Impact Ecommerce Merchants?

May 31, 2011 • Armando Roggio

Google has partnered with MasterCard, FirstData, Citi, and Sprint to demonstrate a new payment technology that could — in theory — change consumer payment behavior, payment security, and even PCI ...
Conversion
Ten Great Ecommerce Ideas for June 2011

May 30, 2011 • Kate Monteith

Practical eCommerce asks industry insiders each month to share a great, innovative idea that could help an ecommerce company. Here’s what ten of them had to say for the June 2011 installment of "Ten Great Ecommerce Ideas." Protect Your Site Against Fraud "Be sure your site is taking...
Google Ads
5 Tips for Increasing Pay-Per-Click Conversion Rates

May 27, 2011 • Scott Smigler

Google’s Farmer/Panda update serves as a reminder to online merchants that their non-paid search traffic is subject to an algorithm that constantly evolves. Pay-per-click advertising, on the other hand, allows ...
Checkout Tactics
11 Ways to Increase Conversions on Mobile Devices

May 27, 2011 • Pamela Hazelton

Last November, while stuck in a waiting room, I shopped for Christmas presents via my smartphone. Few of the stores I visited had a mobile site, making the navigation and checkout process time consuming and frustrating. I gave up on several, seeking out their competition. Some recent s...
Design & Dev Tools
14 Online Task-Management Tools

May 26, 2011 • Sig Ueland

Whether you’re working on your own projects or collaborating with a team, you have to manage your productivity. With online task-management tools, you can organize tasks, collaborate in real-time, access your lists across multiple computers or mobile devices, and much more. Here is a ...
Marketing & Advertising
Should Online Retailers Embrace SMS Marketing?

May 26, 2011 • Armando Roggio

Texting ads and promotions to customers is an excellent way to announce sales and drive foot traffic to brick-and-mortar stores, service providers, and restaurants. But can text messaging drive site traffic to online retailers, too? Dutch Bros. is a regional, drive-through coffee shop ...
Social Media
7 Ways to Build a Brand Using Blogs

May 25, 2011 • Paul Chaney

Branding is more than just a business buzzword. It has become the crux of selling in the new economy. If the old marketing mantra was “Nothing happens until somebody sells something,” the new philosophy could be “Nothing happens until somebody brands something.” If you are not currentl...
Design & Dev Tools
31 Free Tools for Brand Monitoring

May 25, 2011 • Sig Ueland

Brand monitoring is an essential task for any company. By tracking what people are saying about your brand, and how often they’re saying it, you can ensure the right message ...
Social Media
Facebook’s New ‘Send’ Button: How to Use, Install, Benefit

May 24, 2011 • Paul Chaney

Facebook's new "Send" button functions similarly to a "Forward to a Friend" plug-in that you often see in broadcast emails. The difference is, in addition to sending a message to any email address, users can select specific Facebook friends to notify, and send the message as a post to F...
Conversion
Capture U.S. Hispanic Consumers with Website Localization

May 24, 2011 • Christian Arno

If you are looking to break ground in fresh new markets, you’ve probably by now realized the importance of multilingual marketing. But while you’re expanding your business abroad, are you forgetting the domestic foreign-language market? The 2009 U.S. Census found that a fifth of the U....
Business
eCommerce Business Valuation

May 24, 2011 • Manish Shah

eCommerce entrepreneurs often ask me what profit multiple they should use to calculate their business value. Profit multiples are a valuable tool to find a direction or a range of selling price but you can’t rely on them to determine exact value of your business. You will regret if you ...
Business
Affiliate Marketer on Sales Tax ‘Nexus’ Legislation

May 23, 2011 • PEC Staff

The efforts by state governments to collect online sales taxes is impacting affiliate marketers. Several states are attempting to expand the nexus definition to include Internet affiliates in those states, and thereby force retailers with those affiliates to pay state sales taxes. To ...
Conversion
Gas Prices, Unemployment, and Smartphones Affect Ecommerce, Study Finds

May 23, 2011 • Armando Roggio

U.S. ecommerce sales rose a stunning 12 percent in the first quarter of 2011 to more than $38 billion dollars, as soaring gasoline prices, unemployment concerns, and shopping-related smartphone usage affected online retail, according to a report from research firm comScore. "Faced with...
Design & Development
Ecommerce Sales from Smartphones Slow; 5 Suggestions to Help

May 20, 2011 • Charles Nicholls

It seems as if everyone’s talking about mobile commerce, but not many consumers are actually participating in it. It’s not that there is no mobile commerce happening on mobile-optimized sites; it’s just that it is very small. Two different estimates forecast the value of mobile commerc...
Finance
19 Tools for Online Bookkeeping and Invoicing

May 20, 2011 • Sig Ueland

Keeping the books is essential to the health of any company, helping you keep track of your business. With online accounting tools, you can ensure that you won’t miss a beat. Here is a list of online bookkeeping and invoicing tools. Some are complete accounting platforms; others are sp...
Shipping & Fulfillment
Using the Return Policy to Convert Shoppers into Customers

May 19, 2011 • Pamela Hazelton

It’s common practice to focus on trends, design and shopability to (hopefully) increase and maintain sales. For the most part, these topics play a major role in a site’s sell-through rate. Let’s not, however, overlook the less obvious reasons shoppers may be abandoning your online store...
Schools & Resources
5 Free Business Training Opportunities

May 19, 2011 • Armando Roggio

Ecommerce entrepreneurs are responsible for every area of their business, from accounting to order processing to website maintenance. So it is common for some small business owners to find that they need to learn new skills to either get their business started or help it grow. In this ...
Business > Merchant Voice
8 ways to uncover hidden money in your business

May 18, 2011 • Jamie Salvatori

Increasing the “top line” of your business is always critical, especially for small businesses that might still be struggling to reach that magical break even point. But even if you’re making a nice profit, cutting expenses or finding ways to save money should be a monthly exercise. S...
Platforms & Apps
16 Live Meeting and Webinar Platforms

May 18, 2011 • Sig Ueland

With web conferencing you can reach a broad audience, whether it’s a 25-person live meeting or a 2,500-person webinar. Here is a list of live-conferencing services. Many of these distinguish between smaller meetings and larger webinars, offering services for both categories. While t...
Design & Development
4 Ways to Make Site-Search Effective

May 18, 2011 • Gagan Mehra

Search is the second-most critical function on an ecommerce site, after the shopping cart checkout. Shoppers use site search even if they are familiar with the navigation of your site. You can relate to this by thinking of all the instances when you have gone to Amazon.com looking for a...