Page 227 – Practical Ecommerce

Category

Conversion
The Shopping Experience: OfficeDepot.com Offers Free Shipping, After a Twist

July 12, 2010 • Jeff Muendel

Office Depot is well known as a brick-and-mortar store, but I had never purchased products from its ecommerce site, OfficeDepot.com. Since I was looking for a new desk, I decided to give the site a try. OfficeDepot.com is much like a typical office; it is utilitarian without much in the...
Social Media
The PEC Review: Facebook Pay-Per-Click Ads

July 12, 2010 • Armando Roggio

There may be a positive relationship between ecommerce spending and social network participation. Internet trend tracking firm comScore recently reported that Facebook and Twitter users spend more money online than non-socialites, and that some 23 percent of Twitter users follow busine...
Platforms & Apps
Cart of the Week: FatFreeCartPro by E-junkie

July 9, 2010 • Kate Monteith

This week, we'll hear from Robin Kohli, founder and lead developer for E-junkie, the company behind FatFreeCartPro, an online shopping cart. E-junkie is headquartered in New Delhi, India, with its support team based in Tucson, Ariz. According to Kohli, there are roughly 9,000 merchants using FatFreeCartPro, “As well as a couple thousand other users who are in the trial period
Conversion
The Case for Launching Sub-Niche Websites

July 8, 2010 • Michael Stearns

One strategy to grow your ecommerce revenue is to spin-off a subset of your product line onto its own website. With this "sub-niche" website, you can focus your branding, ads, and presentation to the customer who is looking for what you have to offer. This is not a strategy for the eco...
Social Media
Twitter to Offer Early Bird Advertisements

July 8, 2010 • Armando Roggio

Twitter, the microblogging site, said that it would soon begin tweeting special, time-bound deals and offers from advertisers to its users. The program, called "@earlybird," would allow "select" advertisers to offer exclusive, short term deals on Twitter, potentially putting the social...
Marketing & Advertising
Language Translation: Man Versus Machine

July 8, 2010 • Brendan Gibbons

Anyone who has visited a foreign country knows the difficulty of buying products in a foreign language. This confusion can be overwhelming, whether haggling on the street or buying online. But, for ecommerce merchants considering language translation, determining which countries and l...
Conversion
Three Simple, But Overlooked, Conversion Tips

July 7, 2010 • Armando Roggio

Marketing with 404 error pages and showing shipping data before a shopper puts an item in the cart were among the many powerful and often overlooked sales conversions tips that ecommerce coach and entrepreneur, Shirley Tan, shared during a recent webinar. Tan, who is the founder of Ame...
Business
Intuit Exec Discusses QuickBooks 2010, Possibility of New Shopping Cart

July 7, 2010 • PEC Staff

Many ecommerce merchants use QuickBooks, or are at least familiar with it. There is a new version of QuickBooks that includes new document management, online banking, and other features. To discuss QuickBooks 2010 and other Intuit products, we spoke with Alex Hood, product management le...
Schools & Resources
Booklist: Invodo CEO Craig Wax

July 6, 2010 • Nic Murdock

In “Booklist” we ask Internet professionals about the books and blogs they read, and why. For this list, we asked Craig Wax, CEO of Invodo, an ecommerce video company. Wax leads ...
Content Marketing
Free Blogs vs. Hosting Your Own: Pros and Cons

July 6, 2010 • Lorrie Thomas Ross

Should you host a blog on your own website with your own domain name, or use one of the excellent free blog sites? There is no universal "right" choice There are pros and cons to each option to consider for immediate and long-term blog success.
Social Media
The PEC Review: Dlvr.it for Social Media Distribution

July 5, 2010 • Armando Roggio

Blogging, social marketing, email marketing, onsite merchandising, and search engine advertising are just some of the tasks that an ecommerce marketer must manage on any given day. Dlvr.it is a new online service that can help you automate at least one portion of that marketing worklo...
Platforms & Apps
Cart of the Week: Digital River’s CCNow

July 2, 2010 • Kate Monteith

This week, we'll hear from Brant Pallazza, vice president of marketing for Digital River, the parent company of the online shopping cart known as CCNow. Digital River is based in Minneapolis, Minn., and its CCNow ecommerce platform serves roughly 10,000 users. We'll also hear from a CCNow customer, Buddy Carr.
Business
Internet Inventions Covered by Patent Law, Says Supreme Court

July 1, 2010 • PEC Staff

The Bilski case involved, potentially, a dramatic shift in U.S. patent law. It's been awaiting decision by the U.S. Supreme Court since the fall of 2009, and earlier this week, the Court rendered its opinion. The case involved the scope of potential patents, and whether an invention mus...
Business
June 2010 Top Ten: Our Most Popular Posts

July 1, 2010 • Kate Monteith

Each month, we compile a list of the ten most popular Practical eCommerce articles and blogs based on the number of page views. Here are the ten most popular articles for June 2010. Ten Great Ecommerce Ideas for June 2010 Our readers enjoy reading timely ideas and advice from other me...
Shipping & Fulfillment
How To Buy Shipping Supplies

June 30, 2010 • John Lindberg

Shipping supplies, such as corrugated cartons and bubble wrap, are the third highest overhead cost (after labor and facilities expense) in most order fulfillment operations. No matter if you outsource your order fulfillment or do it in-house, keeping shipping supplies affordable is a t...
Conversion
Ten Great Ecommerce Ideas for July 2010

June 30, 2010 • 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 July 2010 installment of "Great Ecommerce Ideas." Don’t Rush Your Product Listings “When first setting up your ecomm...
Amazon & Marketplaces
Alibaba CEO on Acquisition of Vendio, Social Commerce, Product Sourcing

June 29, 2010 • PEC Staff

Alibaba is a huge force in global, business-to-business ecommerce. The company is based in China and it links millions of wholesale suppliers with businesses that resell those products. The company ...
Photography & Video
Do Product Videos Help with Search Engine Optimization?

June 29, 2010 • Bill Hartzer

Having videos of your products will help your ecommerce sales. Visitors to your site will watch the videos, and it will presumably help their buying decisions. But what about the search engines? How will posting a product video on your website help with search engine optimization? One...
Business
Language Translation: Focus on Local Ethnic Audiences, Says Expert

June 28, 2010 • PEC Staff

There are more consumers that don't speak English than those that do. We wondered the best way for ecommerce merchants to reach those non-English-speaking prospects. Merely translating a website is only part of the challenge. To help us understand all of the issues surrounding language ...
Platforms & Apps
The PEC Review: Magento 1.3 Sales Tactics Cookbook

June 28, 2010 • Armando Roggio

Not everyone that downloads Magento can, frankly, figure it out since the platform's effectiveness comes with certain a level of complexity.
Platforms & Apps
Cart of the Week: DesignCart

June 25, 2010 • Kate Monteith

There are more than 500 online shopping carts. And each week we feature one, interviewing both the cart's developer and a customer. "Cart of the Week" is not a review or an evaluation, but rather an opportunity to learn about a shopping cart from the people who build it and use it. Thi...
Business > Merchant Voice
Highlights from the Internet Retailer Conference

June 24, 2010 • Ken Kikkawa

I recently attended the Internet Retailer Conference in Chicago and it was a terrific show. If you are able to attend only one show per year, I highly recommend going to this one and if you are not able to get to any shows because you are too involved in your business you need to find ...
Marketing & Advertising
Ecommerce Redesign: Five SEO Pitfalls to Avoid

June 24, 2010 • Amanda Barnes

A new website launch or redesign requires the integration of management and marketing staff, as well as members of your design, content and tech teams. Each of these groups plays an integral role in the site’s overall success. A new or redesigned website will also want to drive traffi...
Email & Text Marketing
Tips for Formatting HTML Emails in Microsoft Outlook

June 23, 2010 • PEC Staff

Roughly one-third of all email recipients use Microsoft Outlook. But that program famously distorts HTML-formatted emails when other email clients, such as Yahoo!, Gmail, and Thunderbird, render the same email messages differently. The result is that email marketers, such as ecommerce ...
Social Media
Social Commerce: Shopping Carts Extend Reach Into Facebook, Other Social Sites

June 23, 2010 • Paul Chaney

Editor's Note: This is part two of “Social Commerce Spotlight,” our series on the mix of ecommerce and social media. Part one, "Payvment, a Facebook Storefront Provider," we published previously. With the growth of social commerce, especially on Facebook with its 500 million members, a...
Keyword Research
SEO: Keyword Research and Analysis

June 22, 2010 • Bill Hartzer

Editor’s Note: is a contributor to Practical eCommerce and the owner of BillHartzer.com, a Dallas-based online marketing firm. Hartzer wrote the article, below, which first appeared in that company’s blog. Keyword research is one of the most important parts of online marketing. Somet...
Business
Bilski Case to Change U. S. Internet Patents?

June 22, 2010 • PEC Staff

Innovation on the Internet depends on the ability by entrepreneurs to protect intellectual property. Google, Amazon and other Internet companies have received many U.S. patents that protect, seemingly, processes or methods of doing business. But that protection could be threatened by a ...
Design & Development
What’s a Video Codec?

June 21, 2010 • PEC Staff

Editor's Note: Most observers agree that video enhances an ecommerce site and likely increases its conversion rate. But there are many different video formats, and the terminology surrounding the use of video can be daunting. To help us sort through some of these complexities, we contin...
Social Media
In Social Media Era, Nine Techniques to Improve Conversion Rates

June 21, 2010 • Pamela Hazelton

With the ever-growing popularity of social media, online sweepstakes and contests, just how important is the actual conversion rate of an online store going to be in the future? In simple terms, the conversion rate is a measure of the number of unique visitors (potential customers) tha...
Photography & Video
The PEC Review: Animoto for Quick, Basic Product Videos

June 18, 2010 • Armando Roggio

Product videos give shoppers a better idea of what they're buying, slash return rates, and boost conversions. So it is little wonder that many online retailers are adding videos to their product detail pages. But not all product videos are created equally and, frankly, not every produc...