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Business
April 2021 Top 10: Our Most Popular Posts

April 30, 2021 • PEC Staff

Our mission since 2005 is to publish independent content to help ecommerce merchants. What follows are the 10 most popular articles that we published in April 2021. Articles from early in the month are more likely to make the list than later ones.
Business
Quality and Craft Drive Chisos Boots Founder

April 30, 2021 • Eric Bandholz

The idea for Chisos boots started with back pain. Will Roman, the founder, owner, and lifetime cowboy-boot buyer, injured his back in a motorcycle accident. Wearing boots became painful. He launched Chisos.com, a custom, handcrafted bootmaker, in 2019. Quality and craft drive Roman and his outlook on life.
Inventory
The Increasing Complexity of Product Returns

April 29, 2021 • Marcia Kaplan

The pandemic sparked an increase in ecommerce sales but it also generated a massive rise in product returns. According to U.S. Department of Commerce estimates, total ecommerce sales for 2020 were $788 billion, an increase of 32.4 percent from 2019.
Analytics & Data
Using Google Analytics for Continuous Improvement

April 28, 2021 • Morgan Jones

There is no shortage of articles on tips and tricks for improving Google Analytics. This article, however, will focus on using Google Analytics for its main purpose: driving continuous improvement in your business. To help, I've assembled a Data Studio template tailored to ecommerce.
Marketing & Advertising
8 TikTok Ideas for Engagement

April 27, 2021 • Kaleena Stroud

In "11 TikTok Video Ideas for Merchants," I offered options to promote products. But there are other ways to attract and engage prospects on TikTok. Here are eight TikTok engagement ideas for all types of businesses.
Business
The Retail Omnichannel Imperative

April 27, 2021 • Armando Roggio

In 2021 and beyond, successful retailers with physical stores will likely become powerful omnichannel sellers as shoppers choose merchants with superior end-to-end buying experiences. "The reason that omnichannel is critical for retailers in 2021 is because the customer demands it," said Jess Huang, a partner at McKinsey & Company.
Platforms & Apps
13 WordPress Plugins for Membership Subscriptions

April 26, 2021 • Sig Ueland

A membership plugin can transform a WordPress site into a resource for subscription content, courses, a paid community, and more. Sell one-time or recurring access to specific posts, digital downloads,
Marketing & Advertising
Digital Advertisers Need to Pivot

April 26, 2021 • Armando Roggio

The end of third-party cookies and the beginning of opt-in user tracking in Apple's iOS devices have some advertisers worried, but pivoting toward first-party data and better customer experiences may lead to even more success.
Photography & Video
Using a Smartphone for Stellar Product Photos

April 25, 2021 • Pamela Hazelton

Manufacturer-supplied photos are not the greatest. Professional photographers can help tell a product’s story. However, photo sessions are cumbersome and pricey. Need an alternative? Consider a modern smartphone.
Business
Personal-care Founder: No More Petrochemicals

April 23, 2021 • Eric Bandholz

I've interviewed entrepreneurs for this podcast who developed organic consumer-care goods. But none did it before Eric Malka. He and his wife, Myriam, devised shaving oils from their kitchen in 1996 and then launched The Art of Shaving. Their new company, Ingredients, focuses on wellness and sustainability.
Analytics & Data
Charts: U.S. Direct-to-consumer Sales 2018 to 2020

April 22, 2021 • Anna Kayfitz

The growth in U.S. direct-to-consumer ecommerce sales continues, albeit at a slower rate. In 2018, year-over-year growth was 56.6 percent. In 2020, it was 24.3 percent.
Marketing & Advertising
What Google Chrome FLoC Says about Targeted Ads

April 21, 2021 • Armando Roggio

A proposed alternative to third-party cookies may provide insights into the future of targeted ads. Modern digital ad targeting relies on individual and personal information. An online retailer, for example, can use networks such as Google or Facebook to target potential customers.
Email & Text Marketing
Email Conversion Guide, Part 3: Retargeting

April 20, 2021 • Carolyn Nye

Retargeting with email can encompass several tactics. All include a follow-up to a previous message or action. Retargeting can produce among the highest conversions from email marketing. This is the final installment of my three-part email conversion guide.
Shipping & Fulfillment
Consumers Want Fast Deliveries — and a Green Environment

April 20, 2021 • Elaine Porteous

Customers want fast deliveries. But they also care about the impact of shipping on the environment. Sadly, the “last mile” is notoriously eco-unfriendly.
Design & Dev Tools
16 Tools to Create an Online Course

April 19, 2021 • Sig Ueland

An online course can generate revenue, grow an audience, and establish expertise. Given the range of helpful tools, it’s relatively easy to create, distribute, and monetize a course. Here’s a list of tools to create an online course.
Marketing & Advertising
CommerceCo Recap: 3 R’s Are Changing Targeted Advertising

April 19, 2021 • Armando Roggio

For years, online sellers large and small have depended on targeted advertising to acquire and engage shoppers. But changes at leading tech companies, legislation, and consumer-privacy concerns are hastening the end of individual tracking and some forms of ad targeting.
Payments
8 Reasons to Avoid Cryptocurrencies for Ecommerce

April 18, 2021 • Mike Eckler

Cryptocurrencies are hot news. Merchants may be wondering if cryptocurrencies are ready for mainstream ecommerce. The answer is no. Here’s why.
Business
Home Gym Provider Overcomes Supply Disruptions, Thrives

April 16, 2021 • Eric Bandholz

Imagine selling home gym equipment online at the onset of the pandemic. Athletic clubs were closed. Consumers were stuck in their houses. According to Kaevon Khoozani, the founder of Canada-based Bells of Steel, the demand for weight-training equipment was “obscene.” “We ran into two giant hiccups,” Khoozani told me.
Platforms & Apps
Ecommerce Product Releases: April 15, 2021

April 15, 2021 • 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 live-stream shopping, eBay ad campaigns, customer experience platforms, loyalty programs, and more.
Business
How Businesses Go Carbon Neutral

April 15, 2021 • Marcia Kaplan

Climate change is front and center in the news. How businesses can make a positive impact is not well understood. I'll provide an overview in the post. First, a few definitions.
Content Marketing
Using Wikipedia for Content Marketing, SEO

April 14, 2021 • Armando Roggio

Wikipedia can be helpful for content marketing, link building, and entity research, helping marketers reach an audience of potential customers. To be clear, since at least 2007, all external links from Wikipedia include the nofollow attribute, directing search engines not to count the links in page-ranking algorithms.
Conversion
Ask an Expert: How Does Artificial Intelligence Impact Ecommerce?

April 13, 2021 • PEC Staff

“Ask an Expert” is an occasional feature where we pose questions to ecommerce practitioners. For this installment, we've turned to Gagan Mehra, an international ecommerce consultant and a longtime contributor, who explains artificial intelligence.
SEO Tools
12 Tools for YouTube Search Optimization

April 12, 2021 • Sig Ueland

YouTube is the second most visited website, after Google. Success on YouTube requires compelling videos, but it’s equally important to optimize them. Fortunately, there are tools to help. Here is a list of tools to optimize your video content on YouTube.
Local Business
What if 80,000 Brick-and-mortar Stores Closed?

April 11, 2021 • Armando Roggio

A financial services firm has predicted that 80,000 or more physical store locations in the United States are likely to close in the next five years, reducing the total number of American retail outlets by approximately 10 percent. But what does that mean?
Business
Online Onion Seller Rises from Domain Auction

April 9, 2021 • Eric Bandholz

Most entrepreneurs start with a business idea and then secure the domain name. Peter Askew does the opposite. He purchases domain names and then builds the business. Take VidaliaOnions.com, for example.
Product Pages
Product Page Headlines Drive Conversions

April 8, 2021 • Pamela Hazelton

Every product has a name. It could be short and simple or long and tedious. It can be definitive, witty, or subtle. And unless it's your company's product, you have no control over it. But there's an alternative way to grab shoppers' attention: headlines.
Content Marketing
Two-thirds of the Largest U.S. Retailers Use Content Marketing

April 7, 2021 • Armando Roggio

Some 33 of the 50 largest U.S. retail companies use content marketing. And 22 of those are doing it fairly well. I reviewed the websites and social media channels of the 50 largest U.S. retailers, according to the National Retail Federation, to learn which ones used content marketing.
SEO Tools
The SEO Benefits of Web Scraping

April 6, 2021 • Bill Sebald

In "SEO for Google Shopping," I addressed the need to optimize product feeds. I stated that including keyword product descriptions and titles in the feeds was scalable with "scraping." But I didn't describe it further. In this post, I’ll explain scraping.
Photography & Video
14 Stock Photo Sites, Free and Paid

April 5, 2021 • Sig Ueland

Quality images are essential for an ecommerce site. Not only do pictures display the products, but they also establish the brand and inspire the shopper. If you don’t have the means to produce all of your imagery, stock photos are an option. Here is a list of stock photo websites.
Google Ads
Understanding Google Ads Impression Share

April 5, 2021 • Matthew Umbro

I'm frequently asked by Google Ads advertisers how their campaigns compare with competitors. It’s an imprecise question. It could refer to performance, exposure, messaging, or more. The most relevant answer is typically impression share — the number of impressions your ads receive divided by the total available.