Page 64 – Practical Ecommerce

Category

On-page SEO
SEO: Excellent Content Moves Shoppers through the Funnel

November 16, 2020 • Jill Kocher Brown

Informational content such as buyers’ guides and how-to instructions can lure shoppers to your site while they’re in research mode. There, they could complete an action that delivers immediate or future value to your business. Examples include signing up for a newsletter, requesting more info, or the ultimate goal: purchasing a product.
Cross-border Selling
Alibaba’s 2020 Singles Day Breaks Record, Attracts Luxury Brands

November 15, 2020 • Marcia Kaplan

Alibaba's Singles Day is typically a 24-hour event on Nov. 11. This year, however, Singles Day ran for nearly two weeks, from Nov. 1 through Nov. 11. Gross merchandise volume during that period, according to Alibaba, was $74.1 billion. This compares with $38 billion in a 24-hour period on 11.11 in 2019.
Business
ABF Creative, a Podcast Network, Is ‘More Than a Business’

November 13, 2020 • Eric Bandholz

The mission of Anthony Frasier's company, ABF Creative, is to broadcast voices and stories from the African American community. He launched the company in 2016 from his hometown of Newark, New Jersey, having founded a tech conference and authored a book. To Frasier, ABF is much more than a business.
Marketing & Advertising
The 5 C’s of Ecommerce Marketing

November 12, 2020 • Armando Roggio

The 5C marketing framework provides a structured way to evaluate and describe a business's position in a market. The framework, applied consistently, could guide decisions as the business promotes its brand and products.
Analytics & Data
Cookieless Browsers Will Upend Ad Tracking

November 11, 2020 • Armando Roggio

Trends toward greater consumer privacy may force ecommerce marketers to change methods of measuring performance, including turning to "marketing mix modeling," a 70-year-old technique. Most digital marketers depend on some form of multi-touch attribution modeling to measure the effectiveness of their various promotions.
Payments
U.S. vs. Google: How the Antitrust Lawsuit Impacts Merchants

November 10, 2020 • Mike Eckler

On October 20, the U.S. Department of Justice and 11 states filed an antitrust lawsuit against Google. In this article, I’ll provide an overview of the case. Throughout, I’ll concentrate on what means for merchants.
SEO
SEO: Google’s Product Knowledge Panels Drive Impressions (but Not for Amazon)

November 9, 2020 • Jill Kocher Brown

Every merchant wants to beat Amazon in Google's organic search listings. The easiest way? Upload data for placement in Google’s product knowledge panel. Product knowledge panels contain information you’d typically find on a product detail page, such as a product description, images, and reviews.
Business
Google Tables Can Help with Projects, Products, Support

November 9, 2020 • Armando Roggio

Thanks to a new service from Google, small and mid-sized merchants may have a new option for lightweight project management, help desk ticket tracking, and similar tasks. Google Tables blends some of the features and capabilities of a structured database with a simple spreadsheet.
Product Pages
7 Quick Tips to Drive 2020 Holiday Sales

November 8, 2020 • Pamela Hazelton

Consumers will rely on online merchants more than ever during this year’s holiday season. Here are seven tips for retaining shoppers and closing more sales. 7 Tips for the 2020 Holidays Integrate ...
Business
Turn Off Your Phone, Says Agency Founder

November 6, 2020 • Eric Bandholz

Most entrepreneurs in 2020 are uber connected: phone, text, email, Slack — you name it. But to Arri Bagah, the founder of Conversmart, an ecommerce agency, always-on connections means non-stop interruptions. "It's a matter of taking control of my time — trying to be less reactive and more active," he told me. "Receiving all of those notifications prompts you to react.
Business
Your Ecommerce Platform Can Help with That

November 5, 2020 • Armando Roggio

The coronavirus pandemic has encouraged many entrepreneurs and small-business owners to either start selling online or significantly expand their ecommerce operations. Evidence of this trend can be found in Shopify's June 30, 2020, quarterly report. The company achieved a 28-percent increase in subscription revenue for that three-month period.
Technical SEO
SEO: What Google’s New Passage Indexing Means for Ecommerce

November 5, 2020 • Jill Kocher Brown

In its never-ending quest to improve search results, Google is extending natural language processing to "passage indexing," ranking individual sentences or phrases within a page. Google addressed this latest update in an October 15 blog post. The update will impact an estimated 7 percent of its search queries worldwide.
Business > Merchant Voice
Should you buy a failing ecommerce brand?

November 4, 2020 • Peter Keller

Have you been itching to get into ecommerce? Perhaps you've watched a slew of training videos. You're ready to take the plunge. There are a few ways to get into the ecommerce game.
Finance
SPACs: 2020’s Most Popular Method of Going Public

November 3, 2020 • Marcia Kaplan

The traditional IPO has mostly been the domain of large, high-profile companies that had received hundreds of millions in venture capital over a period of years. This year, however, traditional IPOs have been overtaken by a method that has been around for roughly 20 years but has gained traction only in the past two.
Marketing & Advertising
10 Inspiring Holiday Marketing Campaigns

November 3, 2020 • Sig Ueland

The 2020 holiday season is upon us. Here is a list of successful marketing campaigns from previous holiday seasons. The campaigns celebrate Yule logs, Santa, holiday music, and heading outdoors. Several of the campaigns use contests to generate content from followers.
Google Ads
Understanding Google’s Smart Shopping Campaigns

November 2, 2020 • Matthew Umbro

I’ve written many articles in the last year that address Google Ads' automation. Used carefully, automation — bidding, dynamic copy, scripts — can free up time for strategy. In this post, I’ll focus on Smart Shopping campaigns for Google Shopping.
Platforms & Apps
Ecommerce Product Releases: November 2, 2020

November 2, 2020 • Sig Ueland

Here is a list of product releases and updates for late October from companies that offer services to online merchants. There are updates on social commerce, discounted shipping, holiday deals, live chat, analytics, and content creation.
Content Marketing
5 Content Marketing Ideas for December 2020

November 1, 2020 • Armando Roggio

In December 2020, online retailers and B2B sellers can focus their content marketing on getting things done during Covid, launching a YouTube channel, profiling the Nobel Prizes, teaching skills, and raising AIDS awareness. Content marketing starts with creating or curating content such as articles, videos, graphics, or podcasts.
Business
October 2020 Top 10: Our Most Popular Posts

October 30, 2020 • PEC Staff

Since 2005 we've published thousands of articles, webinars, and podcast episodes to, hopefully, help ecommerce merchants. What follows are the most popular articles that we published in October 2020. Articles from early in the month are more likely to make the list than later ones.
Content Marketing
CopySmiths Founder on Content Marketing by the Numbers

October 30, 2020 • Eric Bandholz

Kat McKinnon's agency, CopySmiths, produces hundreds of blog posts per month for, mainly, ecommerce clients. She's developed a formula of sorts for getting those posts ranked in Google's search results. "You need between 1,000 and 1,500 words for a blog article," she told me. "Definitely not 600. Avoid 800, unless you're literally just answering a short question."
Business
Pros and Cons of Composable Commerce

October 29, 2020 • Gagan Mehra

The term "composable commerce" refers to joining multiple components to meet a merchant's specific needs. Example use cases include multiple sales channels, cost control, specialization, and the need for modular construction.
Business
Automobile Sales Are Moving Online

October 29, 2020 • Armando Roggio

For many consumers, a car or truck is the second largest purchase they will make after buying a house. In July 2020, for example, the average new vehicle price in the United States was $38,378, according to a Kelley Blue Book release. Despite the cost, automobile sales could be moving online.
Social Media
Optimize Facebook Ads with Better Images and Copy

October 28, 2020 • Kaleena Stroud

Despite the chatter around its dwindling reach, Facebook remains hugely popular. It has twice the number of users than Instagram, for example, according to Sprout Social. But gaining users’ attention on Facebook via advertising can be difficult.
Amazon & Marketplaces > Merchant Voice
My response to negative Amazon reviews

October 27, 2020 • Richard Stubbings

In last month's post, I described instances of giving preference to an Amazon customer rather than one from my own site. I hated that. It is one of the reasons I scaled down my Amazon listings. For me, customer service is paramount. It is one thing an independent retailer can do better than the large box shifters.
Customer Service
To Sell More, Understand Shoppers’ Motives

October 27, 2020 • Pamela Hazelton

Does your store sell products or experiences? Think about it for a moment because the two are vastly different. And how you approach shoppers' questions and concerns plays a significant role in closing sales. Focus on what shoppers hope to accomplish with particular products.
Schools & Resources
20 Free Tutorials to Learn WordPress

October 27, 2020 • Sig Ueland

WordPress is a free content management system to power a simple blog, complex website, or online store. WordPress also supports an active development community that provides instructional tutorials for users at all levels. Here is a list of free tutorials to learn WordPress.
On-page SEO
Mobile Site Design Impacts Organic Search Rankings

October 26, 2020 • Jill Kocher Brown

The design of a mobile website impacts its ability to rank in organic search results. Mobile design controls the availability and readability of text, the usability of navigational elements, and even access to entire pages that are critical to organic performance.
Fraud Prevention
Crooks Are Creating Synthetic Shoppers

October 26, 2020 • Armando Roggio

The ongoing global pandemic has forced the rapid expansion of ecommerce and a general migration toward digital transactions. Unfortunately, Covid-19 also may be fueling an increase in so-called synthetic identity fraud.
Payments
Get Ready for Digital-first Credit Cards

October 25, 2020 • Mike Eckler

In September 2020, Mastercard announced the expansion of its Digital First Card Program. Introduced in 2019, the program is a series of systems and procedures that enable credit card info to be downloaded directly to a mobile wallet. The expansion aims to increase awareness and improve access to existing digital card-issuing technology.
Checkout Tactics
Manual Texts Recover 21 Percent of Abandoned Carts, Says LiveRecover Founder

October 23, 2020 • Eric Bandholz

Dennis Hegstad believes the best way to recover abandoned carts is via text messages. But his messages are not automated or bot-driven. Hegstad's company, LiveRecover, sends one-to-one texts from a real person to folks who have left an ecommerce checkout without completing a purchase.