Business

An ecommerce site is a business. Our Management & Finance category addresses online payments, funding needs, employee issues, merchant profiles, key metrics, multichannel and omnichannel strategies, cross-border analyses, inventory management, accounting topics, sales taxes, and much more.

Business > Merchant Voice
From Magento to WooCommerce, 1 year on

July 27, 2016 • Richard Stubbings

Just over a year ago, I moved my website from Magento to WooCommerce. I described my process of evaluating and, ultimately, selecting WooCommerce in a 5-part series here on Practical ...
B2B
5 Types of B2B Product Data That Improve Online Sales

July 24, 2016 • Lori McDonald

Sometimes B2B companies invest in a highly functional ecommerce site and fail to use good product data. Shoppers don’t buy from websites if they don’t have the information they need to ...
Business
Learning from 10 Types of Ecommerce Competitors

July 21, 2016 • Armando Roggio

Knowing your competition can help your ecommerce business discover opportunities, avoid mistakes, and differentiate. With this in mind, it can be a good idea to gather and analyze information about your ...
Local Business
Using Pokémon Go to Entice Shoppers to Local Businesses

July 19, 2016 • Bill Hartzer

On July 6 and 7, 2016, Niantic and Nintendo began rolling out a new augmented reality app called Pokémon Go. Within a few days it was a hit. Kids and ...
Business
Understanding the New E.U. Privacy Shield, for Ecommerce

July 18, 2016 • John Di Giacomo

In “Electronically-signed Contracts Enforceable?,” I addressed the implementation of new e-signature requirements in Europe. Those requirements are part of wide-ranging changes in E.U. law. The newest, and perhaps most important,
Finance
Equity Crowdfunding Investments Open for Everyone

July 13, 2016 • Marcia Kaplan

It took four years after President Obama signed the JOBS Act, but the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission finally allows businesses to solicit people who are not considered wealthy to ...
Business > Merchant Voice
Use collaborations to expand reach, revenue

July 5, 2016 • Eric Bandholz

Entrepreneurs tend to focus on their own companies and how to build them from within. While this focus is a major factor in growing a business, don’t overlook the benefits of ...
Amazon & Marketplaces
SEO: Most Online Shoppers Start at Amazon and Google, Study Says

July 1, 2016 • Jill Kocher Brown

When searching for products online, Amazon and Google are the leading places to start, according to a study released this week. Thirty-eight percent of shoppers polled reported starting their shopping ...
Business
June 2016 Top 10: Our Most Popular Posts

June 30, 2016 • PEC Staff

Here are our 10 most popular articles for June 2016, recognizing that articles we published earlier in the month are more likely to make the list than later ones. 32 Marketing Tutorials for ...
Business > Merchant Voice
To grow a business, work less (but better)

June 28, 2016 • David Sasson

I recently read a book that made a great impression on me. The book is Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less, by Greg McKeown. In this post, I’ll offer an ...
Local Business
Using Schema Markup for Local SEO

June 28, 2016 • Bill Hartzer

Local businesses can help their search engine optimization efforts by utilizing the Schema.org markup. By adding the Schema code to your website, you’re helping the search engines identify certain text ...
Business > Merchant Voice
Will Brexit affect my U.K.-based ecommerce business?

June 28, 2016 • Richard Stubbings

To read the newspapers and listen to the television commentators, some would think that the surprise vote in the U.K. to leave the E.U. is a disaster, to change everything.
Amazon & Marketplaces > Merchant Voice
Ecommerce brands vs. Amazon sellers

June 27, 2016 • Peter Keller

I’ve worked in ecommerce for 15 years. When I started, those of us in the industry made the rules as we went along. No one knew for sure what would ...
Payments
Partnering with Credit-card-processing Salespeople, Part 2: Setting Expectations

June 24, 2016 • Phil Hinke

Before you signed your current credit card processing agreement, did you tell the salesperson what you expected from him and the provider? Did you ask him what he expected from ...
Business > Merchant Voice
5 ways to alienate your customers

June 22, 2016 • Elizabeth Hollingsworth

In a single month, I’ve encountered the following five instances of poor customer service from online companies. All could have been easily avoided. Silence after a payment. If you don’t contact ...
Cross-border Selling
Ecommerce in India: Marketplaces, Cash on Delivery Dominate

June 21, 2016 • Gagan Mehra

India is the second most populated country in the world with a large, educated workforce. It is a robust market for selling online. Ecommerce started in India in the late ...
Amazon & Marketplaces > Merchant Voice
For marketplace selling, know written and unwritten rules

June 18, 2016 • Richard Stubbings

If you are selling on a third-party site like Amazon or Ebay, it is important to understand the rules — the written rules and the unwritten ones. The unwritten rules ...
Business
Legal: How to Sell (or Buy) an Ecommerce Business

June 17, 2016 • John Di Giacomo

For many ecommerce storeowners, the purpose of building their business is to eventually sell it. Other times, after creating a successful ecommerce venture, an entrepreneur may decide to move on to ...
Finance
Will LinkedIn Change after Microsoft Purchase?

June 15, 2016 • Marcia Kaplan

On Monday Microsoft announced that it is acquiring LinkedIn — the social media site for business professionals — for $26.2 billion in a cash deal, its biggest acquisition ever. The ...
B2B
Using Site Search to Grow B2B Revenue

June 15, 2016 • Lori McDonald

If you help ecommerce shoppers quickly find what they are looking for, you will likely sell more. To accomplish this, look at your site’s navigation as well as its search ...
Business > Merchant Voice
Developing custom, manufactured products

June 10, 2016 • Eric Bandholz

Building a business requires a lot of moving parts. From cultivating relationships with peers and customers to branding and marketing, there are many factors that go into being successful. But ...
Amazon & Marketplaces
Amazon Payments: Pros, Cons for Ecommerce Merchants

June 9, 2016 • Bruce Harpham

Fewer than 10 percent of Amazon’s 304 million customers reportedly used Amazon Payments on third-party sites in 2014 and 2015. This, potentially, could be an opportunity for ecommerce merchants that ...
Business > Merchant Voice
A tale of overzealous security

June 5, 2016 • Richard Stubbings

I will be publishing my normal monthly post in a week or so. Until then, I wanted to share some stupidity with you, following from “Hacked off” and “Are your ...
Business
May 2016 Top 10: Our Most Popular Posts

June 1, 2016 • PEC Staff

Here are our 10 most popular articles for May 2016, recognizing that articles we published earlier in the month are more likely to make the list than later ones. 25 Free Web Design ...
Payments
Partnering with Credit-card-processing Salespeople, Part 1: Detailed Statements Key

May 25, 2016 • Phil Hinke

The pay of most salespeople in the credit-card-processing industry is 100-percent commission. Salespeople therefore presumably do not want to lose an account from an ecommerce or any other business. Unfortunately, many ...
Business
Avoiding Copyright Infringement in Product Photos

May 17, 2016 • John Di Giacomo

In the last few years, my law firm has handled a growing number of copyright infringement matters, including litigation, involving product photography. With increasing numbers of SKUs in ecommerce stores, the ...
Business
4 Ways to Increase Multi-unit Sales

May 16, 2016 • Stephen Bulger

For many ecommerce retailers, generating sales is often a race to the bottom to offer prices lower than their competitors. While this can be good for consumers, it’s usually bad ...
Business > Merchant Voice
Hacked off

May 15, 2016 • Richard Stubbings

All ecommerce sites are vulnerable to being hacked. No matter how large you are, no matter how much you invest in security and infrastructure, you remain vulnerable. If hackers can penetrate ...
Cross-border Selling
Ecommerce in Taiwan: Thriving Market, Huge Mobile

May 12, 2016 • Gagan Mehra

Taiwan might be a small island but it is big on ecommerce. Taiwan is among the world leaders in terms of ecommerce penetration — the percentage of residents that have ...
Business > Merchant Voice
To grow an ecommerce business, step away

May 11, 2016 • Eric Bandholz

I recently returned from a trip to Amsterdam. It wasn’t a holiday, but a strategy meeting. The three owners of Beardbrand spent a week in the city to focus on ...