Social Media

November 15, 2010 • Paul Chaney

A lot of activity is occurring around the group-coupon-deals space in recent days. Facebook launched "Deals," which, according to Facebook, "local businesses will be able to offer you deals when you check in to their place on Facebook." And there's Groupon Stores, which allow merchants ...

November 9, 2010 • Paul Chaney

"How do I get started?" is a question I often hear regarding social media marketing. In this article, I provide eight steps to help. Think of it as a checklist of must-do items that will put you in the best position to integrate social media into your overall marketing mix and take adva...

November 1, 2010 • Paul Chaney

The last time I compared blog platforms on Practical Ecommerce was in 2005. In "Blog Platforms: Choose One that Fits Your Need," I reviewed four of the most used at that time: Blogger, TypePad, MovableType, and WordPress. While those are still popular, others have since appeared. Over...

October 27, 2010 • Paul Chaney

Twitter can help ecommerce merchants. It provides a conduit to connect with their customers and communicate with prospects. Merchants should be careful, however, when using Twitter to market their products, and I addressed that in "4 Rules for Marketing on Twitter." And seemingly mino...

October 26, 2010 • Paul Chaney

In last week's "5 Timesaving Social Networking Tools," I discussed efficient ways to manage your social media engagement efforts. However, social media is not merely a "tool set" to be used any way we see fit. It is also a mindset. For merchants wanting to use Twitter to market their ...

October 19, 2010 • Paul Chaney

A concern I often hear from those new to social networking is the amount of time it takes to manage engagement activities, such as tweeting or posting status updates to Facebook and LinkedIn. While there's no cost to use these channels, time is valuable and, therefore, the more efficien...

October 12, 2010 • Paul Chaney

Twitter is the "Swiss Army knife" of social networking because it is a simple tool that can be used in many ways. Businesses are utilizing Twitter for such things as brand reputation monitoring, product promotion, customer service, and sales. The key to maximizing Twitter's value, how...

October 11, 2010 • Armando Roggio

For nearly a month, microblogging powerhouse Twitter has been rolling out a new user interface aimed at making the service the "best way to discover what's new in your world." Twitter is already one of the most popular social media sites with more than 165 million registered users, acc...

October 6, 2010 • Paul Chaney

The deal of the day group coupon-buying concept has taken the Internet by storm. Forbes magazine called Groupon, the leading deal-of-the-day site, the "fastest growing company ever." The concept appeals mostly to local brick-and-mortar retailers and large retail brands. But ecommerce ...

September 29, 2010 • Paul Chaney

September 15, 2010 • Paul Chaney

There is a growing integration between social media and ecommerce. And there's a new term for this integration: social commerce. Facebook is the leading social commerce platform. Recently I moderated "500 Million People and Growing: The Facebook Conversation Turns to Commerce," a Prac...

September 14, 2010 • Paul Chaney

Many small businesses are experimenting with social media to market their products. Based on my observations, however, most are doing it in piecemeal fashion, without a coordinated, overall strategy. In this article, I present a practical, four-part social commerce strategy that minim...

September 7, 2010 • Paul Chaney

"Trust" is likely the most defining factor when it comes to selling products online. Consumers will not purchase products from a merchant that they mistrust. Social media can help overcome a consumer's reluctance to purchase products due to lack of trust. It can foster interaction bet...

September 6, 2010 • Armando Roggio

Contest marketing is an excellent way to engage customers, build brand, and get leads for newsletters and other promotions. And in the age of social media marketing, an online contest can garner thousands of entries. Unfortunately some popular social media sites, like Facebook, prohib...

August 31, 2010 • Paul Chaney

Thousands of ecommerce businesses have Facebook Fan pages. But making those pages stand out from competitors' pages is a challenge. One of the ways to distinguish yours is through the use of a custom landing page, also known as a Welcome tab. In the past, to create a landing page you ...

August 24, 2010 • Paul Chaney

Facebook recently rolled out "Places," a location-based sharing application popularized by such startups as Foursquare and Gowalla. Much has been written about Places, but in this article I'll review the possible business uses for it. When a user arrives at a given location–a physical ...

August 18, 2010 • Paul Chaney

Editor's Note: For the past few weeks, Paul Chaney, our social media director, has addressed the integration of Facebook with ecommerce. He has reviewed a number of applications, including Wildfire and Fan Appz, both of which provide sweepstakes and coupons. He's also reviewed fully-emb...

August 11, 2010 • Paul Chaney

Social sharing and bookmarking have taken a back seat to Facebook and Twitter. For most of us, using sites like Digg, Delicious, StumbleUpon, or Reddit rarely crosses our minds. Yet, these and other such services can provide a number of benefits to your ecommerce site, and here’s why....

August 4, 2010 • Paul Chaney

Facebook designates Fan pages for businesses to engage users. And to help these businesses, Facebook now provides a series of resource guides for Fan page development and Facebook Ads development. It has also greatly improved the Fan page analytics component (called Insights), and it ha...

July 30, 2010 • Paul Chaney

"Ecommerce News Around the Web" is our weekly review of articles, blog posts and other news items that could interest ecommerce merchants. Ecommerce SSL is Broken, Says Conference Founder - The Inquirer Black Hat 2010 conference founder Jeff Moss is adamant that commerce's secure soc...

July 20, 2010 • Paul Chaney

Editor's Note: This is the third installment in our series on social commerce, the process of linking ecommerce with social media sites, such as Facebook. In the second installment, we reviewed the Facebook apps of a number of shopping cart providers. These apps extend the Facebook reac...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

June 11, 2010 • Paul Chaney

"Ecommerce News Around the Web" is our weekly review of articles, blog posts and other news items that could interest ecommerce merchants. Shop.org and NRF Weigh in on Boucher Privacy Bill - Shop.org Online privacy is a hot topic these days, both among consumers and in Washington. Con...

June 8, 2010 • Paul Chaney

Social commerce, the use of social media in the context of ecommerce, is becoming commonplace. Over the next few weeks, Practical Ecommerce will examine ecommerce platforms and applications that allow merchants to take advantage of this new trend. In this installment, we will discuss ...

June 7, 2010 • Armando Roggio

As more online retailers invest marketing dollars and time into social marketing, it is becoming increasingly important to measure the return on that investment. As with any concerted marketing effort, social marketing has real costs in terms of hourly labor expenses for time spent twe...

June 1, 2010 • Armando Roggio

Social media marketing is one of the most potent new promotional trends available to ecommerce businesses. Services like Twitter allow you to build two-way relationships with your customers wherein you can get nearly instant feedback about your product offerings and promotions, and gain...