By Suzanne James
January 30

What Should I Sell Online?

The most important question an ecommerce business owner will ever ask is ‘What do I sell?’ The right choice will launch the e-tailer into the elite group of dotcom millionaires. The wrong answer will leave the ecommerce business owner struggling for years, wondering if they were ‘taken’ by the entire internet scheme.

Most business owners make two classic mistakes when they start:

SATURATED MARKETS

They try to pick an item that everyone is selling: DVDs, electronics, designer clothing, video games, books, and web hosting services.  They enter these saturated markets and prepare to go ‘head to head’ with the giants.

To succeed they must invest hundreds of thousands into Pay Per Click campaigns, web designs, and inventory.

DREAM BUSINESS

The second mistake is starting a dream business. All motivational speakers have stories about the entrepreneurs who started a bridal shop or a couple who invested their life savings into a dream franchise. The market may be there, but they may not be able to move the product over the internet.

Where to Find Ideas

The number of websites dedicated to help people start home based businesses is expoding. These sites list hundreds of businesses you can start, and help you find millions of products to sell. They are full of ideas.

These sites help consumers learn how to do their own market research, develop a niche, create a target product line, hone their management skills, and teach them how to sell online.

There are some basics. For example, one well known ‘secret’ is surfing Google to find AdWords campaigns that have less than 15 businesses or products in the campaign.  This means that the market is not saturated. Next, look for communitites. If you find niche communities, but few advertisers, you located an underserviced product or service.

Walking away from the computer will also help you find products to sell that are moving well in the real world, but are neglected in cyberspace.

The lifestyle section of newspapers and magazines are rich in resources and ideas that tap into consumer’s trends, their wants, and their needs. What products have major marketing campaigns spanned through several publications, but the net hasn’t yet caught on to the under serviced market.

A trade magazine is one that sustains itself by focusing on a specific, narrow, niche. Each reveals a hobby or niche market that may be overlooked by most other e-tailers.

Look in the movies and local shopping malls. Where are retailers putting their money? What items are in the settings of the movies? Are there things that are already being promoted through ‘silent advertising’ but may have been overlooked by e-tailers?
Next, visit the trend spotting websites. Hit the local business development offices. Collect all the statistics you can. Eventually, something will pop out.

Make a List

Keep a journal, or a spread sheet.  Make a list of ideas. When the list reaches 200 items, pare it down to the top 50. Then continue building the list again.

This is what ‘systems analysts’ do when solving problems, and looking for ‘unusual ideas.’ They assume that the first 100 or so ideas are common, over used, and most likely flawed. A systems analysts, or market analysts, may refine this list 2 or 3 times. The last 50 items on the list are often pure gold.

Now is the time to do the research. Start measuring ease of marketing, web communities, calculate the profit margin and marketing costs. When finished, the business owner will have a solid visual aid that will compare several products. One product will stand out as the perfect product to sell.

March 7th, 2012
By Edmond Hong

Often big marketing comes to mind when you consider small business, and perhaps you are right to think that way. The scope has changed significantly since the introduction of the Internet. The opportunities for business the Internet has fashioned are unrestricted. Staying ahead of the wave is the secret to success nowadays and its not just big multinational companies with huge marketing budgets that have the edge. What is required is a innovative marketing strategy that will propel your business the levels you may have only dreamt of.

Create Momentum for Online Authority

A Professional Website That Stands Out

Maintenance of your professional website is paramount when it comes to website marketing dominance. Consistent and up to date information is needed to ensure you attract not only new, but recurring customers to your site. Word of mouth should never be underestimated.

With an attractive, informative website that provides current and useful information by way of promotions, sales on products and services, is an effective guarantee that your customers return and inform their friends and family to visit as well.

Opt in lists are an effective way to build an email list of subscribers to your site. By using this method you are able to inform customers of upcoming sales and events that you may have scheduled.

SEO or Search Engine Optimization is a method that should not be ignored. SEO strategies will ensure you are competitive in the search engines and receive targeted traffic to your website. No traffic, no sales.

Social Media for the Competitive Edge

Blog Your Way to Success

Blogging is an effective method of increasing traffic to your website. Blogging about your website has become a successful method of communication between small businesses and prospective customers. It’s the perfect avenue to interact with your readers when it comes to your explaining your products and services. Be sure to respond to your readers queries promptly to avoid them becoming irritated with no answers to their enquiries. Build trust with your customers and establish yourself as an expert to safeguard their return.

Facebook

Facebook marketing for business has become somewhat of an online phenomenon, with over 100 million daily users. It’s advantageous to know your way around the site to maximize and catapult your business to the next level. Creating a buzz or some type of hype that has people flocking to your site and sharing your information with their friends is a clever marketing strategy. This is easily accomplished by creating a Facebook page and sharing with your subscribers who visit your website. You can achieve this by simply adding a Facebook widget that is easily visible on your website pages.

Keep the content on your Facebook page fresh and relevant. You can promote special offers and any other appropriate information for your customers. Photo’s are video clips are especially popular to convey your business products and services. Business logo’s can be used as your profile pictures for maximum value. To learn more about this, you could visit the daily Facebook marketing blog here.

As mentioned, widgets are the best method to create your fans base. The widgets are conveniently provided by Facebook to promote your page and are very user friendly to implement to your website. Facebook ads are another effective method to promote your page on the entire site. While a Facebook page is free presently, you will need to purchase your ads or perhaps you would rather expend your budget to buy Facebook fans to create an instantaneous fan base.

Authenticity is the most successful attribute of your Facebook page, so keep it tangible. People like to feel that they are important to you, so visitor interaction is fundamental. Take the time to interrelate with your visitors as you would with someone you know, to ensure their return. Build trust by letting your visitors know you are a real person, upload items of your own personal interest, such as a personal photo’s taken from a memorable event in your life. By coming across as a real person rather that just a business, you gain visitors trust. Make sure you stay ahead of the eight ball and keep up with the ever-changing world on Facebook.

Twitter

Twitter, used effectively is an effective device when it comes to social networking. Think in terms of Twitter as a continuation of your blog. Keep tweets short and to the point, relating to your brand and link Twitter to all other social media pages for an effective marketing campaign.

Twitter is a very effective method to announce press releases or interesting links to your page and other useful information that your readers may find motivating. Make sure you display your Twitter widget on your website to incite valuable discussion.

LinkedIn

LinkedIn is hailed as the largest business-networking site in the world. Besides being an successful resume site, the ranking authority LinkedIn holds with Google is extremely powerful for any business. It is extremely likely that your LinkedIn profile will be displayed on page one of Google, should your name be searched. Integrity is elevated making it a worthwhile venture to create a LinkedIn profile for your business. Also be sure to link to your website and blog.

Take Advantage of Mobile Optimization

Smartphones are taking the marketing world by storm. To stay abreast of advanced technology it is wise to implement strategies such as Mobile Optimization to gain that competitive edge. In today’s fast paced world of progressive technological equipment, mobile phones are over taking from personal computers as the preferred tool for Internet surfing, emailing and purchasing online. Make sure you are detected by applying a smart strategy using mobile marketing, as there are an ever-increasing number of consumers finding local businesses via their smartphones. Sites such as Google Places, Yahoo Local, Yelp and Citysearch are excellent sites to get on board with to make your marketing plan successful.

Information Marketing Explored

Testimonial Audio/Video

Creating a testimonial audio or YouTube video to promote on your businesses website is amongst some of the most effective marketing tactics that small business can apply. Being easy to make and promote, it gives your customers honest evaluations of your business from satisfied customers. It promotes authenticity from content clients without the hard sales pitch that is so off putting to many people. Webinars have become immensely popular to also gain attention for your business.

Also massively prevalent are E-books.

These electronic books are easily downloaded so your customers have them in seconds following payment. With the introduction of the Kindle, E-books are set to explode even further as a practical marketing solution strategy for many small businesses.

What works for some small businesses may not necessarily work for the next. Reaching your particular target audience takes fine-tuning. By being original and inventive and thinking outside of the box is what you’ll need to have a successful online marketing campaign.

Summary:

In this day and age, staying abreast of the competitive takes time and can be challenging to find the right balance. However, by being aggressive and using online marketing tactics such as social media marketing, you can see your businesses potential soar to new heights.

• Kick start your businesses online existence by increasing traffic to your highly professional website using search engine optimization
• Use Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, blogs and other social media to draw in potential customers and liaise directly with them
• For those fast moving people, mobile optimization is the most effective method to keep up with their pace
• Implement video and audio marketing technology to build trust and communicate vital information in a few short minutes.

About the Author:

Edmond Hong’s expert small business marketing strategies have been presented in respected media such as the New York Times and the Age Australian Business section. He owns a social marketing business where celebrities and marketers could buy facebook fans to increase their social credibility online instantly. He possesses two degrees, one in Civil Engineering and the other in Business Marketing, both from Monash University in Melbourne, Australia – where he currently resides. He spends his spare time writing and educating business people.

April 30, 2012

By Matt Bramowicz

Business is not what it used to be.

While in the past it may have been acceptable practice for a small or medium-sized business to cater only to its native language market, it is no longer the case.  From the onset, small businesses are already at a disadvantage.  Whether the company relies on boot-strapping or bank loans to cover expenses, resources are extremely limited, and profits may not even be seen for years.  Add on top of that a bad economy, an over-crowded marketplace, difficulty in finding local clients, rising interest and tax rates, etc., and it seems like there is no way a small business can succeed.

Since big businesses have seemingly unlimited funds, many of the problems affecting small businesses are not a huge concern for them.  Besides the already established name recognition, they have the money to spend on advertising campaigns, enticing employment opportunities to hire the best workers, established business connections, investors, lawyers…the list can go on.

As the business-stage continues to expand globally, small and medium-sized businesses can easily be left out of the spotlight since bigger companies with an already established identity tend to have more experience dealing with foreign audiences. But that doesn’t have to be the case.  Thanks to the rise of technology and ecommerce, a small business can have the ability to compete, even on the global scale, with their big business counterparts.

The first step to going global, however, is research.  Due to the economic downturn, it’s important for businesses to choose which markets to cater to that will benefit them the most.  All of the necessary data regarding a country’s Foreign Direct Investment, Gross Domestic Product, and Ease of Doing Business Ranking are available online from the World Bank (http://data.worldbank.org/).

Some countries are safer investments than others.

According to the latest ranking of top countries for overseas investment, China tops the list.  As China continues to grow both economically and industrially, foreign investors are eagerly lining up to invest in its internal market.  The United States ranks second, up one spot from last year, followed closely by India.  India is widely known for its great nonfinancial, financial, and industrial service opportunities, but navigation of the business environment may be a bit tricky to those unfamiliar with their practices.  Brazil, Germany, Poland, Australia, Mexico, Canada, and the United Kingdom round out the top ten, respectively.

But success isn’t guaranteed simply because a country is ranked high on the list.  Before any company dives headfirst into any new foreign market, they must be certain they are familiar with the business environment.  Without proper research, the attempt can be disastrous, as each market has its own share of localized intricacies that must be taken into account.

In China it is customary to be familiar with the country’s five-year plan which helps to understand the current and future business climate.  In India, businesspeople do not usually offer their advice or even disagree if they are given instructions.  For their input on how a task could be done more effectively, it is advisable to actively ask what their opinions or suggestions may be.  In Japan, it is considered impolite to say ‘no’ outright.  Refusals are either implied, avoided or someone might simply not reply at all.

Without prior knowledge to these different business practices, misunderstandings could ensue, which could lead to some very serious problems.  Therefore, as an outsider it is even more important to show respect for a foreign market’s customs for the sake of both parties involved.  Information on foreign business etiquette and culture can be found on the World Business Culture website: www.worldbusinessculture.com.

As the business paradigm shifts globally, smaller businesses can utilize new technological resources to help ease them into new markets.

For the majority of foreign business transactions, all documents, business cards, presentations, etc., should be translated into the foreign business associate’s native language, as well as English, even if they can speak it fluently.  It is the standard custom, and failure to do so could be interpreted as disrespectful.

While foreign business etiquette rules can be researched and adopted fairly easily with the proper resources, translating necessary documents still require more outside assistance.

In the past, translating was done exclusively by professional translation agencies and freelance translators.  In today’s tech-oriented business world, however, there are more options available to help small businesses conquer the language barrier.

In the past few years, significant attention and development has gone into  machine translation tools in an effort to make them more accurate and grammatically correct.

As a result, two different systems have evolved:

· Rule-based systems, where rules of grammar and syntax along with individual language vocabulary are manually coded into a computer.

· Statistical machine translation (SMT), where computers analyze millions of existing translated documents from the web to learn vocabulary and look for patterns in language.

Yahoo Babelfish and Bing Translator both employ rule-based systems, which statistically perform better than the SMT system for short texts and Asian languages.  However, Google Translate, which is based on the SMT system, outperforms rule-based systems for longer texts and has the ability to easily improve accuracy as more translated documents become available on the web.

As highly developed as machine translations have become since their inception, they still are not foolproof, and therefore are unreliable as a legitimate translation tool when professionalism is a necessity.  In business, everything that is put out to the public or to associates reflects on the company as a whole.  Grammatically incorrect or mis-translated texts give the impression that a company either does not care about its foreign business associates, or worse, is amateur and lacks the proper skill set to run a business.

Small businesses are seeking alternatives to machine translations and costly professional translators.

A few new companies have developed solutions to help small businesses receive quality translations without breaking the bank.

One method, known as post-editing or hybrid translation, combines machine translation and human translators.  Once text initially passes through machine translation, a human translator or a group of translators review the translation, making any necessary changes.  This process allows for a faster turn around time as well as lower costs.

Translation Cloud, www.translationcloud.net, is one example of a program that makes use of this method.  Translation Cloud utilizes its database of over 10,000 translators who connect to the system via their Facebook accounts. Users of Translation Cloud receive more accurate translations at a much cheaper rate.  This method of post-editing also takes advantage of crowdsourcing, another relatively new concept that is gaining popularity.

Websites such as Facebook and Twitter have both relied on crowdsourcing translation and localization of their websites in order to reach a broader foreign market.  Crowdsourcing is specifically effective when those who are supplying the crowdsourced translation are familiar with the product or company.

Smartling, www.smartling.com, is an example of a company that relies solely on crowdsourcing for delivering fast and accurate website translations.  Their software allows a group of translators who were invited to work on a specific project to easily visit the customer’s website and translate whatever text they wish, directly on the site.

While these programs are more effective than machine translators at supplying accurate translations, they still cost money.  A relatively new website called Ackuna, www.ackuna.com, addresses that problem by providing a completely free and open community-based platform, specifically focused on sharing translations.

Those who are in need of translation services, as well as those who wish to volunteer their language aptitude, can create a free account to either post requests or translate other people’s requests.  Translations are voted up or down by other users in the community, and translators who provide accurate translations receive badges as rewards.  The concept is similar to Quora, www.quora.com, where users post questions or answers on any topic to other users.

As technology advances, solutions will continue to grow.  Right now, Duolingo, www.duolingo.com, is working on developing a program where its users can learn a new language for free, while simultaneously helping to translate the web through the language lessons.

For small businesses on a strict budget, any of these solutions could certainly be of great value for tackling the language barrier issue.

In the end, it is up to the business owner to determine what he or she wishes to accomplish, research the methods needed to make it happen, and utilize the appropriate resources.  While the business landscape has changed in recent years, as technology continues to grow, opportunities for small businesses to succeed will continue to grow as well. It is just a matter of learning to take advantage of them.

Author Bio

Matt Bramowicz grew up in New Jersey and attended Dickinson College in Pennsylvania, where he received a degree in English and minored in Fine Arts.  He now works as the head of PR/Marketing and as a graphic designer for Translation Services USA, a startup translation and technology company located in New York City.

Translation Services USA has developed social networking applications such as Translationcloud.net and Ackuna.com.

April 23, 2012

By Guest Author

There are so many things involved in owning your own online shop.  Customer acquisition, product management, shopping cart software, and shipping costs are just a few of the big concerns!  After you’ve got everything set-up and settled in, you get to start making decisions about shipping.  Shipping costs can really drain your profit margin but there are many ways of bringing down the costs of international shipping in an effective manner. The key to reducing the costs is to research well before hiring any particular company. The basic facts of reducing the expenses of international shipping are usually ignored so we’ll discuss them with this article.

International product shipping has never been cheap. We can, however, reduce some of the extra expenses in international shipping by keeping in mind the following things:

• Research The Costs Of  Other Companies – In order to minimize the expense of international shipping, it is important to be familiar with the shipping rates of all relevant companies.  Knowing the current shipping rates will help you chose the most competitive company with the best deals in terms of service and cost.
• Being Aware Of Hidden Costs – It is important to properly read the fine print, the terms and conditions of a company, before hiring it. Every company must state this information clearly in advance so seek it out in order to avoid paying extra.  Rules like this are undoubtedly in play because some companies will try to be tricky about charging extra in emergency or unforeseen situations.
• Garner Discounts – It is advisable to know about the ‘Truckload’ and ‘Less Than Truckload’ shipments that are going to be made by you within a span of 30 days. This will allow you to bargain as certain companies give attractive discounts for larger orders or specific order sizes.
• Making Adjustments In Advance – The major cost of the international shipping actually lie in the cargo weight. It is important to pre-determine the weight of the cargo before you arrange for shipping. Adjustments in the cargo weight can be made as needed, which can be extremely useful in cutting down unnecessary cargo costs.
• Confirm If Company Has Insurance – The last thing you want to end up with is damaged or misplaced product and no insurance. This situation can be avoided by checking if the company has insurance… it should be the first question you ask.  Companies having insurance are more likely to work with you and pay back the loss, saving you a lot of money and money.  It’s important to add that some companies lie about having insurance so after you have made a mental decision, it doesn’t hurt to verify the insurance with the claimed company.
• Check For Cheap Shipment Companies – There are many times when the shipping companies reduce their charges to a great extent, some days prior to the shipment. This is because the ship is not loaded with the right amount of shipment. This can be a very attractive and effective way of reducing shipment charges.

It’s true that international shipping can be very expensive but the unnecessary costs can be easily cut down by being aware of  the best companies and their services and making sure you’re protected. Finding company information and requesting quotes online has never been easier! The services of Australia Shipping is a good place to start when researching international shipping.

April 2, 2012

By John Trimble

With more and more businesses dealing online, having effective inventory management software is key to handling the difference between profit and loss.

If you’re in the process of selecting a stock control eCommerce software, you should pay special attention to how your back office integrates while reviewing solutions.  There are two main possible back office solutions from an eCommerce perspective:

1. An eCommerce Solution which integrates into your existing stock control and warehouse management systems.
2. An eCommerce solution which incorporates built in warehouse and stock control modules.

Option 1 presents a solution which will require both your eCommerce software and back office providers to work closely together to make sure integration is as painless as possible. This option can be very cost effective if the integration doesn’t require too much customization.

Option 2 relates to the latest generation of eCommerce solutions which include functionality for full inventory control and warehouse management and often contain additional support for supply chain and customer relationship management.

If you’re going down the route of providing a package which includes an integrated back office or a new stand alone solution, there are several key bits of functionality you should look for if you are running an eCommerce business that doesn’t use drop shipping:

Inventory Control Software as a Service

Although few vendors within the industry provide Stock Control Software as a Service (SCSaaS) there are various benefits over the traditional proprietary stock control software model:

• No Large One Off Costs: Traditional stock control software normally involves a hefty upfront fee, SCSaaS differs from this as you get full access to the software for a monthly or yearly fee.
• Trouble-Free Upgrades: Because the SCSaaS solution provider manages the updates and upgrades, there is little exposure to issues involved in downloading and installing software updates.
• Reduced IT Costs: As the software is hosted off-site in the cloud by the SCSaaS provider there is no associated IT infrastructure or staffing costs.
• Globally Accessible: One of the prime benefits of Stock Control Software as a Service is the ability to access it anywhere in the world, provided you have internet access.

Ad-Hoc Goods Saved

In a less rigid warehousing environment, modern stock control solutions can be used to specifically tell the system where each item is going to go, as the item is being saved. For example, as stock is received the system will put the stock into a quarantine location. The user will then be able to scan an item and decide whereabouts they would like to put it.

Stock Replenishment

Most sophisticated stock control software also allows for effective dealing of large reserves of stock in bulk/overspill areas of your warehouse, which can often create difficulties in terms of monitoring the transitions of stock from your overspill to picking areas. These types of stock replenishment systems can intelligently prompt you to move your stock as and when it is needed.

Automatic Allocation of Stock to Orders:

Save time by automating the allocation of inventory to the order process. Enable orders to be picked-up quicker which will enhances the customer experience.

Intelligent purchasing:

With real-time inventory and forecasting logic, most leading Inventory Management Software solutions allow you to simultaneously reduce back orders and stockholdings, further driving efficiency in your warehouse and business.

Guest Author Bio

John Trimble is the Head of Search for ecommerce software and back office solution providers Exact Abacus Ltd. They provide integrated ecommerce, stock control and warehouse management system to both the SME and low end Enterprise Market

March 26th, 2012
By Ken Levy

Personalized product recommendation is a great tool for bringing tailored new product suggestions to a consumer who is in the process of shopping online.  It is used to suggest products to buy with with the current product choice and can convert a ‘window shopper’ into a buyer if their current product was not the correct choice and they needed encouragement to their ideal product. Product recommendation is personalized to the individual and is used to help up-sell and cross-sell customers on items they may not have considered otherwise. A perfect example of this would be the fries you get with your burger, or the gum and magazines at the grocery store check-out. Now consider what would happen if the clerk knew you had a sweet spot for Hershey bars?

While many people obviously see the value in recommending similar and complimentary products to online shoppers, it’s often hard to determine the ROI beyond the basics of increased sales. Below are a few ideas and metrics to watch for:

Conversion Rate or Sales Lift:

Google Analytics can be custom programmed for A/B testing. This is where half of the shoppers (group A) see recommendations and the other half of shoppers (group B) do not see any recommendations. The difference in sales between A and B is the Sales lift. While this is certainly something to consider trying, testing can be expensive and may not always give you a true picture of conversions.

Event Tracking:

Google Analytics enables event tracking. By triggering an event when a shopper clicks on a recommendation, you can look at your favorite reports, in fact any Google report, and view the report in terms of all visits and those that clicked on recommendation. This means that if a shopper clicks on a recommendation and buys it (alone or with something else) the purchase is associated with a recommendation. However, this does not account for actions such as the consumer leaving the webpage and coming back later to purchase the product.

Those are Good Starting Points, but Don’t Forget About These Too:

While sales lift and amount of sales as measured by Google Analytics is a good place to start your ROI research, as evidenced above, they don’t always give you the full picture of benefits your recommendation services are providing. Here are a few other ideas for measuring ROI when it comes to product recommendations:

Time On Site

Time on Site Recommendations entice shoppers to spend more time on a web site, an added benefit that will boost SEO efforts. Google and other search engines use quality scores and click-through rates to determine the strength of a company. When recommendations encourage a shopper to spend more time on a website, Google will “score” these businesses higher and as a result, the company listing will be raised in organic search results, ultimately making it even easier for shoppers to find you.

Products Viewed Per Site:

There will be an increase in the total items viewed per site when using product recommendations, often 3 times or better when compared to shoppers who do not use recommendations. Again, this leads to greater customer engagement and a lower bounce rate.

Lifetime Value of the Customer

By providing the “right” products through recommendations, a shopper is more likely to remember the positive experience, come back to the store at a later time and buy something else. (And most likely will tell others about you too!)

Further Comparisons in Analytics

Two other items to take note of as you delve into analytics are comparing visitors who clicked on recommendations vs. all visitors, and the difference between visitors who clicked on recommendations vs. those who did not. The uplift in metrics for those who do click on recommendations can be significant, reinforcing you really are engaging your customers.

Because Google Analytics tracks just about everything, you can slice ’n’ dice your data in a seemingly endless variety of ways such as looking at these stats by page type and recommendations type, so you can see how cross-sell compares to up-sell in the product page, shopping cart, etc. But be careful – you just might get cross-eyed with all these stats!

While it’s no secret that recommendations help boost sales overall, it’s important to know how and where those sales are being boosted. Customer engagement, time on site, loyalty – these are all important analytics to measure alongside an increase in profits. By drilling deeper into the stats, you’ll amass a wealth of knowledge that can be used to sharpen future campaigns.

Guest Author Bio

Ken Levy, CEO and co-founder of 4-Tell, a product recommendation service, is passionate about helping his customers give their online shoppers the best experience possible. To reach him, email Ken@4-Tell.com or visit www.4-tell.com.

March 1, 2012
By Diana Maria

Google is the leading name in search domain and with its social networking site, Google is set to take a major share of the social market. Although they do not have a business page for marketers, its features are being utilized by strategists all over the world. Once Google+ launches its “brand pages”, business marketers will be able to target their customers by demographic, tastes, purchasing habits, etc. If you are finding difficulties in marketing your business on Google+, here are some tips you may benefit from:

1. As a business owner, the very first thing you need to have is an attractive and catchy mini-bio of your profile. This information will be shown in the designed hovercraft in the Google+ profile.  Often this mini bio encourages users to “follow” you on Google+.  Apart from the short description, you need to provide a relevant description about you and your organization.

2. While marketing your brand, it is essential to create a page on Google+ and include a link to that page on your website. The easiest process is to create a Google badge on your website. A badge is set of code that you can script into your site to display the link. Also add the ‘+1′ button to the bottom of that badge.  Google has previously stated that gaining +1′s can help market and improve your site performance. The key here is to not underestimate the +1 feature.

3. Establish your presence on Google+ and wait for an audience. Since Google+ is still in its initial stage, it may be that a majority of your customers and competitors have not yet joined it. Use this time period to build a solid foundation and establish yourself as a leader in your media. Try to figure out what problems your customers are facing on other social media outlets and develop strategies to solve them.

4. Several Google+ features, such as circles, can be beneficial for you. Use this circle feature to communicate with your potential clients. Use special invitations such as a talk with the project manager in a real time multi user video chat. This may prove beneficial for your brand and can be an innovative marketing strategy.

5. Just like search engines, Google+ provides an interactive search feature. Look for your industry related keywords and use them in the description of your page on Google+.

As a marketer you should be able to sort out what your future preferences are and who the target customers are. Early adoption of such methodologies can give you a definite edge over your competitors on Google+.

Keep yourself updated with the latest development and news to maximize benefits as Google+ will soon launch its “brand pages” for the marketers.

About the author: Diana Maria is a blogger by profession. She loves writing on technology and luxury. Beside this she is fond of books. She recently bought a book on high waisted jeans from a book fare. These days she is busy in witting an article on outdoor kitchens

February 3, 2012
By Richard Fisher

Building a website and keeping it running is one thing but maintaining it is another. It is crucial to keep constantly change your website design. As time passes, the taste and preference of countless internet users change. Furthermore, integrating the latest internet trend into your website design can be a key reason for its success.

Refreshingly Interesting
One key reason why you should change your website is design is to keep it fresh and entertaining. If your website has been up for quite a while and there is no change to the interface, navigation and design, internet users will stop visiting it. Change is a great way to draw new visitors to your website and keep the current members at bay.

Integrations
Expansion is another significant reason why the design of a website may need to be changed. If you desire to integrate flash or other multimedia applications into your website, you may need to expand on it so that the content still matches with the new changes. You would not need a page labeled tutorials if you plan to introduce a link to your YouTube channel. Hence it is important to redesign your website periodically.

Shifting Focus
Most website owners use web analytical techniques to analyze the traffic on their website. If you start noticing that users are becoming more focused on your blogs, redesign your website to focus more on blogs. If you note that most users love your video tutorials, try incorporating separate video links on your website rather than a single link to your YouTube channel.

Start-up Sites
In many cases, the website is produced so that it is cheap, simple and effective. In time, and with increasing funds, the site starts to expand. It is essential that start-up sites keep changing their designs as they grow. If the site is design keeps improving, visitors will know that they are growing ñ a god reason to keep them around longer.

Performance
When features are added or removed, the website has to have a few modifications made to its design in order to ensure that it is running optimally. Nothing slows down a system/website like wasteful space. You may need to search for a particular article you have on your website. If you had removed the content from a section of your website but not the page, the system will still search that page for content. This can consume a lot of resources that could be better used elsewhere.

Whether it is the changing preferences, times or requirements, it is essential that a website is kept as up-to-date and fresh as possible. However, you need to ensure that the navigation is not changed too much or it will be difficult for visitors to keep track of the site.

Author Bio: Richard is an experienced Magento development specialist with over 4 years experience.

January 17, 2012
By Andrey Zavyalov, Wrightimc.com

When you decide to start an online business, you start with one question, “What should I sell?” The next question then becomes, “Where do I get the products to sell?”
When you’re making that decision, how you plan to manage your inventory should be a primary consideration. The most common ways to fulfill your customers’ orders are through drop shipping, product fulfillment services, and shipping from your own stocked inventory. Ecommerce stores can utilize one, or a combination of these techniques. If you need an inventory sourcing strategy, read below for information about which of the three techniques will work best for your business needs.

Drop Shipping

Drop shipping is an excellent way to start your business and try out new products to sell. It does not require that you stock inventory, hence there are no upfront investments. By using drop shipping, business owners can invest money in marketing instead of inventory, thus earning income right away. For existing businesses, drop shipping can do a number of things. It is a great way to expand a store’s merchandise, test how well new products sell, and foresee what kind of ROI they can expect from certain products. For businesses that keep their stock, this is a great way to discover the amount of merchandise they should keep on hand. By testing products with the drop shipping service prior to making large purchases, business owners can keep their warehouses “lean.”

There are two different ways to access a drop shipping service. You can work with a drop shipping company. The companies usually offer large quantities of products, product data, discounts, and out of stock products. Some of the bigger suppliers will offer these updates hourly. Some will also offer integration services for some of the standard shopping carts. This would completely automate the inventory tracking tasks. Although it is one of the easiest and most convenient ways to get inventory for your store, there are a few downsides to working with this type of supplier. For instance, most of the time, these suppliers will mark up the product and/or charge monthly membership fees. As a business owner, you will have to justify the cost of service and see if it fits your business model. Another thing to keep in mind when it comes to drop shipping is these companies usually have many subscribers. In other words, many stores sell the exact same products which can lead to aggressive retail pricing, which might absorb most of your profits.

Another drop shipping program option is to sign up with a manufacturer or an importer. There are plenty of manufacturers and importers that offer this service and will drop ship directly to your customers. The benefit to this option is that they don’t charge monthly fees and do not mark up their prices. There are a variety of services available to search for wholesalers or manufacturers who offer drop shipping services. Among the most well-known are, World Wide Brands and Salehoo. The downside of working with manufacturers or importers directly is that their own inventory management systems are not as robust as pure drop shipping services. Therefore, you might not always know what their stock levels are, and from time to time, you may run into cases where you’ve sold an item to your customer and the supplier is out of stock. This can cause frustrations for business owner and dissatisfaction from customers.

Fulfillment Service

Fulfillment services are an excellent way to outsource your warehousing if your company would like to purchase inventory but does not want to invest in warehouse space and employees to manage it. This service is also great if your business expands very rapidly and you need to outsource extra work and inventory. The great part about this service is that business owners can stock just a few items or a truckload – if not a shipload of inventory. Often, you will be offered cheaper shipping rates since these companies ship thousands of items daily. Not to mention, they get considerably better rates from the shipping service providers than individual ecommerce owners. Many companies offer fulfillment services, but Amazon Fulfillment Services and Ship Wire are the leaders. The downside of this inventory sourcing method is the cost. Fulfillment services charge for warehouse space and handling services, though the cost may be worth the time and resources saved.

Stock Products Yourself

By stocking products yourself, you get the most control over inventory. You can receive better prices since most wholesalers are willing to lower the cost if you buy in bulk. This, in turn, will increase your profits per product. There are many wholesalers who do not offer drop shipping, so you must buy in quantity and warehouse the item yourself. This creates barriers to entry, which means less competition. The downside is that it creates a lot of additional work. There will be substantial rent/mortgage, warehouse worker wages, and inventory carrying costs.
If a business owner does not have previous experience with inventory management, this can quickly get out of hands. To avoid problems and better manage inventory, business owners can utilize barcode scanners and barcode equipment. Utilizing barcodes makes it much easier to track inventory levels and the location of each item. You can purchase barcode equipment from many places, but System ID is a prominent leader in the industry. They offer a wide selection of top brands of barcode equipment and inventory software. They will assist you in this process with consultations on what your specific business needs may be.

As you can see, there is no standard formula that every business should use. I hope this overview will help business owners make the right decisions about inventory sourcing techniques since inventory sourcing can make or break any business.

January 5, 2012
By Myron.com

The Internet is king these days, and fewer companies can come up with good enough reasons not to offer their products online. The few companies that haven’t adopted online shopping are more likely to lose business as the interest in shopping electronically grows.

Borders Bookstores, America’s second largest book selling chain, recently had to close its doors for good, due in large part to their late introduction into the online business. While Amazon grew in popularity due to its convenience and pricing, Borders failed to respond, and as e-readers began taking over large portions of the market, Borders ignored the warning signs. This all resulted in crippling debt that forced the major chain to liquidate and shut down.

Internet sales can contribute to a huge portion of a company’s profit. Conversely, the lack of that option can result in a loss of sales. It is important, therefore, to make sure that your business not only has an e-commerce component, but also that these sales possibilities are easily recognizable to the average consumer.

Consider getting the word out about your online department through the use of free giveaways and promotional products. By adding your URL to promotional products, you will give potential customers an easy way to visit and shop on your website.

It’s important to have the right address on the product. If your main web page does not have easy access to your online shopping section, it may be a better idea to print the URL for your online shopping section instead or fix your website to make it easier to navigate.

You should also make sure the promotional product you print the web address on is appropriate for the occasion. If your company sells paper goods but you print the URL on a coffee mug, the connection won’t be drawn and the URL will go to waste. Place it on something more applicable and useful, like a pen or a pad of note-taking paper. This will allow customers to write down what they’re looking for and have the address handy when it comes time to order.

Myron manufactures quality custom promotional products and works with closely with business to integrate these items in their marketing mix. Check out Myron.com to contact a customer representative or visit their blog if you have any questions on how you can promote your business.

December 29, 2011
By Outright.com

There are two kinds of posts that are inevitable this time of year. One is the never-ending barrage of holiday posts, telling you everything and anything you would ever want to hear about buying and selling. The other, of course, is the end-of-the-year-get-ready-for-tax-season post. We hate to tell you, but you’re reading the latter!

Wait, though, before we click away for another year-end best music list. This tax season blog post at least has a focus, and that’s to tell you all about the PayPal 1099-K.

Is It a Fancy New Car?

Unfortunately, no. The tax form PayPal 1099 is a new form that PayPal uses to report earnings to their users. If you have an online store, for instance, and you collect your earnings via PayPal, you may receive the 1099 tax form in the mail in early 2012.
Before, you would simply perform the task of figuring out your taxes owed with no interference from PayPal. They were simply a way you would bring in the money from your customers. Now however, due to new legislation, the IRS requires PayPal to report earnings. Since their earnings come from users like you, they now will send out the new 2012 1099k for online sellers.

That is, if you’re qualified. You see, not everyone gets the new form, as it’s for a very specific subset of sellers. There are two requirements you must meet to get the new 2012 1099s for online sellers.

- Must make over $20,000 of sales online in 2011
- Must have made that $20K in 200 or more sales

If you hit those two requirements, then you’re going to receive the form in the mail come January or so. If not, then it’s business as usual.

What Do I Do?

Well, it turns out, not much. The only real difference is PayPal is now telling you how much you made in 2011 instead of you having to figure it out on your own.

But PayPal isn’t infallible. They may get it wrong or make a mistake, which is why it is vital that you keep good records of each and every sale and expense in your business. Why we say it’s a good idea this year, however, is you don’t want to end up paying more than you should. Since this is PayPal’s first year sending the new 2012 1099 instructions out, there may be a hitch or two. You just want to be prepared.

Tracking expenses is doubly important as the 1099 doesn’t track that at all. You are still required to keep accurate records of everything you pay out to keep your business afloat. If you don’t accurately report it all, you’ll either pay more in or risk being audited – neither of which is any fun!

This guest post was brought to you by Outright.com. For more about the PayPal 1099-K and other tax time advice, visit the Outright Tax Center!

December 7, 2011
By Michael Smith,  Author of eBusiness Buddy

Using the Internet as a sales channel can be a highly beneficial business activity that can lead to significant growth in customers and revenue. For a small business, eCommerce makes it possible to grow from a local presence to a global one without the costs and hassle of physical expansion. However, with small businesses often having limited time, money, and expertise, eCommerce may seem like a risk not worth taking, even if it looks highly lucrative at first glance. A small business might be concerned about the technology of selling online, how to manage an online store, or whether or not selling online can be a successful endeavor.

Concerns About Technology
Small businesses often don’t have the expertise, infrastructure, or budget to support high-tech ventures, and with eCommerce being rooted in Internet technology, there is the concern that selling online is therefore out of reach. Sometimes, there can also be the belief that only technology experts can participate in eCommerce, and that the management of technical concerns is something that businesses are expected to handle alone and internally.

Fortunately for a non-technical small business, when it comes to setting up eCommerce you can pass on such concerns to external web developers, or use a hosted storefront, which is a service that provides a simple template-based environment for designing and operating an online store. In either case, the technology concerns are taken out of your hands, meaning that your small business doesn’t have to worry about such things when it comes to selling online.

Concerns About Internal Impacts
eCommerce can bring with it a significant change to your business operations, as you must be prepared to do business on a potentially worldwide scale. Warehousing and fulfillment responsibilities will be greater, and there will likely be an increase in overhead costs and staffing if you try to do everything from order management to packing and shipping alone. For a small business, such adjustments can be seemingly impossible, especially if coming from just a small local offline presence.

While your business will need to make adjustments in order to facilitate an online store, the process can be made easier by using the Internet to outsource some concerns to service providers. Fulfillment houses offer warehousing, order processing, and shipping in for much lower costs than doing it yourself, and can greatly reduce the overhead and hassle of managing these concerns internally. This makes selling online a realistic venture regardless of whether or not you have the necessary infrastructure. Even a home-based business is no longer held back from getting involved.

Concerns About Success
Unlike an offline presence that just spans a local area, an eCommerce business is vying for a share of a global marketplace, in competition with both large and small businesses all over the world. A small business with just a few staff and modest resources may wonder how it can possibly compete and be successful in such an environment, and that can make selling online seem like it isn’t worth the effort.

Success is not guaranteed, but a small business selling online isn’t doomed to failure either. Many simple and affordable online tools are available for a small business to take advantage of. Online marketing tools are cheap, accessible, and innovative which can help your business keep up with larger competitors. Online customer service and social tools can help a small business bring its personal touch to customers no matter where they are. And the ability to use the Internet to outsource everything from technology to fulfillment can make selling online possible for even the smallest of businesses.

Author Bio:

Michael Smith is a graduate of eBusiness studies with years of experience in a small business environment. He is the author of eBusiness Buddy, a website that assists small businesses in understanding and taking advantage of doing business online.

November 23, 2011
By Jimmy Rodriguez, CTO and co-founder of 3DCart

The words “cart abandonment” are enough to send shivers down a merchant’s spine and for good reason, average abandonment rates skyrocketed to 75 percent earlier this year!

The surprising numbers underline how important it is for merchants to put serious thought into how they can prevent and recover abandoned carts. And with the holiday boom already in full-swing, battling the Scrooge of the shopping-cart world becomes that much more important!

We say ‘Tis The Season’ to take back lost sales and convert more carts! With more shoppers prepared to purchase than any other time of the year, merchants need to go the extra mile to create an easy pain-free check out process. Just in time to capture the Holiday rush, here’s nine easy ways to decrease abandonment and capture more sales!
Abandon other carts! Go through the checkout process of big eCommerce retailers like

• Amazon.com and abandon your cart at various times. Take notes at how the most successful online stores recover sales.
• Offer familiar ways for customers to pay, including multiple payment portals like PayPal, Authorize.net and Amazon Checkout.
• Make your checkout process a single-page affair to keep the shopper’s interest.
• Include an ‘email me this’ button on product pages in case a shopper needs an easy reminder to come back later.
• Save shopping cart data, even if the form wasn’t completed.
• Feature security certificates prominently throughout the checkout process to offer customers peace-of-mind on the safety of their personal data.
• Make sure support links are showcased and open in a new window. That way the shopper can get the information they need without having to navigate away from the checkout page.
• Send timely, concise email messages to existing customers when they abandon carts. A smart inviting message can reignite interest while the customer is still considering the purchase.
• Capture email address information early in the checkout process so you can send reminder emails to new customers.

The above is an excerpt from 3dcart’s FREE eBook “12 Days of Online Shopping”. Download your copy today to automatically receive a $75 Google Adwords certificate & $100 Amazon Ad certificate and be entered to win one of 20 $100 Google Adwords certificate!

November 2, 2011
By Leigh Ashton, London-Based Author, Speaker, Trainer and Coach

However brilliant your ecommerce platform is, selling anything in this way usually means an automated, impersonal selling process, conducted with someone you’ve probably never met who could be some distance away in kilometers and maybe light years in culture.

So how can you engage with your customers and your potential customers in a more meaningful way that would increase your conversions and your repeat business? By incorporating psychological tools into your selling process.

In fact, you already are! But the psychological tools you are currently already using without realising, could in fact be turning away more customers than you are attracting. Ouch!

When I’m helping clients who have an ecommerce platform and rely heavily on the written word in their marketing, the same three major mistakes have tended to emerge. The aim is to eliminate these errors and replace them with some best practice techniques based on the psychology of selling – and the psychology of buying. The good news is it’s easy to do!

Here we go with mistake number 1…

1) Your marketing talks about WE – and doesn’t engage THEM

Pretty much most of the websites I see are written in a manner that research suggests is not engaging enough for the reader. Lots of time and money gets spent on search engine optimisation and traffic generation.

Yet, if you’re guilty of this mistake, there’s a good chance you’ll be turning these people away, losing leads and sales in the process.

So what’s the mistake? Writing in a style that just talks about ‘We do this…’ ‘We do that’, ‘we’re great at that’, ‘we won awards for this’. It’s called ‘we’ language and too many companies are ‘weing’ all over their sales as a result! So whether it’s your website, landing page, squeeze page, readers just glaze over and move on. Sales you achieve will probably be despite the website not because of it.

Solution? Change it to ‘YOU’ language. So if it currently says ‘we supply the finest work wear…..’ change it to ‘If you’re looking for work wear that…’.

Instead of ‘We offer…..’, it should read ‘You will get…’.

So make sure your copy is written in YOU language, from initial advertising, email campaigns, landing pages, order forms, confirmations, follow ups and the rest. You’ll find the levels of engagement increase with your enquirers – and you’ll convert at a higher level.

Onto mistake number 2…

2) They don’t buy for the reasons you think they do

So – if we’ve established that you might not have been engaging your target readers because you weren’t aware of the need for YOU language, what else could be wrong?

Something else that could have been sabotaging your sales is not realising why they buy, not knowing what their real motivation is.

Marketing prose will usually be written in the style of the person who writes it – written by them, aimed at people just like them. It’s natural.

So for example if the person writing it are themselves very goal focused, looking ahead at specific targets and how they’ll get there, their writing will reflect this and will contain talk about all of the gains that the prospective customer will have when they purchase your products.

But what about your prospective customers who aren’t goal and gain focused? What about those who are on your site because they’re looking to solve some pain that they’re experiencing? They’re trying to get away from a situation they find themselves in. They couldn’t care less about moving towards a goal, they just want to get away from their pain.

The problem is, if all your copy is goal focused, you won’t be very appealing to those who want to move away from pain. And there are an awful lot of people like them. And people in pain buy more quickly than those who aren’t.

Solution? Make sure your promotional copy reflects both camps – those in pain and looking to move away from it – and those goal focused individuals looking to get ahead and achieve their particular target. So if a gain orientated sentence reads ‘double your processing speed with the zyz drive …..’, then the pain orientated equivalent sentence would read something like ‘if you’re sick and tired of painfully slow process speed, you can avoid all that with the zyz drive…’.

Make sure you know what the most common pains and gains are amongst your target market. If you’re not absolutely sure, find out. List these and use these in your material before going on to explain how you would ease their pains.

Mistake number 3

3) You make it hard for them to buy!

Yes. Hard to believe. But true in many cases. When people visit your site they have at least started their journey towards making a purchase. By the way the phrase ‘time wasters’ is banned – barely anyone has got time to waste flicking through websites without some level of interest and purpose. It’s up to you to engage them.

When I visit some website I’m surprised they sell anything. It’s as if they’ve placed a ‘closed’ sign on their shop door.

Often it’s not clear what the customer is supposed to do, there’s no clear call to action, confusion reigns and for these reasons and those covered in mistake 1 and 2, people abandon their browse or worse, browse someone else’s site.

Here are a few pointers you might want to check your own site against.

Firstly, make it abundantly clear what you want people to do on each page – and make that call to action very visible without them having to scroll down to find the instruction. After all, isn’t it still a fact that a web page gets about 8 seconds to make an impression? Don’t complicate matters.

Your call to action might be to place an order, it might be to call a number, it might be to leave their contact details in return for free information. Decide on your call to action and make it unmissable on the page. If it’s a specific landing page/squeeze page, have no other distractions on the page that might potentially tempt them away.

We’ve talked above about the language to use and avoid. In addition, don’t talk about ‘price’ or ‘cost’, talk instead of ‘amount’ or ‘sum’. Instead of ‘Buy’ or ‘Submit’ on the button, put something like ‘Claim’ or ‘Join Up’ or ‘Yes, send me the…’. And while we’re on the button, so to speak, research tells us the best colour of a buy button is orange and the best colour for an order form/sign up box is green. Instead of saying such as ‘when you buy’, consider using ‘when you own’ instead.

Have a short, lively video on the page. This adds to the overall attractiveness and crucially will appeal to those who’d rather watch a short video that brings things to life than read a paragraph of prose.

Make sure you’ve got at least one powerful testimonial on each page, named and used with the permission of the person who commented. Testimonials are far more powerful than any creative copy writing.

Depending on your product, offer a money back guarantee. Too dangerous say some, yet those who offer it say that rarely if ever is this taken up and hardly ever abused as an offer. Yet very powerful and a deal breaker if your number one competitor does not offer one.

If you’re guilty of any or all of these mistakes, make it a priority to eliminate them and install the suggested solutions in their place. You’ll be sure to increase engagement with your site visitors, your conversions –and your bottom line.

About the Author

Leigh Ashton is an author, speaker, leader and coach who started her career in sales in 1984. Since 1986, Leigh has trained thousands of people to use psychology to make positive changes to their attitude, their approach and their sales results. She recently published her first book titled “iSell”, which explores why the psychology of a seller sometimes interferes with achieving great sales on a consistent basis. Leigh is based in London and can be found at www.sales-consultancy.com.

October 17, 2011
By Tina Brandon, Vice President of PayNetSecure.net

Happy Guest Blogger Monday! This week our guest talks about establishing the high-risk merchant account that’s right for your ecommerce solution. Without this knowledge, you might be at risk yourself–for winding up without a merchant account. VP of PayNetSecure.net Tina Brandon guides you through four steps to ensure your business stays safe and your accounts stay open.

Has Your Ecommerce Business Been Labeled “High Risk”?
4 Steps to Getting the Right High-Risk Merchant Account

The lifeblood of your ecommerce business is the ability to accept payments from your online customers. In the last 9 months, banks have been shutting down merchant accounts for many ecommerce businesses because the banks are mitigating their risk. Even if the merchant has good processing history, low charge-backs and fraud, you can find yourself cut off.

There are a lot of sharks lurking in murky waters of high-risk merchant processing that take advantage of unwary business owners. Here are 4 ways to protect yourself.

1. Establish a Direct Account. Any business with high-risk credit card processing volumes of $50,000 or more should establish an account directly with an acquiring bank. It takes a little more paperwork to set up a high-risk merchant account with a bank compared to using a third-party payment processor but the benefits are worth the extra effort.

A direct high-risk merchant account eliminates the middleman and protects your cash flow. With a direct account, all settlement money is sent directly to you from the bank, providing faster and safer deposits.

2. Avoid Application or Setup Fees. Stay away from high-risk merchant account providers who charge setup or application fees. Typically the “middlemen”/third-party processors are those that charge setup fees.

Reputable firms that establish high-risk accounts are registered agents and get paid by the acquiring banks. Although there may be some fees associated with establishing high-risk merchant accounts, those fees are assessed by the banks or card brands and should be paid directly to them, not to an agent.

3. Establish More Than One Merchant Account. Any high-risk merchant processing more than $100,000 per month is wise to establish more than one account.  Redundancy and backup is critical for any business but especially so for high-risk merchants. Companies should consider setting up more than one high-risk account, perhaps in different jurisdictions, to safeguard cash flow from card payments.

We all know the saying “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket,” and this is especially true for ecommerce businesses. Diversifying your processing with multiple banks creates an environment where banks are competing for your business. This drives your fees down and profits up.

4. Interview the High-Risk Merchant Account Provider.
It’s amazing how many companies don’t answer their phones and don’t respond to voicemail or emails. Take your time to call the companies and interview them as you would a new hire. Judge the level of customer service and responsiveness.

About the Author

Tina Brandon is the Vice President of PayNetSecure.net and has been in the banking industry for 17 years. She is an expert in the payment processing community and assists high-risk and global companies with merchant accounts. If you would like to get more information about payment processing for your ecommerce business, you may call her at 718-250-4681 or email her at tibrandon@paynetsecure.net.

[If you're interested in being a guest blogger on the ZippyCart blog, check out our Official Submission Page.]

October 10, 2011
By Brian Doll, Principal Performance Analyst for New Relic

Welcome back to Guest Blogger Monday! Our writer this week, Brian Doll of New Relic, discusses how your mobile-optimized website can make or break you. Internet users want their information now, not in 30 seconds, and they want it to be clear and concise. Read on to get some of the “dos and don’ts” of mobile ecommerce.

Introduction

Mobile changes everything in ecommerce. In this digital age, whether you’re ready or not, consumers are accessing your website via their handheld devices. Unfortunately, only a small percentage of retailers have a mobile-enabled site according to a survey by Microsoft Tag, a mobile barcode scanning app maker. If you’re not one of them, you’re missing an important opportunity to interact with customers, boost sales and seize your fair share of this multi-billion dollar market.

Surprisingly, mobile commerce technology has been available for over 10 years, but until now many companies (especially retail) primarily used mobile as an extension of their online and paper catalogs. Most often, retailers used mobile to send notices and other promotional messages to drive traffic to their retail stores. The industry standard remains brick and mortar stores, but advances in mobile technology are rendering bulk email and text message blasts virtually obsolete.

But modifying websites to function well in mobile environments is often easier said than done. Look at any retail site and notice the sheer bulk of content that must be loaded along with descriptive copy, and often duplicated across several categories and subcategories. Squeezing pages and pages of content into a tiny 5-inch screen is no small challenge. On the other hand, creating a mobile website from scratch is an expensive and time-consuming prospect. So the question is then, what do site developers do to make sure their retail web apps perform well when accessed on a mobile device?

A well-designed mobile website should look different, but not necessarily require a separate platform or backend. Aesthetic design still matters, and with advanced capabilities and high volume of mobile access, your mobile site needs to act as an extension of your company’s brand (not necessarily its print catalog). Always remember to preserve your brand or product logo in lieu of adding additional images or tabs. Bad layouts will disassociate your company’s image from the mobile version of your website and discourage users from visiting it when they are in need of a quick shopping experience.

Below are five tips that can help any retail company improve the mobile experience of its ecommerce website.

Tip #1: It’s true: size matters. When designing an ecommerce site for mobile access, accounting for screen size is key. The typical screen size of most mobile phones is usually less than 4 inches, so when it comes to building your retail app, you must maximize the limited screen area by removing the clutter. While the screen size of a mobile device is drastically smaller than a desktop, the image resolution is still very high, so it is important to remember to preserve image clarity and ensure that your shoppers can see on their device. Consider using mobile web toolkits to provide some common navigation elements so you can focus on what makes your site unique.

Tip #2: Simplicity reigns supreme. Mobile web pages need to be essentially ‘free of fat’, which means keeping pages simple—focus your site’s features on the most necessary images/icons and functions. A simplified approach will give users the best overall experience, reduce content bottlenecks and keep everything running smoothly. For example, if you’re a clothing retailer, you’ll want to solely focus the user experience on single items without excessive images or descriptions. Keep product information concise; when customers are accessing the mobile site they are looking to browse quickly, so it is not necessary to include the full catalog description.

Tip #3: Don’t be dense: streamline the process. Heavy, dense pages with too much data can drag down your speed and discourage users from continuing onto other pages. Lightweight pages will speed up the load time and boost performance. Another common culprit for data-laden slow pages is Flash. Your mobile website should be free of flash and rely on icons and images instead. Keep in mind that iPhone and iPad users won’t even see that Flash anyway. Lastly, keep the search ‘breadcrumb trail’ short—ideally only display the last part of the string from the search.

Tip #4: Seal the deal. Developers should always optimize their checkout process to be as short as possible in order to facilitate a transaction once the decision to make a purchase has been made. Every nonessential step in your mobile checkout process adds friction while likely resulting in lost sales. In mobile commerce as in ecommerce the same rules apply: the method of presentation can make or break a sale and sites that are slow to load — even by just a second or two — can often lead users to abandon the transaction altogether. Mobile users are always in a hurry. Make the sale or be sorry!

Tip #5: Browsers matter, too! It is easy to forget about browsers when you are making your site mobile-friendly, but overlooking the role they play can cause serious performance lags. While web applications are built to deliver content for all kinds of browsers at once, with mobile the opposite is true. It is important to build your mobile site to send content in a way specifically tailored to each individual mobile browser; this will help to avoid weighing down the browser with page data it can’t use. You may even want to consider using a mobile-only multi-part stylesheet to keep these pages lightweight — one style for each contingency, depending on browser type, version, device, and device OS, etc.

In Sum

Designing mobile websites is hard, and designing mobile ecommerce websites is twice as hard. Rather than just a functionality issue, poor mobile site performance can be a business problem. With the way mobile commerce is expanding—estimates expect it to reach $31 billion by 2016, according to Forrester Research—not having a mobile-optimized site will become an even bigger and costly headache.

Figuring out how to help customers find the right product and how to convert that process into a sale is still a daunting endeavor for retail companies. But the convenience of mobile commerce gives way to the need for quick transactions and simplified functions. A distracted consumer can simply and rapidly choose another brand if the mobile site does not meet their needs. Need I say more?

About the Author

Brian Doll is the principal performance analyst for New Relic, a company specializing in web application performance management.