As you finalize preparations for the upcoming holiday season, it’s important to make sure your business is ready for the busy gift-giving season. Having your store or business stocked with popular items is a great way to tap into additional sales. Another way to grow your business and meet the needs of gift-givers is to offer gift cards for purchase at your business and on your website.

Gift cards provide a convenient way for your loyal customers to spread the word about your business and their experience with you. Gift cards are also an impulse buy that you can keep close to your register, showcase in your window signage, or offer on your website or Facebook Company Page.

There are many ways your business can benefit from selling gift cards. Here are 5 ways for you to consider:

1. Tap into more sales for your business.
   Customers who do business with you may not think of your business when they plan gifts for their friends, family, or coworkers. To let customers know that you offer the convenience of gift cards, make sure they’re prominently displayed when people visit your website or physical location. That visual reminder will increase impulse purchases—and help to plant the seed for future sales. And as research shows, gift card recipients typically spend 20% more than their gift card balance.

2. Make it easy for customers to promote your business.
   When a customer chooses to give a gift card, they’re endorsing your business by telling their gift card recipient that they trust your business and like doing business with you. By offering gift cards, you make it easy for your customers to spread the word about your business to their network of friends and family.

3. Build your contact list for future promotions.
   When recipients redeem their gift cards, make sure you’re capturing the contact information for those cardholders. You can use that information to send out future news items and promotions about your business. Just as gift cards help to drive new sales to your business, your contact list provides you with valuable information that can help you develop and maintain long-term customers.

4. Don’t think of gift cards as just gifts.
   Another way to keep your business growing is to issue gift cards as part of your refund or return policy. That way, you ensure that customers come back to your business to spend those available funds.

5. Sell gift cards 24/7.
   Although many businesses think they need a physical store or business to sell gift cards, that’s definitely not the case. You can offer gift cards for sale on your website and via your social media marketing efforts, such as your Facebook Company Page. And with more and more consumers researching businesses online and making online purchases, you can leverage your website presence and your social network to generate sales for your business 24/7.

Please note: You should spend time evaluating gift card programs and their associated fees to ensure that you find the right program that fits the needs and goals of your business.

To help small businesses tap into the lucrative gift card market, Web.com is offering a new gift card program as of October 3—just in time for the busy holiday season. Our program allows you to sell gift cards at your business location and on your website.

For more information about how gift card sales can help your business grow, contact us at 877-543-5107 today.

5 Ways Gift Cards Help Your Business Grow is a post from Web.com | Blog

Many, many months ago, I was shopping at Kmart for some necessities, and as is usually the drill with me, I started to browse other departments—for all kinds of stuff that I really didn’t need and wasn’t shopping for in the first place.

That’s when “the” comforter caught my eye. In all of its silvery, shimmery style, it beckoned me. I didn’t really NEED a comforter, but this one was beautiful, machine washable (a must for me, as I don’t believe in paying dry-cleaning costs for things that I should be able to launder right at home sweet home), and on clearance! (FYI: I can’t resist a good clearance item.)

After getting into a debate with myself, I decided: You don’t need it. Leave it!

But as the months went by, I’d brood about that silvery, shimmery clearance comforter. So when the brooding got to be too much, I started looking for it online, to see if anyone out there had one to sell me.

Lo and behold, not only did I find it online and in the size I needed, but it was still being sold by Kmart, so I was sure I’d get a deal!

Although the comforter that was marked at a clearance price of about $40 eight months ago was now on sale for $59.99, I once again debated with myself and decided that although I never spend a lot for a comforter (and 60 bucks is a lot by my budget), the sale price was still much better than the original price of $99.99.

That’s when I made up my mind: I’m getting that comforter.

So when I added it to my cart and started the checkout process (with a gleam in my eyes), I assumed that it was mission accomplished. But then . . . bam!

Because it was an “oversized item,” the shipping would cost either $90 for standard or $179 for expedited. Yes . . . the lowest shipping price as quoted was nearly double the price of the item. My $59.99 sale comforter just became $149.99. Seriously? I thought this must surely be an error, and the system is simply placing an irrational shipping price on my order by default. I was certain I just needed to contact someone at Kmart to get it all straightened out.

So I emailed the customer service team with the following:

Hi,

I’m trying to find the “Jaclyn Smith Today Euphoria Comforter Set” in size King.

I see it on the site, but the shipping is coming up as either $90 or $179, which, needless to say, is preposterous.

Can you please tell me if this item is available at a reasonable or free shipping rate, or if it is available within 30 miles of ZIP code 18702?

Here’s the response I received:

Thank you for contacting Kmart.com regarding the shipping charge of item “Jaclyn Smith Today Euphoria Comforter Set.”

We appreciate your interest in the item “Jaclyn Smith Today Euphoria Comforter Set.” Please be advised that this item is for oversized delivery and hence the standard shipping charge is $90 and the expedited shipping charge is $179. I sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this matter has caused you.

We are here for you! Please reply should you have any further questions. You can contact us through online chat support or contact us at 1-866-562-7848. We look forward to fulfilling your future online shopping needs.

We’re here to make everything easier. Take our survey to tell us how we’re doing.

Look for great bargains throughout the store and find Kmart exclusive brands like Thalia Sodi, Joe Boxer, Route 66 and Jaclyn Smith. Make sure you are registered at kmart.com for emails, so we can stay in touch!

Not only was the response mostly canned, but it didn’t even answer my question about whether a store near me had the item. I was dumbfounded.

So still being determined, I visited one of two Kmart stores that are within a 5-mile drive from my house. Voila! There it was, in all its glory . . . and I didn’t even need to sell my bed to cover the most expensive shipping charges ever.

My chase for the comforter had come to an end!

Just for fun . . . and because I’m stubborn and needed to prove a point to myself that Kmart was the crazy one in this relationship, I took the comforter to my local post office and asked for estimated shipping costs as if I was going to send it clear across the country from northeastern Pennsylvania to ZIP code 90210 in California. The costs ranged from $20 to $35, with the most expensive delivered within 3 days, Priority Mail.

So what business lessons can we learn from this experience?

1. Don’t charge excessive shipping costs. If you don’t ship items at reasonable prices, your customers will find another business that does.

2. Don’t call it “customer service” if you’re only going to provide a cookie-cutter response. You might as well just send a note that reads, “Good riddance. Try Walmart.”

And the best part? After all was said and done and the beautiful $59.99 comforter was in my bedroom, I received the following message:

Did I leave an item in my shopping cart, Kmart remarketing? I wonder why. . . .

An Un-comforter-able Shopping (and Shipping) Experience is a post from Web.com | Blog

With the explosive growth of eCommerce, it’s easier than ever to put your small business offerings in front of a large group of prospective customers. Drop shippers make it easy to obtain a catalog of items that a merchant can sell, and they provide all of the images, product descriptions, and price points . . . usually in a format that doesn’t require a lot of work to integrate the information in your platform of choice.

Unfortunately, there’s a downside to receiving all this information from a drop shipper. Many small online stores end up using their provided product descriptions, which means their content is up against an army of other merchants carrying the same wares, using the exact same product descriptions and content, just in a slightly altered look for their site. When Google and other search engines see this content, they bury the newest results to promote the older content, which will be a massive problem for a new merchant who is trying to create a presence online.

So how does a merchant combat this army of replicas? How does one stand out among a crowd of hundreds, if not thousands, of duplicates?

The answer is in rewriting the descriptions that your manufacturer or drop shipper provides. Although this can be an extremely time-consuming process (depending on the number of products in your store), writing effective product descriptions can mean the difference between success and failure online.

Here are a few tips that can help you fine-tune your product descriptions and target your customers:

• Know your audience. Try to imagine your best customers when you write your product descriptions. Because you’re writing as a salesperson, you’ll see better results if you communicate with your target audience on their level. Writing clearly, concisely, and specifically will naturally lend itself to creating keywords and key phrases within your product descriptions. Original content will help customers find you more easily on search engines.

• Communicate . . . QUICKLY! Think of your shoppers as if they’re speeding down a freeway. At 65 mph, they don’t have time to read a large block of text. You need an attention-grabbing start that engages your readers and creates enough interest for them to continue reading. Consider beginning a product description with a question that gets them thinking . . . and hopefully keeps them reading. Billboards offer great examples of this type of content.

• Remember that shopping is an emotional experience. If it weren’t, you’d never hear the phrase “buyer’s remorse.” Once you have a reader’s attention, it’s important to appeal to emotion first. Craft a story that offers detailed examples of how the product you’re describing is going to save them time, money, stress, and so forth. Find the specific pain point that this product will address, and offer logical support for the feelings your prospects are having toward purchasing it.

• Recognize that spelling, grammar, and wording DO matter. The most convincing product descriptions use a powerful story with adjectives that reinforce the feelings your shoppers are having about purchasing. Consider using Thesaurus.com to help you find convincing adjectives without being too repetitive. And be sure to check your copy for any misspellings or grammatical errors. Errors in product copy are easily noticed by customers, and they can reduce confidence in your store as well as your products.

Writing convincing and accurate product descriptions is the best way to stand out in a crowd of competing messages, so it’s important to get your message out there in your own voice, and then reap the rewards that you covet . . . getting noticed and generating sales.

Bonus Tips

Want to boost your customers’ confidence in buying from you? Consider these tips:

• Provide answers to Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs). Although many customers prefer to shop online rather than drive to a brick-and-mortar store and interact with a salesperson, they’ll probably have questions about the products they’re considering. That’s why it helps to include a link to Frequently Asked Questions—and their answers—on your product page. That way, you’ll be able to address your customers’ questions as they think of them.

• Leverage the power of product reviews. Although you might be able to craft the most intricate product description in the world, you probably won’t be able to come up with every use that your customers find for your product. That’s where product reviews come in . . . they help to tell prospects how other customers are using the product—and how satisfied they are with it.

  When you’re selecting a product reviews option for your site, make sure you use a solution that:

  • Allows you to approve or deny a review before it posts to your site.

  • Provides an option to email your customers (a set number of days after they purchase) and request a product review from them.

  It’s important to note that negative product reviews aren’t always a bad thing. If you’re getting a lot of bad reviews for a particular product, you should definitely remove it from your catalog. But one or two reviews that aren’t overflowing with love for a product can help lend some credence to the integrity of your store. Plus, people are more likely to buy from a site that’s honest with them. Remember . . . shopping is an emotional experience.

eCommerce Product Descriptions: Tips for Getting Noticed and Generating Sales is a post from Web.com | Blog

If you’re submitting your products to comparison shopping engines (CSEs) and you haven’t implemented any of the buyer surveys, you’re missing out on some key opportunities for increasing product sales.

Many of the paid CSEs—such as Shopzilla and PriceGrabber.com—offer a buyer survey that merchants can add to their order confirmation page. Once shoppers reach that page, they’re presented with a popup that gives them the option to complete a survey. Most of the surveys include general questions about the ease of the checkout process and whether the shopper would return to the site to shop again. Many CSEs also give merchants the option to customize their survey with questions that pertain directly to their eCommerce website and their product line.

Implementing a buyer survey is a fairly simple process. Just follow the CSE’s guidelines, which typically require you to add some basic HTML to your order confirmation page. Once you complete the setup, shoppers will have the option to answer a few questions immediately after their purchase. In addition, they’ll automatically receive a follow-up survey once they receive their order.

Many of the CSEs offer shoppers an incentive for completing the survey, such as the daily $25 giveaway referenced in the PriceGrabber.com image below.

What are some of the benefits of using buyer surveys?

• Positive survey results can improve merchants’ CSE rankings and inspire confidence in shoppers.

• Survey results can help merchants make improvements to their website based on the issues that shoppers are experiencing.

Another benefit to using buyer surveys is that the results are being picked up by Google and displayed along with a merchant’s product listings on Google Shopping. When CSEs and other companies like ResellerRatings submit survey results to Google, Google compiles the results and then displays a star rating next to a merchant’s product listings. Generally, shoppers are more likely to purchase from a merchant who has positive ratings than a merchant who has no ratings. Plus, the feedback helps merchants learn about what they’re doing right and how they can improve their shoppers’ experience in the future.

Implementing a buyer survey is free, so why not try using one today? I’d love to hear about your results in the comments below.

Using Buyer Surveys to Increase Sales on Comparison Shopping Engines is a post from Web.com | Blog

One of my clients—a merchant from a flower store who manages her own Google Shopping data feed—recently asked me: “Why can’t I find my own products when I search on Google Shopping?” After doing a little detective work to uncover the answer for her, I realized that I had a few tips to share about optimizing product listings on comparison shopping engines (or CSEs) so that customers—and store owners—can find the products they’re looking for.

To start, let’s do a simple search to find all of your product listings on Google Shopping. Just type “site:” and then your URL in the search box. For example, if your URL is “abc.com,” you’d type “site:abc.com” in the search box. When you do that, Google will pull up all of your current product listings—just as shoppers would be viewing them.

In the upper-right corner of your search results page, you’ll notice that Google’s default sorting is based on “relevance” (see the image below).

That means that Google sorts the items—from first to last—according to what it thinks is the closest relevance to what a shopper is searching for. And that feature is the reason why one of your products might be coming up a few pages deep—or possibly not at all—during a shopper’s product search. Although Google might recognize your product as a relevant item, it might not consider it highly relevant to the shopper’s search query.

When I looked through the product titles for my flower store client—who sells floral arrangements and other decorative gift baskets—I noticed that some of the titles were too short or lacked a clear description of the product. With Google Shopping, you get 70 characters—including spaces—for each of your titles. When you review your titles, you might want to revise them so that you’re using as many of those characters as possible to create product titles that are relevant to the search queries that shoppers might be using.

For example, “Thanks A Latte Arrangement Mug”—one of the product titles used by my flower store client—was a cute name, but it didn’t tell Google Shopping—or potential customers—exactly what the product is, so I recommended the following title to my client: “Yellow Rose and Lily Flower Arrangement Thank You Cup Gift Basket.” That title—which uses only 65 of the possible 70 characters—would be more relevant to a number of search queries that people might use to find the product, such as “flower arrangement,” “yellow rose(s),” “lily basket,” “thank you gift basket,” or a combination of those words.

After you review all of your product titles, I’d go through the same process with your product descriptions. Although Google accepts 10,000 characters for each description, I recommend that you limit your product descriptions to one or two short paragraphs. Because Google only displays the first 145 characters included in each description, I recommend making those first 145 characters—i.e., the first sentence or two—highly relevant to your product. Even though all of the possible 10,000 characters are displayed in Google’s back end and can aid in the search relevance for your products, shoppers only see the first 145 characters as they’re deciding whether to click on your item.

And rather than using cookie-cutter descriptions for your items, it’s helpful to use targeted product descriptions to drive more qualified traffic. For example, let’s say you sell sugar-free chocolate chips, and you title that item accurately as “Sugar Free Chocolate Chips.” You can use the product description to your advantage by including other terms that people might use to search for the product. Here’s one example: “These chocolate chips contain no sugar. Yes, you read that right. These chocolate chips are sugarless.” In addition to your accurate and search-relevant title, your description helps to display your product for someone who’s searching for “no sugar chocolate chips” or “sugarless chocolate chips.”

One of the interesting aspects about comparison shopping engines is that the product titles and descriptions you include in your data feed don’t have to match the product information that’s in your eCommerce store—which means that you can send unique information to the comparison shopping engines. You do, of course, need to include active product URLs and active image URLs in your data feed, but you can use the opportunity for text variation to your advantage.

Here’s one final tip: Be sure to include UPCs (bar code numbers) and MPNs (manufacturer part numbers) in your data feed. They’re important pieces of information that can help you optimize your product listings even further.

Because many shoppers who use comparison shopping engines already know which product they’re looking for, the more specific and relevant the information you provide to them, the greater the chance they’ll be clicking on the link for your product.

Google Shopping Tips: How to Optimize Your Product Listings is a post from Web.com | Blog

Online shoppers are smarter and savvier than ever when it comes to finding the lowest prices for the goods they want. And many of those online shoppers will be visiting the comparison shopping engines (CSEs) this holiday season to do their holiday shopping.

So as an eCommerce merchant, it’s crucial that you understand some of the data feed optimization tips that can enhance your site’s data quality on the CSEs. Let’s look at a few of them:

• Most comparison shopping engines accept a “data feed” (i.e., a spreadsheet) as the means for updating and editing your estore’s product data. One of the most important and often most overlooked steps you can take to increase the quality of your data feed is to include uniform identifiers—such as UPCs, MPNs, and ISBNs—along with your product data. I call them “uniform identifiers” because you, as a merchant, can title an item in a totally different way than your competitor might title that same item.

  And the only way that a comparison shopping engine can compare your item to your competitor’s item is via a uniform identifier, such as the item’s 12-digit bar code number (UPC) or its manufacturer’s part number (MPN). Because many of the search engines don’t currently require UPCs, MPNs, or ISBNs (International Standard Book Numbers), those important product attributes often get neglected.

  It never hurts to double check the feed specifications to see which product attributes are currently being accepted by a CSE before you submit your data feed. The more accurate the information you can provide about your products, the better.

• Another area that often gets overlooked is the taxonomy that each comparison shopping engine uses to categorize your store items. Categories work like this: If a shopper searches a generic term like “Sony PlayStation,” the visitor will then be able to filter through the results by category. Categorizing your items might seem like a long and tedious process, but it can be a very beneficial one. By making sure that your items fall into their most accurate categories, you’re making sure that each item is as visible as it can be to each shopper. And on the paid CSEs, your items are charged based on the category/subcategory rate.

• Please keep in mind that your data feed doesn’t have to contain the exact same data that’s visible to your customers in your online store. In other words, let’s say that the title for an item on your site is “PS3 Gaming System with Move Bundle.” Whenever a potential buyer lands on your product page, that would be the title he or she would see for that particular product. In your data feed, however, you could include a different title for the same item, such as “Sony PlayStation 3 PS3 Blu-ray Video Game System with Move Bundle.”

  I recommend that you do some research to find out which keywords your audience is using to search, and then develop titles based on the results of that research. Here’s a great tip for Google Shopping: As long as your title is less than 70 characters, it will be completely visible to the person who’s searching.

These are just a few of the tips that can help you enhance the quality of your data feed. Please remember that anything you do to enhance your data quality is a step in the right direction—a step that will make it easier for potential buyers to find your products. Because if they can’t find them, they won’t be making those purchases.

Until next time . . . I wish you a safe, happy, and profitable holiday shopping season.

eCommerce Merchants: Optimizing Your Data Feed for Comparison Shopping Engines is a post from Web.com | Blog

The Solid Cactus Boot Camp is a 3-day eCommerce training operation that helps site owners grow and optimize their online businesses. We use a small group setting for increased engagement among attendees and speakers, and we offer a wide range of presentations for eCommerce users at all levels—from new recruits to veteran sergeants.

The Boot Camp will be in full operation September 22–24, 2010, at the Solid Cactus Headquarters in Shavertown, Pennsylvania. The pricing includes all reconnaissance, rations, and barracks, so register today before this battalion goes off to battle!

Here’s a sampling of the interactive presentations and seminars in our plan of action:

• We’ll cover public relations dos and don’ts (atten-shun, BP!), and we’ll hone in on the latest and greatest tactical maneuvers in social media optimization (SMO) and search engine optimization (SEO):

  “The Spin Cycle: How to Combat Negativity and Crisis Online”—Learn how to effectively use damage control when your reputation is under attack.

  “Link Building: Successful Strategies and Tactics for Store Owners”—Get tips on attracting quality links and avoiding guerrilla warfare tactics.

• We’ll explore the codes of conduct in email marketing:

  “Email Marketing, Meet SEO and Social Media: Forming Connections Among Multiple Marketing Methods”—Because you won’t defeat your competition with just one form of artillery, you’ll need to leverage multiple arms in your arsenal.

• We’ll help you avoid land mines in your pay-per-click (PPC) account: (Heck, we’ll even provide you with a free PPC evaluation upon request.)

  “PPC Real Talk Roundtable: No-Frills Answers to Your PPC Questions”—In this open forum, you’ll get down and dirty in the trenches with our PPC Specialists.

  “PPC Deconstruction”—Arm yourself with the tools that help you avoid wasteful PPC spending and boost your PPC performance.

• We’ll deconstruct a live site right before your eyes as part of our focus on store development:

  “Site Deconstruction”—We’ll dissect every aspect of a website and then provide you with the intel to help improve your own. (This is always one of our most popular sessions.)

  “Introducing Mobile Commerce for Yahoo! Stores” (presented by Unbound Commerce)—Are you using the appropriate weapons for your target market? If you want to attract the mobile market, you’ll need a mobile-friendly version of your site.

Plus, if you’d like a bit more basic training, our brigade members will meet with you one-on-one for some additional recon. You’ll also have plenty of time to brainstorm with your fellow boot campers—off the record and in top secret.

But it’s not all work and no play. We get out of the trenches each night for some tasty provisions and friendly chatter.

Here’s what some of our past campers have to say:

“Not only the ability to learn new technology and options for your website, but to be able to interact with other business owners and share ideas and experiences. I thought the entire experience was very positive and as someone who had attended other types of seminars, I thought Solid Cactus did a wonderful job of pulling it all together (hotel accommodations, seminars, food, entertainment). Well worth the money.”
      — Liz Broussard, Classic Charms

“I could write a book about the entire event! Put it this way, it was awesome . . . and you spoiled us. I’ve been to many events . . . and this is by far the best!”
      — Pam Macharola, Blair Candy

“For Yahoo! Store owners, I believe the Boot Camp experience is one of the best educational programs I could have received with a laser focus on Yahoo! Stores.”
      — José Calero, LapWorks, Inc.

We’re saving a bunk for you . . . so register today.

Pack Your Fatigues . . . It’s Time for the Solid Cactus Boot Camp is a post from Web.com | Blog

A recent poll from RetailMeNot.com and Harris Interactive® reveals that 30% of online shoppers will not make a purchase if they cannot find a coupon for that store. This shows that coupons don’t just offer value for consumers; they actually define the spending habits of nearly a third of online shoppers.

No matter where people shop—online or off—they’re looking to save. Retail consultant firm Inmar reported that in 2009, coupon usage increased for the first time in 17 years. Coupons.com boasted $1 billion in savings for its printable coupon category alone. Record usage. Record savings. The time is now for online store owners to embrace coupons.

The Hunt Is On

If a shopper wasn’t lured to a specific store from a promotional code they received via email marketing or through a social media site, chances are they will search coupon directory sites or even Google phrases such as “promotional code for XYZ store.” As the Harris Poll® study concludes, if there isn’t a coupon, there’s a good chance the customer will purchase elsewhere or wait until one is available to make a purchase from that store.

In the past, many eCommerce store owners feared that coupon codes meant for loyal customers would leak onto those sites, which would allow just about anyone to use these loyal customer perks. Today, not being there could be costly. The old way of thinking is quickly being replaced with: “A sale is a sale.”

There are many types of coupon sites available, ranging from community-oriented sites like RetailMeNot.com and CouponCabin.com, where coupons and codes are shared among users, to sites like Coupons.com, which distributes coupons on behalf of major brands and other retailers. Most of these sites feature popular deals and allow for searching by various criteria.

Membership to these sites often includes features like clipping and email notifications. Coupons.com even has an option to “save to member card” for many mass retailers. Many coupon sites allow users to report on the success rate of coupon codes and even make comments.

Because of the ever-increasing popularity of coupons, it’s a good idea to keep current coupons available on these sites. Scan the big coupon sites to see if any codes are presently there. If there aren’t any, or they’ve expired, get new ones listed. In a way, a host of expired coupons (even if the store owner was not the one to list them) can make a store look stale in the eyes of those perusing the listings.

Preventing Abuse and Getting Removed from Coupon Sites

Stating rules such as “one-time use only” could be deterrent enough. But . . .

If a coupon code appears on a coupon site and you would like it to be taken down, there are steps that you can take. RetailMeNot.com has a few measures to protect merchants: asking for removal of specific coupons, signing up for email notifications to see if/when coupons are posted, or opting out entirely from allowing coupons to be shared.

The capabilities of an individual store’s shopping cart software may offer help with coupon management, such as single-use coupons (a feature that allows a store owner to send a special offer to select customers) and combinable or noncombinable coupons.

Printable coupons for in-store use may be personalized with the recipient’s name and may include instructions for retailers not to accept the coupon without seeing identification. This helps prevent the fraud that many mass retailers and grocers fear when it comes to Internet coupons.

If a customer is abusing the same coupon code repeatedly to the point where the store owner no longer wants to honor them, action could be taken with a polite “request declined” notice that reminds the customer about any rules that may be in place, such as “limited to one use per customer.” Abused coupon codes can also be deactivated.

The bottom line: don’t create coupons that could hurt, well, the bottom line.

Using Coupon Offers for Marketing, Merchandising, and More

Coupons can help a business in many ways. Perhaps an item that wasn’t a great seller suddenly had a spike in sales when it became more affordable. Not only would that be a successful promotion, but it would also help identify an item that was priced too high.

Different versions of coupon codes could be used in different places as a test. Use one code with a social media audience and another with an email list and see which one has a better return. Then, you can use the data for future efforts.

Not every visitor to a store will be from the coupon-conscious crowd, but using on-site promotions such as “Scratch and Save” for Yahoo! Stores can present savings in an enticing, interactive way. Offering a coupon upon sign-up could also be an incentive for current or potential customers to subscribe to an email list.

Simply put, coupons are a smart idea for the eCommerce retailer. They attract customers, help build repeat business, and help to increase revenue.

This article was published in the March/April 2010 issue of eBiz Insider, the magazine for eCommerce professionals from Web.com.

More Online Shoppers Looking to Cut Costs with Coupons is a post from Web.com | Blog

When deciding which items to purchase, online consumers have many options to aid them in making their buying decisions, such as Google™, comparison shopping sites, product reviews, and even friends.

Most shoppers are likely to use a combination of those four, but product reviews are one of the most-sought-after features. In fact, MarketingSherpa says 58% of online consumers look for product reviews when they’re looking to make a purchase.*

Tools like Solid Cactus’ Star Product Reviews—which is compatible with Yahoo! Stores—can be implemented to help prospective buyers decide whether or not a product is right for them. Not only will these reviews contain valuable information from other satisfied customers, but the content can be indexed by search engines, which can aid in getting ranked well for individual products.

Star Product Reviews Build Trust

Online shoppers are more likely to buy from companies they trust, and with Star Product Reviews, building consumer confidence is easy to accomplish. Reviews can help to build trust in several ways:

• First, consumers see that others are shopping in your store.
• Second, asking for reviews shows you care about customer feedback.
• Finally, you’re giving prospective buyers more product information.

As a bonus, Star Product Reviews offer a “Was this helpful?” voting feature for each review, which gives users another way to provide feedback. You can also showcase a reviewer as a verified customer with colored icons and customized text.

Star Product Reviews Are SEO Friendly

Star Product Reviews were designed to be easy for search engines to access your content, which is helpful for increasing rankings and traffic. This adds SEO value to your individual item pages, while maximizing the chances for your site to rank for a specific product or keyword term—a vital element that can give you a competitive edge when your customers go to Google for more information. Each review written about a product can be included in the item page content or on a separate page with a link back to the item, which gives you flexibility in having search engine spiders crawl where you need them to.

Star Product Reviews Are Hands-Off and Flexible

Star Product Reviews are easy to manage. Customizable emails are sent automatically at timed intervals that you set to invite previous customers to submit reviews about the products they’ve purchased. You can even offer past customers an incentive to write reviews, which could increase repeat business and build loyalty.

When new reviews are placed, notifications are sent to as many contacts within your store as needed, making it easy for multiple staff members to manage inventory. Star Product Reviews can be set to automatically approve or deny reviews—as well as filter any profanity or unwanted words that may appear in any incoming reviews—which means you’ll spend less time moderating.

If you want more control, you can manually approve or deny each review. You can also edit or delete reviews once they’re live, either one at a time or globally, which makes moderation easy to accomplish. This functionality helps eliminate the risk of competitors or spammers posting unrelated, cookie-cutter, spammy, or harmful reviews.

Factor in the ease of tracking each review, and you’ve got a great way to get feedback on your products so that you can adjust your inventory to better serve the needs of your customers.

In the end, product reviews are much more than a way to inform and persuade your customers. They can also improve your SEO efforts, help you make informed business decisions about your inventory, and increase repeat business.

*Source: MarketingSherpa, Ecommerce Benchmark Guide 2007.

This article was published in the March/April 2010 issue of eBiz Insider, the magazine for eCommerce professionals from Web.com.

eCommerce Stores: The Power of the Product Review is a post from Web.com | Blog

David Brown,
Chairman, President,
and CEO of Web.com

Welcome to 2010 . . . we’ve closed the books on 2009 and can all collectively let out a sigh of relief, roll up our sleeves and get busy growing our businesses. Whether you’ve survived, thrived or even succumbed to the numerous challenges all small businesses faced last year, the way is clear: If you want to level the playing field competitively in a new or existing venture, then your website is the place on which to focus.

Ben Franklin once said that nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes. If he was alive today and a small business consultant, he’d probably say that nothing can be said to be certain for small businesses, except online marketing and eCommerce. When I started Web.com back in 1997, I did so to help the underserved small business owner establish an online presence. At the time, a website’s true value wasn’t always obvious to many small business merchants, but given the current economic environment, as well as the astounding technological advances since then, that’s no longer the case.

The news in 2009 wasn’t good and you felt it. The latest report released by the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB), reflects the sinking optimism of many small business owners—the optimism index dropped 0.8 points, making November the sixth consecutive month the index has been below 90. What’s driving this crisis in confidence? Consumers are not spending like they used to, so merchants are stuck with inventory and have been forced to lay off employees. While 9% of businesses increased employment by 2.3 workers, 21% reduced headcount by an average of 4.2 workers. The percentage of businesses planning to make capital expenditures also fell to a 35-year low: 16%. The uncertainties are many: Will taxes increase, and if so, by how much? Will your industry face additional regulation? Your customers are waiting to see what happens, also, which is why they’re reluctant to spend.

Modified spending habits have left many small business owners with overflowing inventory, so few are seeking loans, as a result. Those who do seek credit, continue to face obstacles, despite continuing efforts in Washington to improve access, such as guaranteeing a higher percentage of SBA-backed loans and increasing the size of the loans.

If sales and customers are the key to recovery, then look no further than this holiday shopping season to find the silver lining. 2009 may well be remembered as the year that eCommerce is crowned retail’s most valuable player. The convenience of shopping online and the promise of potential savings drove consumers to retail websites at record levels. In 2009, eCommerce accounted for approximately 10% of all U.S. retail sales—up from 6% in 2008. Holiday shoppers spent $27 billion online, a 5% increase over last year.

While it’s true that a significant portion of the season’s website revenue went to large retailers, the unavoidable fact is the stakes have been raised. The good news is that a website can elevate the fortunes of a small business in a way that offline channels never could. Well-executed SEO and SEM strategies, a well-designed website and e-store, can make all the difference. If your website ranks higher on search engines than your competitors’, you stand a good chance of making the sale, no matter how large your competitors are. If you help your customers find you easily and provide them with the right incentive to make the sale, the rest will take care of itself.

No one can say for certain how 2010 will play out, but at a time of year when so many of us are inclined to make resolutions, the obvious resolution for all small business owners to make is to move more retail “bricks” to “clicks.”

From all of us at Web.com, have a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year!

P.S. Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook.

2010: A Small Business Odyssey is a post from Web.com | Blog