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Winning Internet Integration Strategies for Today's Retailer

 

 

e-RETAILING NEWS & OPINION ARCHIVES

October 2007

For the Archives Index, please click here

 

About Advertising

and Promotion

 

October 31, 2007

From DM News:

"Essential Guide to E-mail Marketing"

Effective e-mail campaigns are those that harness the power of the advancements in the medium as well as tapping into consumer insights, while maintaining the age-old tenets of effective direct marketing through any channel...

http://www.dmnews.com

 

October 31, 2007

From MarketingProfs.com:

"Halloween Email Advice:

How to Revive Your Dead Email Subscribers"

The first step is to identify the percentage of inactivity that is acceptable in terms of your marketing goals...

http://www.marketingprofs.com

 

October 30, 2007

From Advertising Age:

"This Isn't the Holiday Catalog You Remember"

Gone are heavyweight tomes packed with every item the store sells and designed as direct-sales agents.  This year's offerings will be sleeker, more lifestyle-oriented and focused on getting you online...

http://adage.com

 

October 30, 2007

From eMarketer.com:

"Thin Margins Squeeze Web Store Spend"

The majority of merchants spend less than 10% of their Web sales on marketing...

http://www.emarketer.com

 

October 22, 2007

From MarketingProfs.com:

"The New Rules of Internet Marketing"

Now that Internet media enables two-way communication, the whole idea of moving customers through a structured consideration process needs to be revised...

http://www.marketingprofs.com

 

October 18, 2007

From iMarketing News:

"Low-Tech Database Marketing for the Holidays"

Three attributes:  Recency, frequency, and monetary value.  Vary the criteria based on your own business; if 90 days is too short for your repeat sales cycle, change it to be more appropriate...

http://www.dmnews.com

 

October 16, 2007

From DM News:

"The Buy vs. Build Argument for SEM"

Three questions must be asked...

http://www.dmnews.com

 

October 11, 2007

From SearchEngineWatch:

"Is Your Paid Search Campaign Part of a Mix or a Mess?"

If you aren't yet doing basic ad copy and landing page testing, as well as budget and bid forecasting, then start there...

http://searchenginewatch.com

 

October 10, 2007

From iMarketing News:

"Seven Lessons in Seven Years in E-Mail Marketing"

State a benefit to the receiver in the subject line...

http://www.dmnews.com

 

October 4, 2007

From E-Commerce News:

"Using E-Mail Marketing to the Max"

E-mail marketing delivers a $51.45 return on investment for every marketing dollar spent...

http://www.ecommercetimes.com

 

October 3, 2007

From ClickZ.com:

"Not So Fast:  Slow Down Your E-mail Review Process"

You can't always just slap the HTML version of an e-mail into a text format.  Without the benefit of sidebars, hotboxes, and graphics, copy may have to be reordered to flow correctly...

http://www.clickz.com

 

October 3, 2007

From iMarketing News:

"Going Retro with E-mail Creative"

Using a retro design does not mean compromising your brand image.  A well-placed logo, font coloring, copyright and background colors can adequately communicate brand identity in e-mail...

http://www.dmnews.com

 

October 1, 2007

From InternetRetailer.com:

"Digging Deeper into Online Ad Spending to Show What Pays and What Doesn't"

The productive online ad spend across most retailers is about 45% to 65% of total spending...

http://www.internetretailer.com

About Customer

Service

 

October 25, 2007

From eWeek.com:

"Is Technology Success Killing Customer Service?"

Cutting off phone contact with customers doesn't only prevent them from bugging your people and taking up their time.  It also prevents your people from hearing what your customers are trying to tell you...

http://www.eweek.com

 

October 24, 2007

From iMarketing News:

"Free Shipping the Norm this Holiday Season"

78% of retailers will offer free shipping with minimum purchase requirements this holiday season...

http://www.dmnews.com

 

October 24, 2007

From ClickZ.com:

"Revive Touch Points

On- and Offline"

Polished touch points that reinforce the brand are among the most tangible, talk-worthy elements you can actually control....

http://www.clickz.com

 

October 18, 2007

From ClickZ.com:

"E-mail:  Still Learning"

There's no excuse for dialogue with customers to be disjointed and irrelevant, particularly if we aim to provide superior service...

http://www.clickz.com

 

October 15, 2007

From E-Commerce News:

"What Not to Do:  5 Rules"

Many firms now have complicated, confusing checkout processes, which result in losing customers at a staggering rate...

http://www.ecommercetimes.com

 

October 15, 2007

From iMarketing News:

"Product Customization and In-Store Visualization"

Retailers that connect their in-store kiosks with their e-commerce sites will help their sales staff improve a shopper's multichannel experience by providing the personal experience of an in-store environment coupled with the online benefits of visualization and long-distance gifting...

http://www.dmnews.com

 

October 12, 2007

From the New York Times:

"Nothing Says Buy Like Free Shipping"

Customers like free shipping promotions more than product discounts that save them considerably more money...

http://www.nytimes.com

 

October 11, 2007

From eMarketer.com:

"Shoppers Look to User Reviews, Search"

Online shoppers researching products are turning to user reviews more than expert reviews...

http://www.emarketer.com

 

October 9, 2007

From ClickZ.com:

"Will Retail Sync with E-tail for Holiday Season?"

Uninformed salespeople and poor merchandising are among the problems encountered when consumers try to convert an online experience into a transaction in a retail store...

http://www.clickz.com

 

October 5, 2007

From Knowledge@Wharton:

"The Impact of Online Recommenders"

Because common recommenders recommend products based on sales and consumer ratings, they cannot recommend products with limited historical data, even if they would be rated favorably.  This can create rich-get-richer effects for popular products and vice-versa for unpopular ones, which results in less diversity...

http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu

 

October 4, 2007

From Business 2.0:

"Live Chat:  Your New Online Salesperson"

Rather than offering a sales pitch the moment the visitor expresses interest in a product, dig deeper into what he's looking for...

http://money.cnn.com

 

October 2, 2007

From iMarketing News:

"Guiding Site Visitors Across

Channels with Landing Pages"

Landing pages are an effective technique to help visitors cross the channel between the marketing message that brought them to the site and the site functionality for them to take action like making a purchase or submitting a lead...

http://www.dmnews.com

 

October 1, 2007

From ClickZ.com:

"Give Users (and Search Engines) What They Want"

By creating content that's closely aligned with consumer search behavior, you'll make not only your users happy but also the search engines due to enhanced relevancy...

http://www.clickz.com

About Webstore

Management

 

October 30, 2007

From iMarketing News:

"Common SEO Mistakes -

And How to Avoid Them"

Eliminate complex JavaScript and DHTML navigation.  Put session IDs in a cookie rather than your page URLs.  Don't use Flash for important links and content...

http://www.dmnews.com

 

October 29, 2007

From InternetRetailer.com:

"Q3 Online Sales Grow a Robust 23% Year Over Year"

In the first three quarters of the year, online sales grew 21% to $83.58 billion from $69.12 billion...

http://www.internetretailer.com

 

October 29, 2007

From ClickZ.com:

"Effective Keyword SEO Research"

Once you have a good idea of what your audience might look for, you can start to think about keywords they might type in a search engine...

http://www.clickz.com

 

October 26, 2007

From InternetRetailer.com:

"Improving Site Search by Looking at What Lies Beneath"

Site search can be improved if web retailers think of organizing their information based on how visitors use the data...

http://www.internetretailer.com

 

October 26, 2007

From ClickZ.com:

"How Start-Ups Can Build Effective About Us Pages"

Being small or new doesn't automatically slap you with a disadvantage or keep you from being credible.  You have several things working in your favor...

http://www.clickz.com

 

October 25, 2007

From MarketingProfs.com:

"A 10-Step Program for Search Engine Fitness"

Make sure that all the important pages in your site can be reached through internal text links, not just menu navigation.  Search engines cannot see graphical buttons or the text in them...

http://www.marketingprofs.com

 

October 25, 2007

From E-Commerce Times:

"Cheery Outlook for Holiday E-Shopping Season"

New online buyers are expected to increase more than 6 percent this year, compared with the number of e-commerce newbies in 2006...

http://www.ecommercetimes.com

 

October 23, 2007

From ClickZ.com:

"What if Your Business Model Changed Every Four Hours?"

Web site visitors look to friends online and offline, as well as other trusted resources online outside of your site, to learn about your company and to determine whether to engage in a relationship with your company.  Visitors are in control, and you must give them options if they are to do business with you....

http://www.clickz.com

 

October 23, 2007

From E-Commerce Times:

"Shopping Cart Options for SMBs"

You are expected to have a fully integrated retail system to manage your merchandising assortment, inventory, promotion, marketing, customers, product returns and financials...

http://www.ecommercetimes.com

 

October 22, 2007

From InternetRetailer.com:

"95% of Internet Users Searched in August"

An average of more than 80 searches per searcher during the month...

http://www.internetretailer.com

 

October 19, 2007

From ClickZ.com:

"Don't Waste Q4"

A gift purchase isn't necessarily indicative of that shopper's interests.  Instead of enrolling the person in e-mail campaigns that show other products similar to the one she bought, enroll the user instead in a gift-givers campaign...

http://www.clickz.com

 

October 17, 2007

From InternetRetailer.com:

"Forecasters Predict Happier Holiday Selling Season Online than Off"

Online retail spending will grow 21% over last year, while overall retail growth will be only 4%...

http://www.internetretailer.com

 

October 17, 2007

From ClickZ.com:

"SEM Hyperchondria?"

Many sites optimize a few levels deep and ignore the potential of their deep, targeted content.  Companies fail to realize that the traffic sent to deep pages is often more targeted and ready to buy...

http://www.clickz.com

 

October 15, 2007

From ClickZ.com:

"Web Marketing 101 for Small Businesses"

What kind of information does the site for your small business need to contain?  If nothing else, put your address and phone number in a prominent place...

http://www.clickz.com

 

October 15, 2007

From MarketingProfs.com:

"Good Reasons Not Blog"

Blogs are a bridge between the community of your customers, and the community of workers that make up your company.  Unfortunately, too many companies view their customers with an almost us-versus-them mentality...

http://www.mpdailyfix.com

 

October 12, 2007

From ClickZ.com:

"How to Use Customer Reviews to Increase Conversion"

Negative reviews can actually aid a purchase decision.  No product is perfect.  They allow visitors to see both product strengths and product weaknesses...

http://www.clickz.com

 

October 11, 2007

From InternetRetailer.com:

"Staying on Top of Changes at Comparison Shopping Engines"

Over 80% of consumers come in and hit the price sort button, so price and brand outweigh the initial default sort...

http://www.internetretailer.com

 

October 11, 2007 

From MarketingProfs.com:

"Killer Web Content Examples"

Short, sharp, second person and active; that's Web content...

http://www.marketingprofs.com

 

October 10, 2007

From InternetRetailer.com:

"Half of All Web Users Will Shop Online this Holiday Season"

50.7% of Internet users will do at least some of their holiday shopping online this year, up from 37.6% last year...

http://www.internetretailer.com

 

October 9, 2007

From E-Commerce News:

"The Path to E-Commerce Gold:

A Transparent Customer Experience"

Create a simple, transparent consumer experience that is centered around the traffic originating on the manufacturer's Web site leading directly, without detours, to the page deep within the retailer's Web site...

http://www.ecommercetimes.com

 

October 8, 2007

From E-Commerce Times:

"Rules for E-Commerce Startups to Live By"

Five tips that could entice consumers to purchase your products...

http://www.ecommercetimes.com

 

October 5, 2007

From MarketingProfs.com:

"Web Site Creation and the Eye of the Spider"

Three things a search engine spider can't see...

http://www.marketingprofs.com

 

October 4, 2007

From iMarketing News:

"Extreme Makeover:

Five Tips for Organic Search Rankings after a Site Redesign"

Make sure that the content of your top-ranking pages is carried over to the new site, preserving the page's title, metatags and body content...

http://www.dmnews.com

 

October 3, 2007

From The McKinsey Quarterly:

"How Companies Are Marketing Online"

53 percent of all respondents expect that their companies will be making more than 10 percent of total sales through online channels three years from now...

http://www.mckinseyquarterly.com

 

October 3, 3007

From E-Commerce Times:

"Is Your Site Search Ready for Holiday Shoppers?"

An e-commerce Web site has only about eight seconds to engage a shopper before they leave the landing page...

http://www.ecommercetimes.com

 

October 2, 2007

From InternetRetailer.com:

"Most Moms Will Do Some Holiday Shopping Online"

14% of all mothers will do most of their shopping on the Internet this year...

http://www.internetretailer.com

 

October 2, 2007

From E-Commerce Times:

"Three Steps to Maximize Search Campaign Efficiency"

Continuity of user experience from keyword and text ad through the landing page to the point of conversion is essential...

http://www.ecommercetimes.com

 

October 2, 2007

From eMarketer:

"Welcome!  Now Pass This E-Mail Along"

Getting the welcome message to a new e-mail program subscriber in a timely manner is imperative...

http://www.emarketer.com

 

October 1, 2007

From Marketing Charts:

"Retail Ecommerce Sales in Q2 Up 6% from Q1"

US retail ecommerce sales for the second quarter of 2007 was $33.6 billion, 3.3% of total retail sales...

http://www.marketingcharts.com

 

October 1, 2007

From MarketingProfs.com:

"Wiki Your Way to More Search Engine Real Estate"

While concerns about brand-slamming or diluted marketing messages may give some pause, companies are often surprised about how a wiki can bring out the best in their customers...

http://www.marketingprofs.com

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