E-Commerce Blog

What our friends and relations think matters to us. I care about what my wife thinks of my new shirt, and when I got a 12-inch table saw this summer, I was sure to discuss the tool’s finer points my friend Steve. I am not alone. Shoppers like and trust recommendations and opinions from friends and family. We all talk about the great deal we got from one store or about the horrible shipping experience we had with another store, and our friends are listening.

Simply put, our peers influence us and we them. They help us make many buying decisions, and savvy online merchants can use this rather natural tendency to increase sales and make happy customers this holiday season. Specifically, I am going to describe three ways to use coupon code…

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Sharable Coupons Can Boost Sales

Practical eCommerce counts over 300 different shopping cart platforms. In this, our “Cart Of The Week” feature, we’ll profile—but not evaluate—a specific shopping cart and ask its management about its strengths and weaknesses. We’ll then ask a customer about the cart, too.

In this installment, we’ve featured Actinic, a U.K.-based licensed shopping cart that is distributed in North America by Sure Solutions. Actinic is a Windows PC application for small and mid-size business owners who want control over their online store, but don’t want to keep a full-time designer or developer. We spoke with Brian Johnson, President of Sure Solutions. We also spoke with a customer of Actinic, Fred Riehl, of Surfeyes.com.

PeC: How long have you been …

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Having even one credit card number stolen from your site can tarnish your reputation and impact sales for years. It is important to be aware of potential security flaws and how to mitigate them to protect yourself.

“A breach of cardholder data can be big money in fines and remediation efforts. If there isn’t a need to keep this data, it’s suggested that it’s not kept at all,” suggests John Carr, owner of Bluebird Consulting, a Detroit based security firm. “For many ecommerce sites, the best option is simply to work with a third-party processor that will not only process credit cards, but also be the payment site [to store the data] as well.”

Improper Storage

Many ecommerce sites store customer data and credit card numbers well after…

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Credit Card Theft: Steps to Protect You and Your Customers

With the holidays ahead, and a new inflatable fruit cake product selling only sparsely, Seattle toy store Archie McPhee this week is setting out to drive online sales with an explanatory video. It’s apparently working.

Within 12 hours of launching the video ad campaign, sales for the $6.95 blow-up novelty at ArchieMcPhee.com jumped 500 percent, said David Wahl, director of marketing and host of the viral instructional video.

“I used a five-year-old digital video camera and movie editing software that came with my Macintosh; it’s definitely not state-of-the-art equipment,” Wahl said. “Most of it’s just creating something that’s interesting that people want to enjoy and share with other people. It just drove a lot of people to the pag…

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Video Boosts Online Sales, Merchants Confirm

Personal recommendations and coupons or flyers passed on by friends are key factors in how female shoppers select products, according to a survey of 2,000 women from SheSpeaks, a marketing agency and social network for women.

“SheSpeaks members are representative of influential and engaged consumers nationwide, and they want to be able to pass along the ‘wealth’ of being in the know,” said Aliza Freud, CEO of SheSpeaks in a release from the company. “Brands and retailers really stand to benefit from making women feel like they have access to a unique offer. This year it is especially important for marketers to engage women using direct marketing that gives them a personal incentive to shop.”

SheSpeaks found that “nearly 75 percent of w…

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Survey: Female Shoppers are Influenced by Their Friends