E-Commerce Blog

“Lessons Learned” is an occasional series where we ask seasoned ecommerce professionals about their mistakes and successes. For this installment, we’ve asked Allan Regenbaum, owner of Keylan, Inc., a company that sells cookware, coffee machines and fitness products online. Keylan, Inc. is 12 years old and based in Atlanta. It has two employees, Regenbaum and his wife Robyn, with an annual revenue approaching $1 million. It offers about 200 products. Here we give you Regenbaum’s experiences and suggestions.

On general advice for ecommerce merchants
“People like to speak to other people. Customers yearn to speak to someone with good product knowledge. They are tired of minimum wage, gum-chewing salespeople who have zero product knowledge. Compete in areas where Amazon.com cannot, for example where just being there to explain the product to the client is a unique differentiator. For high-ticket items, I think the web is going to be used more and more to push customers to call…

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Lessons Learned: Scanpancookware.com Owner Allan Regenbaum

How often do you find a classical musician who is not only a virtuoso on his or her appointed instrument, but who demonstrates Internet marketing virtuosity as well? Allow me to introduce you to classical pianist Grace Nikae (Gracenikae.com). From looking at her website, it’s obvious the piano is not the only keyboard Grace spends time on. Her site is a convergence of standard web content, social media and ecommerce.

Blog/email newsletter: a two-part invention

I’ve long been a fan of using a blog in concert (yes, pun intended) with email, a more traditional form of marketing. The combination works as well together as two skilled hands playing two parts on a Bach composition. Grace utilizes this approach on her site.

While I’ve yet to receive a newsletter to determine whether it’s simply repurposed blog content (think Feedblitz) or something else altogether, the fact that she offers two forms of media to appeal to different audiences is a communications strategy worth…

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A Social Media Symphony

The major credit card companies, Visa, MasterCard, Discover and American Express, have collaborated on minimum payment-processing security requirements. These requirements make up the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS). Merchants and merchant account providers who work with each of those four credit card companies must follow these standards. In that sense, the PCI standard is not law, but industry self-regulation steps that the credit card companies have adopted.

We asked a PCI compliance expert, Sweta Duseja, to explain these standards to us. Duseja is Product Marketing Manager for nCircle, a security risk and compliance management firm.

PeC: PCI compliance is not a law, but self-regulation by the credit card industry. Can you explain?

DUSEJA: Many different industries have requirements that dictate security and privacy. Some of these are laws and regulations - mandates passed by federal government and by individual state governments - and others are…

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PCI Compliance Is “Industry Self-regulation”

There are hundreds of branded tools that ecommerce merchants can turn to for help in catching fraudulent credit card orders. Some tools are free, and some come bundled or offered as additional features in payment processing systems like Authorize.net and Google Checkout. Others can be subscribed to, purchased as software or outsourced. As yet there doesn’t appear to be any all-in-one solution, although some come close.

Many online merchants are already on board with fraud detection technology. The average merchant uses 4.4 fraud detection tools according to the 2008 “Online Fraud Report” from CyberSource, a major electronic payment and risk management solution provider. The trick is to wade through all of the tools to determine which ones are best for your type of sales, your type of data storage and your type of customer. These articles should give you a sense of where to start or what you might be missing.

Online merchants are one step ahead of the game if they can catch…

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Effective Tools to Detect Stolen Credit Cards, Part 1 Of 3

Back-end store security: It’s the most important, yet the oft-overlooked parameter of running an online business. Without securing customer data, you have no claim to running a legitimate business.

I often hear excuses of ignorance, which makes me wonder how many online store owners take the time to read the latest ecommerce news and even merchant account information that comes in the mail? But it doesn’t matter. You’ll learn now, and you’ll commit-right now-to taking the steps to make it right.

I’ve my own gripes and rants about the lack of attention to security, and they’re vast. So I’ve picked a few key points and will preface with this fact: Nearly 80 percent of the online stores, upon my first entry, compromise customer information and sensitive sales information. Most heed to the warnings, but I have had to outright refuse to work on stores that ignored recommendations and continued to violate either legal or moral issues when it comes to security. Forget about what a…

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Protect Customers’ Data Or Lose Your Business