Ecommerce Blog

Amazon Testing New Inline “View Cart” Page

Published on August 8th, 2010 by Mitchell Harper

As I was buying a book on Amazon.com as a present for one of our support ninjas, I noticed that when I clicked the “Add to Cart” button I was presented with an inline confirmation page instead of being taken to Amazon’s usual cart page. You can see the inline page in the screenshot I took above (click on it for a larger version).

In my opinion they may see a short term decline in sales because it breaks the typical buying process, but then again Amazon is Amazon – they run everything by the numbers so obviously they think this will increase their conversion rate.

Also, my guess is that 90%+ of people on Amazon buy just one item per order, so this is their attempt to get you through their virtual checkout as quickly as they can.

What are your thoughts? Have you seen this before? Like it? Hate it? Want it added to your store?

Let me know in the comments below.

[Video] How to Create Your Own Groupon With Facebook

Published on August 5th, 2010 by Mitchell Harper

Groupon is all the rage with retailers at the moment, but what about e-commerce vendors who want to get their own piece of the groupon pie?

In this video I share a strategy you can use to create and distribute your own group-activated coupon. You’ll attract more customers (as well as their friends) and your cost per acquisition (CPA) will effectively be zero because you’re relying on potential buyers pulling in their friends from Facebook and Twitter.

[Video] How to Build a Feedback Loop With Customers

Published on August 4th, 2010 by Mitchell Harper

In this video I share a simple strategy you can use to gather customer feedback and implement it inside your business. Using this strategy you’ll improve your business processes and bottom line. You’ll also turn one-time customers into repeat customers who will send their friends your way because you’ve taken the time to a) ask for their feedback and b) implement it.

[Video] 6 Ideas to WOW Customers After Buying

Published on August 3rd, 2010 by Mitchell Harper

In this video I share six ideas to wow customers after buying. As a business on a budget, you really need to do whatever you can to turn one-time customers into lifetime customers who will tell everyone they know about you, and these six tactics will help you do exactly that.

Even if you only implement one of them, your repeat customer count will grow significantly. The six ideas are:

  1. Call them on the phone and thank them
  2. Upgrade their shipping to express/overnight for free
  3. Include something free (such as a product sample) with their order
  4. Include a hand-written thank you note with their order
  5. Include a 5-20% coupon code on their printed invoice to use for their next order
  6. Refund their shipping cost as store credit to encourage a second order

11 BigCommerce Stores Strut Their Stuff

Published on August 3rd, 2010 by Mitchell Harper

Attention web designers: If you’re looking for shopping cart software that’s super easy to customize and design for (and also that your customers will love) then make sure you check out our partner program. We’ll even send you BigCommerce design leads for free!

If you know a little HTML, CSS and Photoshop you can really work wonders on your BigCommerce template. You can start with one of our 100 built-in templates and customize it as required or you can even build a template from scratch too. Everything you need to know is included in our design guide.

Here are some beautifully customized BigCommerce stores to marvel at:

Exclusive Roots

Kool Kitchen

Focus Attack

Lil Feet Candies

Alon Design Shop

Dormzy

Super Delivery Guys

Worry Not Curry

eLight Supply

Softbots

Miss Lucy’s Monograms

Would You Spend 10 Cents to Almost Guarantee Repeat Customers?

Published on August 2nd, 2010 by Mitchell Harper

The tea in the photo above was purchased at a regular market so there’s nothing special about the tea itself. What is special, however, is the little card that was included with the purchase that directs you back to the tea makers website, www.realchai.com.au:

Here’s the message that was included with the tea if you can’t read it:

Dear Chai Lover

Thank you for purchasing some Real Chai from us today.

I look forward to you being part of our Real Chai community for many years to come.

I appreciate that you can’t get to the markets all the time so we have made it very easy to re-order your Real Chai once it has run out.

All you need to do is follow these simple steps…

  1. Go onto www.realchai.com.au
  2. Visit the shop page
  3. Select your re-fill bag
  4. Enter in your details
  5. Watch it get delivered to your door step in days
  6. Continue enjoying your Real Chai experience

If you have any feedback as always I would love to hear it.

Happy Sipping!

Anthea Cahill (aka the chai girl)

Simple, effective, cheap to produce, and a brilliant marketing strategy – getting people who purchased from you at a market to your website using a piece of paper that probably cost 10 cents to print.

Try getting repeat customers for 10 cents using any marketing method period. Besides some creative email marketing, you’ll find it tough.

Why not take this idea and implement it for your business? Write your own message (or just copy Anetha’s – I won’t tell), print up a few hundred and slip one in with every order. I bet you’ll be amazed with the results

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