Open Your StoreFront

Shop.org : Statistics

Jonathan — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 21:03:24 +0000

Here is a great resource for statistics of online shoppers, online shopping, and shopping cart / ecommerce in general.

Shopping Cart Software - StoreSuite

Jonathan — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 18:16:52 +0000

StoreSuite NX is shopping cart software designed for small and medium businesses looking to sell anything online. I’ve, personally, been a user of Interspire’s products for many years and have always been pleased with their products and service, which is no small feat among Web-based software development companies. I am excited about Interspire’s new product, StoreSuite. After using many, many shopping cart applications over the years, I have learned what to look for in a purchase decision. The software must first be easy-to-use & easy to customize and this is exactly what Interspire is promising. Plus, in order to provide customers with a good user experience, the software must include enhanced user-interaction features, such as suggested products, send a product to a friend, and product reviews just to name a few.

I’ve been following the story of the development of the ecommerce software at The StoreSuite Blog for many months now. Of special note, is the ability to turn on and off design features with ease. For example, if you do not want to display the right column, then you could drag it off the design-time editor and click save. You’re done. This feature is just an indication of what is to come.

Product Reviews by customers is included in the base shopping cart software, which is a key to getting highly relevant SEO for your ecommerce store. The more people who comment on a product for others to see, the more free content for you! And as we all know, Google, Yahoo! and other search engines love targeted content. You would be surprised that many applications do not include this functionality, even the applications costing several thousand dollars (base price).

I’m excited about this product because Interspire has proven themselves over and over again year after year. I’m hard to please too. Looking forward to it Interspire!

Link to Shopping Cart Software - StoreSuite

Amazon Payments Enters Online Payments Arena

Jonathan — Wed, 08 Aug 2007 05:00:28 +0000

Launched for limited beta, Amazon.com is entering the arena for online payments by providing a platform that web developers can use to build into their ecommerce applications. It’ll be interesting to see how the PayPal vs. Google vs. Amazon battling plays out. Amazon has roughly 69 million users which will be able to log in to their account from your store front to complete their payment.

From Amazon:

Amazon Flexible Payments Service (Amazon FPS) is the first payments service designed from the ground up specifically for developers. The set of web services APIs allows the movement of money between any two entities, humans or computers. It is built on top of Amazon’s reliable and scalable payment infrastructure.

My next step is to dig deeper and find out how smoothly it will work, which will be an indication of the receptiveness from buyers.

Source: Amazon Payments Account Management

From the Official Google Checkout Blog: Look, Ma — no wires!

Jonathan — Sat, 02 Jun 2007 05:25:09 +0000

Google checkout on mobile phones.

Link to Official Google Checkout Blog: Look, Ma — no wires!

2-Minute Review of Storefront.net Shopping Cart Software & E-Commerce Shopping Cart Solutions

Jonathan — Tue, 22 May 2007 19:34:34 +0000

Storefront.net shopping cart software is at first an appealing glimpse at how to sale successfully online. Storefront.net has done a wonderful job at marketing their software. But there is a big difference between great marketing and great software. We’ve been testing this software for 3 years. It’s been 3 years of trouble.

StoreFront’s software, although complex and diverse, is buggy. It takes a very high level of programming experience to make it work. Even then, you ”will” have problems with the software. This is typical of web applications. There are always problems.

The major problem is that their support is deplorable. Plus, they charge an unusual amount of money for support issues, even if the problem resides with the software itself. They are very slow to correct problems with the software. On average 8 months before you’ll get a fix for a problem that could severely impact your online business.

Save your precious time, money, and headaches.

TWO THUMBS DOWN ON SUPPORT AND BUGGINESS OF THE SOFTWARE

Link to Shopping Cart Software & E-Commerce Shopping Cart Solutions

An Online Business Doing Business Right: Discount Swimming Pool Supply, Cleaning Supplies, Accessories & Pools

Jonathan — Sun, 20 May 2007 23:59:27 +0000

Aqua Superstore, at www.aquasuperstore.com, has really impressed me recently. I did business with the owner, Chris Smith, and was surprised by the 110% professionalism I experienced. Doing business right, in my opinion, is going above and beyond our expectations. Chris did this. With leadership like Chris, the business is sure to be even more successful for many years to come. Thank you for the excellent transaction.

Link to Discount Swimming Pool Supply, Cleaning Supplies, Accessories and Pools

Practical eCommerce magazine: Articles, resources, strategy and a community for internet retailers, online business owners and ecommerce developers.

Jonathan — Wed, 11 Apr 2007 15:53:40 +0000

If you are a web store owner, check out this magazine for a resource on search engine optimization, customer conversion, legal issues, shopping carts, user interface design, Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising, and product sourcing. Online and print versions available.

Link to Practical eCommerce: Articles, resources, strategy and a community
for internet retailers, online business owners and ecommerce developers.

Google Analytics Video Tutorials: Internet Marketing Strategies by Conversation Marketing

Jonathan — Mon, 09 Apr 2007 23:32:25 +0000

If you’re like me, digging deeper into your online store’s analytics is always on your incomplete to-do list. I’ve been following a blog by Ian Lurie for about 6-months now. I’m really impressed with his approach to web marketing. Recently he has created online videos tutorials detailing Google Analytics. These tutorials are especially helpful for e-commerce store owners. With Ian’s help, you’ll understand how to dig deeper into your website’s analytics and get to know a lot more about who your site visitors are and who they are not….

Link to Google Analytics Video Tutorials: Internet Marketing Strategies by
Conversation Marketing

Firefox 3 Plans and IE8 Speculation - Browsers Heading Apart Again - ReadWriteWeb

Jonathan — Sat, 20 Jan 2007 04:01:51 +0000

It’s going to get interesting again for the battle of the web browsers. Read the latest at:

Firefox 3 Plans and IE8 Speculation -
Browsers Heading Apart Again

Source: Firefox 3 Plans and IE8 Speculation - Browsers Heading Apart Again - ReadWriteWeb

Search Engines Work Together To Ease Our Pain with Sitemaps

Jonathan — Thu, 16 Nov 2006 19:52:10 +0000

Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo working together to make my our life easier…. :)

Link to Search Engines Unite On Unified Sitemaps System