Category

Checkout Tactics

The ultimate goal of an ecommerce business is to move shoppers through the checkout process to complete a transaction. Our library of checkout tactics includes ways to streamline to avoid cart abandonment, ideas for removing distractions, tools for discounts and promotional offers, pricing strategies, thank-you pages, and more.

Checkout Tactics
6 Pointers for Selling Last-Minute Gift Certificates

December 17, 2010 • Pamela Hazelton

For years, gift certificates have been a difficult sell for the majority of small online stores. Despite consumer-advocacy laws that now require retailers to impose no fees and that limit expirations on gift certificates and gift cards, consumers are often reminded (especially during th...
Checkout Tactics
Usability Report Card: OldWillKnottScales.com

October 14, 2010 • Pamela Hazelton

“Go ahead… hurt my feelings.” That was the subject of the message request by online store director Will Knott. He obviously understands my no-holds-barred approach, as his message concluded, “Punch me in the eye and bloody my nose…” Well, Will, I’m not that abrupt (at least, I don’t t...
Checkout Tactics
Convert Visitors by Engaging Them: 6 Ways

October 11, 2010 • Pamela Hazelton

Converting visitors into customers is about more than just supplying great product information. It's about more than a great design, simple navigation and customer service links. The basics–such as page design and content presentation–are certainly necessary. But if you want to grow a l...
Checkout Tactics
Conversion: 10 Ways to Make Category Pages More Shopper-Friendly

September 15, 2010 • Pamela Hazelton

Most conversion articles focus on a store’s product pages. After all, those pages are most visited by search engine spiders and internal search results. Customers who browse, however, use category pages, and those customers need buying nudges, too. Every store needs conversion-ready c...
Checkout Tactics
Conversion Tip: Reduce Abandonment by Publishing Voucher Codes

August 25, 2010 • Charles Nicholls

The widespread nature of discount voucher and coupon sites is encouraging visitors to abandon purchases to look for voucher codes. In response, Macy’s, for example, now publishes its own "special offer" site that lists Macy’s own voucher and coupon codes.
Checkout Tactics
Conversion: Pros and Cons of Four Checkout Methods

August 23, 2010 • Pamela Hazelton

There are hundreds of studies on the subject of shopping cart abandonment. Companies offering recovery-type services often rely on these statistics to tell us how their products can help. What ...
Checkout Tactics
Usability Report Card: LiveOutThere.com

August 3, 2010 • Pamela Hazelton

Live Out There is an online community and store for active people. Featuring top brands in apparel and gear, the site is designed to attract folks serious about outdoor activities. The products Live Out There sells aren’t for the budget-shopper, but rather those looking for tried and ...
Checkout Tactics
Usability Report Card: How-To-Plans.com

June 15, 2010 • Pamela Hazelton

I’m always excited to hear business owners wanting a blunt, no-holds-barred analysis. It means they’re serious about being competitive. The team at How-To-Plans asked Practical eCommerce to grade the usability of its website. How-To-Plans sells do-it-yourself plans for all sorts of hom...
Checkout Tactics
Conversion: Technology, Customers, and ‘Embraceability’

May 13, 2010 • Pamela Hazelton

Conversion rates of an online store rely on many things, and that includes the technology used for graphics, video and interactive content. Cascading Stylesheets (CSS), JavaScript, and Flash have made the web a better, more interactive place. Next up is HTML5, which is the next major r...
Checkout Tactics
The PeC Review: WinBuyer Puts Competitors’ Prices on Your Pages

November 30, 2009 • Armando Roggio

By some estimates, 94 percent of online shoppers will invest at least some time comparing prices before they make a buying decision. That comparison process often takes shoppers to as many as four different online retailers and a price comparison engine or two, but now one vendor is off...
Checkout Tactics
Seven Ways to Reduce Shopping Cart Abandonment

September 23, 2009 • Jan Riley

Shopping cart abandonment affects most every ecommerce merchant. A whitepaper by McAfee, an ecommerce security company, called Digital Window Shopping: The Long Journey to Buy, cites a survey conducted by comScore, in which comScore attempted to determine why shoppers abandon their cart...
Checkout Tactics
Ecommerce Know-How: Identify Related Products and Boost Sales

June 29, 2009 • Armando Roggio

Good on-site marketing, such as related-product promotions, encourages emotion-driven "joy buying," potentially boosting per-customer revenue and profit. Online shopping can be both a practical and an emotional activity. Often buyers begin an online shopping experience because they see...
Checkout Tactics
Ecommerce Know-How: Using a Variable Pricing Model

March 20, 2009 • Armando Roggio

Selling downloadable products online presents a number of special problems for ecommerce businesses, not the least of which is demonstrating the value of an intangible product that has no physical form and no glossy packaging. Certainly, software vendors and popular sites like iTunes ha...
Checkout Tactics
PeC Traffic Report: Accept Competitors' Coupon Codes

February 6, 2009 • Armando Roggio

With the retail market suffering under the weight of a global economic recession, online shopkeepers must take every step to attract more site visitors. Accepting competitors' coupons in your own online store is a tactic that can help attract bargain-hunting customers, encourage loyalty...
Checkout Tactics
PeC Traffic Report: Will 2009 Be the Year of the Coupon?

January 6, 2009 • Armando Roggio

2009 begins in the shadow of global economic recession. The Consumer Confidence Index hovers at 38, a new low in United States, and those consumers that are shopping want deals. So could 2009 be the year of the ecommerce coupon? According to a Dec. 10, 2008 comScore report, coupon use ...
Checkout Tactics
Sharable Coupons Can Boost Sales

November 24, 2008 • Armando Roggio

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...
Checkout Tactics
Secure Checkout Most Important in Attracting New Customers

November 19, 2008 • Armando Roggio

A newly released consumer survey from Harris Interactive, a research firm, and Volusion, a hosted shopping cart company, suggests that payment security is—not surprisingly—a top issue for online shoppers. The survey asked more than 2,400 online shoppers aged 18 or older what factors in...
Checkout Tactics
Keep It Simple And Straightforward

June 11, 2008 • Pamela Hazelton

During a recent online shopping experience, I was thrilled to find the particular store offered free shipping on orders of $25 or more. The large, bold graphic denoting such offer was in the upper-right hand corner of the screen. So I spent some time picking out a few more items, then I...
Checkout Tactics
Be Sure To Simplify Checkout

November 15, 2007 • Pamela Hazelton

There have been many a debate about how to siphon shoppers into the checkout process quickly, and just as expeditiously get them to the final invoice page. The words easy, simplified and ‘lightning fast’ come to mind during such arguments, while retailers and advisers sight statistics, ...
Checkout Tactics
Lowering Shopping Cart Abandonment

July 11, 2007 • Greg Laptevsky

As an ecommerce owner, you always want to make the checkout process as quick and smooth as possible for your own ecommerce customers. Here’s a quick checklist of simple website changes that could help you lower shopping cart abandonment. Prominent “Add to Cart” button Make sure that a...
Checkout Tactics
Lowering Cart Abandonment

December 1, 2006 • PEC Staff

With shopping cart abandonment at a high level, ecommerce owners continue to look for ways to motivate shoppers to complete the checkout process. Research from Shop.org indicates shoppers abandon their cart during checkout more than 75 percent of the time. Imagine 75 percent of the gro...
Checkout Tactics
Giving Them What They Want

May 1, 2006 • Pamela Hazelton

Listen to your customers. Part of my job is to rip online stores apart and present solutions, all focused on existing and potential customers. It still shocks me to see so many online businesses implement bad ideas because the head honcho thinks something is “good”, without ever asking...
Checkout Tactics
Navigation is Key

September 1, 2005 • Pamela Hazelton

Online shoppers need guidance about finding what they need, and information about the pages they are viewing. We get so used to all our friends and family being online, we take for granted that each and every day, thousands of people use the Internet for the very first time. This leads ...

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