I’ve got a good friend who says, “if it’s free, it’s for me”. When you think of ecommerce shopping cart software solutions, this is a serious challenge. Naturally, when it comes to free items, your natural inclination is to check it out. However, the free osCommerce shopping cart may be more of a hassle than a bargain. The main reason being that people launching online web stores like women’s clothing stores - forget to factor in TWO elements to their costs: software (non-human) and labor. Just because the software may be free, does not mean it is free because it still costs someone the time - and money - to install and integrate the software.

The biggest advantage to the osCommerce cart is obviously that it is free to download. It is essentially a multi-featured online sales and payment engine available for free. Because it is free, many people are willing to put up with the trouble to download it and get the osCommerce cart running on their computer. When you install it, you get all of the basic requirements needed for use with ecommerce.

In order for your free osCommerce to work properly, it is recommended that your machine can run PHP and has access to a typical LAMP (Linux/Apache/MySQL/PHP) setup. It is possible to run on a WAMP, which replaces Linux with Windows, but the trouble makes it almost not worth it. If you have a web hosting provider that you use, it is likely that you have all of the requirements. However, it is better to be safe than sorry, so contact your support rep to assure yourself.

Before you turn around, hours have gone by just installing the platform. Then you have to start CONFIGURING it. Then you have to start integrating your design and content with their system. We could almost guarantee in a side by side comparison that it will take minimally 30-40 hours to get an osCommerce store running. Whereas with our WebCart Shopping Cart platform you could be up and running in a few hours. You could also pay one of our offshore content masters $500 or so to take your web design and integrate it completely with our cart system.

This is the first time I've come out of hibernation in a long time and this conference was a great way to get back into the groove of hearing what people are talking about in person.

For the last 12 months the developers of the WebCart shopping cart software platform have been engaged in "Secret" to redo our web platform completely and correct all the mistakes we uncovered over the last 3 years. At the same time as we've been redoing the core, we also took a major leap of faith in the drive towards Online Community Building and integrated many features of content managements systems like photo galleries, video galleries, podcasting galleries, events calendar, email newsletter and the whole notion of ratings and comments and friends and communities and we've built basically the first totally integrated Portal Platform for Online Communities.

You'll be able to preview our platform at www.worldclassplatform.com pretty soon.

If I could break down the Community 2.0 conference into a few distilled points this is what I got:

1. Many software providers were focused on group communication focusing on the collaboration of the group and the dialogue that ensues. But what the companies did not focus on was anything substantive beyond this Yahoo Groups type of communication.

2. Archiving was a big issue - though this was not really gone into in much depth it is becoming a seriously important issue as companies have millions of pages in archives which are moderately accessible. 

3. Big q. still is what is the next thing in community besides "dialogue" and will there be a focus on the individual rather than on the individual as part of a distinct group.

Since we develop in PHP I am confident we will be able to benefit from other software developers' improvements to the Web 2.0 universe and embed new technologies into our platform. Wait and see. Wait and see.

The previous few posts I focused on different methods of increasing web traffic though accepting credit cards, organic search engine optimization and Pay Per Click marketing. Lately I have been receiving emails from readers and customers asking me to explain different internet terminology which I refer to in posts. Therefore, I have decided to create a couple of posts dedicated to eCommerce terminology in order to give new internet users an enhanced understanding of vital terms in cyber space as they relate to running an online store.

PPC Is an acronym for Pay Per Click Marketing. Essentially PPC is a method for online retailers and site owners to expose their product or services to search engine users without obtaining organic ranking   . The reason it's called pay per click is because the advertiser only pays for the ads which are clicked. In most search engines paid ads are separated from the organic listings and marked as such. If done properly PPC can be a very profitable source of traffic because it allows small companies to compete with the big boys.

SEO stands for search engine optimization which generally refers to optimizing any given website to meet specific search engine criteria. An example is following Google's webmaster guidelines (http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=35769) to optimize a site so that search engines find it friendly and valuable. In addition SEO can also include link building and other organic ways to increase organic search engine rankings.

SEO Shopping Cart is an eCommerce solution which encompasses seo principals within its design and structure. An example would be shopping cart software that is created in CSS has the ability to easily and or modify header tags, page content and content placement. Additions like adding alt tags, Meta keywords and descriptions would also be considered SEO shopping Cart software.

Over the next few posts I will add more definitions as they relate to future posts.

Pay-per-click marketing should be a marketing strategy for just about every e-Commerce store owner. On the surface PPC can appear to be a rather simple and straightforward process however, to maximize ROI (return on investment) a shopping cart software owner usually comes to the realization that PPC is more than just a bidding and clicking system, but rather requires specific marketing techniques in order to maximize traffic and visitors. Often times, it becomes profitable to hire an external firm to manage the entire process, but since many small online businesses don't have a budget to hire a firm all the internet marketing is learned and executed in house. This being said there are specific techniques out there that very few merchants are taking advantage of. In this post I will cover several techniques and tips which if implemented properly  may boost not only your conversion, but will decrease your PPC spending.
 
Seasonal Keywords - It should go without saying that keywords are one of the  most important factor when it comes to setting up a PPC campaign. However, what many merchants often don't pay attention to are seasonal keywords. Let me explain if I was in the business of selling sunglasses I would bid on all the sunglass manufacture brand names as well as generic terms to capture the proper internet traffic for my sunglass eCommerce site. Seasonal keywords are targeted  keywords for specific holidays like "mother's day sunglass sale" or "Christmas sunglass blowout" often times when a PPC campaign is running on auto pilot eCommerce store owners neglect to invest the time in discovering profitable seasonal keywords.

In the next post I will cover landing pages, ad copy and evolving a stale PPC strategy.

Previously I wrote about how eCommerce design differs from any other design style, and by incorporating the right look a merchant’s conversion rates will sky rocket.  In this post I will discuss other high impact areas like affiliate marketing, promotional and marketing campaigns and many other areas that effect your shopping cart software conversion.

Good Old Affiliate Marketing

A successful affiliate marketing strategy can be an eCommerce store owner’s best friend. It’s a perfect situation for a merchant because it offers free exposure; commission based advertising and free one way links. Having an affiliate program allows websites to advertise without spending any money.

Setting up an affiliate program is easy; first you would need shopping cart software which supports affiliates. If you are using osCommerce then you have to install an additional module. WebCart on the other hand come with a pre-built affiliate program which is ready to go out of the box.  Second, you need to find people who will put up your store banners on their website. This in its true form is pure marketing, and I am not going to get in to the specifics, but a simple search in Google for “affiliate marketing tutorials” will bring up a wealth of information. 

Once an affiliate program is in full swing many eCommerce merchants relax, and subsequently don’t take the time to keep in touch with their affiliates.  This creates lost business and poor business relationships with the people who are helping your eCommerce business succeed. Here is what you should do to keep your affiliates happy.

1. Send out a newsletter twice a month
2. Visit your affiliate’s sites and call them once every few months to talk about how their business is going.
3. Offer special commission and coupons to your affiliates so they market your products more aggressively.
4. Private Label your site for each affiliate so that you can offer a level of personalization. (this option is available in WebCart)

Let me ask you a question: What good is shopping cart software if you are not able to completely configure personalized options? Well the simple answer is, not very good. Part of what makes a shopping cart solution so popular is its ability to mold in to almost any eCommerce industry. The area of configuration remains in the hands of the shopping cart software developers.  For every eCommerce solution the options are different and in some cases absolutely unique. This brings me to my next point of what makes the WebCart configuration panel so unique? For starters it's very easy to use, and that is not mentioning the fact that almost every option imaginable is configurable. Let's take a look under the hood.

 

The WebCart Configuration interface is very unique. Our developers didn't just copy the look from osCommerce like my other eCommerce solutions do, but rather created an entire new system. Within the configuration page you will find:

Shipping fees (shipping and handling) - Here you can specify how much to charge for shipping and handling in addition you are able to
specify different parameters for things like weight, price and shipping method.

Packaging - This option allows you to define custom packages which could be used when customers are purchasing items.

General - This area is all about your information like email. Address etc. The information here is vital because it will be used by your shopping cart software to send emails and related information.

Inventory - Active and define options for the inventory manger which comes pre-built with WebCart 11

Messages - I love this option because it lets you customize the error messages you customers get. For example: A webmaster has the option of inserting a custom message if the password or user name doesn't match. Another example could be an invalid gift certificate could get a custom error message without breaking in to the code.

Payments - Here Webmasters are able to configure their authorize.net, VeriSign and / or PayPal account.

Taxes - The taxes page allows you to add custom tax information for specific states.

User Controls - Here you can modify the user name and password for logging in to your WebCart shopping cart software's back end.

Contact - This page allows you to create custom contact forms which can be customized for different areas of your eCommerce website.

WebCart’s shopping cart software comes pre-built with hundreds of features. In previous blog posts I discussed many of these features. However, in the next series of posts I plan to really get down to the nuts and bolts of how each feature functions. In addition I will be posting screen shots of different features to give you (my readers) a new level of understanding when it comes to the functionality and usability of WebCart’s shopping cart software.

Often times when dealing with shopping cart software the learning curve is so difficult that many non technical users just give up. The challenge many eCommerce solution providers is organizing the flood of features which are available to the merchant. However, even a well organized backend still causes confusion because the merchant may not remember in what category the feature they want is located. To combat this issue WebCart created a “favorites” feature which allows the Webmaster to simply add a feature / page to their favorites and in a sense creating a custom set of categories.

By incorporating simple, yet useful usability features in to WebCart we hope to take the management of maintaining an online store away from expensive professionals and leave it in the hands of the small business owner.

criteria for shopping cart software easy to use shopping cart software php shopping cart software shopping cart software webcart shopping cart software

If by reading my pervious post example, you became frustrated just take a second to visualize how a potential online customer feels. When a consumer visits your site, most often they are looking for a apparent reason to buy from you instead of all the other sites. Does your eCommerce site give them a reason? Can you honestly say you can give them more then one reason?

If all considerable factors are identical or even if they are all similar your visitors will find it hard  to choose your site over the rest. Once online consumers start playing a guessing game of who to purchase  from, your online business start losing potential revenue. There is always a chance they would choose you, maybe that same chance is that they won’t. There is a way to ensure you are chosen over your competition. You have to make it clear through content how your online store is superior to the rest of your competition. A few great tips are:

- Offer only specialty items and become an expert in those items.
- Up your prices (this tends works well for premium services and goods)
- Redesign your website with a new “modern look and feel”
- Offer an unconditional 30 day return policy
- Boost your area of expertise (for service-based businesses like web design firms, internet marketing firms etc. )
- Offer a  creative customer loyalty program
- Reduce your prices
- Stress the importance your companies “great” customer service policy
- Provide an easy to see 800 number
- Create user reviews for all your products.
- Personalize service to your customers
- Offer discounted shipping or even free shipping for spending a pre-specified amount

Many web users are surprised to learn that there is a downsides to podcasting. If you do video or graphics, anyone using a standard audio-only iPod will not be able to take advantage of the imaging you are streaming, so if you’re planning on reaching a large group of people, you might want to think about doing a separate stream for audio and a stream for audio and video.

Popular to contrary belief, not every person uses itunes, (although the criteria was set by them) consequently if you’re going to podcast, consider streaming the content through your website in conjunction with itunes. You may also want to run an email alert system so you can send out a mass email notifying your listeners of new content.

To the best of my knowledge Apple doesn’t charge for serving podcasts in its directory, you are responsible for the bandwidth charges incurred, and any gear you need to generate and edit content. Personally, I look at podcasting as a win-win strategy. It allows you to reach new audiences and also keep current customers updated without then subscribing to an XML feed or sending them new product emails.

Online consumers are always craving helpful information, so as an online store owner you should spend the time devising audio and video that provides useful information that online customers can’t get from reading your product descriptions. For example, if you sell computer equipment, a podcast explaining the proper way install an additional hard drive would be useful to some, and you could always mention or use your product within your podcast.

When a business begins the search for a shopping cart solution, they tend to look at the big features a solution has to offer as oppose to the smaller, and what may seem less significant ones. In the next few posts I am going to highlight small, but significant features which should meet the criteria for shopping cart software, and play a big role in keeping customer loyalty.

User Log In / Order History

Perhaps, the most underrated feature is the ability for a customer to obtain a user name and password in order look up their order history, get real time shipping updates or make changes to their order.
I remember the last time I ordered a laptop from dell, and how excited I was to receive it as soon as possible. The cool thing about dell was that it gave me real time progress reports on when my order was being built, and once the system was built I received real time shipping information. I felt secure and confidant I would receive my order in the time promised. I can go though countless ways a user log in system can be beneficial, but I am pretty sure I made my point.

Surprisingly, many leading online shopping cart solutions don’t offer a robust user login system. Magazinepromotion.com, a long time client of WebCart, allows its current subscribes to renew all their subscriptions with one click. Therefore, once a user places an order for multiple magazines, they have the option of renewing whichever magazines they want though the backend with one easy click.