As you know, E-commerce is the process used to sell or market your products and services while transferring funds online. You may be asking, what makes a good E-commerce Web site?

It is very likely that an attractive E-commerce Web site with features will catch the attention of users and make your Web site their favorite over every other. Nowadays, the world turn around the internet and almost anything can be done on it. It has made it possible to do business anywhere, and at any time.

When you have an E-commerce Web site, consider these tips:

1. In first place, you should think like your consumers. Keep navigation simple and make your products and services easy to find in your Web site, for instance you can place them in more than only one category for fulfilling their online retail.

2. Use photos of your goods, take into account that a picture is worth a thousand words.

3. Make payment processing easy and secure. Nowadays, those who shop online want to be able to pay you online. You can accept credit card payments, PayPal account, among others. You’re probably worrying about security right now, but that’s why there are https sites, these are secure sites for secure transactions. HTTPS is not a different protocol, but uses encrypted Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) or Transport Layer Security (TLS) connectivity. This ensures reasonable protection provided that the server certificate is verified.

4. Last but not least, once your Web site is built and live, give publicity and market it. You need to promote it to prospects and customers. A good idea is to optimize the content of your Web site.

As a Los Angeles web design company, Weboart can help you build and offer E-commerce Website with its team of professional website designers, who are trained to build all kinds of customized websites. Our web designers can modify existing sites by adding ecommerce features.

Shopping Cart is an e-commerce tool that has a lot of benefits either for you and your online customers. For instance:

• Your shoppers can select items to buy and also subtract them and even choose options like quantity, size or color while they are buying. Here it’s very important to display the total running price as soon as shoppers add and remove items or change options.

• Make possible to calculate shipping costs and set shipping options too, such as weight, area, establish a flat-fee and many different delivery categories such as overnight, on the second day, air-postage, standard-mail, etc.

• Shopping Cart system can send a confirmation e-mail of the orders to the shopper and a confirmation of item’s ships as well. Related to this topic, remember to set up your cart to show shoppers the shipping fees as soon as possible because they are not usually willing to enter their credit card information unless they see the total first.

• A shopping cart offers secure transactions. This issue is essential, you not only can collect credit card numbers from users that want to buy your products or services, but also it enables a secure transaction either for you and your e-customers, and for you the credit card processing point you work with. This is done with a SLL (Secure Sockets Layer) connection; this encrypts information, avoiding hackers to gain access.

• Your Shopping Cart can be customized. Probably a generic shopping cart would be able to handle the needs of a small site, a good e-commerce site with a large amount of products or services to offer will need a customized cart. Additionally, to be professional with an orderly structure, showing all the information clear simple to be used easily.

• You can customize your Shopping Cart Design. Keep in mind that e-Commerce companies who have “prettier” Web sites are more likely to have better performance due to it. Your shopping cart is a main tool when the customer is checking-out and this is the axis of e-commerce. So, do your best!

The shopping cart in your Web site should guide your customers through the entire process making them feel secure and comfortable. Now, need to update your website with a shopping cart? We can help you with this task! Whatever this is for: new web sites, web site redesigns, minor changes or just updating, updates are a common and useful way to keep your website with new web standards and accessibility requirements. Just contact us now 1-800-932-2580.

Additionally, we can help you build other e-commerce features like product search, ratings and reviews, online payment system integration, automatic shipping cost calculation, sale price and discounted price display, among others. Enjoy your results!

Source:
How to Add a Shopping Cart to Your Site

Firstly, answer these questions: does your Web Site reflect what your company stands? Have you updated your Website lately? Does your Web site transmit what you want to communicate today? If the answer is no, then you should start working immediately!

But that’s not all. If your answer is yes, you still have to take a look at your Web site and compare it to those of your competitors; does it look outdated, colorless, and not attractive? Pages load very slowly? Does its simplicity make it too simple and therefore lacking tools? Isn’t it user-friendly? Does it have incomplete information? Organic traffic from search engines is low? Now, if you would answer the above questions with a yes, then it is time to redesign your Web site.

Due to the constant technological advances, a Web Site that is not regularly updated will suffer several negative consequences. Competitors will take advantage of it and will attract more prospects than you. Hey! What are you waiting to stay ahead of the game!

More important reasons to redesign could be:

• If your Web site was built over five years ago, probably technology and web standards have been modified. Today, you need to use CSS/XHTML to manage your Web site. This will help you optimize on Search Engines, improve easy access to your site and ease up updating in the future.

• A Web site completely built in Flash is perfectly beautiful and looks very professional, but it will give little or no content to search engines to scan, and therefore will pull you downwards in the rankings.

• If you have gone through re-branding or a change of look with your print materials, you will obviously need to do a complete make-over. Leaving it with the old looks will probably confuse your customers.

• If your business is growing rapidly, then it might be time for you to look into e-commerce for some of your products and services, maybe a Content Management System or even including a blog.

• If the leads and sales you have are not from your Web site you might want to take a good look all possible improvements you can do to make it profitable, you should make sure you have proper content on your Web site and contact forms so people can get in touch with you easily.

Tips for the redesigning process

1) Make it easier on your customers. Clients may get used to find your products and identify each section is a specific way. It’s hard to suddenly change their online routine. For that reason, you must be careful in order to avoid confusion. Your new Website “face-lifting” has to be functional and easy to use. Your goal is to maintain and attract new visitors, right? So, remember it is not likely that low-loading pages will keep visitors coming back for more. In addition, include contact forms, shopping carts, banners and newsletters that also help you stay in touch with them. Including online paying systems the likes of major Credit Cards or PayPal can also help you ease your transactions without additional work to be done.

All these things will result in additional income from your Web site, and this will prove how important it is to plan a Website redesign to keep it up-to-date.

2) Keep a provisional Web site for the redesigning period. There is nothing worse than wanting to visit a Web site that is under maintenance or construction. Clients can get really annoyed if they are not able to enter because you decided to stop working for a while. They want things to be fast and effective. They key is to still be effective and avoid been seen as lazy and unprofessional.

3) Redesigning is also a great marketing and PR opportunity. It’s a good time to contact your current customers and prospects and the press too. You can communicate that you are making some changes and in this way become more popular. Additionally, consider doing an event with them, where you show your new image. Then, you add pictures on your Web site as well as comments made by your guests. In this sense, your transformation will not only be virtual, but also real!

4) Become 2.0 and use attractive tools such as videos, colors and images. Become modern and fresh! Add multimedia tools which are fashionable today. But, do not overload your Web site. Try to find equilibrium in order to achieve the precise combination of music, texts, images and videos. If you excessively recharged it, then you will saturate your audience. The actual trend is modern, but functional. Use the proper amount of text, videos, music and images.

5) Hire a creative design team. Carefully choose the designers who are going to help you. Here, communications are crucial! Pencil on the items you want for your new website, and ask your web designer about these changes. Get together with the team and come up with ideas; let them know your vision, goal, and objectives. You should inform them the image you are willing to reflect. Moreover, trust on their creative advice and get involved!

In conclusion, redesigning is a must in order to be on truck in the online marketing field. It should be a priority! Your Web Site is like your “face” to the world. Don’t forget your make up then! The right time is as soon as you see that your Web Site is failing in communicating who you are and what you do today. The right time is now!

If you need assistance, we are ready to help you. We have the required experience to redesign your Web site and bring your vision to life. Our philosophy of ‘design first’ is still proving success when applied to business. Just call us today at 1-800-932-2580.

Still want to read more on redesigning your Web site? Check out these articles!

Redesign Your Website To Become Web 2.0: Quick Tips

Website Facelifting – 5 Reasons Why You Should Do It?

Planning To Redesign Your Website? Check these Simple Tips

How Not to Redesign Your Website (A Marketing Lesson From NYTimes.com)

SEO Checklist For Your Website Redesign

How to Redesign Your Website to Play to Your Audience

How will this union get in the following times? Here are some trends that will be likely to become our daily bread tomorrow:

Mobility

Until now, the most common way of Internet surfing was sitting in front of a computer. A laptop with Wi-Fi, a BlackBerry or an iPhone; were the closest hardware accessories to a mobile Web. Nevertheless, a new Web is about to born, a Web conceived for mobility where everything has to do with location.

Brandon Mendelson, who define himself as one of the most followed people on Twitter, uses mobile technology to mobilize and empower people to help others! He states that “the future of the web is mobile” [we agree!]. In addition, Rahul Sonnad, founder and CEO of Santa Monica-based tech start-up Geodelic Systems, presents this new Web as a combination of mobile devices with web browsing along with accurate location awareness. A Web who knows where you’re at and provides you all the pertinent data, from the coffee shop promos around the corner to historic curiosities about the spot you’re standing on. It will be like browsing the real world itself, not just the digital one.

The proliferation of location enabled devices like GPS or smart phones provides an opportunity for brands to improve the quality of the consumer’s experience by changing the way their information is created according to the real world’s space possibilities; says Sonnad.

Sharing

Human’s urge to communicate and share thoughts, experiences and ideas through posts, photos, videos or any online expression format have positioned social networks as the place to be in the cyberworld.

The future may be about a new platform for people to save and share their life’s moment. In this sense, ThisMomentis no longer focused in sharing lives, but in specific special instants through a computer or a mobile device. ThisMoment creates a holistic experience and is already in sight of leading media companies.

Bill French, an information architect specializing in Internet applications and Co-founder of MyST Technology Partners, Inc. says that “in the next 24 months, any business that hasn’t transformed their Web site into a social media core for all marketing content and conversational activities will be considered irrelevant by people and machines (i.e., search engines, flow engines, etc.)”. So, sharing seems to be the key!

Cybernetics

What’s wrong about dreaming in a supersonic’s life? With the technological advances mixed to natural sciences, a whole new lifestyle could be a click away. Graham Jones, an Internet Psychologist, assures us that it will relatively soon be possible to connect biological systems with computerized ones; it has been already possible to control a robot using the brain of a mouse and transmit information from one person to another’s nervous system through Internet. According to him, we will be able to get rid of keyboards and transmit information by thinking and swap data from the brain to a web-based store; a place to file copies of the information in our brain. That is just amazing!

Interactivity: The communication experience

We all love interactivity! Online TV, Video, Advertising… they are taking advantage of this trend. Emily Gannett, co-founder of an interactive video platform called KlickableTV, believes that their technology is what’s new and what’s coming soon!  This interactive video platform is a good example of how to create a comprehensive viewing experience and provides unique insights into viewer behavior.

Probably in the future, intelligent Web design will get so aware of users’ profiles that the Web will know us better than our mother, in order to talk to each user in his or her very personal language. As we take information from the Web, it will take information from us though our online activity; who said that wasn’t a dialogue?

Real money in online business

Free or Paid? That’s the big question on the future of online business. It’s usually said that the future of online business is free of charge. But; we believe that it’s A future of business, not THE, right?

Why can’t micropayments be the future of the web? Troy O’Bryan, President & CEO of Response Capture, Inc.says that “hefty subscriptions and licenses will be a thing of the past.  Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMORPGs) were of the first to prove the model”.  At Response Capture, they believe that “marketers should only have to pay for what they use or more importantly what their target responder uses.  Paying for more is a waste”.

Even though it’s true that the majority of people don’t like to pay for material they actually can get for free, it doesn’t mean that everything online must be that way. There are several ways to do business online and combine ways of shopping; and, there will definitely be new ones! We will be witnesses of the proliferation of social networking/ecommerce sites where you can offer your products or services, or even social networking/shopping sites where you can shop and get cash back! For instance, GreenBackStreet.com provides Cash Back rebates for shopping at more than 1,100 national and local stores. According to National Marketing Director, Eric Brisgel “Whether you’re looking for the best price on the latest tech gadgets or everyday items, if you have  an interest in providing for your non-profit organization, religious group, association, employees or just enjoy the social networking aspects, GreenBackStreet.com provides an ultra-convenient, FREE method of saving thousands of dollars”.

In addition, the pay per result model will have more presence online and e-commerce features will keep improving and providing security and privacy [at least, we hope so].

Finally, Brandon Muth says “that the biggest move we’re going to see over the next 10 years is focus and quality”. Absolutely, YES! We also believe that we have a lot of things to do to improve quality, ‘cause like in the evolution of species, only the best qualified will last! We invite you all to be part of that great future!

Before the future comes upon us, we’d like to thank all the comments that made this article possible. About tomorrow we don’t know that much, but what is sure by now is we’ll keep on touch online; after all, we all live in this yellow submarine.

Personal details are crucial for e-merchants’ marketing research: no doubt about it!  As customers visit several Web sites and do online purchases, online businesses can track their visits and analyze profiles of their interests without their concern. Businesses can get to know your age, ethnicity, preferences and hobbies and other valuable information about you. Having access to this information allows them to improve their advertising techniques as they have a profound knowledge on what their target audience needs and wants. But, where is the limit?

It looks like privacy issues are gaining importance in the Net. Several new policies will soon be launched in order to improve customer rights online. One of the proposals is that companies let their clients know when they are being track. The American Association of Advertising Agencies, the Association of National Advertisers and the Direct Marketing Association are behind this project. They want customers to have the option and the right to choose if they want to share their personal data. In summary, there is an imminent demand for an increase in self-regulation.

Customers will have the option of “opt-out” the tracking policies, but not vice versa. Is that enough?  In this way, only those who are concerned and aware of Web Tracking will choose to avoid it. But, what about the rest of the audience?   If you don’t know anything about tracking, then your privacy will still be violated? Maybe the option should be opt-in instead of “opt-out” (meaning that businesses can only track customers who actually choose to contribute to their marketing research). Privacy will be partially protected then.

What about E-commerce?

Marketing research and campaigns will be damaged as businesses will have limited access to vital information. Very few customers will want to be tracked as the online reputation is related to invasion of privacy. So, the key for merchants will be to rebuild the bond with their customers. Their major concern should now be how to gain their trust. How to make them feel comfortable enough to share valuable information?

In conclusion, there are two main points to be considered. On the one hand, a harder work towards privacy protection and self-regulation should be done. These policies are a first step in order to achieve the proper defense of customer rights. On the other hand, businesses should find a new way of improving marketing strategies respecting the privacy of their customers.

Sources:

Companies Working Towards More Transparent Web Tracking

User tracking underlines trade vs. privacy debate

Rounding Up The Privacy Debate

New guidelines for Web Tracking Ensure More Privacy

Four Ways to Fight Back Against Cyberattacks

How to make your website more attractive and reliable? Here there are some tips. Let’s see!

Above all, make sure that customers have access to detail information about products. This includes sizes, colors and prices. Don’t forget to include shipping costs, guarantees and taxes. People can get really annoyed if they find out that they have to pay more at the end of the transaction. If things are not clear since the beginning they will probably choose another company on their next transaction. You don’t want that to occur, do you?

E-commerce can appear as cold and distant. Try being personal with your customers! Make them fell as if they are actually at your store interacting with you. Answer their doubts by e-mail immediately or even better have live assistance at your Web site.

Once you finish your sale and the product was delivered, it is recommendable to measure customers’ satisfaction. A good alternative is to send them a short survey asking them what they think about your service and check if they had any problems or if they have any suggestions. Just a couple of standard questions where they can review and rate your products or services. You can also give them the option of answering open questions to give more specific details. This is important for two reasons. Firstly, because you can make an evaluation of your service and improve your weak points. Secondly, —and even more important— new visitors can notice good references of other people and trust in you to make their first purchase.

Keep in mind that making a survey is not enough; if there is a problem, you have to solve it, or your customers will feel disappointed: they are looking for solutions!

We know how important is to for you to improve your Web site. Our Los Angeles web design team can help you meet users’ preferences and expectations. If you need help, call us at 1-800-932-2580.

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Your Website is Your Front, Use It Carefully