Author: PoLR

A lot of our clients for SEO are Ecommerce websites. Not all of them by any stretch of the imagination, but a fair old percentage. The thing about Ecommerce is that you pretty much know the success of an Intenet Marketing campaign by the sales increase enjoyed. This is mostly the case, arguably you could say that the traffic increased Tenfold but the sales actually dipped, so the conversion of the website let the side down. Thankfully though folks, this isn’t the way we work at PoLR.

As with any of our SEO or Internet Marketing Clients, we understand that the conversion of the website (the amount of traffic that actually do what you want them to do, this usually mean ‘buy’ and this equals a ‘conversion’ but can also just mean an ‘enquiry’ for a non-transactional website) is sometimes as important as the traffic levels. This is why we constantly adjust the websites for best performance in the Search Engines and best performance when everybody actually gets onto the website.

When we increase conversions on an enquiry focused website, they will get more enquiries in which seems like an easy equasion. The next question is then, how do they know that it is our SEO campaign that is generating their increase in enquiries? And not the Thirty Grand they just unwittingly gave to Yellow Pages? Well you can actually take care to show them who’s contacting from where and Google Analytics helps too. Ultimately, sometimes you rely on their in-house noting of where leads came from which can be, at times, unreliable.

When an Ecommerce client is looking to see if their SEO campaign is working for them it is pretty cut-and-dried. They can see immediately, from Google Analytics, everything they need to know about traffic sources and how the increases are going and where they’re being generated from. So generally, it’s the easiest type of client to show successes for. The monthly meeting will follow a similar path to other Ecommerce based clients, but still of course, looking to constantly improve.

This makes it seem like it’s more applicable for an Ecommerce website to obtain SEO than another type of website. I would argue that the importance is equal! Every business wants to get more business. The manner in which you get it is down to the products/services you provide (they might not be ‘tangible’ products). You shouldn’t have to have a lesser internet concern than direct selling websites.

It’s mostly just the reporting and analysis that gets slightly more complex. But to be honest, it’s not that much of a stretch and we know how to do it anyway, so leave it to us! The end result is: SEO is just as important to a company looking to generate leads/sales in any way, be it selling online, or attracting potential customers to contact you.

We previously carried out an e-commerce survey where we touched on users feelings over third party payment gateways(such as Paypal etc) and the security of buying online. We concentrated on how much users knew about third party gateways, whether they were trusted and what they looked for to show an e-commerce website is secure.

In April, ClickandBuy commissioned a similar survey and the results landed in our inbox today. Several of the results complimented or related to our previous survey, for example, 54% of respondents being concerned over the security of entering credit card details online.

40% of respondents would have more confidence in an online shop that had more than one payment method. When you couple this with the 54% who are concerned and the 59% who will abandon a transaction if their preferred payment method is not in place, it is easy to see why a company could benefit from keeping some human-to-human contact and allowing more traditional payment menthods such as a telephone sales hotline – covering all bases so to speak.

Online shopping to carry on rising.

As we have often blogged about Christmas shopping figures we are always interested to hear anything that shows browsers are buying with more frequency online. We were happy to read that in terms of the increase of online shopping the survey found that 36% plan to shop more online than on the High Street in 2009 than 2008. 45% of the 36% said this would be in order to source a cheaper, online version of a product.

What’s a cart to do?

Whilst there is obviously a way to go before 100% or users feel safe shopping online, the best thing an e-commerce website can do is offer professional, well-known payment options that users are familiar with and happy to use. Offering an offline payment option where possible could also help ‘catch’ some of the 59% who might otherwise abandon a purchase. While offline payments have disadvantages including the fact that it may be slower, it is worth having a procdure in place to allow for anyone who’s dubious about online safety.

We talk a lot about e-commerce design and the benefits of e-commerce and an SEO campaign we also have carried out an e-commerce survey recently that gave us a lot of food for thought. Base on this survey we decided that today we would put together a list of 10 things you should do or consider with your online shop.

So here we go with our top ten tips to consider for your e-commerce cart. If you have anything else to add the please leave a comment.

1) Accept Payment

We once worked on a site that had an e-commerce cart set up, fully populated and being marketed online but they weren’t selling products. I don’t mean the internet marketing wasn’t working rather that they preferred the cart to be just an online catalogue. Eventually they were persuaded to ‘go transactional’ and made a killing but the point is they could have been doing this all along.

If you have gone to the effort of building, populating and marketing your e-commerce website then make sure users can follow that through with a purchase.

2) Get straight to the product

Look at your online shop, if you were a first time user would you know it was possible to buy online? Let customers see the products straight away to entice them into looking further. Big Flash animations are great but if they use up space that could otherwise be selling for you then it may be worth re-thinking it.

One more thing, make sure users can see a shopping cart somewhere obvious on the site, subconsciously it will tell users they can buy.

3) Keep it all legal

Beware of your legal obligations when distance selling and make sure you are adhering to everything you should from data protection to distance selling regulations. Not only does this offer protection to you and your customer, it will free up your time answering e-mails about shipping, returns etc!

4) Get your website found

Having your online shop up and running in one thing, having buyers is another. Combining your e-commerce cart with an online marketing campaign will help advertise your website online and encourage visitor to your site. A well thought out site will help convert these visitors to buyers.

5) Don’t have any nasty surprises

This relates to the ‘keep it all legal’ section. A large cause of abandoned carts is due to unexpected shipping charges being added on at the point of purchase. If you think you are getting a bargain online then find another £10 added on just before you put in your credit card details it would put the richest of us off! Alert your buyers to shipping charges throughout the cart so they are informed and expected to see any additional amounts added to their total.

6) Check your checkout

Another cause for abandoned carts can simply come down to a broken checkout. Check your payment process every now and again to give yourself peace of mind and react quickly to any reports of a broken cart your customers report.

7) Show them the product

Remember that old saying ‘a picture speaks a thousand words’. We are very visual creatures, we like to see nice pretty pictures and reading text can be a pain in the behind. In an e-commerce cart get as many images uploaded as you can of each product. Show close ups of any special detailing or funky wee features your product may have.

8 ) Let them get to know the product

How many times have you looked at a product online and not been well enough informed to buy? Input as much data as you can about each product to really inform the buyer. If they are encouraged by the lovely array of images you have uploaded (from point 6) then they will want to know mas many facts as they can before purchasing.

9) Keep it professional

A well designed, professional website will give your customers a high degree of trust in your website. In a recent e-commerce survey we carried out, a huge percentage of respondents cited an unprofessional design as a major factor in them deciding not to progress with a purchase.

10) Get your products out there with Googlebase

Set up a Googlebase account and stick in a feed of your products. This gets your products ‘out there’ and puts them in the results in Froogle. It’s not in lieu of an SEO campaign but it does get your products a little exposure.

Recent blog posts of ours made us realise that we haven’t been shouting out enough about the beneficial combination of an e-commerce website and an internet marketing campaign. It’s what we do best and decided it’s about time we told you why it’s a cracking combination!

Why go e-commerce?

Selling online has tons of benefits. Amongst others, it’s cheaper than a high street shop, can sell for you when you’re asleep and can reach a wider geographic area. Want to know more? Then look at our ‘5 Reasons to purchase an online shop‘ post.

Why take SEO?

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) aims to advertise your website online to put it in as best a position as possible for your chosen search terms. For example, if you are selling hair care products then you will want to be as high as you can for this term to get as many sales as you can. Simple, isn’t it?

Why go e-commerce AND take SEO?

If you have gone to the trouble of appointing a web designer and developing and populating an online shop then of course you want to sell (and as much as you can). Now, maybe you don’t need SEO, maybe you are the only seller of ‘pink dentures with yellow dots’ and users will know to look for this. But for the most part you will have a product that thousands of other companies are also selling online. Being hidden back on page 25 won’t sell you anything because you won’t be found.

• How do you set yourself apart?
• How do you encourage someone to buy from you?
• How do you get your company infront of consumers?

The answer is simple, (well the answer is simple, our job isn’t!):

• You want a professional Internet Marketing company to compliment your new shop and encourage users ‘into’ your shop.
• Once in, you want them to buy (because it’s not all about hits!)

That’s where PoLR fit the bill.

We offer affordable e-commerce websites and SEO packages to get you online quickly and professionally. Contact us to find out more on 0141 572 8819.

Want to know more about e-commerce? The take a peek at our e-commerce survey results.

Traditionally, (or as much as we can use the word traditional in reference to the web) we view e-commerce as the act of selling a physical product on the web. Like Amazon selling books or Boots the chemist selling toothpaste.

However, we often forget that e-commerce encompasses several other variations of selling and does not have to refer to an actual product. It is about trading information online to open up communication through as many difference channels as possible (but always with the hope of a sale later on). Think of it like this, we carry out acts of commerce every day of the week and not all of them involve the immediate exchange of money for goods and it’s exactly the same online.

Digital advancements are enabling methods of e-commerce that were previously uncommon. It is far easier for buyers and sellers from all walks of life, locations etc to have access to each other and to form relationships. But what are the different forms of  e-commerce out there and how can you embrace it for your company (or self) promotion?

Business to Business (B2B)

Setting up and promoting your company website is form of e-commerce. You may not be selling a physical products and money may not be exchanging hands but you are selling your company, it’s experience and it’s branding online. You are putting it out there for other companies to find and react to and with any luck, buy from!

B2B selling can also refer to business specific websites such as trade wholesale websites and also business directories such as whichwebdesigncompany.com which sell you company without selling a physical product.

A company website, blog, e-mail marketing campaign etc are all examples of B2B e-commerce.

Business to Consumer (B2C)

This is the ‘traditional’ interpretation of e-commerce. Selling a product to a customer via an online shop such as play.com or debenhams.com.

Consumer to Business (C2B)

Possibly the least common of all e-commerce is Consumer to Business. For example, imagine an antiques dealer scouring ebay to source a bargain or a limited edition piece. They may well end up buying from ‘Joe Bloggs down the road’ rather than an actual company. That’s Consumer to Business e-commerce

C2B selling can include websites such as Ebay and Amazon Marketplace.

Consumer to Consumer (C2C)

Social media sites such as MySpace and Facebook count as Consumer to Consumer selling. We all have looked at links recommended by friends, think of the Arctic Monkeys, a British band that rose to success through fans copying and distrubiting their demo cd’s. They rose to fame through fan recommendations and downloads through the likes of MySpace.

C2C selling also refers to websites such as ebay where anyone can easily buy and sell products regardless of them owning a shop or having a huge stock of products.

Once again, MySpace, Facebook and Ebay are all versions of C2C selling. Easy to set up and does not require knowledge to set up, host or run an independent website.

Buying Online – Concerns

The actual transactional concerns that online purchasers possess have become quite aparrent thanks to our recent e-commerce survey. Our findings show that many share the same concerns and that each user can relate to more than one concern at a time. It is first of all worth pointing out that 16% of those surveyed had no concerns at all (or would that be better put that 84% of people HAD concerns about buying online).

Leading the line, 69% of all those surveyed thought that ‘Fraud and Identity Theft’ was a concern they held about buying online. This could also be read as: Of those who held any concern about buying online, 83% marked Fraud and Identity Theft as one of those concerns. Either way you look at this, being able to overcome this fear must be a huge ‘concern’ for anyone looking to make a serious business out of an online shop.

This was the most popular, but by no means only concern held in our survey (and remember someone can have more than one). 53% of those questioned flagged a ‘Non Secure Website’ as being a concern they had about buying online (again that statistic is 63% of people who held any concern about buying online thought this element was one worth mentioning). These figures are eluding to the fact that more than half of everyone that could potentially buy from you are looking to see if you have a secure website, perhaps something to keep in mind when considering hastily mocking up a cheap alternative?

35% of people (42% of concern holders) hold a concern over the shop actually existing other than simply online. Is this a clue that the more company/premises details you can provide for your customers on your ecommerce website will result in a higher trust factor and hopefully more transactions.

Virus and Phishing concerns 31% of all those polled (37% of concern holders). This can be combated by having a clear and concise level of data that you take from the user and making sure you are taking the best steps towards security patches on your website. Sending them to a third party like paypal for the transaction (or a secure domain https://) tends to eradicate the owners specific liability, but does the end user always know why they are being sent away? Find out below…

13% of everyone (15% of concern holders) had ‘other’ concerns about buying online. These were mainly about their information being misused for spam and unwanted contact and also just a lack of other contact details for the company to make a complaint or phonecall.

Awareness of Security

73% of people in this survey look for something that tells the user that the online shop is secure. Let’s call them ‘Seekers’ and the remaining 27%  who don’t look for something that tells them an online shop is secure ‘Non-Seekers’. These Seekers were further broken down into different elements and it was surprising to see the different opinions that people held about what elements made the website look secure. Here we’ll try to run through the different answers we got and any of those which popped up with any regularity.

First up, there was a free text box for our respondents to tell us the things they look for, so one Seeker could flag up more than one ‘thing’.

One third of all Seekers (33%) said that they look for ‘The padlock’ to tell them that an e-commerce website is secure. This would lead any online shop owner to the conclusion that having this element was worthwhile.

With a generally professional look or feel to the website being something that 13% of Seekers sought, it would seem that a lot of these fears of lack of security of a website can be overcome (or existing security reinforced) by taking the time to visually reassure customers that they are in a safe place to transact, especially when 18% of Seekers look for something as vague as ‘Secure Logo’s’ to let them know the website is secure.

Surprisingly, 16% of Seekers actually look to see if the domain changes from ‘http://www.example.com’ to ‘https://www.example.com’ specifically to see the ‘https’ element present in order to denote security, a rather savvy bunch. 13% actually flagged a 3rd party payment location (mostly mentioning Paypal) as something they look for in a website as an indication of security.

Third Party Payments

So the whole aspect of sending your users to a third party payment site seems to be a pretty good way of keeping their confidential information away from the baddies. Exactly half of those surveyed (50%) would have an increased trust in a site that sent them to a third party payment place, 39% would say the trust level would stay the same and 11% would decrease the trust in the website by being sent to a third party. It’s worthwhile maybe explaining to the 11% why this is happening to keep them at ease, but ultimately, 89% would either not care about being sent there or even like you more for it. Go on, get a payment gateway and let them worry about the security of sensitive information.

Following on from our other research into users buying behaviour online we decided to compare online v’s offline buying.

Our interest was sparked as to how many of our participants had looked online then bought instore versus looking instore and buying online. Also, why did they not follow on with the purchase online?

Our question related to user experiences over the last 12 months. So, we found that in 2008:

• 77% of participants had looked instore then bought online
• 53% of participants had looked online then bought instore

We were curious about the 53% that had looked at an online shop then bought instore. Was something wrong with the cart or the buying process or was it something else?

Reasons for not buying online

The reasons our participants gave for purchasing instore rather than online included:

• Wanting to see the product in person
• Needing the item quickly
• Too high shipping charge
• Product was no cheaper online (so no incentive to wait for delivery)
• Clothing size worries
• Requiring advice

In terms of seeing the product in person and clothing size worries, it could be possible that with a little more information regarding cooling off periods, users worries would be abated slightly. Knowing they could return something if it wasn’t right could encourage online purchasing (assuming time was less of a concern).

Value of online purchase

It’s possible that the reason of ‘Wanting to see the product in person’ could be combined with the value users were happy to spend online in one purchase. I would guess that with a product under £100 it would be less necessary to see in person than say something over £500. For example, if I were spending £1000 on a holiday I would want to know it was a well known company and would potentially only buy online if I had already been in to see the company first (and buying online offered a financial incentive).

PoLR carry out a fair amount of Internet marketing of e-commerce websites for our clients. It is because of this that we wanted to delve deeper into how a user finds an online shop and their motivations for buying at one online shop over another. We felt that it was all good and well us taking an educated guess as to the reasons but far better to hear directly from the buyers themselves.

Finding Products Online

First up, we wanted to know what drove traffic to an e-commerce website. Is it as simple as a Google search or is reputation the key?

Turns out a good old fashioned search engine was top of the list which makes everyone at PoLR very happy indeed! Seems there is still a need for us Search Engine Optimisers after all.

Our survey also showed that (as expected) word-of-mouth and reputation is an extremely powerful marketing tool with this taking the second and third place. I guess you could say that a strong Internet Marketing campaign plus a high quality of service should make for a successful business indeed. Not exactly rocket science but nice to see our initial thoughts backed up by fact!

1. Search Engine
2. Previous knowledge (used before or well known brand)
3. Recommendation
4. Result of offline advertising
5. Result of online advertising (e.g paid advert on a blog)

Researching a Company

Now, a search engine is all good and well but what about when the user has the search result staring back at them from their computer monitor…what’s the next step?

Assuming they have not searched for your company specifically through a recommendation or previous knowledge.  Then according to our survey 71% of you research the company through consumer review sites etc before purchasing from them.

With this in mind, it’s a good idea to do a Google search on your own company every now and again too keep an eye on those reviews!

Influencing factors

Next we asked what was the main influencing factor that made our survey participants buy online once they were on an e-commerce website.

1. Previous Experience i.e used site before
2. Price
3. First result in Search Engine
4. Location of Shop or Seller
5. Low Shipping charges or free shipping

Other influencing facts included cash back website, security and general reputation of the company.

The answers surprised us in some regards. Previous experience and price were expected to be high up on the scale, after all, who doesn’t look for a bargain? Being the first result in the search engine (although very good news to us) led to more questions; why the first result? Was it a time factor or do users have more trust in high ranking sites?

Another interesting factor was the location of the seller. Seems that users want the convenience of buying online but want to be able to find the company premises if the product doesn’t arrive! Not that anyone in our survey has needed to do this – all 100% have had only positive experiences shopping online to date!

Low shipping came surprisingly low in our results. Considering that unexpected shipping charges were high on the list of reasons for abandoned carts we would deduce from this that users are more than happy to pay for shipping in favour of quality of service, but need it displayed clearly.

In aid of researching which items were most desired online we quizzed our survey participants about what they buy on ‘tinternet. We were interested in seeing whether the most common items were at the lower end of the budget (and what that budget is) or whether people regularly shopped online for items such as cars!

The Top Ten

The top ten products to buy online (according to our participants) are as follows:

1. Books
2. Holidays
3. Music, DVD’s & Video Games
4. Electricals
5. Clothing
6. Shoes & Accessories
7. Sports Equipment
8. Children’s Games
9. Groceries
10. Furniture

The least popular item to buy online was alcohol which instantly lead me to believe none of our friends completed the survey! 

Interestingly, out of everyone surveyed 66% restricted themselves to spending a max. of £500 online in one purchase. Out of the list above, everything could fall into this budget bracket. Although Electricals, Sports Equipment and Furniture couldpotentially be over £500, finding these items within the £500 budget is not impossible.

Christmas shopping online 2008

If you follow this blog you will know that we do a yearly post on the value of Xmas shopping online over each festive period. We were interested to find out whether our participants were happy to carry out some of their Xmas shopping online too. Our survey results showed that 56% of participants did at least half of their Xmas shopping online for Christmas 2008.

5% of participants did all of their Christmas shopping this way, maybe unsurprisingly, all of these were men…probably carried out on Christmas Eve.

I wonder how many of our participants would have happily put off present swapping until the 27th of December to save £100!? Ah well, guess that’s a question for the next survey!

After our  ‘Forming a form‘ series, we decided to incorporate into our survey a section on issues users have encountered when completing an Internet purchase and whether that led to them abandoning an online purchase. Our previous research through Google told us that users have most frequently abandoned an online purchase due to shipping charges being too high or unexpected and we wanted to see if this was the case for our participants.

Our findings are in the table below:

Among the ‘other‘ category, our survey participants reported encountering issues such as:

• Their own credit/debit card not working
• A feeling of a lack of security
• Restrictions on delivery address (must be same as cardholder)
• Forgot Mastercard “Securecode”
• Items not actually being in stock despite being advertised as such
• Site looking “dodgy”

What is in your hands?

In our results above you can see that a broken checkout is the main cause of abandoned online carts. Important as this figure is, we’re going to skip over it for now in favour of the points below. Reason for this is that a broken checkout should be caught during testing and is to do more with functionality. We’re interested in the actual design of the checkouts and how you can use our data while developing your e-commerce solution.

Too much & too many

Almost 39% of you have taken offence to a cart requesting too much information and approx 24% have found checkouts to be confusing. When developing your checkout, try to use as few steps as necessary. This can occur naturally if you really trim down the information you are requesting in the first place. The nature of an online checkout means that there is going to be more required information than with say, a newsletter. But, everyone who has ever shopped online expects this, what they don’t expect is to have to complete information other than the bare minimum for authorising payment. So, trim down the information you are requesting and see how it improves your shopping cart completion rate.

Other steps worth trying include a one page checkout or separating out your information into small bitesized chunks with progression indicators as per the image below.

Who are you!

It seems that a lack of trust is a huge issue with users but having some simple information clearly displayed on your site could combat this. Always have your company information and shopping procedures clearly displayed on the e-commerce cart. Ignoring the fact it’s a legal requirement, it instills confidence in your company by showing you are actually a legitimate company and the goods they order will actually arrive!

Shipping Charges

Approx 51% of you have been put off with unexpected shipping charges. We’ve all been there, gone through all stages of the cart, got to the paying part and discovered there’s another fiver added on for shipping. Try to make it as plain as possible to users what your charges are from the offset. If you have a set shipping charge you could advertise this through a graphic on each page, clearly have a shipping/deliver costs page or even detail shipping on each products page. Anything that keeps your visitor from getting an unexpected shock is worth adding!