Many websites evolve to get too busy. This happens even with the best of intentions. Here’s what happens— 1: They look at their email marketing platform report and see that historically shoppers who signup for newsletters have a higher lifetime value, so they add a giant popup to drive up newsletter sales. 2: They look at their Google Analytics data and see …

Your story matters, especially for first-time visitors.  This isn’t an opinion, it’s data fact.  Inc. 500 award winner (#1 in travel category) Regal Wings knows this, which is why when you land on their site regalwings.com you’re shown this floating tab— I love floating mini tabs because they take up very little screen space but are hard to miss.  For their tab, …

Because I’ve been obsessing over ecommerce for 8 years I often erroneously start believing I’m an expert.  I’m not.  Case in point— on my virtual stroll through ecommerce stores I stumbled on bikesdirect.com.  Please stop reading, visit their homepage and return in 10 seconds.  I didn’t take bikesdirect.com seriously because it was obviously a “small” site with a “1995” look.  …

There is something that’s bothered me for years. Some ecommerce sites (example www.fast-growing-trees.com) have banner ads promoting other businesses. This is the banner ad that’s currently on display at the footer of www.fast-growing-trees.com — Mind you, www.fast-growing-trees.com isn’t a low traffic site, their traffic is impressive— I can see why a tiny ecommerce site would have link-sharing with other sites, …

I’ve had a thought float in my mind a long time, but never managed to figure out a way to express it.  Now thanks to Smriti Chawla from VWO (who pointed me in the right direction) and Rand Fishkin (who beautifully described it) I can just link to my thought— http://fast.wistia.net/embed/iframe/xq1iovyyaa

Askthemeatman.com is a site I’ve known about since 2007.  It’s a popular site and gets over 23,000 monthly visitors (traffic used to be way higher few years ago)— Back in 2007 the design of their site seemed dated.  My theory was they’re probably about to do a redesign; surely. Every year I’d check back and the site design would remain …

Nankin Battery is a one location car/motorcycle battery shop in my neighborhood– This small business has some serious disadvantages: 1. Higher costs (because of higher per item overhead)2. Smaller selection (small shop)3. Limited reach (1 location) If the business owner spends her entire day stressing over her much larger online competitors she’ll want to shut shop.  But Nankin Battery has …

1. When a shopper walks into a brick-and-mortar store in their head they’ve pre-allocated time and money investment.  The same phenomenon happens online. 2. Etailer X launched his site in 2003 with 37 pages.  These included product pages, category pages, checkout pages, shipping info, return policy, about us and newsletter sign-up.  With time etailer X learns more about ecommerce and …

One day I randomly discovered steepandcheap.com.  My first thought was, “this site is so similar to woot.com”.  I added a tag on steepandcheap.com called “woot” to remember it for future reference.  Now every time I type woot into Firefox address bar I’m reminded of steepandcheap.com (see red box below)- In the last two years I estimate I’ve visited woot.com 200 …

Assume you’re a young pure-play etailer competing against a well established multi-channel retailer with 15 locations.  Your competitor’s strategic advantages are… 1. Ability to offer customers multiple shopping formats- catalog, store, phone and online. 2. Being a larger company driving higher volume they have greater pricing power.  Translation- deeper supplier discounts. 3. Their advertising costs are amortized across 15 stores, …

Not investing in conversion optimization because you have disappointing sales. -or- You have disappointing sales because you haven’t invested in conversion optimization?

Total discretionary consumer spending is a fixed number.  It’s a finite pool from which millions of retailers are drawing sales.  When you look at your store don’t frame the question as, “Why would people buy from me?” frame it as, “Why would a moderately satisfied consumer change buying habits, sever existing vendor ties and buy from me?”

I’ve never made a prediction on this blog. My friend’s dad was a creative director at an ad agency.  He once told me that a TV commercial needs to be aired six times before it starts registering with viewers.  If that’s true, which I believe it is, retargeting will be a huge deal online…

Hotbuckles.com has a page dedicated to all the ways in which “belt buckles” could be misspelled- Does this strategy work?

If your entire business model hinges on unconditional customer love then all you are doing is delaying the inevitable. If you want customers to stay help them understand why your store is a better alternative than competition (brick-and-mortar or online).