Yahoo Store Tips By 1 Choice

"I Came, I Puked, I Left" Analytics with Avinash Kaushik on Ecom Experts

2010-02-08T11:11:00.000-05:00

When I first looked at analytics, I thought forget this!! What the heck are all these numbers? What are all these graphs and what the heck do they mean?? HELP!!

Then I went to a conference and they were talking about bounce rates.

What the heck is a bounce rate? This wonderful man came on stage and said,

"A bounce rate means I came, I puked, I left."

WOW! I understood what they were talking about finally. I bought his book and learned analytics. He made it easy for me.

His name? Avinash Kaushik.

If you have not heard of this man, let me tell you... he is in one word... AMAZING.

Avinash WILL help you to understand analytics and he will be on Ecom Experts TODAY!!

Instead of me asking him my questions... I thought he needs to be answering YOUR questions.

So today is your day to ask this brilliant man anything you want about analytics.

Post your question here in the comments section, email them to us, or twitter them to me.

Either way, tell me your analytics question so we can help you learn and increase sales today!!

Then join me and Avinash at 6:00 PM ET on Webmaster Radio. You can listen live, chat, and have fun!!

Just go to:
http://www2.webmasterradio.fm/chat/

See you there!!!

Blogger FTP Says GoodBye - Where To Next?

2010-02-08T10:49:00.001-05:00

Last week we informed you of a major decision Google made about their blogging software. Blogger will no longer support FTP.

We also asked that you give us a week to think about where to go from here.

I already knew what the answer would be but, still wanted a week to verify everything.

We are officially moving over to WordPress but, I am not happy about the move. If we wanted to be on WordPress, we would have started our blogs there from the start.

So why WordPress now and why not from the beginning?

Many people swear by WordPress. They think it is the best software for blogging. In some ways, I agree.

**Disclaimer** I am about to go on a tangent -

However, we are creating blogs for ecommerce owners with Yahoo Stores. We are creating an extension of your store that will help you gain traffic, search engine optimization, and connect with your customers. However, your first priority is and will always be your ecommerce website. Your first priority is making sure that your customers are taken care, your products are up to date, your conversions are high, and your ecommerce site kicks butt! The blog is a tool that you use to help you in that process.

Since the blog is secondary, the blog should be:

Easy to use
Simple and clean
Drama free

Here is my problem with WordPress. YOU have to keep updating the software. Why? If you don't update the software, hackers can inject whatever they want into your blog and kill everything you are trying to accomplish.

Now, take a look at all the different releases from WordPress. YOWSER! I have been with Blogger for YEARS! Know how many times I updated the software?

ZERO

They did it for me so I could concentrate on growing my business. That is what a blog should do for you!!

Guess what else Blogger did for me that WordPress never did? Put my posts in Google in 3 minutes.

Don't believe me? Here are pictures I took just 10 days ago that took 4 minutes.

Average time was 15 minutes but, still... not bad. WordPress users are excited because it takes less than 30 minutes.

What about all them gadgets that WordPress has?

Gadgets are really great. Heck, gadgets can be fun too! Gadgets can also kill your SEO if you're not careful. So when we were building blogs it was all about what was easy, what would get you the best rankings, and what would help you the most!

So it is with great sadness that I say yes, we are moving to WordPress.

Am I happy? No.

Can you tell? Yes.

Hopefully beginning next week we will be assisting you in moving your blog from Blogger to WordPress. We will have 3 different packages available for you depending on how many extras you would like. Yep, WordPress comes with lots of extras.

We are going to make sure your blog is VERY search engine friendly.

We will be able to move your entire blog over to WordPress so that you do not lose a thing. There are many blog converters available to assist with the process.

We still have plenty of time for this move. The FTP shutdown does not happen until March 26th and we are not going to do anything rushed in a panic. That is how mistakes happen. I guarantee we will have your blog ready to keep on publishing by the deadline.

I will be back with more information soon and hope to have some video tutorials for those do-it-yourselfers as well!

Important! Changes to Blogger FTP Service

2010-02-02T18:35:00.000-05:00

If 1 Choice 4 Your Store has built your blog or you are using Blogger.com, there is important information that you need to read.

If you do not have a blog or you are not using Blogger, then ignore this post :)

Today many Blogger customers received a very frustrating email, Blogger will no longer support FTP publishing after March 26, 2010.

This is very sad indeed as Blogger has given us years of great service, great search engine optimization, and quality blog service.

However, by removing the FTP publishing... they have removed many of the features that we love best.

By publishing our blog through FTP to our Yahoo Store URL:

We are keeping our website updated with unique content
We are getting great search engine optimization results
We are creating more pages for our URL

If we switch over to a custom domain or host our blog with blogger.com, we remove all of those advantages.

Here is what you need to know:

What do you need to do today? Nothing. We have about 7 weeks until this change takes place.

Will I lose all the work I have done for years and years when this change happens? No. That is why we like hosting your blog on your OWN domain. Things like this happen all the time. If you decide to do nothing about this change, you will not lose any of your hard work. You just won't be able to add anymore blog postings after March 26, 2010.

What type of blog service should I use instead and will 1 Choice help me move? This question is the first thing that everyone wants to know and my answer this minute (3 hours after the announcement from Blogger), I don't know yet which blog service yet but, I do know 1 Choice will be there to help you.

Now, why am I saying I don't know yet? Before I tell you, "We are switching to _____." I want to do my research. I want to make sure that we provide you with the best possible solution that provides you the best possible results. 3 hours is not enough time to make that decision. After a few days of heavy research and testing, I will have more information to provide you.

I will make sure once we have made a decision, we will provide you with the do-it-yourself education, as well as have us help you pricing.

How Do You Get Shoppers To Sign Up For Your Mailing List?

2010-02-01T15:01:00.001-05:00

Let's say you have an amazing conversion rate. Let's pretend you have a 5% conversion rate. This means that 1 out of 20 customers that come to your website buy something. What happens to the other 19?

If you had a retail store... you could talk to the customer, answer questions, and let them know how friendly you are. You use that communication to encourage them to come back to your store and purchase something.

So how do you do that with your online store?

Easy - Mailing Lists!

Email marketing is a simple and easy way to communicate with your customers... including the ones that haven't purchased from you yet. But how do you get them to sign up?

Ron Pereira from Top Right will be teaching us that little trick today on our radio show Ecom Experts at 6:00 PM ET.

Ron and I will be discussing:

1. Abandonment rates

2. Techniques to convert shoppers

3. What I think is the most under-utilized conversion tactic out there? Email!

4. Why email is an important weapon in the conversion process?

5. Is it more important for some stores than others?

6. What are “the basics” of getting someone to sign up to your list?

7. Where does the email go after the shopper hits the “submit” button?

8. Where do you put the sign up form?

9. What do you say on the sign up form to get them to give you the email address?

10. What information do you gather?

11. What do you do once you get the email address?

Lots of great information!

So make sure to join Ron and I on Ecom Experts. You can listen, chat, ask questions, and best of all... LEARN!

Just go to http://www2.webmasterradio.fm/chat/ at 6:00 PM ET.

I look forward to seeing you there.

Your Questions Answered - More Traffic and Sales!

2010-01-29T12:53:00.000-05:00

This week on Ecom Experts, we decided to try out something a little different. Instead of having a guest, we asked you questions.

How can we help your online store? What questions do you have about SEO, conversions, and more?

The outcome - Lots of questions on getting more traffic and sales to your online stores.

If you didn't get to listen to our show, check out our end of the month newsletter.

We give you some great tips for writing unique content to help you get more traffic AND more sales.

Plus we discuss:

Changes that you need to know about Meta Tags
Official Google Blog - No more Meta Keywords
Programming best practices
New Product - Automated Niche Blogging
New Life Event - 30 Webinars in 1 Weekend
and more!

Make sure to read this edition today!

http://www.1choice4yourstore.com/jan-2010-news2.html

Need Help Getting More Traffic? Have Questions? Today is YOUR Day

2010-01-25T12:49:00.006-05:00

Today on our radio show Ecom Experts we are going to try something a little different.

If it works, we will do this every month!

I know that you have questions like:

How do I get more sales?
How do I get better rankings in the search engines?
How do I increase my conversion rates?

Some of you have even more specific questions and that is great!

We want to answer them on our show and not only help you but, other store owners as well.

If you have a question you want to get answered then here is what I want you to do.

Go to the following page and fill out this simple form:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/FTVTDFN

Basically I need to know:

Your question
Your website (trust me this helps a lot)
If I can share your website URL on the show

Your privacy means a lot to me. So make sure to let me know if it is ok to share your URL or not.

I will not share this information on the show unless you give me the go ahead :)

Join me today at 6:00 PM ET to hear all the fantastic questions and our fun live chat room by going to:
http://www2.webmasterradio.fm/chat/

See you there!!

Sincerely,
Shawna Fennell
1 Choice 4 Your Store

NFL Marketing - What You NEED To Learn!

2010-01-24T21:05:00.002-05:00

What an excellent marketing plan this was!

Game day and everyone's watching the AFC Championship. The game is over so what do you do? After three hours of watching the game, you get online and check your email.

And what pops up?

An email from an ecommerce store announcing the winner and where to get your team gear.

Was this a last minute email?

Did someone say last night - "Hey this would be a good email?"

Did they wait until the winner was announced to write the email?

No - this was marketing campaign a season in the making.

They knew there would be a game on this Sunday and they knew the fans of the winning team would want team gear. They knew after sitting there for three hours, you were going to go check your email.

So they wrote two emails and someone behind the curtain said go with Colts email.

Planning and preparation just like the execution of any game.

So what are you doing today to market your store for Valentine's Day? What about Mother's Day, Father's Day, and the Holiday Season 2010. Get a calendar out tonight and start a marketing plan for 2010.

Get ahead of your competition.

(Another) Great Lesson on Why You Should TEST TEST TEST!

2010-01-22T15:19:00.003-05:00

If you haven't heard by now, the New Life Event is back!

30 Webinars in ONE weekend - All Free.

But momma and I had a disagreement about one tiny little thing... Pre-Event Giveaways

You see, I wanted to give out a Netbook like mine. I have an awesome little Toshiba Netbook that I travel to conferences with. It has 9 hours of battery life!! I thought this was the perfect contest prize.

Mom thought it would be better to break up the prizes into smaller amounts so that more people could win.

So how do we solve this dilemma?

We tested it. We sent out a survey.

We are still taking your feedback but, so far... I was wrong by 2-1.

You guys wanted more prizes instead of one bigger prize.

But there is a MUCH bigger picture to learn here:

Whenever we think we know what is best for our visitors, we are usually wrong. That is why we should always test test test.

Don't assume that you know what is best for your customers. Don't assume that the red add to cart button will get you more sales then the orange. TEST that theory.

One small change in the color of your add to cart button can increase your conversions by 35%.

Maybe your customers want blue, my customers want red, and their customers want orange.

You never know unless you test.

If you would like to take our survey, please visit:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/TDRJWQS

If you would like to register for the New Life Event go to:
http://www.newlifeevent.com/

If you would like 200 add to cart buttons FREE go to:
http://www.1choice4yourstore.com/free-add-to-cart-buttons.html

Top-Growing Site Categories for December 2009

2010-01-21T12:37:00.002-05:00

According to the latest press release from ComScore,retail sites continued to climb in December as Americans scoured the Web for deals this holiday season.

Among the top-gaining Retail sub-categories were Jewelry/Luxury Goods/Accessories, Sports/Outdoor, and Flowers/Gifts/Greetings sites, each growing more than 20 percent versus November. Jewelry/Luxury Goods/Accessories sites attracted nearly 23 million visitors during the month, representing a 30-percent increase from November.

eBags, Inc. led the category with 2.9 million visitors (up 28 percent), followed by Coach.com with 2.2 million visitors (up 26 percent), Zale Corporation with 2.1 million (up 48 percent) and Kay Jewelers with 1.7 million (up 69 percent).

Sports/Outdoor sites grew to nearly 39 million visitors during the month, a 25-percent increase versus November, led by eBay Sports U.S. with 5.1 million visitors (up 21 percent), which was closely followed by Cabelas, Inc. with 5.0 million visitors (up 26 percent). DicksSportingGoods.com grabbed the #3 position with 4.6 million visitors (up 39 percent), followed by SportsAuthority.com with 2.9 million visitors (up 29 percent).

Flowers/Gifts/Greetings sites saw a 23-percent gain, reaching nearly 39.8 million unique visitors in December. AmericanGreetings Property led the category with 13.6 million visitors (up 18 percent), followed by Gifts.com with 6.8 million (up 49 percent), Hallmark with 5.6 million (up 46 percent) and 1-800-Flowers.com, Inc. with 2.9 million (up 48 percent).

Check out the full press release

Yahoo Store Owners - Make Sure To Sign Up For PriceGrabber!!

2010-01-18T17:35:00.002-05:00

Yahoo Shopping has merged with PriceGrabber.

In order for your products to be found on both shopping search engines, you need to make sure to sign up for a PriceGrabber account, and upload your data feed.

This is a very simple process and we explain each step with this video tutorial.

Transcript:

Signing Up For PriceGrabber / Yahoo Shopping for Yahoo Store Owners

We are on the PriceGrabber sign-up page for Yahoo Stores and we are given two different options.

Do we want to join the Yahoo Shopping network only or Yahoo Shopping and PriceGrabber?

For the purposes of this tutorial, we will sign up for both.
The first thing that we are asked is to give our merchant member name and this is the name that shows up next to our products. You want to make sure to put in the name of your company. We also need to put in our website URL. One of the things I like to do when I'm putting in my website URL is to actually go to our website, copy the URL, and paste it into the URL field. This is something that you don't want to mess up and I like to get it exactly as it should be. We are going to go ahead and fill out the rest of this information for account and billing and skip this part for you guys. We will come back when we are all done.

Now that we have finished putting in all the information for account and billing information, we get into payment options. You can choose to be charged the initial deposit one time or enroll in the auto pay plan. The difference - With the first option, whenever your account balance gets low they’re going to e-mail you and let you know. Then you can choose to add more funds. The auto pay plan will automatically charge your card whenever your balance is low. The choice is yours.

Then you have to agree to the referral marketing agreement and decide if you want to add a logo next to your listings. If you want to add a logo, you will be charged $.10 per click. Understand that it will cost you $.10 per click to have your logo next to your listing. Should you do that? Is it going to increase your conversion rates? The only answer to give you is test test test. But once you decide either way go ahead and click on the continue button.

For step two we do quick e-mail verification and click continue.

Now we're going to be asked about our feed format. Do you have a product data feed? Yes. Is the feed visible? Yes. You see the Yahoo Store sets up this feed for you. What we want to do is go into the back end of our Yahoo Store and go to the bottom left-hand side underneath promote. Click on search engines. What I want you to do is look under Enable and Submit Your Product Catalog and Shopping Search Engines. Make sure those are enabled then go to the catalog.XML. Copy that URL and go ahead and paste that URL into the feed URL. Click on save and finish later.

This is going to log you out completely. That's okay because the next step is logging into your account and verifying that the URL for your feed works.

So how do you know if that feed URL works? You click on analyze feed and if it doesn't work you'll get this big red box that says please correct the errors marked in red. Now if you get this error, don't worry. Go back into the store and grab the objinfo.XML link info instead. Paste the URL and click analyze feed.

Everything should be complete. No red box everything looks good we can go ahead and click on the continue button.
We are given a little warning here that says our feed doesn't contain any shipping costs. Now that's not a problem because we can actually go in and enter our shipping information right here. The formula we use is a flat fee and we're just going to put in zero as our shipping cost because we have free shipping.
For our taxing rates the shipping is not taxed because we have free shipping. We are going to go ahead and click on our state which is Michigan. Put in the tax rate of let's say 6% and once you're done with that go ahead and click continue button.

Everything is done. Your registration is completed. Within 1 to 2 business days you should see your products in PriceGrabber. If you don't see your products after five business days, go ahead and give their customer service a call.

We hope you enjoyed this tutorial on setting up PriceGrabber and Yahoo Shopping. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us. Make sure to visit www.1choice4yourstore.com for more Yahoo Store tutorials.

3 Simple Steps To Double (or Triple) Your Profits, Cut Your Work Hours In Half & Enjoy a Business That Runs Itself

2010-01-18T15:05:00.004-05:00

Today on Ecom Experts at 6:00 PM ET on WebmasterRado.fm, I get the great pleasure of interviewing Beth Schneider of www.processprodigy.com

Why am I so excited to talk with Beth?

Because you will discover how to take your existing business, your existing team, the marketing you are already doing and everything else you've got at your disposal... and squeeze 2-3 times the results from them by following her simple, yet amazing, Step-By-Step System.

Ever wonder why success comes so easily for some and is such an uphill battle for others? Those who are making it know the secret. . . having great marketing simply isn’t enough. Yes, you read that right. Marketing is not enough.

Just like you need both a mother and a father to make a baby, you need BOTH savvy marketing and a great operations plan to “make” a successful business; one that brings in the money, lifestyle and freedom you want.

If you:

Want to scream because you are paying good money to a team that messed up . . . again.
Are overwhelmed because you are juggling hundred of details in your head that you just can’t keep straight.
Are worried you’ll forget about an important client.
Are frustrated because you are missing out on money-making opportunities simply because you don’t have the time to get to them.

Then you want to join me and my friend, Beth Schneider of www.processprodigy.com for this eye opening interview!!

She is going to show you how to find the money, free time and prestige currently hiding in your business so all you have to do is show up and do the fun stuff.

Beth will show you:

The one thing you don’t even know you’re doing that is killing your marketing efforts and wasting all that time, money and energy.
How switching your thinking from “WHAT” to “HOW” can prevent things from falling through the cracks so you can watch your bank account fill up.
How you can set your team up to automatically “get it” so they accomplish more than you ever thought possible and say things like, “don’t worry, it’s handled” – and have the surety that it IS!
Her proven 3-step formula that will show you how to get everything out of your head so you can get the business running without you.

Are you ready to build a business where you can just show up and be the star?

Then get ready to discover the tricks to building a business that works for you . . . rather than you working for it.

This is one interview you do NOT want to miss out on. Make sure to join us at 6:00 PM Eastern by going to:
http://www2.webmasterradio.fm/chat/

Sincerely,

Shawna Fennell

P.S. We are giving out free goodies tonight so make SURE to join us!

BUYER BEWARE!! Hotel Ballroom Marketing and Other Scams

2010-01-08T12:05:00.001-05:00

In this month's newsletter, I am addressing internet scam artists.

You can start reading it right away by going to:

http://www.1choice4yourstore.com/jan-2010-news.html

Here is a preview:

It all started with me interviewing John Lawson, AKA ColderICE, on our new radio show Ecom Experts. He shared many pearls of wisdom including this wonderful phrase, "My short term investments pay for my long term investments and my long term investments pay me." LOVED IT!!

Our conversation led into how he became successful online. I love when people share REAL stories of their success. I get so upset when I see scam artists telling people how they made $30,000 their first month by opening an online store and YOU CAN TOO!

Wrong.

They are just there to take your money.

The majority of people starting online may not see sales right away. When I first started out, I only had 1 sale my first month. Then I learned about pay per click marketing and search engine optimization. Slowly those sales picked up and eventually I was selling over $100,000 a month.

But it did not happen overnight. As John Lawson said during our interview, "We live in a microwave society and we think that things should pop up overnight. That never happens. It's a fantasy they sell in hotel ballrooms."

Continue reading by going to this month's newsletter located at:

http://www.1choice4yourstore.com/jan-2010-news.html

You will also be able to get more education on:

Google's Changes and What You Need To Do On Today
30 Webinars in ONE weekend - YES the New Life Event is Coming Soon!
Website Monitoring
Recent Ecom Experts Interviews
Recent Blog Posts
and much more

Head on over to http://www.1choice4yourstore.com/jan-2010-news.html

Sincerely,

Shawna Fennell

1 Choice 4 Your Store

Have You Met My Friend John Lawson AKA ColderICE?

2010-01-04T16:13:00.003-05:00

If you haven't heard of John Lawson, you have probably seen him on TV.

He was asked by American Express to be in a commercial!! You can check out the commercial below but, we are interviewing him TODAY!

Find out how he got picked for the interview, what it was like to shoot a commercial for American Express, and tips John has for all ecommerce owners for 2010.

Oh yeah, and since he won 1st place in Startup Nation's Savviest in Social Media... we will ask him about networking via social networks as well.

Make sure to join us LIVE at 6:00 PM Eastern. You can listen live, chat, and ask questions by going to:

http://www2.webmasterradio.fm/chat/

Yahoo Store Owners - Is it Time To Jump Ship?

2009-12-30T11:25:00.003-05:00

As many of you probably know by now, the Yahoo Store platform has been a little unsteady the last two days.

Store owners are asking me, is it time to make a leap over to a new platform?

Sorry to disappoint but, my answer is no.

I have been with Yahoo Stores for 10 years now and during that 10 years I have had sites hosted on:

Yahoo
GoDaddy
Dedicated Servers
and everything in between

Every single one of those sites have gone down one time or another. It is just the facts of life. We may not like it but, it does happen.

Thankfully with our websites hosted on Yahoo, it does not happen NEARLY as often as it does to other websites hosted other places.

I know what you are asking, "Well what caused all this to happen in the first place?"

My guess based on rumors (again this is just a guess) is that the Yahoo servers were attacked by the same thing that took down Amazon right before Christmas.

What can you do?

There are two things that I recommend:

Why do both?

The Yahoo Store status page is usually the last place that tells you that your store is down. For instance... Monday when all of the Yahoo Stores went down, it took the status page 22 minutes to note that there was a problem with the Yahoo Stores.

I don't know about you but, I want to know MUCH faster than 22 minutes if my website is down.

By the time Yahoo updated its status page:

Website Monitors knew the sites were down
Twitter knew Yahoo Stores were down
Our radio show was doing live updates of the Yahoo Store being down

What is wrong with finding our your website is down 22 minutes later?

For 22 minutes Yahoo Store owners still had ad campaigns running and people clicking on their ads. For 22 minutes Yahoo Store owners still were paying for people to click on those links and not get anywhere.

That is a lot of wasted money.

There were some store owners that never knew about the outage until it was over because they don't get any alerts whatsoever. Those store owners paid for 2 and half hours worth of people clicking on their links and not being able to get to their website.

More wasted money.

What did 1 Choice do?

We saw how long it took for store owners to realize their store was down and thought... this is taking way too long. Store owners need to know this information immediately. We need a solution.

We found a website monitoring service that we could partner with that would give you a free trial, let you know that minute your website was down, check to make sure your shopping cart URL is always working, and would alert you through text message or email.

We created a video to show you how easy it is to get set up and know exactly when your store or your shopping cart goes down.

We hope that this solution will help everyone and will save you lost dollars!

We have created a short video to show you how easy it is to get set up and start monitoring not only your website but, your shopping cart URL as well.

Let us know if you have any questions!

Yahoo Store Owners - Consider Pausing Your Ad Campaigns

2009-12-29T19:42:00.003-05:00

Yesterday all of Yahoo Stores went down for over 2 hours. Today many Yahoo Store owners are seeing their site go in and out or take forever to load.

So you will want to do the following:

1. Pause all of your ad campaigns - Until we get notice that this issue is fixed once and for all, why spend money getting people to your website that will not ever make it there?

2. Consider signing up for a website monitoring service so you know exactly when your store goes down.

We were quite upset about the store closings yesterday and many store owners asked us how they could learn when and if their store was to go down immediately.

We found a solution and today we have 1 Choice 4 Website Monitoring. You can sign up for a free account or get a premium account for as little as $2.00 a month.

Either way, you will learn when your website goes down so you can pause your ad campaigns and stop losing money.

Google's Changes and What You Need To Do On Today on Ecom Experts

2009-12-28T13:06:00.005-05:00

The countdown has begun.

Lots of changes going on over at Google and they are only getting started.

December 4th Google announced more personalized search results for their users.

Google also announced recently they have integrated REAL-time search. Social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace are being integrated into the search results.

After the first of the year, Google will be performing a major update called "Caffeine" that will be shaking up more than a few website rankings.

Join us at 6:00 PM Eastern at WebmasterRadio.fm for our LIVE broadcast of Ecom Experts as we discuss all the changes, how they affect you, and what you need to do today to get ready for tomorrow.

You can listen live, chat, and ask questions by going to:
http://www2.webmasterradio.fm/chat/

We will see you there!

Is Your Website Jealous?

2009-12-23T14:09:00.006-05:00

Yesterday I wrote a post called, "If Only Our Websites Acted Like My Dog."

In that post I introduced you to one of my beloved Golden Retrievers Amber B.

Today let me introduce you to the other girl... Autumn Rose.

Autumn Rose has a completely different personality than her sister. As you can see, she also weighs about 40 pounds more as well :)

Autumn Rose is what you would call a jealous little puppy. She is the perfect lay down by your feet Golden Retriever...

UNTIL you are giving someone else attention.

In the image to the right, my son Andy was playing with Amber and having a good time until Autumn found out. Then she had to come in, get a great big hug, and get her love too.

I see this same situation with website owners. They seem perfectly content letting their websites sit there until they see their competition do something. Then they feel they have to do it too.

Your website needs to be the leader not the follower. Be innovative, be proactive, be involved, and most importantly stop being jealous of the other guy.

Instead of trying to copy the other website, what is your unique value proposition?

What sets you apart from anyone else? Why should your customer buy from you instead of your competitor?

Once you identify this unique value, make sure to express it on your landing pages so that your customers understand what sets you apart.

Be the leader and not the follower. Instead of being jealous, be the website that everyone else envies.

If Only Our Websites Acted Like My Dog

2009-12-22T16:41:00.003-05:00

I have 2 beautiful Golden Retrievers. You may have heard about them (or heard them) during one of our webinars or radio shows.

The one in the picture, her name is Amber B and she NEVER gets enough attention.

As I sit here writing you this posting, she takes her nose... places it under my arm... and lifts it straight up and onto her head.

"MOM GIVE ME ATTENTION NOW!!"

I try telling her, "Amber B, Mommy is working now."

I place my hand back on the mouse and the nose lifts it back off again. This continues over and over again until I give her the attention she rightfully deserves.

Imagine if our website could do the same to us.

How often would your website be begging for attention?

Hopefully on a daily basis because search engines are looking to rank websites that have fresh unique content. If you are not updating your website often and giving it the attention it rightfully deserves, the search engines will find another website that is.

Kind of like my dog Amber. If she can't get any attention from me, she runs off and gives those sad pathetic eyes to anyone else that might look at her.

Sure, she will come back sooner or later when I am ready to give her attention. But, where will she go to first when she craves the attention? To the person who she has trained to give her attention on HER time.

The search engines will do the same. They are trained to go back to the websites that give their websites the most attention as well.

For instance:

If Site A updates their website once a month

and

Site B updates on a daily basis

Then the search engines know that they need to visit Site B more regularly to stay up to date with all the great new stuff.

Here is the problem:

Our websites don't come over, lift our hands off the mouse, and tell us they need attention.

You have to remember to do this on your own. Set reminders, set alerts, do whatever it takes but, add new content to your website today and every day.

Otherwise your website might give you those sad pathetic eyes that my darling Amber B gives to me 50 times a day.

Using Video For Ecommerce - Tips From Ecom Experts

2009-12-22T10:25:00.005-05:00

Yesterday I interviewed Erik Kretschmar from iSpeakVideo and we discussed the use of adding not only video to your website... but a video spokesperson as well.

Some of the benefits of using a video spokesperson can be:

Explaining your product in detail
Providing a full product demonstration
Show how to use the product

However, some of the unique ways of using a video spokesperson could be used to:

Explain how to place an order online
Explain how to return a product
Walk your customer through the checkout process

Adding these types of videos can increase your conversions by up to 49%.

Plus, it helps with the reduction of questions that you have to answer and you can focus more on customer service.

You can listen or download the full interview below.

Can Video Really Improve Your Sales For Your Ecommerce Site?

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Can Video Really Improve Your Sales For Your Ecommerce Site?

2009-12-21T15:27:00.003-05:00

In one word... yes.

YouTube has now become the second largest search engine.

Think about that for a second. The #1 place people are going to is Google for searches and the #2 place is YouTube. Amazing.

Videos are fresh. Videos are hot. Videos will help you to increase sales!

Today on Ecom Experts we will be interviewing Erik Kretschmar, Co-Founder and Vice President of Marketing for iSpeakVideo.

We will be discussing:

Ways that Ecommerce sites can use a video spokesperson
Ways that Ecommerce sites can use video
Benefits of adding video to your website
What type of conversion rates are website owners seeing after adding video
and much much more

Join us live at 6:00 PM Eastern (3:00 PM Pacific) by going to:
http://www2.webmasterradio.fm/chat/

You can listen live, chat, and ask any questions you may have on adding video to your website.

See you there!

Send Your Customers an Email TODAY And Fulfill Their Last Minute Shopping Needs

2009-12-18T13:19:00.004-05:00

We are officially one week away from Christmas.

Can you offer your customers guaranteed delivery by Christmas Eve?

If yes, then go send an email to your customers right now and let them know!

Include a coupon for free shipping or 10% off to sweeten the deal. Make sure to highlight all the reasons why they should be shopping online at your store:

No parking
No lines
Guaranteed in stock
Guaranteed arrival
Secure shopping
Free shipping

Offer your customers the ability to share their coupon. In fact, encourage them to forward the email to their friends, coworkers, and family members.

If you cannot guarantee arrival in time for Christmas, offer your customers the ability to purchase gift certificates from your website. Create a beautiful gift card for your customer to give to their loved ones.

I did a search on Istock and found a few gift cards that you can easily add your company name and amount too.

If you would like us to make your company a custom gift card for your customers, you can order our Custom Gift Cards Service.

Plus we guarantee that your custom gift cards will be created within 24 hours so that you can use them immediately and start selling them to all of your last minute shoppers!

Order your Custom Gift Cards today!

Did You Get All The Free Goodies From Ecom Experts?

2009-12-15T18:54:00.004-05:00

As most of you know, I just love giving out free goodies.

Goodies consist of free education!

Ebooks, articles, video tutorials, and anything else I can get my hands on to give to our customers.

Education is powerful and I want you to have tons of power for your website!

Here are the 5 FREE goodies we gave away during our 12/14 episode of Ecom Experts:

2009 Holiday Trends from Yahoo Search Marketing
Over 200 Add To Cart Images - Use these images to make small changes to your website with BIG results.
Seth Godin's lastest e-book - What Matters Now
Attention Wizard - Free software that will instantly create an “attention heatmap” of your Web page that predicts where real people would look during the first few seconds of their visit. Plus, it's from one of my fave authors Tim Ash!
2 $9.99 Videos from our Advanced Video Training Center"

There is a small catch on the #5. You have to listen to the show in order to get the coupon code.

I promise it is worth it! You will learn lots about landing page conversions from HiConversions.com

High Conversion Tips For Your Online Store

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Free Goodies For All Ecom Expert Listeners

2009-12-14T17:34:00.009-05:00

You know how much I love education right?

Well, tis the season for gifts and tis the season for free goodies too!

I just added 7 new video series to our website and I want you to grab any 2 you would like for free.

What's the catch?

You have to listen to the December 14th edition of Ecom Experts:

High Conversion Tips For Your Online Store

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

We are discussing how to increase your conversion rates which is always loads of fun!

Listen, chat, and have fun by going to:

http://www2.webmasterradio.fm/chat/

During our broadcast I will be giving out the coupon code to use for your free videos.

See you there!

High Conversion Tips For Your Online Store

2009-12-14T13:09:00.003-05:00

Today on our radio show Ecom Experts I am interviewing Zee Aganovic from HighConversion.com

We will be discussing some of the latest tips and advice for getting the highest conversions for your online store.

What pages you should be optimizing
How to prioritize your pages
What are the major challenges online store owners face when increasing their conversion rates
and much more

Come join us at 6:00 PM Eastern by going to:

http://oseo.us/wmr-chat

You can listen, chat, and ask questions.

PLUS!

I have a gift for all our listeners in the chat room.

A brand new video series that is not even on our website yet!

Yanno I love to give out free goodies :) Education is important to me!

So make sure to join me at 6:00 PM Eastern and learn some high conversion tips for your online store by going to:

http://oseo.us/wmr-chat

Sincerely,

Shawna Fennell

P.S.

Can't make the live show? No worries.

Click Here To Subscribe To Ecom Experts on Itunes!

Have You Used Your $100 Gift Certificate from 1 Choice?

2009-12-11T14:43:00.002-05:00

Last week I sent everyone a $100 Gift Certificate to use at 1 Choice.

Many of you have used your coupon for learning, add-ons, or a new design.

However, we have also received many phone calls from customers asking, "What should I use my gift card for?"

So today, I am going to be your personal shopper.

In this month's newsletter, I discuss common problems that many store owners have and how we can help you fix those problems.

You can check it out by going to:

http://www.1choice4yourstore.com/dec-2009-news.html

Remember, use coupon code holiday09 and have fun shopping!

Sincerely,

Shawna Fennell

P.S.

**PLEASE NOTE** If you have never done any custom changes to your Yahoo Store, make sure you read our page about converting your items over to custom templates.

http://www.1choice4yourstore.com/convert-templates.html