During the course of the first 2 week period traffic from Facebook.com has increased by around 250% over the previous 2 week period, fan numbers exceeded 800 and Facebook.com has risen to become the second highest (non search engine) referring website.

Facebook currently have in excess of 400million active users and in any 24hr period over 200million users will login. Whilst we would often encourage use of a number of different social media channels, the share of the population and the sheer numbers and that Facebook represents means that it will, for the foreseeable future, be quite a force to be reckoned with.

You can skip sections by using the slider control at the bottom of the video clip.

All times are in Eastern Daylight Time (-5hrs). So the first time (07:35) is the equivalent of 1:35pm BST for UK and 3.35pm in Finland.

07:35:15  Toby Parkins : Hi Ryan and Martin=
07:51:05 uknetweb : Hi everyone. We will be starting shortly. There is no sound yet by the way.
07:55:54 habeyhl : Do I have to call in to hear the audio, or can I hear it through the web?
07:56:25 uknetweb : Audio is being switched on now
07:56:41 habeyhl : thanks!
07:59:05 habeyhl : is there a twitter hash tag for this?
08:03:35 Ray Bolitho : Nice shirt Toby!
08:03:59 Tony Conte : hearing you loud and clear Toby!
08:04:00 cathy : Hello
08:04:15 Charla Symons : Hi from Totally Truro
08:04:57 Follett Stock : Good afternoon everyone – Follett Stock Solicitors & FS Media
08:05:24 Kristin Zhivago : hi
08:05:31 Ryan Mcfarlane : Hello
08:05:38 Dougie Woods : Hi Toby!
08:05:56 Matt : Good afternoon from Matt, Rob and Mark from WDL
08:06:01 Jemiina Hautamäki : Hello from Finland, from Persoona
08:13:06 Toby Parkins : Hi Dougie, well done – you made it
08:13:45 Toby Parkins : Hi Jemiina, thanks for coming
08:24:18 Gary J : Twitter
08:24:22 habeyhl : Twitter
08:24:25 Tony Conte : Blogs/wordpress
08:24:26 Charla Symons : Facebook and Twitter
08:24:37 Craig : WordPress / facebook / twitter
08:24:41 Kristin Zhivago : Blog – since 2004, Twitter (business), facebook (personal only)
08:24:50 Dougie Woods : facebook
08:24:52 John Knowles : As a company? Facebook, Twitter, Forums, Youtube, LinkedIn
08:24:54 Follett Stock : Facebook/Twitter/UGC
08:24:58 Jemiina Hautamäki : Twitter, Skype, Facebook, blogs
08:24:59 Ryan Mcfarlane : Blogs, skype, facebook
08:25:08 evolutionpd : facebook, twitter, blog, slideshare, linkedin
08:25:18 Ray Bolitho : none I’m afraid
08:25:20 Kristin Zhivago : Kristin Zhivago here – agree with you about virtual worlds
08:25:36 Kristin Zhivago : Also skype
08:25:41 Toby Parkins : Yeah, virtual worlds are really powerful
08:25:54 Gary J : Just starting with wordpress
08:27:59 Josef Nankivell : twitter is always a great place to have a web dev question answered – with a transactive memory like twitter the answers find you
08:29:12 John Knowles : Gordon Brown on #w elovethenhs
08:34:06 habeyhl : what are ABC1s, C2DEs?
08:34:26 Matt : social bandings
08:34:37 Toby Parkins : marketing groups
08:34:56 habeyhl : thanks
08:36:07 Toby Parkins : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NRS_social_gradefor more information on Social Grading
08:36:28 Toby Parkins : (the link should open in a new window/tab
08:36:45 Toby Parkins : It’s a UK system
08:38:13 Paul : Not at all currently
08:38:14 Tony Conte : to increase SEO and drive more traffic
08:38:17 Gary J : Awareness, marketing, driving clients to site and SEO
08:38:29 John Knowles : Research, identifying/qualifying prospects, driving offline PR
08:38:33 Toby Parkins : at UKNetWeb we are finding that 70% of new business comes through some kind of Social Media
08:38:33 Ryan Mcfarlane : SEO
08:38:33 Kristin Zhivago : will be using it to launch my next book
08:38:41 evolutionpd : marketing, awareness, engagement,
08:38:48 habeyhl : we’re not using it well
08:38:49 Follett Stock : posting links to articles, driving traffic to site, a bit of PR and marketing
08:38:56 Charla Symons : Awareness of events and driving traffic to www.enjoytruro.co.uk
08:39:07 habeyhl : (thanks for the link Toby)
08:39:08 Josef Nankivell : using social media for research into starting a web business
08:39:19 John Knowles : also online PR.
08:39:25 Kristin Zhivago : already using it to raise awareness. and helping clients adopt it
08:39:49 Kristin Zhivago : Yes, already using a blog for that
08:39:50 cathy : Not using it in the offices-some volunteers are on it -casual references to our charity?
08:39:52 John Knowles : Even where our clients’ eventual targets aren’t that interested in social media, the journalists who cater for them usually are.
08:39:54 Kristin Zhivago : And Twitter
08:40:17 John Knowles : (In fact, you get a faster response from Facebook / Twitter than from email or phone!)
08:40:26 Kristin Zhivago : absolutely
08:40:30 Ray Bolitho : not using it at all but really feel that I need to
08:40:38 Josef Nankivell : very true, John
08:40:44 Toby Parkins : It’s really important to ensure that your Social Media strategy is integrated with the rest of your communication strategy
08:41:19 John Knowles : Toby… how much of this presentation is being recorded? (Just the slideshow & Aren, or chat etc too?)
08:41:38 Toby Parkins : Not sure if all chat is recorded.
08:41:51 Toby Parkins : The main presentation window and audio are recorded.
08:42:19 Toby Parkins : We may be able to record the chat for future use. Please let me know if there is anything commercially sensitive
08:42:54 John Knowles : That would be useful, Toby – it’s hard to read all the comments and concentrate on Aren at the same time!
08:43:07 Elliot Smith : Copy & paste into notebook
08:43:17 Elliot Smith : er.. notepad
08:44:03 Toby Parkins : Need to eat more fish and enhance your Corpus Callosum
08:49:08 Elliot Smith : Thanks Toby. Just suffering from sleep deprivation
08:53:11 Tony Conte : not getting google screen
08:53:19 Tony Conte : still showing Business Cornwall
08:53:56 John Knowles : Are Twilerts available within Twitter?
08:55:52 Toby Parkins : It’s available as a seperate site although I think it’s down at the moment
09:04:35 cathy : Can you join any of these at a “corporate ” level or do you have to have an individual as a front at least?
09:05:38 Toby Parkins : Cathy, I’ll let Aren answer that one
09:05:38 John Knowles : Some of them are a bit of both – on Facebook and LinkedIn etc. you can have a corporate page with linked personal profiles
09:06:15 Kristin Zhivago : do you advise CEOs to twitter? eg Zappos CEO – constantly twittering
09:06:37 cathy : I have no wish to “share ” with the world myself but it might help our charity
09:07:09 Kristin Zhivago : mostly i work with b2b companies
09:07:43 Kristin Zhivago : the problem is time management – the CEO seldom has the time
09:07:44 Gary J : C athy: We use our company name as our twitter handle
09:08:26 cathy : Thank you for those replies.Will try for a more general presence
09:09:04 Gary J : We are also just about to launch a new site (in a couple of weeks), so have used the URL (www.TheAntCan.com) as my twitter handle (theantcan)and use the logo as my twitter picture.
09:09:14 John Knowles : Cathy – a friend of mine has certinaly taken that approach. She’s self-employed, and has moved entirely from a personal to a business presence.
09:09:46 John Knowles : How easy is it to set up the sharing functionality if you’re non-technical?
09:09:55 Gary J : If using wordpress, how do you get the sahre this link
09:10:13 Elliot Smith : Every business should consider registering their company name / url on social networking sites, even if it’s only to protect your name
09:10:33 Gary J : What plugin do you use? and for retweeting?
09:10:48 John Knowles : Is wordpress subscription based?
09:10:49 Tony Conte : which is better, WordPress hosted or on wordpress server? from an SEO point of view?
09:11:08 Gary J : WordPress is free – we have it on our own server
09:11:10 cathy : Are there any downsides to all this? Does it take up a lot of time tracking and monitoring?
09:11:39 Gary J : Thanks
09:12:36 Josef Nankivell : When starting an online business, do you think it is important to share your new experiences/issues with others? Or wait until your business is at a certain level of success before using social media?
09:12:38 Tony Conte : makes sense, thanks
09:12:58 Gary J : Do you find the google adsense detractss from content on your site or do your clients linke it?
09:13:44 John Knowles : Cathy – as much as you let it, really. I suppose the main danger is that you spend ages catering for a very few people. You need to be very clear about objectives and how much time it’s worth to you, I’d say.
09:14:30 Elliot Smith : How about Facebook as an advertising platform?
09:14:38 Gary J : What’s best – adsense or paid-for banner ads?
09:15:00 Josef Nankivell : Thanks very much, I was thinkning along the same lines.
09:15:17 John Knowles : From whose point of view, Gary?
09:15:26 Gary J : Aren – this is really useful stuff. Thank you.
09:16:34 Elliot Smith : thanks!
09:16:48 Kristin Zhivago : thank you
09:16:54 John Knowles : Thanks Aren
09:17:03 Ryan Mcfarlane : Nice work – cheers
09:17:08 John Knowles : Media with a K?
09:17:10 John Knowles :
09:17:20 Paul : Interesting stuff. Thanks.
09:17:21 Josef Nankivell : Thank you Aren. This has been very helpful!
09:17:24 evolutionpd : Thanks Aren
09:17:32 Tony Conte : thanks Aren
09:18:46 habeyhl : managing
09:18:53 Charla Symons : Managing a website
09:18:53 cathy : Managing
09:18:56 John Knowles : As a company, we’re in the process of developing a new site
09:18:56 Elliot Smith : Just about managing
09:19:04 Jemiina Hautamäki : managing, designing & developing
09:19:04 Charla Symons : ww.enjoytruro.co.uk
09:19:17 Gary J : We have a wesbite, are launching a network www.theantcan.comand just starting to develop a wordpress site.
09:19:17 Joona : designing
09:19:19 habeyhl : www.womenshealth.gov
09:19:22 Craig : www.websitedesign.co.uk
09:19:22 Kristin Zhivago : had a website since 1995 or so – http://www.zhivago.comand blog since 2004 http://www.revenuejournal.com
09:19:31 Paul : Contributing and developing new site(s)
09:19:31 Tony Conte : design, manage and develop, plus offline.
09:19:48 John Knowles : For reference, we’re www.jkc.co.uk- although there’s not much there now!
09:19:52 Josef Nankivell : contributing to Bright Hub as a writer http://www.brighthub.com/members/kivster.aspx
09:22:07 Gary J : Can you recommend a banned words filter as part of an automatic upload feature?
09:22:44 John Knowles : Are blog homepages more effective as a list of full articles, or just headlines / first paragraphs where you can click through?
09:26:04 Mark : im going camping this weekend
09:26:15 John Knowles : Ooh… that’s interesting. Why did you choose Dimdim?
09:26:40 John Knowles : Hold on – if Toby’s doing the presentation, who’s anwering the questions? Oh…
09:26:44 Aren : Not me – another Aren by the way
09:27:05 John Knowles : Surely there can’t be two Arens!
09:27:38 Aren : I believe he’s actually called Joe.
09:27:41 cathy : What’s on your ceiling?
09:28:27 Aren : Sorry with regards to Q’s I will pass to Toby when he stops unless best answered by me.
09:28:36 Aren : On the ceiling?
09:29:05 cathy : Something keeps catching Toby’s eye up there!
09:29:11 Ryan Mcfarlane : Live Chat – surly its just a good way for a company to have a low cost base in india and use images / names of british people to make them look like they are using local staff?
09:29:31 Kristin Zhivago : good way?
09:29:42 Kristin Zhivago : I wouldn’t call that “good.”
09:30:23 Aren : In the example used the live chat is managed locally.
09:30:47 Aren : I am sure some companies may use it to outsource customer service abroad.
09:30:55 Josef Nankivell : That’s a very good idea. I have purchased several items due to a friend’s regarding the product!
09:31:02 habeyhl : I’ve found it’s often call center staff that staff the live chat. I’ve gone from chat to phone call with the same person sometimes
09:31:03 Charla Symons : Very locally – i went to school with Aaron!
09:31:07 John Knowles : Risky though
09:31:14 Josef Nankivell : friend’s excitment*
09:32:21 John Knowles : You have to be pretty confident to say: “Here. Ask your friends to help you find a cheaper price”
09:32:24 Aren : By the way, Toby is not looking at the ceiling – we have a projector screen in front / above displaying the view you see
09:33:52 John Knowles : Still not very clear on Facebook connect. is it to facilitate you sharing content without leaving a site, or are you effectively adding that site as a facebook friend? Or something else?
09:33:53 Ryan Mcfarlane : haha – yeah not good as in good – if that makes any sense!
09:34:31 Craig : Facebook connect is an API that enables visitors to your site to use 1 link to share the content on their facebook profile
09:34:45 Craig : developers.facebook.com/connect.php
09:34:52 John Knowles : How does that differ from a “share” plugin?
09:35:26 Kristin Zhivago : seems to me that faking faces would lead to the company being “outed” for the fakery…!
09:35:28 Aren : The ‘Share’ plugin allows users to pos content to a variety of sites
09:35:41 Craig : an API is a bunch of code that a developer codes into your site.
09:35:57 Aren : Yes, Kristin.. very true
09:36:07 Kristin Zhivago : API = application programming interface, I think – a code module
09:36:11 John Knowles : I don’t see why Facebook connect would be better
09:36:13 Kristin Zhivago : with hooks
09:36:40 Aren : Facebook connect links the profile to the website and allows them to login in the future.
09:37:11 Aren : Share this functionality allows users to share content with their friends, followers etc only
09:37:12 Josef Nankivell : It is similar, however, it usually allows the site to broadcast to your facebook prfile
09:37:24 John Knowles : Sort of like a share button that remembers you?
09:37:52 Aren : Well, sort of.. however, share this buttons can recognise you and let you login to their service only
09:38:16 Josef Nankivell : for example, “Josef registered for an event using Eventbrite! Webinar: Social Media for Business Taster”. Opposed to “I am attending an event using Eventbright!”
09:38:16 Aren : Toby can say more during Qs – I don’t do technical, ha ha
09:39:30 John Knowles : So your activity with the website is automatically posted to your profile? (I’m not technical – after more of a “what it does” level answer!)
09:39:51 Josef Nankivell : it depends, but that is a possibility
09:40:02 John Knowles : Wouldn’t that just be really annoying?
09:40:47 Josef Nankivell : It wouldn’t be in a companies best interest to be annoying with the facebook connect feature
09:41:00 Aren : Yes, possibly… it depends on what that content is. Spammy content can do more harm than good
09:41:21 John Knowles : Well, exactly. I’m struggling to think of an example where it would be a good thing for the user.
09:41:45 Aren : In defining a strategy you need to take time to consider the options. Just because a feature exists it doesn’t always make it a good idea to use.
09:42:22 Josef Nankivell : if you look at my profile http://facebook.com/josefnankivellyou might be able to see some examples, such as Eventbright.
09:42:38 John Knowles : Thanks Josef
09:43:45 Josef Nankivell : no worries
09:48:42 John Knowles : I keep hearing RSS. What is it?
09:48:43 John Knowles : (Sorry – too many questions)
09:49:12 Elliot Smith : Really simple syndication
09:49:45 Josef Nankivell : its a way of having information that you are interested in come to you
09:50:10 Josef Nankivell : instead of visiting a news website, you could have news headline appear in your RSS “feed”
09:50:45 Kristin Zhivago : it’s the orange button on a lot of sites. If you click on it, you can get that site’s content sent to you via an RSS reader like Google reader
09:50:59 Kristin Zhivago : go to google reader and you’ll get started
09:51:04 habeyhl : and you can view a RSS feed in igoogle or google reader, or display a feed on your web site
09:51:27 Aren : Wikipedia definition: An RSS document (which is called a “feed”, “web feed”,[3] or “channel”) includes full or summarized text, plus metadata such as publishing dates and authorship. Web feeds benefit publishers by letting them syndicate content automatically.
09:52:03 Josef Nankivell : when you subscribe to more than one rss feed in your rss reader, it becomes a very powerful tool allowing you to get information relevant to you in one place
09:52:05 Aren : We use RSS (naturally present on WordPress blogs) to feed info across to other sites. i.e. To Facebook profiles
09:53:26 Aren : And as Josef says.. you can use RSS as a method to subscribe to the stories /articles from a site and read them in your RSS reader such as Google Reader
09:53:45 Aren : instead of visiting those sites to check for new content all the time
09:55:37 Josef Nankivell : Exactly! If it helps John, imagine one tv channel with all your favourite programmes on all day!
09:55:47 Kristin Zhivago : you can also set up an automatic feed – from your RSS reader to tweets – using twitterfeed.com
09:56:20 Aren : Yes, this is how Business Cornwall sends new stories out on twitter
09:57:17 cathy : It’s been very interesting ,thank you.Some of it went over my head but I will see how it might help us at www.penhaligonsfriends.org.ukin the 3rd sector.
09:57:46 Tony Conte : would you say then regsitering a Facebook business page is better than a personal one?
09:57:47 John Knowles : Just a few. Sorry…
09:58:05 Tony Conte : sunny
09:58:15 Gary J : When moderating comments, do you have an automatic banned words filter? What do you recommend?
09:59:40 Tony Conte : thanks Toby
09:59:41 Kristin Zhivago : do you see that linked in is all business, twitter is a mix, and facebook is becoming more personal?
09:59:50 Josef Nankivell : I think you are providing a very useful service to people who are unsure about social media. Once you help set them up, you are introducing them to a community full of helpful people!
10:00:51 Aren : LinkedIn is mostly business, Twitter and FB are what you want them to be, in my opinion… it depends on your friends / followers- you are in control
10:00:54 Josef Nankivell : I do not know of many businesses that offer that “leg-up” into social media for small businesses
10:01:02 Ray Bolitho : Thanks Toby & Aren. I’ll be in touch with Toby shortly.
10:01:23 John Knowles : Everything in moderation!
10:04:19 Kristin Zhivago : good summary, thanks
10:04:56 Gary J : All done – great info Thank you
10:04:57 John Knowles : me: me: Are blog homepages more effective as a list of full articles, or just headlines / first paragraphs where you can click through? me: What about Facebook Causes? Can you communicate with everyone at once on those?
10:05:01 Kristin Zhivago : how do we contact you?
10:05:27 Charla Symons : Thank you very much Aren & Toby, Totally Truro has found this webinar very useful
10:05:40 Aren : To contact Toby call +44 (0)1872 555933 or email toby@uknetweb.com
10:06:07 Aren : My contacts are: 07501 259000, aren@tonickmedia.com
10:06:23 Kristin Zhivago : thanks
10:06:27 Paul : Lot of good info to think about/explore. Thanks.
10:06:35 Aren : search our names on Google to find profiles and other contact details
10:06:42 cathy : I wanted to know which if any you would most recommend for a charity viz last statement ?
10:08:01 Josef Nankivell : Using facebook for fundraising events would be useful!
10:08:27 Kristin Zhivago : muxt go thanks so much. great meeting
10:08:37 Kristin Zhivago : will be in touch as soon as I reboot
10:08:45 habeyhl : can a facebook (fan) page post an event?
10:08:47 Jemiina Hautamäki : thank you very much, this was a good two hours! will follow you guys on twitter
10:09:08 Aren : Thank you
10:09:32 Gary J : Thanks – see ya !
10:09:38 Tony Conte : many thanks guys, much appreciated.
10:09:48 habeyhl : thanks, this was great
10:09:48 John Knowles : Tom and David want to know if you’re all at Skinners later.
10:09:50 Josef Nankivell : Thanks very much Toby & Aren! It has bee a very enjoyable and helpful experience!
10:09:57 Aren : Yes I will be at Skinners
10:10:20 Aren : For the Cornish delegates – pls check out http://cornwall.twestival.com
10:10:21 John Knowles : Well, have a great time!
10:11:19 Aren : Thanks John, I’m sure I will. Are you not going?

With countries around the world falling into technical recessions and consumers struggling to obtain credit, ecommerce website owners need to be clever with their websites to ensure continuing growth.

In recent years website developers may have hidden any lack of ability behind a buoyant market which has seen double digit growth for a number of years; however, with times changing they will now be forced to demonstrate their expertise.

At the time of writing this piece, UK expectations for the 2008 Christmas shopping period look good for ecommerce websites, albeit they are not set to grow at quite such a large percentage as seen in previous years.

Findings taken from the IMRG Capgemini e-Retail Sales Index, and reported in ZDNet, show that UK shoppers will spend £13.16bn on ecommerce websites in the last quarter of 2008. This rise is equivalent to a healthy year on year increase of 15%; however, represents a drop from the 54% year on year growth reported in the year before.

In the US, things are not looking so healthy but again the figures have not entered a decline. According to comScore’s monthly retail ecommerce sales estimates, October saw the lowest monthly growth rate since they began tracking results in 2001 with just 1% year on year growth.

All told it will be the more savvy ecommerce website owners who reap the rewards this Christmas, while others who have not made sufficient plans for their ecommerce website will pay the price.

In the coming months, pressures on the economy will only serve to push things further so what advice can we give on getting the most from your ecommerce website?

Start by getting the right developer for your ecommerce website.

When selecting a web developer you need to ensure you are selecting one that is focused on the fundamental idea of ‘return on investment’. You need a developer who understands the market and can identify areas of development that will lead to sales growth.

It is easy to get carried away with statistics. Many web developers will talk about visitor numbers and rankings. These are important to your overall success but can be used to mask the real areas of importance such as bounce rates, cart abandonment and purchase levels.

Don’t rely on rankings alone. These figures often have more to do with other areas such as search engine optimisation (SEO) or marketing than they do web design or development.

Once you believe you have found a suitable developer for your new or existing ecommerce website you should take time at the outset to research your online competition, brainstorm functionality and define potential functionality.

Using the notes from this session you and your developer should perform a cost to benefit analysis on each function. The simple question you need to ask yourself is ‘Will this make me money*?’. It might sound harsh, but if you don’t take your website development seriously and pay for functionality that does not lead to increased profitability you are wasting money that could be used to generate a profit somewhere else.

*When we say ‘Will this make me money?’ you should keep in mind that customer retention is very important. If a particular function will help you keep customers coming back then you are developing potential repeat business which can be very valuable.

Wish Lists and Ongoing Development

Sometimes you will find that some areas of development are great ideas for the future. They could provide a decent return on the investment required, just not until user levels reach a higher level. Don’t discard these ideas – keep a note of them on a ‘Wish List’ and add them to an ongoing development agreement or plan to review them at a later date.

Other times you will notice that there are small improvements which could yield higher sales. It may be that you could add hurdle or bulk discounts, offer promotional codes or inform customers when items return to stock. Good ideas should be built into an ongoing development plan to spread the cost and allow for continued growth to be achieved.

Track Performance and Tweak

On launching your site ensure you have Google Analytics installed with Goals and Funnels established. Review the data regularly with your developer to establish fresh areas for development keeping in mind the simple rule – ‘Will this make me money?’.

If you can see that you are suffering from high levels of web cart abandonment deal with it early. If you were running a bricks and mortar store where customers where literally dropping out at the till you’d do something about it – why should the web be any different?

Map how your customers use your site. Are there opportunities to maximise the sales value? Are you losing customers on any particular page or product? If so, make changes and monitor the results.

Providing you follow the rules of ‘return on investment’ with your ecommerce website there is no reason why you shouldn’t fare well through tougher economic times. Get the right developer at the start and the investment will more than pay for itself.

If you would like to receive personal advice on how we help you grow your ecommerce revenues year after year, call Aren on 01872 555933 or use the contact form provided.

The task of building the perfect website is an ongoing one. Continuous monitoring, tweaking and updating is the only way to ensure your site is the very best it can be.

Here are ten tips to improve your website…

1. Understand the customer – sounds simple but so many people get it wrong.

Get all your great products together with a clearly defined and communicated brand message and you’re on to a winner!

2. Make finding things easy – some sites are just so damn complicated!

Provide easy to use, fast and accurate search facilities as standard. Ensure that navigation is simple and easy to use – no hidden or difficult to find buttons or tabs.

3. Once you have their interest why not show them what else they want?

Upsell, cross-sell, showcase promotions, offers, best sellers and new products. A sure fire way to increase basket size and average order values is to show similar or slightly better products at the checkout.

4. Understand your performance.

Use analytic tools to ascertain what’s going on with your site. The information gathered could unlock areas for additional marketing, enhanced usability or missed opportunities to tap into.

5. Let them see all you have to offer.

Use rich imaging (a fancy way of saying zoom and alternative views) with professional, clear photographs throughout.

6. Tell them what you have to offer.

Make the words on your site interesting and engaging to your target audience as well as optimised for good search engine rankings. Don’t bore them with drawn out technical specs and data which could be summarised in a table elsewhere.

7. When you offer help – give it.

Don’t you just hate the little button that says ‘Sizes Explained’ (or something equally promising) that then links to a nightmare table of numbers with no explanation or help in sight?

8. Get the customer to tell you you’re good.

Positively encourage your customers to leave and publish reviews.

9. Offer other information options.

Newsletters, promotional emails, catalogues or store information should be offered for those who want it. You could make a regular customer instead of a one off sale!

10. Offer something different.

In a world where everyone has a store online being different to the competition will help your site stick in the mind of the customer and could make the difference between a sale or not. Check out your competition and see what you could do better.

The term ‘web cart abandonment’ refers to consumers ending their purchase somewhere between adding an item to their shopping cart and final payment being made. There can be a number of reasons for this occurring from complicated processes at the checkout, to consumers feeling unhappy with the information being requested.

What makes cart abandonment so frustrating for e-commerce owners is that all efforts to draw the customer in, offer the right product and get them to place the item in their basket have succeeded only to lose the all important sale at the last hurdle.

Not all reasons for abandonment are under your control, there will always be those people who dash to the phone, realise the credit card is maxed or just decide they didn’t really want that item after all but understanding the reasons under your control can help leverage additional value from your site.

Although things are improving year on year (web cart abandonment rates fell from 59.8% in 2006 to 52.1% in 2007 according to Marketing Sherpa Ecommerce Benchmark Guide 2007) e-commerce owners can still go along way to drive levels downwards and increase site profitability.

Ask yourself would you willingly accept any other source of such a loss of revenue to your business? Can you really afford to ignore losses exceeding 50%? What profits could you expect if you improved your checkout and cart processes?

If you are a typical e-commerce owner I expect you would like to ensure the highest levels of returns from your site. You may have worked really hard on SEO strategies, paid for sophisticated features and bespoke programming, brought in designers, copywriters and the works all to lose the sale only moments away from the money hitting your account.

So what causes potential customers to retreat from a sale?

Popular reasons for cart abandonment include; unexpected charges at checkout, products out of stock, requirements for the customer to register before purchase, limited payment options, postage or delivery costs too high, no clear delivery information, lack of contact details or complicated / time consuming processes.

Careful consideration and research is needed to fully understand issues. It may be that some areas can be addressed while at the same time causing an issue in another. It is important, as with most web developments, to test, evaluate and modify your systems on a regular basis to ensure that your site remains ahead.

Setting up tracking on your site to measure activity is vital to making the right decisions with regard to your shopping cart. You need to gather information relating to the following areas on an ongoing basis and especially before tinkering with any site processes;

• Abandoned Carts

Track the overall number of carts being abandoned.

• Abandoned Products

Track whether abandonment figures are the same for all products / product ranges?

• Abandoned Units

Establish how many units are being abandoned. Some research can be skewed by results from customers mistakenly placing multiples of a product into their cart.

• Where are they abandoning their purchase?

Set up tracking to establish the areas where the greatest numbers of potential customers abandon their purchases.

Once you are armed with this information you are ready to begin investigating the problems and making the necessary amendments.

Take the information gathered and use the site to make a number of your own purchases. Can you see any reasons to justify why customers are abandoning their items at these stages? Can you see how the process could be improved?

Take your research to recent or current users of the site and ask them why they stopped their purchase or how you could improve the usability of the site or shopping cart. Run usability tests on the products pages or the checkout areas to establish any known issues.

Once you feel you have all the information, try to summarise all your findings by category. i.e. Process too long or Postage charge too high. Use this list to plan a fix or series of fixes for each issue. It may be that some issues will cost too much at this stage to implement; however, delayed plans to deal with these areas should still be made with a schedule detailing when they will receive further attention.

Before carrying out any changes decide on a method of measuring the results of each fix and ensure that appropriate tracking is set up to catch the required information. Where your fix has not worked you may need to look at alternative plans to address the same issue.

This process shouldn’t be a one off. Customer habits change all the time and as such regular reviews, testing and implementation should be a part of any ongoing online strategy. Schedule times to regular monitor performance and tweak as necessary. It could be that minor changes in the sites usability reap huge rewards for your profitability.

Where you don’t have the time to monitor these areas yourself enlist consultants or your web development team to track details and suggest regular changes or upgrades. Many companies will offer retainers where they will identify issues or areas for development which could lead to increased profits for your business.

Below I have listed 10 more simple areas to watch with your website checkout process. These offer some basic guidance on how your site may be improved with a little bit of tweaking.

1. No Hidden Extras
Don’t try adding hidden costs at the checkout. Customers will feel you’re abusing their trust and will not only abandon carts but may never buy from you in the future.

2. Provide Information
Don’t surround your store in mystery. Make customers aware of the process involved in making a purchase, be sure to explain; total costs including postage, delivery details, availability, returns policy and telephone contact details should they have an issue at the beginning of their purchase.

3. Don’t ask for too much too soon.
Some websites still make the mistake of asking the customer to register when placing items in the basket. Allow your customer to feel ready to make a purchase and pay before asking for too much information.

4. Keep it simple.
Limit the number of choices that potential customers have to make when checking out. Higher drop out rates have bee found on those sites with the highest number of choices.

5. Offer payment options
There’s nothing more annoying than getting to the checkout in a store and finding out that they don’t accept the card your holding. Try and offer as many payment options as you can.

6. Ask for the minimum
Don’t be too greedy for information. Minimise the information taken to that required to process a transaction. Additional info requests increase your chances that your buyer will not complete the purchase.

7. Be contactable
Display clear contact details throughout the checkout process, such as phone number and email, plus provide a live online chat where possible. Customers like to know that they can contact someone should something go wrong with their order.

8. Show you’re site’s Secure
Ensure potential customers know that transactions processed through your site are secure and encrypted. Explain any company policies on protection of consumer information and privacy as well as displaying any safeguard logos.

9. Get their email first
Ask for emails near the beginning of the checkout process, preferably on page one. Sample customers who have abandoned shopping carts and email them to find out why they decided to abandon their purchase when they did.

10. Own your own checkout
Ensure that your checkout process is part of your system rather than forwarding checkout processes to third party sites.

This piece was originally written for catalog | e-business magazine – [published April 2008: Issue 151].

If you would like to see the finished piece you can view it on the ‘Press Coverage’ page of our news feed site by clicking here

The system built for Travel Smith Limited, based in the South East, required more than 400 hours of complex programming over a period of 6 months. This was needed to ensure that a range of back end systems could work together seamlessly to assist those booking holidays on the Channel Islands.

Built by St. Agnes based, UKnetweb, the new system allows customers accessing travelsmith.co.uk to book flights and accommodation through the one site building on their previous success in arranging accommodation and ferry travel for customers throughout the UK.

Although flight booking systems of this kind often appear relatively simple to the consumer using them, they involve a range of highly complex programming languages to ensure that the different parts involved in the process work together to generate the required results.

“Many people could be forgiven for thinking that the site is pretty simple, after all, that’s how the customer should see it. However, behind the scenes we have to ensure that thousands of processes work hand in hand to deliver the service they expect.” Says Toby Parkins, UKnetweb’s Managing Director.

“As a company we focus on these kind of projects which other companies find difficult. Knowing that nothing is impossible we work to establish new ways of doing things and have become nationally renowned for a number of European internet firsts.” He continued.

The Travel Smith system is not the first project of this complexity undertaken by UKnetweb, past projects have included a national sales system for genealogy store, Parish Chest and a mobile application for brand leader, Nokia.

Anyone looking to develop their own booking system, or other complex web development can contact the company at their offices on 01872 555933 or visit the company’s website at www.uknetweb.com

A series of lunch seminars organised by local companies uknetweb, Coodes and Niddocks have attracted another full house as businesses in Cornwall search to understand how they can utilise their online potential.

The specially arranged short seminars have been designed to give business owners and managers a quick burst of information covering the three major areas needed for success online.

Carried out over a lunchtime the intention is that each session allows those interested in trading online to build their knowledge without the need for whole days away from the office.

Law firm, Coodes, put forward Jonathan Wilde to give an overview of the legal documentation associated with trading online. Uknetweb MD, Toby Parkins provides insight into the role programming plays in successful e-businesses and Rob Edlin, MD of Niddocks looks at the online marketing aspects.

Each speaker takes around 15 minutes on their area of expertise, offering further one to one advice after the formal part of the session.

So far visitors to the seminars have represented a range of business interests and levels of experience, ranging from small cottage industries just starting out online right through to more experienced e-traders.

Uknetweb MD, Toby Parkins commented, “We wanted the seminar to be useful to both the new web business and those already underway. We knew from the start that the seminar would be information rich but that was always our intention. We wanted all our attendees to leave feeling they had really learnt something without the need for a whole day on each subject.”

Following the success of this event, the second so far, bookings are now open to the next event taking place on the 16^th of April. Anyone interested in attending this session should contact Laraine Smailes at Coodes Truro on 01872 246211 to arrange a free place.

When we first heard about the dontclick.it project we were excited to see what it had to offer and whether this might just be the start of an entirely new way for websites to work. Driven by my passion (and if I’m honest geeky desire) to search out the best of Web 2.0 projects and emerging internet technologies I first came across dontclick.it through a random Stumble and at first site was pretty impressed.

Not wanting to stop at my own first impressions I felt it was time to let the site do the rounds of the office and see just what the designers, techies and normal polite members of society thought about a site that doesn’t need (or allow) to be clicked.

______________________________________________________________________________________

John Thornton… resident PHP Programmer and general ‘codehead’ at uknetweb

The user interface is definitely a novel and very innovative one; however this kind of site operation is likely to prevent site visitors suffering from motor control problems or other special needs due to the nature of the programming employed.

The various button control techniques shown, set about destroying some of the only positive arguments for an interface control system of this kind. i.e. that you don’t need to keep clicking or pressing buttons!

The delay while you hover waiting for an action to start makes the site clumsy to use, confusing and slower than clicking. The continuous mouse wiping and waving motion is more likely to cause Repetitive Strain Injury (RSI) than a single movement and a click.

In all it’s a great theory which unfortunately lacks any forethought (but it does look lovely).

Score: 2 out of 5 – awarded for innovation and looks.

______________________________________________________________________________________

Richard Collett… resident CSS expert responsible for making client sites ‘look pretty’.

What an annoying site! OK, so on first impressions it captures every aspect of the Web 2.0 style – bold colours, reflections, crazy page structures and so on but come on is there really any need to remove the click function?

Within minutes of hitting the site I couldn’t help myself, I pressed the button on my mouse, sending me to some strange page of snow that told me I shouldn’t have done that. The site creators just can’t help themselves after all this site is more about standing out from the norm and doing something different rather than anything useful.

My annoyances in the site didn’t stop there. Try using this site with a laptop touchpad, I beg you to!

OK so lets be serious here for a moment. What does this site achieve?

Very little I’m afraid. I have spent my time putting together sites and ensuring ease of use for site visitors but this site is just so confusing. You are never quite sure where you are or where you’re supposed to be going, that’s fine for a crazy test site but it just isn’t applicable to any real world scenarios.

Score: 0 out of 5 – because it’s so god damn annoying!!

______________________________________________________________________________________

Esther Caulfield…a rose amongst the thorns, she handles all the lines of communication coming into the Engine House.

Ummm. I’m confused why do you want me to go to this site?

Hey, what’s the point of all this.

It just told me to click and now I have been told off for clicking! Oh, how annoying is this!?

I’m bored can I go now… ah, wait a second I’ve just found a giveaway!

Score 1 out of 5 – it has a giveaway!

______________________________________________________________________________________

So at the end of the day the team here at uknetweb were not impressed by the dontclick.it project giving it a final score of 1 out of 5. Our end message to the developers has to be ‘Why? – If it isn’t broke don’t fix it!’

The entry looks at how sites like Wikipedia and Digg, which purport to be web democracies actually work more like an oligarchy, where a small segment of users are responsible for the majority of content and the sites general direction.

Where I find problems with Wilson’s view starts in his title. It is clear that there may be an argument to show that sites such as Digg and Wikipedia are in the control of a select bunch of users. However, these users have not been selected, appointed or employed but have risen through the ranks (so to speak) through active participation, knowledge and the support of other users.

The whole principle of the so called ‘Web 2.0′, Crowdsourcing and the Read / Write web is that it offers open access to the collective commons. It seems only natural to me that those who put the most in would naturally achieve a higher degree of ability to affect changes across those sites operating in this way.

As such the title used in Wilson’ s blog, describing ‘Web 2.0 democracy’ as a ‘myth’, does not really seem accurate or fair.

I believe that the Web 2.0 phenomenon may not be perfect and is in fact still at a relatively early stage. Where I see that it offers many advantages over the web as it existed until this time, is in the open ability for most, regardless of technical knowledge or ability to participate in a creative commons un-bound by mainstream corporate concerns, financial restrictions or censorship.

It is difficult to apply terms such as ‘democracy‘ to such a subject when countless sites struggle to provide an accurate definition of exactly what it is. If we take the literal meaning listed by About.com as ‘the will of the people’ then can anyone really argue that Web 2.0 is anything but democratic, after all, are we not all free to participate as we choose to do so.