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Interview: Steven Roth Talks About Channel Intelligence Data Feed Services

eCopt — Wed, 07 May 2008 22:49:33 +0000

This interview marks the second of two we have conducted with the folks over at Channel Intelligence. For more insights into the company and their services be sure to check out the first interview we did with Vik Murty about SellPath.

As a core part of their solution, Channel Intelligence offers industry leading comparison shopping and data feed services for merchants and eCommerce sellers who are interested in receiving high-end channel marketing technology from a company with a long standing reputation in this industry. The individual comparison shopping services are designed to make the process of generating, uploading, optimizing and tracking feeds as simple and easy as possible on the publisher. Also, they are setup in a way that makes it absolutely clear which campaigns are producing what, giving additional insight into the campaigns that may need to be improved or tweaked in order to produce the desired results.
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Interview: Gary MacDougall Talks About ChannelBrain Data Feed Services

eCopt — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 23:18:13 +0000

ChannelBrain is Freeportway’s (parent company) service for eCommerce merchants looking to market or sell within Online marketing channels such as comparison shopping engines (CSE’s) and shopping portals. ChannelBrain’s solution is designed to help and facilitate the process of syndicating various products offered by merchants and eTailers to numerous CSE’s all from one, simple to use location and tool. In addition to the formatting, ease of syndication and one-click solution, ChannelBrain also offers users the ability to create their campaigns so that progress, or lack of, can be tracked.
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Google Testing New Universal Shopping/Product Results Displays

eCopt — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 15:42:49 +0000

While conducting some research last night I accidentally stumbled across what appears to be new Google Universal testing within organic search results. I noticed the new look and layout on several universal searches I queried such as seattle, wa (featuring both book and news universal results), 10,000 bc (featuring video universal results), ecommerce (featuring news universal results) and ball (featuring image universal results).
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Interview: Stuart Larkins Talks About DoubleClick Performics Data Feed Marketing

eCopt — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 23:33:26 +0000

We have recently added a new section to our comparison shopping guide dedicated to the top data feed companies that currently offer comparison shopping engine listing services including feed generation, submission, distribution, management and tracking. Some merchants find it difficult to setup, manage and track their individual CSE campaigns and sometimes they just don’t have the time to deal with all that’s involved. For this reason, several companies now offer different services designed to help ease or take-over these tasks for any merchant who may fit into either category.

One such company featured on our data feeds list, DoubleClick Performics, was gracious enough to spend some time with me in order to discuss their comparison shopping solution details more in depth. I hope to eventually take the time to talk with each company on our list so that our readers can pick and choose based on the individual needs or goals of any CSE campaign.
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JetBlue Airways Now Accepting PayPal Payments For Online Ticket Purchases

eCopt — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 15:50:24 +0000

JetBlue Airways announced today that they will now be accepting PayPal payments for passengers who wish to make ticket purchases off of their website, JetBlue.com. Todays partnership between JetBlue and PayPal makes for the fifth major airline to begin accepting PayPal as a website payment option for ticket transactions.
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Interview: Anand Jagannathan Discusses iStorez Personalized Shopping

eCopt — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 07:01:48 +0000

Today Kriyari, Inc., a Web 2.0 storefront network creator, launched their latest Online retail project, a unique personalized shopping service, called iStorez. Earlier this week I was able to get together with Kriyari’s CEO, Anand Jagannathan, to discuss iStorez in more detail. In addition, I took advantage of the special site launch preview and went through the steps necessary to create and publish my own personal storefront to shop from on iStorez.

The concept behind the newly launched site is wonderful and see all kinds of potential for an “opt-in, opt-out” shopping service like this within the Online selling space, for both merchants and shoppers, but especially for retailers who already run regular email marketing campaigns.

iStorez already has some biggest names in eCommerce participating in their unique shopping experience, including many of the hottest 100 retailers. With strategic partnerships, innovative features and a unique concept to create a more personalized shopping experience, it won’t be long before iStorez becomes a regular destination for today’s most savvy Online consumers. It’s certainly found a permanent home in my shopping bookmarks.
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Yahoo Store Merchants, Get Practical Ecommerce Magazine FREE For One Year

eCopt — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 18:39:17 +0000

Practial Ecommerce (PE) and Yahoo Small Business have teamed up for an excellent offer going on right now where Yahoo Store merchants can get a full one year subscription to Practical Ecommerce’s annual print magazine, complete with all 6 issues for FREE (magazine printed bi-monthly). Yes, I said FREE for a year compliments of Yahoo. This is a great way for PE to gain new reader subscriptions to their industry leading eCommerce magazine, it also helps many of Yahoo’s small to medium-sized merchants gain insights into the world of eCommerce and selling Online.

PE has three main ways of distributing information to their readers; one is the print magazine previously mentioned, they also offer an Online version of the magazine through their blog, podcasts, forums and regular columns and finally they send out a regular newsletter (EcommerceNotes) with tips and resources to help more merchants on their journey to Online selling success. PE magazine, site, blog, forums and newsletter contains unique eCommerce related features, tool, interviews, site profiles, professionals and many recurring departments, such as search engine optimization, email marketing, customer conversion, legal issues, pay per click advertising and much more.
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eCommerce Ideas: Using Live Product Links Within Videos & Product Demos

eCopt — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 19:20:56 +0000

I came upon an interesting new service for Online sellers the other day and I wanted to share it with all our readers as an eCommerce Idea article. It’s really unique, useful and right in line with current eCommerce trends.

Before we get into the new service I wanted to briefly mention our last eCommerce Ideas article on Using Creative Linkbait and Engaging Customers At The Same Time. It featured another really creative eCommerce idea that at least one merchant is using. This idea article has the same concept, in that it’s a unique or creative idea that eCommerce merchants can use to improve or enhance their stores, however it’s not related to linkbait and customer features as much as it is related to eCommerce video content and store usability. Same concept, different topic basically.
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New eCommerce Trends Tool: Get Google Checkout Merchant Trend Data

eCopt — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 17:54:36 +0000

Caught this announcement on the Google Checkout Blog yesterday and it also appeared on Search Engine Land today. It looks as though Google has added another Trends tool to their arsenal that caters to eCommerce sellers, shoppers and even eTail professionals and search engine marketers.

The new eCommerce trends tool is called Google Checkout Trends. The tool is similar to Google Web Search Trends, except that the Checkout Trends tool only aggregates useful sales data from Google Checkout merchants and charts the data on an easy to use, easy to read interface for the user to see. Basically, it shows users important trend data about who is buying and selling what from Checkout.
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eCommerce Ideas: Using Creative Linkbait & Engaging Customers At The Same Time

eCopt — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 18:48:53 +0000

It’s always interesting to see the new and innovative ways that Online retailers are coming up with to generate buzz, links and customer interaction on their eCommerce sites in an attempt to boost rankings, visitors, conversions, average orders or sales. Recently, I came across a great example of one retailer who uses creative ideas to generate new links and engages customers at the same time.
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Applications Make Unsubscribing From Catalogs Easier: Is Catalog Marketing Done For?

eCopt — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 18:20:42 +0000

If you’re like any other person on Earth you have probably subscribed to one or more print catalogs in the past and currently receive them via your mailbox each month. Personally, I receive about 3 -4 paper catalogs each month from companies including Cabelas, Land’s End, Victoria Secret, Business 2.0 and many even a few more like the Costco business catalog or my update catalogs from Dell, HP, T-Mobile and more.
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PriceGrabber Gets A Fresh Homepage Design, Much Needed Improvements

eCopt — Tue, 01 Jan 2008 19:04:26 +0000

It looks like the folks over at PriceGrabber have rolled out a fresh new look for the comparison shopping sites homepage. There were some initial reports from around the blogoshere that they have been testing it for about a month now, and it looks like they are pleased with it, as the new design appears to be here to stay (before it was only being displayed at certain times to certain visitors).
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Interview: Mel Ronick Spotlights StacksandStacks.com

eCopt — Mon, 31 Dec 2007 18:02:47 +0000

It’s time for another Store Spotlight everyone! I have got to say, this is one of the most fun blog series we have done here at eCommerce Optimization. Already I can tell that we will all learn so much from the top 100 retailers who choose to participate in this interview style QandA. The series really does give us all an inside look into some of the most successful Online retailers in existence today.

Today’s Store Spotlight features an inside look into StacksandStacks.com. We were lucky enough to catch up with Mel Ronick, President of StacksandStacks.com, to ask him about their business, background, customers, products, design, marketing, team and other factors that have attributed to their success over the years. Basically, we wanted to find out some of the things they have done that has led to them becoming a 2008 Hot 100 Retailer. In the process, we hope that others can learn and benefit from what has worked and what hasn’t during their time in the Online retail business.
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Comparison Engines Blog By Brian Smith Has A New Look

eCopt — Mon, 24 Dec 2007 19:15:54 +0000

Last night I was browsing my Technorati reaction links and spotted a recent one from Brian Smith’s blog, ComparisonEngines.com. If you’re not already familiar with Brian’s blog, it’s all about comparison shopping engines and understanding the inner workings of them. It also includes comparison shopping tips, news, specifics about data feeds and much, much more.

I was hoping that we got added to his blogroll, so when I jumped over to check out what was up, I noticed that indeed we did get added, but the blogroll wasn’t the only thing that he updated recently. As a matter of fact, he rolled out a whole new look and feel for the blog including a new color scheme and header graphic with really cool rounded corner content background images. Comparison Engines is one of the eCommerce blogs I visit most often during each week (the Get Elastic blog is another one).

Here’s Brian’s post about the blog redesign, posted on Christmas Eve.
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Google Changes Products Link To Shopping On Main Navigation

eCopt — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 17:51:42 +0000

I recently noticed a change to the ‘Products’ link in Google’s main navigation. Not too long ago they removed the ‘Video’ link and replaced it with ‘Products’ instead. Now they have changed the ‘Products’ link again, but this time they renamed it to ‘Shopping’ on the main navigation found on all results pages and Google’s main page.
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Google Product Search Traffic Down, Other CSE’s Report Steady Or Increased Traffic

eCopt — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 16:55:10 +0000

I was browsing news headlines yesterday and came across an interesting one on CNN Money about Google Product Search. According to the news piece, the comparison shopping engine site by Google has been experiencing dramatic drops in traffic to their shopping service while comparable shopping search services such as TheFind.com or Pronto.com and even Yahoo Shopping have all increased or remained steady, at the least.
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