This month on Building Keystones we featured the cleverbridge Ecommerce Benchmark Report, a must-read for those interested in best practices gleaned from processing millions of monthly ecommerce transactions in over 250 countries.
We also offered our readers six guides on essential ecommerce strategy and tactics, including information on handling VAT rates, conversion optimization tips, making the most of November and December ecommerce, and other crucial elements of ecommerce success.
We hope your holiday season ecommerce plans are in place and that you’re starting to see a bump in traffic and sales. Now, get ready for tips on ecommerce fraud prevention, Singles Day ecommerce, the importance of mobile-friendly sites, the basis for effective loyalty programs and the evolution of social media marketing.
Fraud Prevention
How I Detect Ecommerce Fraud | Practical Ecommerce
While the amount of attempted fraud transactions have decreased the last five years, the actual amount of money stolen by fraudsters increased. When you process payments through your online store you can’t rely solely on your bank for proper fraud screening. This post emphasizes that your understanding of your business, and your understanding of what constitutes a typical order, should impact your fraud prevention strategy. Criminal attempts to steal and use your customers’ payment information are subtle, and your revenue is at stake. Make sure you are doing everything you can to maximize valid orders and minimize fraudulent ones.
Global Ecommerce
Singles Day | MarketWatch
This post from MarketWatch reports that Alibaba, the Amazon of China, raked in over nine billion dollars on November 11, which is about four times as many sales generated online by all U.S. companies combined on Cyber Monday in 2013. For merchants looking to expand their sales beyond North America and Western Europe, start establishing your presence in new territory using evergreen localization tactics, and make sure to take advantage of local shopping bonanzas.
Mobile SEO
Mobile Laggards Beware – Google is Exposing Your Shortcomings | Forrester
Everyone knows from personal experience how frustrating it can be to click on a link from your phone or tablet and land on a page that has not been optimized for mobile. By placing little notes on search results, Google now lets searchers know whether the site they are about to click on is optimized for mobile or not. Certainly, you can understand how these notes might affect a customer’s likelihood to click on your company’s link. Thankfully, this post has resources for getting your site started on the road toward mobile friendliness.
Loyalty Programs
Smart Framing as the Basis for Effective Loyalty Programs | Nir and Far
Alright, raise your hands: how many loyalty programs have you joined that you haven’t used except the day you enrolled? The results of a loyalty program test in this post indicate that the reward of a loyalty program may be less important than how that reward is presented. This presentation ultimately influences a customer’s behavior with your brand.
Social Media Marketing
Let’s Get Social | Six Pixels of Separation
Social is a complex channel, and many companies wonder how to approach it or if it is even worthwhile. Is social media a form of advertising or is it a content channel? If you don’t have the creative budget for an Old Spice or Oreo sized campaign, should you even bother? In this podcast, Mitch Joel and Jason Keath discuss whether companies should be focusing on creating “high intensity” pieces of content and using social as a distribution channel. Also discussed is how to connect social media followers with your CRM.
Do you have any suggestions for improving fraud prevention, how to enter the Chinese software market, SEO, loyalty programs or social media? Let us know in the comment section below.
