This week, Volusion, one of the top shopping carts integrated with Webgistix SmartFill, released a “2011 eCommerce Survival Guide for the Black Friday Weekend.” Even for online retailers confident in their holiday procedures, it’s worth a read. There is some interesting data that is presented in the guide. For example, while retail sales are only expected to grow 2.6% this year, eCommerce sales this week are projected to grow 12%, a clear indication of the advantages buying online offers over traditional brick and mortar. Black Friday and Cyber Monday online sales have traditionally broken records year after year, and 2011 looks to continue the trend.
The guide also provides tips for Pay Per Click (PPC), email marketing, and coupon campaigns. The holiday seasons are the best time of year for online retailers to attract new business and to build customer loyalty by showing their commitment to quality under pressure. This holiday guide is a fantastic way to make sure they make the most of it.
You can find this free guide
here.
Webgistix is holding a new contest on its
Facebook page! Submit a story or photo before the 8th of October for a chance to win a $25 Starbucks giftcard. The best entry will be chosen!
Ecommerce software provider 3DCart recently announced the launch of version 4. As the biggest rollout to date, 3DCart 4 capitalizes on the group buying trend by putting control of group deals in the hands of online businesses. The new version features tight integration with Webgistix.
As part of the release, 3DCart is inviting merchants to use Webgistix and 3dcart with a special promotion:
sign up for one month of service and get two months free.
The biggest new features of 3DCart 4 include:
- Daily Deals – By featuring a “daily deal” on their sites, online stores gain the ability to drive more conversions by adding urgency, pique customer interest with exclusivity, allow partner sites to promote deals, generate more content for social media channels and more easily clear stock of outdated products.
- Group Deals – The new “Group Deals” tool gives online stores the ability to feature their own group deals without paying out to a middleman. Businesses have the ability to run their own group promotions whenever they want and control how those deals are promoted.
- Make An Offer – This feature allows customers to place a bid on items. If the bid falls within a pre-designated percentage margin, the sale is closed. If not, the administrator has the ability to accept or decline the sale. The feature is meant to appeal to comparison, bargain and haggling shoppers.
- Autoresponders – Set and forget autoresponders—preprogrammed emails that go out based on customer activity and designations—to build brand loyalty.
- Feedback – Collect more leads, generate more sales, reduce cart abandonment and keep customers happy with easy-to-implement feedback tabs.
3DCart 4 also includes new features like “Quick View” to preview products and buy directly from the category page; “Quick Cart” to preview products in the customer’s shopping cart without leaving the page; “Facebook Send Button” to allow customers to quickly and easily share products over Facebook; “Facebook Open Graph Meta Tags” that allows customers to “Like” your store directly from your website; “Recently Viewed Items” for customers to return to product pages they previously visited; integration with Australia Post; warehouse location updates; and updated order sorting. Head
here for a more detailed look at the new release.
The new features on 3dcart 4 together with Webgistix’s fulfillment solution can help merchants increase sales and improve their order processing.