The $300 Million button

April 5th, 2009

I found this great atricle the other day on User Interface Engineering that emphesises the importance of good usability on a eCommerce website perfectly.

In a nutshell it was one small form that was causing the problem to a tune of $300 million a year. The form was simple. The fields were Email Address and Password. The buttons were Login and Register. The link was Forgot Password. It was the login form for the site. It’s a form users encounter all the time.

It wasn’t so much as the forms layout but where the form lived. Users would encounter it after they filled their shoppign cart and were required to fill it in before they could purchase their products.

The designers thought the form woudl save return visitors time and first time purchasers wouldn’t mind the extra effort of filling the form as it would save them time next time they purchased from the site

“I’m Not Here To Be In a Relationship”

Usability tests conducted with customers told a different story – they didnt want to register to make a purchase! All they wanted to do was choose and item and pay for it with the minimum amount of effort.

You can read the full article here:

The $300 Million Button

There couldnt be a better example of how a users journey affects their experience on your website. At the end of the day all a user want sto do on an eCommerce website is make a purchase with the minimum amount of effort. Removing as many hurdles for your customer as possible will undoubtedly increase sales, in case to the tune of $300 million.

10 great ecommerce websites

March 28th, 2009

Whilst designing and developing Designer Sunglasses Store I did a lot of research into what makes an eCommerce site work in trems of usability, accessibility and SEO. Below is the top 10 eCommerce websites which I feel are at top of the pile.

10 Reasons to use Email Marketing to beat the Credit Crunch

March 28th, 2009

Email marketing is a powerful and easy way to build a list and communicate your marketing messages to leads and customers. Here are the top 10 reasons to use email marketing to help your company beat the Credit Crunch

1. Email marketing is virtually free.
Email is truly unique in it’s ability to put your marketing message in front of thousands of potential customers at virtually no cost. This means that virtually 100% of revenue generated from email campaigns is pure profit.

2. Email is personal.
Everyone’s favorite sound is the sound of his or her own name. Most email marketing solutions allow you to automatically customize email messages with personal data such as the subscriber’s name.

3. Valuable demographic data can be collected. When a lead subscribes to your email list, you can collect valuable data about your potential customers. This data allows you to better target your marketing messages to your list.

4. Email messages are sent instantaneously. With the touch of a button, your marketing message is sent to your list. There is no waiting for the post office to deliver the message to the customer’s mailbox.

5. Email is transparent. With email, virtually every marketing metric can be tracked with a high degree of precision. Among the metrics that can be tracked are delivery rates, open rates, click through rates, and conversion rates.

6. Email marketing is highly automated. Very little manpower is required to create an email campaign. Essentially, the only manual work required is the copy writing of email message itself. Other aspects such as delivery and tracking are done automatically.

7. Email messages do not necessarily require any design work. Unlike many other forms of marketing, email messages require little to no designing. In fact, it has been shown that plain text email messages with no HTML tend to be more effective. Plain text messages are much less likely to trigger spam filters and consequently have significantly higher delivery rates.

8. Rapid response time. Particularly if you sell products online, an email campaign can begin to generate a response almost immediately. Customers don’t have to leave their home and can make a purchase with the click of a button.

9. Email is the ultimate “word of mouth” marketing vehicle. If your email message is “viral” in nature, your customer can quickly and easily forward it to friends and family, spreading your message to new potential customers.

10. Email helps you build a relationship of trust with your customers.
Email solves one of the greatest challenges in marketing: building a relationship with customers. Email allows you to keep in touch with customers, get their feedback, offer support, etc.

If you think that email marketing can help your business in these tough times why not get in touch with BulletMail and see if they can help you with an email marketing strategy that will work.