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Showing posts from 2010

Designing your eCommerce Website with Zen Cart

From the point of view of technology, the Internet had indeed gone through a tremendous change. What with eCommerce businesses exploding all throughout cyberspace, new online stores are opening up by the minute. And this is why Zen Cart is the best software for your web design and development needs, especially if you’re looking for a powerful eCommerce solution that has thousands of features to it. Available under the General Public License, the Zen Cart is extremely easy to install and comes at no additional cost. Now you can execute your projects in no time at all and your clients can access features like Product Management instantly. Zen Cart is the perfect platform because it has many features such as: inventory, product categories, invoice, order management, packing list generation, etc. Many web designers and developers recommend using this software and there are plenty of dedicated communities that are available online as well. What’s more, the software has the capacity to suppo

Things to Keep in Mind While Selecting a Shopping Cart Software

You need to be very careful while deciding your choice of shopping cart solution for your ecommerce web site. Here are a few important points you should keep in mind while selecting the perfect online shopping cart system that matches your requirements: The first thing you need to consider is whether your shopping cart will be able to handle the delivery for your goods. An ideal shopping cart should be capable of delivering digital as well as hard goods. There are certain carts that limit your ability to change your pricing. This means you will not be able to dish out special discounts and attract customers. Of course, you will want a system that saves your time. Therefore, you would obviously want a shopping cart that will integrate information into your accounting software, instead of reentering information. Upsells are another thing that makes ecommerce web sites a success. Always go for a shopping cart system that can handle sophisticated upsells. It is always advisable to have a s

Tools to Maintain your Website Design

If you have an online business, then there are some tools that need to be used to maintain your website design. Here are a few tools: A Web Page Editor: If you have an HTML based website, then the most important tool or software you’ll need to maintain your site is the web page editor. If you don’t know anything about HTML, then this web editor would be a good option for you. Some options include Dreamweaver, iWeb and Expression Web. A Graphics Editor: A good graphics editor program will help you edit photo images and other graphic images and you can crop, change the size of the image, and alter the contrast or brightness and many more such functions. A good example is Photoshop. An E-mail Client: It is important to have an E-mail client for sending and receiving your official emails. Get an email client that will catch hold of spam from any email account and will spell check, filter your emails and store your addresses. Some examples are Outlook, Apple Mail and Entourage which are des

Ecommerce Website Usability

Do you know that apart from the products you sell on your site, your customers are more focused on the usability of your site? Yes, this is true. A major chunk of website visitors will eventually leave your site if they find the usability not up to the mark. Include clear navigation and links to improve customers’ experience on your ecommerce website. Most customers tend to stress more on the fundamentals which facilitate purchasing. According to one study, clear-cut pricing and shipping details topped the most important feature list followed by site’s look, credibility and trustworthiness. They also tend to look for more advanced features like links to social media and the customer service. Most online retailers concentrate more on conversion rates, shopping cart abandonment and failed transactions rather than focusing on keeping the site simple and user friendly for their users. A site’s functionality can have a big impact on your conversion rate. If visitors find your site difficult

Custom eCommerce Web Design can Boost Business

An eye grabbing ecommerce web design is a necessity today. A custom ecommerce website design will not only help to direct traffic to a site but also improve web presence and business profit dramatically. A custom web design is a powerful tool, which can add more professionalism to a plain looking website. It has the advantage to twist the website to meet your requirements. Custom ecommerce web design refers to enhancing the graphic and technical aspects of the website to make it more attractive as well as user friendly. In most cases, the concentration is more on the look, feel, logo, color, texts, images and presentations on the web pages so that the end result is eye-catching, informative and professional. An ecommerce website solely concentrates on promoting and marketing a product/products and vigorous sales. The website designed should largely be filled with target audience content, informative photos with full description, promotional logos and the page should load faster for use

Important ways to make your eCommerce web site SEO friendly

eCommerce web site development should be done in such a way that it is optimized for all the major search engines. This can be achieved by practicing Search Engine Optimization techniques. If you make your web site SEO friendly, you will undoubtedly rank higher for relevant and common keywords put in by users when they are searching for your site. Only, this has to be done in a proper manner. A look into the following points will give you a full idea on how to go about developing your eCommerce web site: Use of correct keywords: Always remember to make use of keywords that are relevant and appropriate for your site. Inappropriate keywords will lead visitors away from your site. And make sure to not use them a lot. It will lead to keyword stuffing. The content of your web site should be of good quality. Information which is relevant to your web site will help attract visitors. Also, search engines love information in bulk. Unique meta tags for each page: The meta tags for any web site i

Must Have Features of eCommerce Sites

Every online merchant realizes the importance of having a professional looking website. To make your ecommerce site successful at selling and managing the products efficiently for a long term, you need to add some vital features. A professional look and compelling design is necessary to boost your business but without great features, your site simply cannot survive. Again the ecommerce realm is the most competitive place and you need to identify the best solutions for your site. There are a handful of ecommerce features which are critical and these feature sets are a must have for every ecommerce site. The following are some of the features that can best serve your online store: Strong Catalog Management: You must identify a solution that will help to start your online store quickly by providing a bulk catalog import/export. This feature will support your business in the long run. The solution should provide a product cloning so that automatic resizing of product images, catalog additi

Importance of a Web Design Layout

When planning the initial design of your website, it is very important to consider your web design layout. So, you have your business plan in place and you have identified the best marketing niche for your business. Your marketing strategies are raring to go. Your hosting service and domain name are all in place. The only thing missing is a web design layout. And although it seems like a good move to hire the services of a good web design company, it is very important to first put in a little effort before you go ahead and hire a professional. The simple fact is that nobody else knows the workings of your business like you do. You are the only one who knows what appearance your site should have. And although a good designer can bring forth the visual elements, only you will know what really appeals to your niche audience. What's more, you may also know all the marketing tricks that can help you rank high in the search engines. These factors are not what your designer would give to

Everything you should know about designing an effective web page

Nowadays, almost every company has its own website. This website is designed in such a way that it allows more and more people to know about the products and services that are being sold or endorsed by the company. The aim to be kept in mind while designing a website for your company should be that the visitors who visit your page must, in the log run, become clients. Many companies do not have either the time or the skill to design such an effective website. Also, once the website is designed, the design maintenance becomes another task. This is where Ecommerce website designers come into the picture. Their services are not only to design an attractive website for your company but also to make sure it is done in such a way that first-time visitors return time and again to know about the products and services your company is selling or endorsing. The design and maintenance is entirely taken care of by them. There are several processes that are incorporated in to designing an engaging w

Designing Rules set by Skilled Ecommerce Website Designers

Online business ventures can succeed in this competitive web arena, only if they meet the needs and desires of their potential consumers. Present below is a list of designing rules that have been set up by some of the best eCommerce website designers: 1.Simple and organized: An unorganized and messy web design creates a sense of confusion in the minds of the customers. Internet users tend to turn to other sites, which provide easy access. A website design should be simple so that users can easily browse through the site. 2.Easy navigation: It is extremely vital that e-commerce web designs are inculcated with those features that provide potential users with the flexibility to easily navigate through web pages. 3.Ordering process: This final process should never be too difficult to decipher. The customer should not face any obstacle in the last step of the transaction process. Every e-commerce site must exude flexibility and ease with regards to any transaction. 4.Win the trust of the co

Shopping Cart – How Important is it for your Online store

A shopping cart is very important for a traditional store, for it allows customers to carry the products, which they wish to buy. However, in an online store, the shopping cart resembles that area of the store where every price, catalog or product is displayed. The customer just has to click on the desired product and it will instantly be placed in an invisible cart. Some carts even display the total number of products picked as well as the total price, which includes all tax and shipping charges. If your e-commerce site sells a great variety of products then, the shopping cart program is a must. But, if you are selling just a few products, then you need not install this program. Instead, you could finalize your transactions via email. The next critical step deals with choosing the perfect shopping cart software that best suits the requirements of your online store. You can ask yourself a series of questions. For instance, what kind of features am I looking out for? What are my priorit

Facts about Website Redesign

If you have a business website, and have been trying without hope to optimize your site, then your probably only thinking about keyword research, forum participation and building a link list. Most people do not really focus on the actual website itself. In reality, your website design or redesign is the most important part of SEO. It isn't that your site should just be visually appealing to site visitors. It should be appealing to the search engines as well. Designing a website or redesigning a site that attracts visitors will help improve your rankings as well as make it easier for you to get conversions. Which is ultimately your end goal. It is important to note that there are many tools and techniques that we sometimes use when designing sites that are generally ignored by the spiders. Using graphics with embedded text and Flash may look great to us, but the search engines don't recognize them. Due to this, it is very important to redesign your site so as to include a lot of

Choosing an Ecommerce shopping cart

Ecommerce shopping carts are a kind of software that provides people with a platform, as well as helps and assists them with regards to making purchases online. This software helps people accumulate a list of products that they want to purchase and upon checking out, it calculates the total sum of the order. This price includes the shipping, delivery charges as well as any associated taxes. There are a wide array of shopping carts available. This can leave one feeling completely overwhelmed. Your friend may suggest PayPal's cart, while a professional web design agency may suggest Magento. Thus while choosing a shopping cart one needs to keep in mind their business needs of today as well as tomorrow. There are several Ecommerce shopping carts. The key here is not to find the best shopping cart out there, but to find the one that fits you and your needs the best. Some of the Ecommerce shopping carts out there are: Magento: Most importantly, it is free and has an impressive array of f

How to Design an Search Engine Friendly E commerce Website

All it takes is a a powerful combination of a few effective factors that a web owner should implement while constructing his website, in order to make his website a search engine friendly one. The web world in general is very unpredictable. Many a times, you will see that in spite of fulfilling all the factors, your site is still not receiving the right kind of web traffic. So, it is always better to understand how search engines work, in order to know where you have missed out. In this day and age where Web 2.0 has become the norm, there are many factors to take into consideration while building a search engine friendly ecommerce website. You might take the assistance of an ecommerce website designer as only an experienced designer can craft your website from an experts point of view. Website design service does not only give a look to your website, but it includes all other integral parts without which it is not possible to make an effective website. Highly experienced and talented

Ecommerce Friendly Website Design

If in near future you are planning to sell goods or services online, for that you will need an ecommerce website. The success of you ecommerce website depends on getting the three factors right – design, search engine optimization and usability. Design is important as it has the capability to influence the impression your visitor gets of you and your business. Your website should be professional and attractive. This assures to the first time visitor that you are the right company to do business with. In addition, your website should reflect your brand and mission statement. Next is the matter of usability. This will determine how easily your visitor can navigate your site. The first thing you have to consider is the mechanics of your business model. You will have to decide what you want your visitor to do and then give the user clear means to do it. One factor that promotes clear navigation is to make sure all links are well labeled. And your visitor should always know his location a

Ecommerce Website Design(Brief Idea, Importance)

If you are going to start with an ecommerce website, then you must think how important website design for paving the way for your success and benefit. Website design is a significant part that helps the website getting search engine ranking. Search engines consider a good and appealing ecommerce website that can be easily navigated as qualified to be in its first or second page as website design shows the potential portfolio of the company online. You must have some ideas about the website design that can have easy access to search engine's before you go for getting designed your website. As an online business person, you need your website well designed, attractive, easy to navigate, highly usable, having good content, full of relevant information, and enough functionality. All these qualities will retain visitors for long and make them come back again and again. You should know that there are two types of website design such as static and dynamic website design based on simple H