Article posted on the Official BAIA blog on February, 2007.
Massimo Arrigoni is the co-founder and CEO of Early Impact, the company making ProductCart, a popular shopping cart program for e-commerce. Massimo is a friend of BAIA and I invited him to participate in the following interview:
How did you ended up in California founding an e-commerce company?
I fell in love. Not with e-commerce, but with a gorgeous California girl. We have been married for almost 10 years and have 3 kids. When we met I was at UCLA doing research on e-commerce. Early Impact came later, but electronic commerce is something that I’ve been involved with for over a decade.
Which aspect of a shopping cart is more important: the interaction with the end-user or the services for the merchant?
What we sell is a feature set: businesses buy ProductCart because it has this or that feature that is particularly important to them. But what makes ProductCart a successful shopping cart system is ultimately the fact that online shoppers like stores that are powered by our software. So I guess the answer is: they’re both extremely important.
Can you tell us why a company should invest resources selecting a shopping-cart? Aren’t all similar?
It’s the foundation of your e-commerce business. It’s crucial to spend time understanding what best fits your needs, even if it takes a lot of time. And you’re absolutely right. There is an overload of shopping carts today. That’s simply because putting together a cheap, basic shopping cart is not hard. But once you dig a little deeper, the differences are huge. Do most shopping carts allow you to get a report of customers that have not yet purchased product XYZ and email them an electronic coupon for free UPS Ground shipping if they buy it within 2 weeks? No way. Only a handful are at that level.
Is Google checkout affecting more your business or your customers?
Google Checkout actually generates business for us. ProductCart is integrated with it, so now merchants buy our software for that reason. Google aggressively went after companies like Early Impact to quickly make Google Checkout available on as many stores as possible. By the way, I just posted something on my blog a few days ago exactly on this topic. It might be worth a look.
What is your connection with BAIA? Do you think that Early Impact could benefit from that connection?
I’ve been to many BAIA meetings and recently became a member. I’ve met a lot of interesting, talented people. Early Impact has already benefited from some of the connections. We found a new master reseller for Italy, for example. The company is called NWEB, and I met one of the owners, Nazzareno Gorni, at a BAIA event last summer. Nazzareno and his team are going to help us aggressively sell our e-commerce software in Italy, which could be a big growth market for us in the future.
I would like to thank Massimo Arrigoni for taking the time to speak with me today. If anybody has a question for Massimo or for BAIA, just leave a comment below, and we will be glad to answer.
Franco Folini 