A collection of notes, ideas, and pictures
On April 30, 2021 I organized and moderated an online event for the students of the UC Berkeley Extension Digital Marketing Bootcamp where I teach. It was a pleasure to moderate a panel of three exceptional women and marketing experts: Tamara Osheroff, Osheroff Marketing and co-owner of The Magic Flute in San Rafael, CALyn Rundell, HERO Marketing... Continue Reading →
Intuition is a powerful tool to push us to explore new ideas, new ways to approach old problems. But intuition should only be the starting point, and never used as a way to justify our choices. eCommerce is based on technologies that provides us with incredible amount of data. We really should leverage the data to test our ideas and intuitions.
I've been invited to present, on Zoom, a webinar for the IULM University in Milan talking about "Silicon Valley, Marketing & Entrepreneurship". The webinar focus was on the Silicon Valley business culture and I provide a few simple guidelines on how to separate the Silicon Valley's mythology generated by the media buzz from solid business... Continue Reading →
Tip #147 – © Franco Folini When promoting a product or a service, always consider leveraging one of the oldest marketing tricks: Scarcity: there are only few products left. You better buy now! Urgency: this fantastic promotion is going to end very soon, don't wait any longer! Scarcity refers to any limitation placed on a... Continue Reading →
You can listen to the podcast and watch the video recording of our conversation. I recently had the pleasure and the honor to be featured by my friend Kenneth Kinney in Episode 263 of his popular marketing podcast "A Shark's Perspective". It was a great conversation with Kenneth about the subscription-model for the foodbiz and... Continue Reading →
WordPress new Gutenberg Editor, aka WordPress Block Editor, is becoming more popular every day. Gone are the day where learning HTML, or PHP, was the only way to achieve certain visual results. With Gutenberg our options are almost limitless. Skeptical user are complaining about Gutenberg inconsistency and bug. Yes, the new editor still has a... Continue Reading →
Add a FAQ section to all your product pages. Then optimize it for SEO with powerful keywords and add the JSON-LD snippets. Flawless FAQs can earn you a prominent position in a rich-results box on Google SERP! Tip #146 – © Franco Folini For this technique to work correctly, it's important that your FAQ page... Continue Reading →
Not all eCommerce website visitors are made equal. Some will convert, while others will never buy from you. Likely, you can't afford to push brand awareness outside your target market. Forget the number of visitors, focus on their quality. Tip #145 – © Franco Folini How do you monitor the quality of your website traffic?... Continue Reading →
A/B Testing is an essential tool for Digital Marketers. But don’t forget, it’s just a tool. The strategy remains on us. “With extreme A/B Testing, every website will converge to a porno website.” -- Seth Godin (via Kenneth Kinney podcast) Tip #144 – © Franco Folini Franco Folini lives and works in the eCommerce territory, a... Continue Reading →
For your Google Ads to be effective, those 3 things must be 100% aligned & consistent: Triggering keywordsAds title and copyLanding page A discrepancy among those will kill your CTR (Click Through Rate) or CVR (Conversion Rate). Tip #143 – © Franco Folini The additional advantage is that when an ad generates high CTR and... Continue Reading →
Consider using the float-labels UX pattern in your forms. Labels are displayed as placeholders. When the field get the focus, its label is reduced in size and moved above or to the field's top left corner.Your conversion rate will thank you! Tip #141 – © Franco Folini Shorter forms have a few advantages: the user... Continue Reading →
Including your product's SKU (Stock Keeping Unit), MPN (Manufacturer Part Number), and UPC (Universal Product Code) in all product pages is necessary for enhancing your PageRank for those codes.The organic visitors you will get, will be at the conversion stage of the funnel with a very high conversion rate! Tip #140 – © Franco Folini Not... Continue Reading →
Don't limit your customers to only one payment option! Let them use their favorite method. The minimum set includes credit/debit card, PayPal, wire transfer (plus terms for B2B). But don't overdo it. Too many options will make the checkout unnecessarily complicated. Tip #139 – © Franco Folini For every vertical market, country, and eCommerce merchant... Continue Reading →
Add Security Seals throughout your store. Make sure they are prominently visible in the shopping cart pages. If your brand is not yet fully established, the seals will increase the trust, in particular for new visitors. Tip #138 – © Franco Folini eCommerce retailers measured an average 3% increase in conversion rate for all traffic... Continue Reading →
Don't offer the same experience to all. Personalize the user experience for returning customers! You have the information to do it! When a returning customer lands on your home page, offer a highly personalized experience. Populate the page with the products he/she checked during the last visits and recommended products based on his/her profile. Tip... Continue Reading →
Many eCommerce customers still like to talk to a real human by phone, mostly in B2B but in B2C too. Get a toll free numberDisplay and highlight it on the header of every pageHave a competent person promptly answering every call (at least during business hours) Tip #136 – © Franco Folini When talking about... Continue Reading →
How to make your content more effective? Create proper subheadings.Use bullet points to organize your content and to attract attention.Improve readability with larger font sizes (recommended: 16px).Add visual content such as videos, diagrams, and real photographs.Generously space the content to make it more readable. Tip #135 – © Franco Folini Content is not only about... Continue Reading →
A Search Bar is a must for every eCommerce! Leverage data in your CMS to implement the search autocomplete. Show search results using a combination of text and images and consistently with your website style. Tip #134 – © Franco Folini Make sure the search bar is always prominently visible at the top right corner... Continue Reading →
Do you want more links, also called backlinks, driving traffic to your website and improving your page ranking? Make sure your content is unique, well-written, relevant, and easy to share and link! Tip #133 – © Franco Folini Once you have created high-quality unique content you can send email to the most relevant website and... Continue Reading →
After a conversion, only suggest companion products such as maintenance, extensions, and optional modules. Do not recommend alternative products. You are risking to irritate and confuse your customers. Tip #132 – © Franco Folini This issue is frequently underestimated by the people or teams in charge of product recommendations. There is nothing more irritating than... Continue Reading →
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