A collection of notes, ideas, and pictures
Add a Canonical Url Tag to every page! <link rel='canonical' href='...' /> It’s the single most crucial tag to help Google Crawler to understand your website and to improve your SEO. Tip #131 – © Franco Folini The canonical tag will tell Google crawler that a set of pages that differ only for their Url... Continue Reading →
Make sure all crucial content is served as plain HTML and not generated by Javascript script. 80% of eCommerce sites make this mistake. Google Crawler is is getting better at capturing dynamically generated content, but still prefer plain HTML. Tip #130 – © Franco Folini If your eCommerce website or SPA (Single Page Application) is... Continue Reading →
Almost all the user feedback we get, it's from users who purchased from us. It’s crucial for customer retention but worthless for customer acquisition. Usually, we don't receive feedback from users who never visited us or left without buying. Tip #129 – © Franco Folini Don't get me wrong, customer feedback is very important and... Continue Reading →
Do you want to please your ego, or do you want to sell more? Intuition can be a good starting point to explore new options, but you must A/B testing everything. Don't trust your gut feelings, only trust data. Tip #128 – © Franco Folini When it comes to business, there is not right opinion... Continue Reading →
You know your visitors and customers love videos (and Google too), but you are concerned videos will slow down your product page?Display a video’s snapshot and use Javascript to embed the video on-demand, when the user clicks on it. Light pages, great UX , improved SEO. Tip #126 – © Franco Folini Any Javascript programmer... Continue Reading →
Stop being afraid of structured data (JSON-LD). Structured Data is a simple snippet of JavaScript describing the content of your page. It’s easy to write and even simpler to validate (just google it!). Great SEO results guaranteed! Tip #125 – © Franco Folini Structured Data for eCommerce not only makes Google crawler life easier (and... Continue Reading →
On each product page, highlight the best and most recent reviews as social proof for your visitors. Don't highlight negative reviews, but keep them. They are proof that your review system is fair and honest. Tip #124 – © Franco Folini People love to read reviews, and they trust reviews! Make them happy by listing... Continue Reading →
Don’t compete on price! Eventually, your competitors will match your lowest price. It’s a lose-lose battle. Compete on quality of service, brand image, visibility, and user experience. Tip #123 – © Franco Folini Nobody likes price wars, don't start one! Unless you are moving huge volumes and have access a exceptional prices on a consistent... Continue Reading →
This article was first posted on LinkedIn on November 20, 2019. Recently I was asked to explain the rules to make a company marketing email newsletter worth reading, a newsletter that gets read. It's an excellent question. Publishing a newsletter gives you the opportunity to increase awareness and understanding of your company and its products... Continue Reading →
Relationships outlast transactions. Invest in building strong relationships with your customers, transactions will follow. Don’t let shortsighted salespeople focus only on transactions. There’s life after the end of the quarter! Tip #122 – © Franco Folini Marketers call it Loyalty and Advocacy. I prefer to call it simply relationship.Happy customers will return to your website... Continue Reading →
Send regular newsletters to your customers. Include useful information: new products, promotions (with expiration), product tips, and company news (when appropriate).Always test to make sure the newsletter is rendered correctly on all email systems (including old Outlook versions).If you have the resources and the data, you should consider segmenting your users and send multiple versions... Continue Reading →
If your business is on social media, you must be available to answer all questions and respond to comments quickly! Do the same for emails and site comments. It's the easiest way to start and nurture a relationship with your customers. Tip #119 – © Franco Folini There is nothing more irritating than sending an... Continue Reading →
Don’t hope or wait for a product review, ask for it! A few days after an order has been delivered or a trial downloaded, send your customer a personalized (automated) message asking to write a review. Tip #118 – © Franco Folini People are busy, they forget to go back to your website and leave... Continue Reading →
This article was first posted on LinkedIn on November 4, 2019. Several activities related to eCommerce and Digital Marketing can benefit from Machine Learning (ML) as well from other branches of Artificial Intelligence (AI). The integration of machine learning algorithms and eCommerce can help with all the main marketing goals: retention, engagement, and conversion. Adoption of Machine... Continue Reading →
Do you know if your eCommerce is ready for the Machine Learning era?You need to be ready to transition your eCommerce to machine Learning technologies. The big eCommerce guys, like Amazon and Walmart, are already extensively using Machine Learning (ML) to process customer data to control their marketing efforts and to personalize the interaction with... Continue Reading →
It doesn't matter if you have a plan to integrate your eCommerce with Machine Learning or not. Pretty soon, you will! Start preparing by collecting more data about your users' behavior. The more data you have, the more effective your Machine Learning will be. Tip #110 – © Franco Folini Make sure your data is... Continue Reading →
Product descriptions should be information-rich, updated, and only about the products. Customers who are taking the time to read your product descriptions are looking for information, not for generic marketing statements and buzzwords. Tip #109 – © Franco Folini There was a time when everybody believed that buzzwords were the most effective way to positively... Continue Reading →
This article was first posted on LinkedIn on October 4, 2019. In order to be in control of your eCommerce, you need to know if you are making progress toward your goals, if there is an area of marketing activities or a website performance that should concern you, and how your campaigns are performing compared to the... Continue Reading →
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