Chapter 10
E-Commerce and the Entrepreneur
Q) Factors Essential to E-Commerce Success
• Obtaining customers
• Optimizing changes
• Maximizing Web site performance
• Ensuring a positive user experience
Q) What are the Eleven Myths of E-Commerce
1. If I launch a site, customers will flock to it.
2. Online customers are easy to please.
3. Launching an e-commerce site is free – or at least really inexpensive.
4. Making money on the Web is easy.
5. Privacy is not an important issue.
6. I don’t need a strategy to sell online.
7. The most important part of an e-commerce effort is technology.
8. Customer service is not important.
9. Flashy Web sites are better than simple ones.
10. It’s what’s up front that counts.
11. My business doesn’t need a Web site
Q) How to Improve Web Site Conversion Rate
Increase the speed at which your Web site downloads
Be accessible to customers
Build simple navigation into your site’s design
Let customers see the products you are selling
Include product reviews
Q) What’s Virtual order fulfillment?
Also known as Drop shipping, is a fulfillment strategy in which a company forwards customers’
orders to a wholesaler or distributor who then ships the product to the customer with the online
merchant’s label on it.
Q) What are the Strategies for E-Success?
Build a community.
Listen to your customers and act on what you hear.
Attract visitors by giving away
Make creative use of e-mail, but avoid becoming a “spammer.”
Promote your Web site online and offline
Use social media tools to attract and retain customers
Q) How to Build Web Site Credibility?
Show that there are real people behind your site
Show that honest, trustworthy people stand behind your site.
Make it easy for customers to contact you.
Make sure your site has a professional look
Make sure your site is easy to use
Q) How to Design a Killer Web Site
Understand your target customer.
Give customers what they want
Use online videos.
Create a gift idea center.
Provide customer ratings and reviews
Build loyalty by giving online customers a reason to return to your Web site
Use the power of social media
Follow a simple design
Minimize the number of clicks to get to pages
Include a FAQ section
Confirm transactions.
Keep your site updated
Consider hiring a professional to design your site
Q) What’s Web analytics?
Tools that measure a Web site’s ability to attract customers, generate sales, and keep customers
coming back.
Q) How to Measure Online Performance?
• Cost per Acquisition (CPA): - The amount it costs to generate a purchase.
• Bounce Rate: - The percentage of visitors to a site who view a single page and leave without
viewing other pages.
• Retention Rate: - Measures the percentage of customers a company holds over a period of time
• Lift Rate: - The percentage change in a company’s retention rate from one-time period to the
next.
• Conversion (browse-to-buy) ratio: - The proportion of visitors to a site who actually make a
purchase.
• Cart Abandonment Rate (CTR): - The percentage of shoppers who place at least one item in a
shopping cart but never complete the transaction.
• Customer Lifetime Value: - The total sales that a customer accounts for throughout his or her
entire relationship with a business.
• Latency: - The time between customers’ purchases.
• Search engine ranking: - Shows where a company’s Web site ranks in search engines’ results
pages.
Q) How to Ensure Web Security?
Use of firewall
Use of Virus detection software
Use of intrusion detection software