Buy For Less Online are an online retailer of toys based in the Midlands near Birmingham. Managing Director, Dan Aston, considers ChannelAdvisor to be one of his most reliable employees, stating the system easily does the work of three or four people. During peak times such as Christmas, Buy For Less Online process around 3,000 orders per day and state they would not be able to do this without ChannelAdvisor.

Buy For Less Online are an online retailer of toys based in the Midlands near Birmingham. Managing Director, Dan Aston, considers ChannelAdvisor to be one of his most reliable employees, stating the system easily does the work of three or four people. During peak times such as Christmas, Buy For Less Online process around 3,000 orders per day and state they would not be able to do this without ChannelAdvisor.

Createyourtemplate design the background, eBay shop/template and basic CA store.

March’s case study is already up!

But my main concern is HOW the whistle-blower got all of my clients (who happen to use said  software) email addresses?

Is this information widely available? Or is this a breach of data protection by an employee of said company? I know this company has made several redundancies recently and probably upset a few employees but still the contents of the email has rattled my clients. One is now thinking of moving away as the words ‘financially viable’ were suggested with respects to the companies future.

It is worrying times for small businesses that use eBay/e-commerce service companies. Personally I lost £50 due to a supplier (GotLingerie.com) going into administration before they could complete my order. In fact they KNEW they would not be able too and still took my money. Unless you pay by credit card you are kinda stuffed. Luckily you can recover from a small amount, but other companies have not been so lucky and it will cost THEIR business.

So with the recession getting worse who can you trust? *insert Morcheeba song here*.

A point about trust, a new review site keeps popping up:

Review:

Frooition : http://www.trustpilot.com/review/www.frooition.com
eBay: http://www.trustpilot.com/review/www.ebay.co.uk

or add other companies, couldn’t find anyone else.

Really should have bothered to find my affiliate links for that one.

Well my clients can trust that I won’t go bust in the recession, I am even having to turn my hand to eBay design due to failing companies.

Recession proof yourself:

- Host your own images/design and keep a local back up

- Back up inventory/sales/analytic’s and any data you have locally on a CD/Tape drive

- Check your suppliers and services providers and don’t let anything go on too long

- Don’t invest massively up front, pay through out the ‘project’ or when it is complete

- Have a plan B and C, possibly D if you have the time and inclination

So, for the UK the only two sections you need to worry about is:

Configuration> Shipping > Shipping Methods:

and you only need to use ‘set allowed countries’ for the UK. Northern Ireland comes under UK already and….

The shipping methods available to you for all inventory are:

• By Weight
• By  Total
• Individually (Not integrated with CA so it would mean editing each and every one)
• Fixed prices
• Free Shipping
• By Total and Percent

Zones are not available for UK users, but you can use in store pick up or live rates from companies such as Fedex and UPS. But lets face it we mostly use Royal Mail in the UK for all its faults.

One nice attribute on the shipping side is that when your customer has their item in checkout, there is a neat ‘Get Shipping Estimates’ button which allows your customer to find out how much the shipping will cost and the options available before carrying on through checkout.

Oh, and did you see what I did there? I set up a shipping method for International Signed for Europe and a separate one for Rest of World (ROW) to mimic zones.

You can of course do this for every zone you need and just call the method Royal Mail International Signed For (Zone 5) etc and set the allowed countries appropriately. Possibly just shorten it to whatever you need, but that is the only way I can see that UK users can use zoned shipping as we know it.

But remember to map it to your CA account in Stores > Premium Stores (Configuration)

So how could meta pack save me from being posted to the depot of lost items in the sky? By reducing the vast amount of paper waste generated by a normal royal mail/parcelforce relationship.

With metapack you get funky all purpose labels, one per parcel and you ship by service rather than by carrier. The only waste you get is your label roll backing and the sticky protector strips on your mailing bags.

The fact that they automate all of your shipping carriers, simplify your CA account shipping set up, send tracking information to you and your customer with AWOL updates and possibly reduce the amount of humans needed is by the by.

For £100 set up fee and 4% of your carriage fees you can save the planet.

For those people who really want to know more details there website is : http://www.metapack.com/

In come InterCultural Elements:

Cultural subtleties and the technical nature of products and services demand cultural expertise and industry know-how to communicate accurately. You need quality translation from experts who combine:

* cultural expertise
* industry know-how
* knowledge of online selling

to ensure your online presence is both appealing and technically accurate.

No only will they work to translate your inventory, but advise on how you actually expand into different countries with an understanding of the differences in culture and infrastructure.

These guys also work with ChannelAdvisor, and will take your English language account, and translate it in the your desired language and set it up for you.

This is going to work very well with the Createyourtemplate multi-lingual eBay shop capabilities, as we don’t translate but provide the technology!

Channeladvisor has their own retailers superhero….uTube Marketing here they come…

Moving a service or product on line enables interactivity and customisation to engage your customers, as we know very well the impact of social media on today’s adult population, with the myspace and facebook generation.

Affiliation should not be shunned by an e-business. An organisation with rich links to other compatible companies or organisations will be able to gain a larger reach and influence.

Encouraging your customers to use on line services will reduce costs while providing a new, convenient channel for purchase and customer service. On line your customers are only a mouse click away from your competitors so you need to make sure you build last relationships with your customers. This statement can be a generalisation in some cases as customers or suppliers will generally lock themselves in after learning to use a system or website as the switching costs can be high.

Take the Marketworks and ChannelAdvisor example. Both are on line auction and e-commerce management systems. Marketworks has the poorer product, which was less reliable but high end retailers were locked in because of the cost of switching from one system to another.

This is now however not a problem for Marketworks Customers wishing to switch!

There are some limitations to your e-business and problems will arise. For example in customer service, emails need to go directly to the person concerned within your business and not just ignored. This can damage a companies reputation as your customers will share their experiences on-line in forums and message boards.

Your services are limited by bandwidth, the amount of information that can be presented to the customer at any one time. A website can become unreliable at peak traffic times, and after certain events such as the Olympics and the World Cup if you products are relevant. Your information has to be accurate and reliable, constantly updated to meet the customer needs and changes within the marketplace. No e-business can rest on its laurels.

Security and protection of customer data is an on going problem which you will have to keep on top of.

My sources tell me that Paypal Pro UK has a problem with UK addresses, with respect to integration.

Get your finger out Paypal!

The channeladvisor store is by far the weakest point in channeladvisor as a ‘one solution e-commerce’ system and you have limited obvious SEO control.

(For all of this I am going to assume you are already logged into channel management)

Header Information:

HTML Titles: These are important and within channeladvisor you can specify the main page title in stores>store name and logo.

Meta Keywords: Pick 10 keywords to focus on that cover you main products. For example Rubbergirls-Blue-Boutique sells lingerie and shoes so the main keywords focused on are:
Leg Avenue, Dreamgirl, Vollers, Axfords, Sensual Mystique, Pleaser, Demonia, Hustler, Vacari, Bridal Lingerie, Wedding Lingerie, Nuptial Lingerie, Sexy Costumes, Fetish Lingerie, Corset

Place these keywords in your categories also as you have the opportunity to add in keywords for each category ( store>manage categories – click on the category name)

Meta Description: Its not just HTML titles and keywords a search engine picks up on it is also the meta description. Make sure you add a main page description in store name and logo AND a description for you categories.

This is the main listing in Google for the above website:

RubberGirls Blue Boutique | Bridal Corsetry | Hen Night Fancy …

Rubbergirls Blue Boutique Provides excellent pricing for gothic, alternative and exotic clothing and footwear. Our brands include Leg Avenue, …
www.rubbergirls-blue-boutique.co.uk/ – 61k

Header Image: Make sure you use the alt functionality for your header image too

Item Details :

Rockabilly Demonia EMO Shoes Polkadot Goth: DAI20/BW RubberGirls …

Black With white polka dot flat shoe!- Available in Sizes UK 4-10 Shipping for these shoes is £3.50/£6.00 as they are a light item!
www.rubbergirls-blue-boutique.co.uk/Items/Item.aspx?sck=23968174&SKU=DAI20/BW -

Within channeladvisor you store title precedes the HTML title and becomes searchable on google. You can make sure you repeat a main keyword in your item titles, in fact you could possible squeeze more keywords in there! this title formation look familiar? Its the same title format as you would use in ebay. Tanked full of keyword goodness.

Keyword Links:

Google along with many other search engines like keyword links like Cybergoth Hair Extensions. Make sure you name your categories and sub categories appropriately with a good keyword and go to store>manage store layouts>home page layout and make sure you choose the option to display all your sub categories on the main page. Instant keyword links. ( P.S Make sure you have added an image to each or your categories or it could look a little dull)

Shopping Comparison:

To get ahead with google use google services! Google base is a free classifieds and syndicated everyday from automatically from channeladvisor (Console> Shopping comparison)

Other shopping comparison feeds can be used but they are pay per click

Track your results:

See what is going on with google analytics, sign up for an account and make sure you enter the information in store>store tracking. If you know what’s going on you can improve your SEO campaign

Every piece of software is what you make it and channeladvisor is no different.

P.S Rubbergirls Blue Boutique is MY store and also designed by me, if you want to know how I changed the layout then email me at liz@kidsontalks.com and if I have the time I will tell you.