Atlantic Business Technologies, Inc.

Author: Jon Jordan

  • Ten Critical Elements of a Successful Retail eCommerce Site

    It’s no secret that eCommerce is both extremely successful and extremely competitive. How does a site gain market share, loyal customers and revenue? It may seem mystical — lots of smart people have created good sites and not been successful.

    The example I will use to illustrate the 10 critical elements is www.extremeterrain.com. I happen to also be an off-road enthusiast and this site caught my attention by how well it is put together. Our company didn’t build the site and we aren’t affiliated with it at all. It is impressive work, however.

    This post doesn’t deal with anything related to marketing or actual fulfillment or customer service. Let’s assume that you won’t be successful if nobody comes to your site or you deliver really lousy service. Agree?

    As you read through this list you notice a consistent theme. Trust. People very rarely do business with anyone they don’t trust. Most of the keys to successful eCommerce are related to establishing trust with the consumer. Trust in the company and trust in the product.

    1. Precise, Targeted, Unique Emails on a Regular Schedule

    Successful e-commerce sites use e-mail. A lot. So what’s different? Lots of people use spammy communications to try and drum up business for everything from drugs to Groupon specials.

    Successful e-commerce mailing appears in your inbox as something very interesting and targeted specifically for you. Looking at the email below you will notice how many times they use the information they gathered about me to precisely target the email. “2009 Wrangler” is used in the subject, the header, and the sub-heading above the targeted product listing. Exciting Wrangler imaging is, of course, also used as the primary e-mail image.

    Picture12. Big, Detailed, Consistent Pictures

    One of the things that makes customers hesitate to buy, even if they think they want the product, is a lack of confidence about the quality or whether it’s really exactly what they want. Having big, detailed, consistent pictures closes the gap from an in-store experience significantly and increases the buyer’s confidence that it’s what they are looking for. Where all the other sites simply have decent picture of the product. Extreme Terrain goes way above. They actually install the products on a Jeep and show how they look. In addition they allow their customers to post photos of their rigs with the products installed. It’s a home run. Who doesn’t want this parked in the garage?

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    3. Clear Descriptions

    Just like having big pictures, clear descriptions help buyer to understand what they are really getting. This lessens their concern they are going to get something they don’t want. It doesn’t matter whether they can ship it back or not, most people don’t want to hassle with the process.

    ExtremeTerrain provides 4 different tabs with detailed information about the product so the customer knows exactly what to expect.

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    4. Targeted Focus

    Ok, let’s face the facts. This post isn’t about creating Amazon.com. Unless you have a spare billion and think you’re smarter than they are, you should probably choose a niche and stick to it. Once you choose that niche make sure it’s big enough that you can focus precisely on it without expanding in order to grow your revenue. Once you lose focus, you’re out in the tall grass without a GPS.

    Extreme Terrain isn’t just about 4×4 parts in general. It is specifically about Jeep Wranglers. They probably have a mission statement somewhere about being the most complete and most trusted online resource for Jeep Wranglers anywhere.  Small enough to get their arms around, but big enough to do one heck of a lot of business.

    5. Real Reviews

    Consumers can spot a fake review a thousand miles away. Fake reviews detract from trust and detract from conversions. Data actually shows that bad reviews boost sales. Read about it here (http://hbr.org/2012/03/bad-reviews-can-boost-sales-heres-why).

    The point is that reviews increase confidence and increase trust and that increases sales. Seeing a pattern here?

    Look how well Extreme Terrain does at displaying reviews. They are also in the main part of the page, near the add to cart and pricing. There are stars all over the page. Of course in order to display reviews you also have to be good at capturing reviews and enticing customers to leave them.

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    6. Clean Design, Organized Navigation

    Don’t make your customers work to find what they are looking for. Good user experience is a must. You can get away with a few mistakes but once a user feels like it’s a struggle to get around then they associate the difficulty of the shopping experience with frustration and other negative thoughts and as you can probably imagine this doesn’t lead to happy customers.

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    7. Good Search

    What makes a good search? First it should be prominent and easy to find. Second, the search should be contextual so search terms are suggested as you type. Third, the search catalog should contain all of the site’s pages; products, blogs, and static/informational. Finally, when the search results contain products the site should display images, descriptions, price, and reviews. It isn’t essential but having the ability to refine and sort the results further by price, category, manufacturer, rating, etc. is a nice feature.

    Search has less to do with trust than some of the other items and more to do with common sense. If your customers can’t find what they are looking for then they can’t buy it. Duh. In addition, many merchants fail to capture internal search data so they can see what customers are looking for and perhaps not finding. It helps guide product selection, trends, and even promotions. Google Analytics makes it really easy to wire up so there’s no excuse.

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    8. Subject Matter Experts / Accessible Customer Service

    Going back to trust again. Trust in the product and trust in the company. The more you can help customers to feel confident in what they are purchasing the more they will purchase. Sometimes the mere appearance of accessibility to customer service and focused expertise is enough.

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    9. Affordable Shipping / Simple Return Policy

    People don’t like to pay for shipping because it feels like “tax.” To some extent they don’t mind paying for expedited shipping to get it faster because that’s a choice. I’m no saying shipping should be free, but whenever you can offer free shipping options that’s a huge bonus. Many sites have a minimum order value where shipping becomes free. This has a huge effect on improving the average order size.

    The return policy goes back to trust again. The buyer’s threshold for confidence must be much higher if “all sales are final.” Conversely if you offer a simple, easy return policy customers will consider slightly more risk. Additionally more trust is created if you appear willing and eager to help customers if they are less than satisfied with their purchases. Mostly common sense.

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    10. Mobile Experience

    This simply comes down to data. Lots and lots of customers do their shopping and browsing from mobile devices and tablets. These numbers continue to grow, although slower than they have in the past. It is near suicidal to provide a poor mobile experience to your customers.

    Conclusion

    As you can see, a lot goes into a solid, high-performing eCommerce website. And while it can look overwhelming, the end result is an eCommerce engine that will drive your business in ways you might never have imagined before. Ready to go further with eCommerce? Learn more about how we can help with your eCommerce needs and contact us to talk with an eCommerce expert ready to help you take your business to the next level!

  • Boldly Go: What it Means to be an Entrepreneur and a Leader

    The core values of  The Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO) are Boldly Go (bet on your own abilities), Thirst for Learning (be a student of opportunity), Make a Mark (leave a legacy), Trust and Respect (build a safe haven for learning and growth), and Cool (create, seek out and celebrate once-in-a-lifetime experiences). 

    Being thirsty for knowledge really resonates with me. From the day I started Atlantic BT to now, I didn’t want to be someone who waited to be told how to do something. The first time I went to an EO meeting, the other members were hungry for knowledge, eager to write down when a seminar was happening or what books they should read. Finding really successful people like these who shared this thirst opened a whole new chapter for me. I always try to share that knowledge and spirit here at ABT and inspire our management team to create that thirst for knowledge in our organization.

    I really believe high-achieving humans distinguish themselves from having a thirst for knowledge and desire to put different ideas together. That drives human innovation. Our ability to access knowledge has never been better than it is right now.  I love being able to share experiences with people from different situations. When we share what we’re dealing with in the group, we can all learn from it. In our EO forum, we’re very open to this kind of direct feedback.

    Inspiration

    What I enjoy the most is building things and making them better. There is a special sense of accomplishment when you create something that leaves a lasting impression. With Comfort Monster, being able to purchase a company and help it grow really meant a lot to me. You can look at something, have a vision for it, and keep pushing it toward something exceptional. At CM we have a long way to go, but we can continue to build momentum. This creates an engine that can run whether or not you’re applying that pressure.

    The Comfort Monster team

    At ABT I love having such a great team. We have a culture, an engine that runs well whether I’m in the office or not. I will apply some steering, but it would thrive whether or not I was here to provide direct input. Being able to see that momentum in action every day is definitely inspiring.

    How to Face Challenges

    Prioritization is your friend. It’s your job to break down larger goals into bite-sized pieces and make sure all of your resources are being used as effectively as possible. On any given day, you have hundreds of priorities. When you make the right decisions, your business does well. When you make the wrong decisions, you are slowing down your path to success.

    Sometimes these priorities are clear. They jump out at you and you know what to do next. Sometimes you’re faced with lots of choices that all seem to be right (or wrong) with no clear frontrunner. These situations can be difficult. But at the end of the day, you have to make a decision and move forward. Not making a decision is often worse than making the wrong decision. In most cases you can go back and correct mistakes when you have more data.

    The other challenge is that you can’t really have an “off” day. The people around you are depending on your energy and vision. An off day for you is amplified through the organization to your team. My theory is that you, the CEO, should have more energy than anyone else. If you make a mistake at this level, that’s a huge deal. This is why managing a small company effectively is HARDER than a large company because the smaller company really depends on your energy and leadership to keep momentum up. If you’ve got a big team, having a couple people be off course isn’t as big a deal—the engine will keep moving forward even if it could be more efficient.

    Social Responsibility and Business Leadership

    It’s now common to see companies come out and take a stand on social or political issues. This is a challenge because you’re tempted to use your company as a platform to influence others. This is why companies do this: you’ve got a captive base of people with a leadership chain in place and your influence is going to be magnified by that. Your customers are impacted in turn. This gets complicated because not everyone is going to agree with you.

    The Atlantic BT team

    I don’t want anyone to feel uncomfortable. I can have personal opinions and create a platform off the clock, but once I bring that into the workplace it’s almost guaranteed to make at least one person feel uncomfortable. If you lose even one person because of your political stance, that’s one person too many. But, if you look at it from a performance perspective, having uniformity within your culture will lead your company to under-perform. No one has any diverse opinions and then there is no room to grow, learn, or connect. Too political, and you’ll alienate people with different opinions. I want people who work with me to feel comfortable standing by their values. 

    Values in Action

    I totally get why companies use their business as a platform. When the NC General Assembly passed HB2, I felt it was important for me to speak out against this law and any efforts to discriminate against citizens based on their sexual orientation or identity. I sent a company-wide email at ABT reaffirming that as a company, our job is to create a welcoming and inclusive environment. I told all of our employees that anyone of any faith, race, nationality, or sexual orientation was welcome at ABT, and that we’d make any necessary accommodation to help our employees succeed and help ABT succeed as a company. This stand of inclusiveness felt deeply important to me, so I made my opinions public to my company.

    That said, I’ve always believed intimate impact is more important than sheer numbers. I’ve always been more of a quiet change kind of guy. My number one priority is creating a company culture where everyone enjoys working here. When I was young, I had several hourly jobs and I always felt like those days lasted an eternity. When I started ABT, one of the promises I made to myself is that we would create a culture where people enjoyed being at work so much they wouldn’t ever want to leave. It’s the responsibility of the company to create an environment that people feel is engaging, challenging, and meaningful. After all, think about how much of your waking life you spend at work!

    How to Lead and Leave a Legacy

    The most important thing to remember is that success is not going to happen over night. Keep going! Entrepreneurship is a journey. I remember one particular instance in my career. My first company was very young, we had 3–4 employees and a handful of customers. The work was hard, meeting payroll was hard, customers were hard to manage, and I was only paying myself the bare minimum to survive. I was sitting at a stoplight on my way to work and I thought to myself, “This sucks!” Then I thought “OK, if you don’t do this, what else do you want to do? Where would you rather work?” In that instance, I realized, there is nothing I would rather be doing. From that point on, the stress was my choice and there was nothing I’d rather do. It’s a big difference from finding yourself in a place you don’t to be.

    So my advice is this. Keep going and never quit. Even if the worst happens and your business fails, learn something from it and try again. When it gets tough and you’re thinking about quitting, do what I did. Think about what you would rather be doing for work. Chances are if you’re meant to be an entrepreneur, there is nothing better than the pressure and the adventure of entrepreneurship. That realization alone will make your journey easier.

  • How to Choose the Best eCommerce Platform

    Choosing an eCommerce platform can be difficult. There are many options available, each with different benefits designed to best help you. While some businesses prefer a SaaS solution (like Shopify), others prefer custom eCommerce options.

    How do you make sense of it all? How do you pick the best eCommerce platform for your business?

    There are two directions you can take when selecting a platform. Do you want hosted or open software? Let’s go ahead and assume no one wants a proprietary system that you couldn’t change on a whim. Although, there are sure to be some out there. Technology loves to evolve in mere seconds.

    Hosted eCommerce Platforms (SaaS)

    A hosted solution is an eCommerce service that you sign up for. You then build your store within an online system. This is like other web-based software, such as Salesforce or Google Docs.

    The benefit of a hosted eCommerce solution is its ease of use. Setting up and getting started is a breeze. You still have to put effort into learning how to use the system and customize it as you’d like. But, the technical hurdles are much lower than installing and designing software.

    There are some downsides to this solution. At some point, you will hit a roadblock in the system. It won’t be able to handle something specific. Since the source code isn’t accessible, changing the system is costly.

    Then you’re stuck with a difficult choice. Do you learn to live without the specific feature you wanted? Or do you switch platforms all together?

    Switching platforms is very complicated. For starters, it requires a time investment. You’ve also already established search positioning. You have become familiar with your customers and how to best serve them by using this system. Moving your store to a new platform becomes a very, very disruptive process. In extreme cases, the results can be catastrophic. We often see this happen when the move is not planned the way it should be, or a good consultant/developer isn’t used.

    Some of the most popular hosted eCommerce solutions include:

    eCommerce Software

    Software based approaches to eCommerce also come in two dominant styles. There is custom software built from the ground up (also called proprietary software). There are also off-the-shelf systems that you can customize.

    Custom eCommerce systems used to be the norm. Off-the-shelf offerings lacked strong development and did not have helpful features available. However, the offerings have evolved over the years. It’s now rare to see a custom system in place. Well, unless you’ve got less than a 20% overlap between your needs and the best-fitting off-the-shelf option. Another scenario would be a high-security application. Perhaps it’s not permissible to use a system with source code available to the public due to company policy.

    Paring Down the Options

    There are hundreds of eCommerce platforms available in every language. Ruby, PHP, .NET, and even Perl/CGI are out there, waiting to assist you. What’s next?

    The best way to start is to figure out if you or your developers have a technology preference. Making this decision first will whittle down dozens of choices. Now your list of possibilities is more manageable.

    Now, look at which of the remaining platforms is most used. The more momentum a system has, the more popular it will be. The more popular it is, the more developers there are who will support it, and the longer its life will be. Even after the development of a stronger platform, popular systems maintain their status. They continue to have the most add-ons, extensions, plugins, support, and available developers.

    Not every solution will have the same community support as Magento. But, Magento will give you a good benchmark for what’s possible. It’s used by over 200,000 organizations and that number continues to grow. There are over 500 extensions available.

    Look at the functionality of the platform and any extensions they might have. See how close you can get to what you need without custom development. This will save you time and money. The more active the extension marketplace is for a product, the better.

    Check out the demo of the software, too. One should be available for both the customer area and admin. Customer areas tend to be similar, but admin areas can vary a great deal.

    Log in and walk through standard tasks. Work through adding/editing a product and processing an order. See what it is like to view reports and segment customers. You’ll be living inside this system for a while, so make sure it’s easy-to-use and satisfactory.

    Making the Final eCommerce Platform Decision

    Marketing is important when you’re selling online. First, look at how well the platform is set up for organic rankings. Check things like the friendliness of product URLs.

    How clean is the source code? See how well customer sites rank for product-specific terms. You can always enhance your site’s ability to rank well. But, the better the tools are out of the box, the further ahead you’ll be.

    Check out the biggest sites who use each platform. This might take some digging. Many platforms, though, will proudly list their banner customers. For example, Magento won’t hide the fact that they work with Vizio, Nike, and North Face, to name a few.

    Look at reviews and locate forums for a particular product. Jump into the forums and look for problems, complaints, and reviews. Every product will have some technical issues and people grumbling about them. Try to get a feel for the vibe of the community. Take note of whether the company is responding to complaints, issues, and suggestions. If the company doesn’t offer a user forum, that’s usually a red flag.

    Your Platform Is Up to You

    With this approach, you should be able to narrow down your options from hundreds to just a few pretty quickly. Do your homework. Transferring to a new platform later is disruptive. Whatever direction you decide to go in, be confident in your choice.

    If you choose something successful and mainstream, you won’t break your business. From our experience, things like marketing, customer service, merchandising, descriptions and photos, prompt delivery, finding a niche, and creating loyal customers deserve much more of your attention.

    If you’re still not sure where to go next, we can help you avoid resorting to the flip of a coin.

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  • Avoid Weeping When You Get a Server Response Code

    If you’ve spent much time hanging around a web developer, search marketer, or a sysadmin at a web development firm, you’ve most likely heard the terms 404 and 301 thrown around. If you’ve been hanging around programmers you can add 500 to that list. So what do these mysterious codes mean to the average web user or business person?

    It isn’t too important to the average web user or business person to be knowledgeable about these codes. But, you’ve likely come across them in your travels on the Net so you might still want to know what they are.

    May I have the Results, Please?

    Most web servers adhere to a standardized set of result codes that every request/response falls under. Each series has a general meaning and within the series there are very specific result codes.

    • 200 – Success – Everything is working! (These are generally silent or not sent to the browser. Why? If everything is working ok, why would you send a message saying so? You would see the web page you needed.)
    • 300 – Redirection – You are being sent from one page or URL to another. (These are also often silent. You are generally sent to a new location, which should respond successfully)
    • 400 – Incomplete – Something happened and the request didn’t complete successfully. (These are generally sent to the browser in some way)
    • 500 – Error – There was an internal server error either related to the server or the software running on it. (These are almost always sent to the browser)

    Responding to Response Codes

    Here are a few of the more popular response codes you might have seen, with some info about them. There are far more, but the details can get pretty gory.

    • 301 – The page you were trying to get to has moved to a new location. The server should automatically redirect you to the new page and you shouldn’t have to do anything further. Search engine marketers use 301s a lot when a page is removed or a new website is created. Then visitors and search engines can find the new page easily.
    • 403 – You are not authorized to view this page. Either you authenticated incorrectly or your IP address is restricted from viewing the page. In either case, it’s back to the drawing board for you.
    • 404 – The page you were trying to get to does not exist. It might have existed in the past and has been removed. Perhaps the link you followed was wrong. There is no redirect and you’ll have to find your page another way. Our creative team put together a great 404 page for our site. Yup, that’s it up there. Hopefully this is the only place on our site that you will see it.
    • 500 – Any 500 code means that something has gone wrong. Don’t worry. It’s not your fault. You might try again in a few minutes in case it’s a server load issue. But if the problem doesn’t clear up, let the manager of the website know what happened. Try to remember what you did prior to the error. That information can be helpful for troubleshooting.

  • eCommerce Requirements Worksheet

    There are many functionalities, features, and marketing needs that will factor into the complexity of your eCommerce website. For this reason, creating a budget for an eCommerce web project can be a process in itself. So what is the easiest way to scope the requirements and calculate price?

    Over the years, Atlantic BT has scoped many custom eCommerce projects and developed a worksheet to streamline the process.

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    This worksheet is designed to help focus your efforts when building or redesigning an eCommerce website. There are many other factors to consider during this process, but we focus on the high-level, critical factors that will organize your thinking and get you moving in the right direction.

    What’s Included in This eCommerce Requirements Worksheet? 

    This free download will walk you through determining objectives, technical requirements, needed features, and more. We included examples and checklists to facilitate the process. 

    • Determine your objectives.
    • Determine your features and technical requirements to gauge which platforms or service providers are the best fit for your business. 
    • Determine which features you need – such as marketing tools, customer account functionalities, and checkout methods.
    • Determine key audiences and personas.
    • Break down average traffic and conversions to determine scalability needs.
    • Determine product catalog size and related features needed for management.
    • Determine necessary integrations with other systems.

  • ABT Entrepreneurial Award Winner!

    In our first ever entrepreneurial award contest, ABT set out to honor a local entrepreneur who embodies the values we share:

    • Dedicated to serving the community
    • Hard-working
    • Compassionate
    • Respected
    • Optimistic
    • Creative

    Jess Kahut from Headbands of Hope

    We are proud to announce Jess Kahut is our winner. Jess is the founder of Headbands of Hope, an organization that makes headbands for young girls fighting cancer. She embodies both someone who guides her company based on her principles, while also being a consummate entrepreneur and inspiring entrepreneurship in others. Congratulations Jess!

    Here are our other finalists for the ABT Entrepreneurial Award:

    Abe Crystal, Ruzuku

    • As a co-founder of the online learning platform Ruzuku, Abe has provided support, optimism, and commitment to staff and consumers alike. Devoted to education and communication, Abe is a dedicated leader and mentor who takes time to give back to the entrepreneurial community.

    Matt Kane, Precision Biosciences

    • Matt is the CEO and co-founder Precision Biosciences, the company behind the next generation of genome editing. Matt’s company now has the technology to cure cancer with ground-breaking gene therapies (while balancing a great culture and employing over 100 people in Durham).

    Rich Brancaccio, Fokus Labs

    • Rich, a trained child psychologist, created a product that helps kids with attention issues called Re-vibe. Rich works tirelessly to help give back to students in Wake County and across the country by helping them improve their focus and concentration. He is also a proud father of two.

    Nick Palmisciano, Ranger Up

    • Nick has always been the entrepreneur of the family—taking on huge projects like the movie “Range 15” and the documentary “Not Another War Story.” Nick’s probably best known as the founder of Ranger Up, an American apparel company that gives back to our veterans in so many ways. He is always willing to help those in need and go the extra mile to do what is right.