Ecommerce Conversations

Microsoft’s new search engine is called Bing. It launched on June 3, 2009 and observers have already described it as a dramatic improvement over Microsoft’s previous search engine efforts. Most every ecommerce merchant relies on search engines, and many of them, we suspect, will be interested to learn how Bing affects their businesses. Dave Wascha, Microsoft’s Senior Director of Bing Shopping, joins Practical Ecommerce’s Kerry Murdock to discuss it all.

For many retail observers, the name Zappos is synonymous with great customer service and ecommerce well executed. The company was launched in 1999 as an online, footwear merchant. It has since grown into a retailing powerhouse, with 2008 sales reaching just over $1 billion dollars. In 2007, Zappos, a purely ecommerce firm, began publishing a printed catalog. That product is now a four-times-a-year magazine/catalog mix, and Zappos mails it to several million prospects annually. Jeanne Markel is Zappos’s Director of Casual Lifestyle and Performance. She’s involved with the execution and production of the catalog and she joins Practical Ecommerce’s Kerry Murdock.

The U.S. Virgin Islands are located roughly 90 miles east of Puerto Rico, in the Caribbean Sea. The islands are known for their white sand beaches and clear blue water. But a new Virgin Islands based economic initiative wants e-businesses to know there are significant federal tax advantages to doing business there. This new initiative partners the University of the Virgin Islands with private technology providers. It’s called “eCommerce Island,” and its chief marketing officer is Steve Rohrlick, who joins Practical Ecommerce’s Kerry Murdock.

Miva Merchant is an early day shopping cart. First launched in 1995, it rose, and then fell, with the dot-com boom and bust. Findwhat.com, a publicly traded company, purchased Miva Merchant in 2004. Findwhat.com subsequently renamed itself Miva, only to sell the Miva Merchant shopping cart division to a private investor in August 2007. That investor is Russ Carroll. He’s now the CEO of Miva Merchant, and he joins Practical Ecommerce’s Kerry Murdock.

There is much talk about social media sites, and there’s talk of how companies can use social media for marketing purposes. One company doing just that is Comodo, a firm that provides online security solutions. Comodo has recently created a “social media officer” job position and Comodo’s CEO, Melih Abdulhayoglu, is here to discuss it with Practical Ecommerce’s Kerry Murdock.

Online retailers are frequently interested in new channels to sell their products. In addition to a merchant’s own ecommerce site, he or she can consider auction sites and comparison shopping sites, for example. And there’s also Amazon.com. Amazon competes with many smaller merchants, but it also allows those merchants to list products there, too. The service is called “Selling on Amazon” and the executive in charge of it is Sam Wheeler. Wheeler is Director Seller Services at Amazon and he’s here with Practical Ecommerce’s Kerry Murdock.

Many ecommerce merchants rely on email marketing and many of them, we suspect, wish they could monitor and target emails based on where a recipient lives. This would allow for offers specific to a market or geographic area. Well, Listrak, an email marketing provider based in Pennsylvania, now offers email “geo tracking.” Listrak’s CEO is Ross Kramer, and he joins Practical Ecommerce’s Kerry Murdock in this interview.

Millions of Internet users are blind, deaf or are otherwise unable to use a website in a traditional manner. Ensuring that a site functions well for these users is called accessibility, and our guest for this interview is an expert on that topic. Joseph Dolson is CEO and founder of Accessible Web Design, a St. Paul, MN based firm that designs and consults on accessibility matters. He joins Practical Ecommerce’s Kerry Murdock.

Jordan CollettaThe shipping of products is a crucial function for most every ecommerce merchant. And there’s no company more prominent in the shipping business than UPS, who has recently announced upgrades to its “UPS Ready” program. Jordan Colletta is vice president of customer technology marketing for UPS, and he joins Practical eCommerce’s Kerry Murdock to discuss those upgrades. Mr. Colletta has been with UPS since 1975 and in his current position he’s responsible for all of UPS’s ecommerce marketing functions.

Andrew HazenThe use of domain names to enhance an ecommerce “footprint” is growing in popularity. We’ve asked Andrew Hazen, the founder and CEO of Prime Visibility, a Long Island, NY-based Internet marketing firm, to explain domain-name strategies to us. Hazen is an Internet pioneer, having founded Prime Visibility in the late 1990s. The firm specializes in search engine optimization and pay-per-click ad management, and its clients include Fox News, Lauren Hutton, Adelphi University, among others. Hazen joins Practical Ecommerce’s Kerry Murdock.