E-Commerce

Groupon has said it started an online group-buying service in China as consumers in the world's fastest-growing major economy increase spending over the internet.

Following recent research demonstrating coupon distribution in the U.S. increased 6.8 percent in 2010 and that more coupons were distributed during the year than ever before, Coupons.com Incorporated issued its Digital Coupons Trends Report for 2010, releasing data about consumer use of digital coupons.

Hip British online clothing site Asos became the first European fashion retailer to open an e-tailing outpost inside Facebook. Now, Sarah Townsend will no longer have to leave her Facebook friends behind to buy the $55 baggy sweater she's been eyeing.

A longitudinal shopping cart abandonment survey conducted between 2009 and 2011 by email marketing firm Listrak reveals that online retailers still aren’t doing enough to recoup the estimated $18 billion lost annually due to shopping cart abandonment.

Testing is one of the most important factors in driving conversion and elevating customer experiences. It turns insightful data into useful information. The e-tailing group and Amadesa recently conducted an online survey of 160 merchants, Testing Ready: The Merchant's Cheat Sheet for Testing and Targeting, to try and help them improve their testing experience.

Cabela's use of analytics tools that measure how quickly its salespeople engaged customers led to staffing increases — and higher sales — in its shoe and gun departments in Q4.

According to a new study on consumers' shopping behaviors by the AMP Agency, Inside the Buy, just 3 percent of consumers say they're loyal to a particular brand and never buy anything else. The study considered digital behaviors in five leading consumer categories: baby products, consumer electronics, food and beverage, health and beauty, and fashion.

Consumers need to feel secure with each transaction they conduct on Facebook, or retailers might as well forget about building storefronts on the social site. Adgregate Markets, which provides transactions through ShopFans, and security software maker Symantec, plan to announce a partnership Tuesday relying on Symantec's VeriSign Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) Certificates.

eBay is adding FedEx to the mail carriers it integrates with on its site. Sellers can now select FedEx Express and FedEx Ground services from the drop-down menu of shipping services when listing items on eBay.

While traditional e-commerce retailers like Amazon and eBay tout their massive catalogs with millions of products as selling points for consumers, a host of new start-ups are looking to do just the opposite: make buying decisions easier by limiting choice.