E-Commerce

What any e-retailer really needs to make 2011 a great year is some way to grow year-over-year visitors by 10 percent to 
15 percent.

Rebuild it or else. This is the emerging mind-set of mid-sized companies as they start to feel the growing pains of a first generation e-commerce site that no longer supports their needs. Lack of features, scalability challenges, weak business tools, the need for mobile and social commerce support, and a slew of other challenges have driven many online sellers to a tipping point. Their current online solutions will not cut it.

We’ve all been there — navigating a site, filling up our shopping cart with holiday presents, clicking “checkout” in excitement, and then it hits us — a big shipping fee. Suddenly, Grandpa’s new slippers don’t seem like such a bargain.

In a first for its in-store holiday toy catalog, Target has printed quick scan response codes that, when scanned, take smartphone users directly online.

Sears is using multiple mobile channels, from commerce-enabled mobile websites and applications to QR codes, to enhance its multichannel holiday marketing strategy and drive sales.

Website monitoring startup WatchMouse is now watching the top 100 retail websites for availability around the holiday shopping season. The startup tested retail sites including Apple, Amazon, Best Buy, Borders, Overstock, Wal-Mart and Zappos for availability and performance during the month leading up to and including Thanksgiving Day, November 25 and Black Friday, November 26.

eBay shoppers are now able to buy toys directly from Toys"R"Us, which opened a store on eBay just in time for the holiday shopping season.

ChannelAdvisor announced that its customers achieved record-breaking sales for Thanksgiving, Black Friday and throughout the holiday weekend, led by Amazon.

Is Groupon the worst marketing ever? Or is it the best marketing ever? Probably both. One thing is for sure: Groupon is a beast.

Shoutlet announced its Shop & Share feature, a simple tool that helps brands create a tailored digital storefront in Facebook to drive e-commerce efforts.