E-Commerce

Beyond Commerce, a multifaceted media hub for high-traffic web properties, announced the launch of a new daily-deal website, pricecrusher.com. The site will offer one daily deal each day. Each item will be sold to customers at deeply discounted prices. 

Some may say 2010 was the year of the "flash-sale" site. Given the economic climate, it's no surprise these sites caught on — the majority of them offer members limited-time deals at drastically discounted prices. In fact, the three most visited flash-sale sites, Hautelook.com, Gilt.com and ideeli.com, all saw at least a 60 percent increase in traffic per month compared to 2009, one study found. And as of press time, Gilt Groupe was on track to hit $450 million in revenue for 2010.

As two out of nearly 50 retailers participating in Click It To Gift It Day, Staples and CHEFS relied on the power of the internet and gift cards to squeeze every dollar possible out of the busy holiday shopping season.

Urban Outfitters will debut a wedding brand called BHLDN on Valentine's Day. BHLDN's first collection will be offered through its online boutique, www.bhldn.com. The collection will bring together a curated selection of heirloom-quality wedding gowns, bridesmaid frocks, party dresses, assorted jewelry, headpieces, footwear and lingerie.

Amazon reported a 36 percent surge in fourth-quarter sales but still fell short of Wall Street's estimates, sending shares of its pricey stock sharply lower in after-hours trading. Amazon reported its first-ever quarter with more than $10 billion in sales; however, expectations were high as the company was seen benefiting from consumers increasing the number of purchases made over the Internet this holiday season.

"The Girl Store" is a rather jolting title for an e-commerce site, but that's exactly what its creators were going for. "It's true that girls are literally being sold into slavery, and we wanted to pick up that thought to make [helping them] provocative," explains Corinna Falusi, the creative director of ad agency StrawberryFrog.

American fans of H&M are all breathing a sigh of contentment after the apparel retailer announced that it will be allowing online shopping in the U.S. early next year.

eBay will use an outside firm to sell and serve up ads on its marketplace and will embed ads into the site to avoid driving shoppers off-site. Triad Retail Media will manage all on-site display advertising for eBay.com and eBay Motors.

Internet Archive recently released the beta version of its Wayback Machine, which allows users to browse through old websites that have been collected over the internet throughout the years.  

The days of managing your website based on page views and traffic statistics are over. From tracking which pixel on your main page holds the most interest for consumers, to understanding what a customer abandoned his cart — website and customer analytics are changing the way e-commerce site owners do business online.