Internet Retailer

Every website has it. That small box in the header with the picture of a magnifying glass to the right. We call it the search box, and it's kind of the unsung hero of your e-commerce site. And maybe it isn't the sexiest topic in the world, but it doesn't have to be because site search has a return on investment story that speaks for itself. Retailers typically report two or three times the amount of conversions for site search users.

Email marketing is a very competitive field. Not only is your brand vying against direct competitors as well as other retailers for attention, you must also prove to mailbox providers that your content is desired by subscribers and should be placed in the inbox. To find out which brands are excelling in both inbox placement and subscriber engagement, Return Path compared the email programs of the top department stores and identified which brands stand out above the rest.

In September, Google made changes to its sitelinks search box, and some merchants are unhappy with the change. They say it's another way for Google to increase the money it makes from advertising. Google explains that with its sitelinks search box, people can reach the site owner's content more quickly from search results. For instance, if you want to find a video on Youtube, you might go to Google.com, enter a search for Youtube, click on the link, and then conduct the search on Youtube. The sitelinks search box removes that extra step. 

Customers go further for the brands that truly inspire them. In email, that means not merely reading their favorite brands’ messages, but searching the spam folder when they can't find them. Among top apparel retailers, Abercrombie & Fitch and J.Crew distance themselves from the rest in these as well as other measurements of subscriber engagement.

In June, I wrote that I'd decided I'm not in the e-commerce business. Actually, I concluded, I'm a brick-and-mortar retailer who happens to have a good website. The point was that I have to be careful about the resources I devote to building my web business because e-commerce sites can turn into black holes. But that was way back in June. Shortly after writing the post, I spent several days immersed in the brave new world wide web at the Internet Retailer Conference in Chicago. And with another couple of months to process, I've come to a different conclusion. 

Pinterest's current monthly visitor total of more than 70 million worldwide might be small potatoes compared to Facebook's audience of over a billion, but Pinterest's unique visual slant has been proving valuable for retailers. Here are six tips on how you can use Pinterest to help promote your retail business:

Named the country's most trusted company by a 2014 Millward Brown report, Amazon.com continually reinvests its profits to improve communication with customers, speed up service and find innovative delivery methods. By focusing on long-term growth over immediate profitability, Amazon has gained an extremely loyal customer base. Here are eight ways the U.S. e-commerce giant puts service first:

In a session last week at the Internet Retailer Conference & Exhibition in Chicago, Diana Adair, director of communications at custom products retailer Zazzle, a company that's no stranger to crises, offered her top tips for surviving — and avoiding altogether — a social media crisis:

There was an energy — not to mention growing audience — to the Internet Retailer Conference & Exhibition (IRCE) last week that reflected the fast pace of change in the industry. The hot topics for catalogers included the following:

In a conversation with Retail Online Integration yesterday at the Internet Retailer Conference & Exhibition in Chicago, Anthony Qaiyum, president and co-owner of Merz Apothecary, a 139-year-old pharmacy in Chicago specializing in health and personal care products from around the world, discusses his company's omnichannel strategies as well as how to prepare for the upcoming holiday season. Check out the video to learn more!