In 2011, the number of people purchasing goods or services in the UK over the internet increased by 62% to 32 million people (66% of all adults)1. The market is expected to reach a value of £221bn by 2016. Getting it right now means a greater share of that market in the future.

Increase conversion to improve profits

Whether you are just setting up or you are a seasoned eCommerce professional, the importance of conversion rates is as significant online as it is in-store.  Below are a 7 ways to increase conversion rates on your eCommerce site.

1) Measure and monitor. Don’t lose sight of statistics.  Facts and figures for use of your site are instant, accurate and detailed and should be monitored frequently.

Essentials for any business should include sales, profit, conversion rate (number of visitors to number of purchasers), abandoned sales (during checkout process), average basket value, most popular products, most popular landing pages.  Note trends and dig deeper to find out why your site is or isn’t working/improving.

2) First impressions. Customers won’t wait. Slow upload and purchase processes lose visitors.  This is likely to be one of the first things they will notice!

Ensure customers know what your Company does that is different from the competition.  Make this clear on your home page and throughout the site.

Let your visitors see the human side of the business behind the technology.  One way to achieve this is by making your contact details (including telephone number) visible.

Make it easy for potential customers to find what they are looking for by allowing visitors to run searches of the site with a simple search tool.

3) Product display. Keep it simple!  Step back and think about how you would navigate your home page as a customer. Is there too much information?  Can you group your products into fewer categories?

Product photographs should be the best your budget can afford.  Use one, clear photograph in your ‘shop window’ with a simple description/price, followed by another page for more information and multiple products for those who want this detail.

Include shipping information as early in the process as you can to help avoid abandoned sales during checkout.

Include customer reviews for each product to provide reassurance.

4) Checkout tips. Display clear calls to action throughout the site.  The most important of these is your shopping cart.  Make this obvious and easy to find on every page of your site.  A recent A/B split test case study shows that there is a 20% improvement in sales with a one click checkout process 2. Taking this further, a single page checkout speeds your customer to purchase. Review your checkout process, identify and remove potential barriers to purchase.

5) Extra information and features. Answer the questions your customers want to know – provide easy to find, clear information and resources on products, delivery and returns.  Think about ways to make the purchase more valuable to your customer – e.g. if they might be buying from you as a gift, could you include gift wrap as an extra service?

6) Make it a smooth mobile experience. Recent research indicates that customers expect an even better mobile shopping experience than they do in store.  Review your website on your mobile and make sure it delivers! If it doesn’t, consider having a mobile eCommerce site produced specifically for your customer on the go (call a member of our team on 08456 123831 for our mobile eCommerce website packages).

7) And finally….a quick note on SEO. The above improvements will assist to improve your online conversion rate.  SEO increases visitor numbers.  SEO is an essential aspect of your sales and marketing strategy and we don’t have space to discuss it in nearly enough detail here! For sound advice on improving your SEO call us on 08456 123831.

And if you’re looking for professional help……….

Power up your online sales and join our eCommerce superstars! dv8media are proud to announce the launch of our roxora
eCommerce system, a dynamic, versatile eCommerce platform, which is delivered to our VIP customers along with a devoted entourage of experts to advise you and adapt the roxora platform to meet your business’s every need and process.

Source: 1NewMedia TrendWatch 2Get Elastic

We’d like to wish Georgia all the very best in Plymouth’s Half Marathon, taking place this weekend (Sunday 28th April)!

Georgia has been using her evenings wisely by training 2 to 3 times a week and is hoping to beat her previous best by completing the 13.1 mile course within less than 2 and a half hours.

Georgia Forrest-Jones is dv8media’s graphic design apprentice and is studying with the Plymouth College of Art.

Good luck to Georgia and all those taking part in the marathon this weekend!

Drummond LLP offers a complete range of bookkeeping and accountancy services throughout Plymouth, Devon and Cornwall.  Services include tax planning, annual accounts, management accounting and payroll.  Small to medium-sized businesses who outsource this work will benefit from managing their own time more effectively, allowing them to run their own businesses and focus on the work which grows their organisation, whilst they will also find the service extremely cost effective to buy in.

George Granville, managing partner of Drummond, approached dv8media with his existing website.  The site was professional looking, however, enquiries were not representative of the visitors to the site and it was felt that a barrier was being formed due to the look and feel appealing to bigger businesses (who would often generally have their own in-house resources to take care of these services).  As a result, we felt that the site was alienating the small to medium target market and we needed to address this through the design.

One of the first things to consider was a clear, strong call to action throughout.  In addition to the main navigation bar at the top, we’ve highlighted the main services using click-through ‘buttons’ across the top of the page.  The speech bubble design ‘element’ used to create these buttons is implemented throughout the site and represents the friendly, communicative style of the practice.

The site is built on a CMS to allow the Drummond team to update and amend it themselves, keeping it fresh.  In addition a blog has been integrated to the site, which not only assists with Search Engine Optimisation, but is also a way for Drummond to talk about industry-related topics, demonstrating their expertise.

George says “ dv8media got stuck in from the get go – Liz was a fantastic project manager whose marketing experience was really useful in getting our design brief refined.

Chris and the team were endlessly patient in building and designing the Drummond website. The result is a great success and achieves exactly what we set out to do.”

Thank you to George and the Drummond team for choosing to work with dv8media! We can highly recommend them for your own accountancy and bookkeeping services!

As part of our ongoing 10 year anniversary celebrations, we have now launched our mobile website packages.  That’s all very well for us, but do you know your mobile website from your mobile app?  How does ‘click to call’ improve your conversion rates? And what IS the difference between geo-fencing and geo-tagging?

We’ve put together a glossary of mobile web speak with a view to demystifying the subject.  The list DOES go on, but we have tried to collect together the terms which are most relevant when you are considering marketing your own site through mobile devices:

Smartphone – A mobile phone with a full colour touch screen, fast mobile connections, the opportunity to use apps and handle advanced features such as email

Mobile web – Access to the world wide web through a hand held mobile device

Mobile browser – Software used on a mobile device to access the world wide web

Mobile website – A website which has been designed to provide a better, smarter browsing experience for mobile users

Mobile app / mobile application – A downloadable piece of software which can include greater functionality than a mobile website (for example, animation and games), can be operated without an internet connection and which is potentially able to generate revenue

Mobile CMS / MCMS – A type of content management system, delivered through mobile devices

Mobile commerce / M-Commerce – An online store, built specifically for a better browsing experience for customers buying through their mobile devices

Mobile operating system – The operating system which is used to run a mobile device.  This includes Android, iOS and Blackberry OS

Mobile website optimisation – Streamlining the delivery of a website’s content and functionality for mobile devices, whilst taking into consideration the way in which the user interacts with the site

Mobile ads – Any form of advertising which is delivered through mobile devices / mobile web.  This includes SMS, MMS, mobile web banners, mobile web posters and more.

Responsive website design (RWD) – An approach to website design to deliver the best browsing experience across a number of devices (from desktop PCs to mobile phones)

Click to call – A short cut for users who click on a displayed telephone number they have found using the mobile web and are automatically connected as a result

Gestures – The set of touch/movement-based gestures mobile users apply to navigate their way around their devices.  Includes ‘swipe’, ‘shake’, ‘pinch to zoom’, amongst others

GPS (Global Positioning System) enabled – facility for a smartphone to connect to the GPS – i.e. the satellite navigation system used to provide location and time information

Geo-tagging – the ability to mark a video/photo/other media with a location

Geo-fencing – allows a response to be actioned when someone enters or leaves a specific geographical location (for example, a coffee shop forwarding a mobile voucher to a passerby’s mobile when they are in the immediate area)

m.subdomain – this is a subdomain of  your existing website which may be used for your mobile website.  Because it is a subdomain of the site you already have, it effectively costs nothing to set up

.mobi domain – a mobile-friendly domain name, which you purchase in addition to your main website domain

QR codes – when read with a QR scanner which is downloaded to a mobile device, a QR code is a type of barcode that links the user to a URL or specific data via their mobile browser

Network speeds – the speed at which a mobile phone network can upload or download data via a mobile phone broadband connection – includes 2G, 3G, 4G, LTE, WiMAX

dv8media’s mobile website packages include the design and creation of a mobile website from £300.  We will also create your mobile apps, mobile shops and mobile games. If you’re looking to reach your customers on the move, please contact us on 08456 123831 for more details of these products and packages.

Open College Network South West Region (OCNSWR), now trading as apt awards, needed a website as part of the launch of their new brand.

This National Awarding Organisation aims to help learning providers equip their learners with skills to progress professionally and personally – hence the new name ‘apt’ which stands for ‘Access, Progress, Transform’.

dv8media pitched for the website design and build in a competitive tender process, and has been commissioned to build the organisation’s website, using a two-step approach.

Phase one is an ‘interim’ website.  The timing for the design and build of this site was critical, the organisation having planned the launch of apt awards to their customers and the general public on the 1st of March.

Phase One is therefore a vehicle (carrying the new brand identity) for a wide range of learning providers; from schools and colleges to employers and private training companies.  The website offers them details of all of the services provided by apt awards.  A Content Management System (CMS) has been used, allowing the client to update the website themselves (essential given the ever-changing nature of the services provided), adding, removing and editing page information, news stories and events when necessary.  Integration of the apt awards Twitter account (by way of displaying latest tweets on the site) was important to the client, as well as a simple search function for the site (to be developed as part of Phase Two) and clear call to actions encouraging users to sign up to make contact / sign up to the latest newsletter etc.

Completion of Phase One took just over three weeks.  This is a demanding time-frame for any web build, however it was achieved with tight project management from start to finish and, most importantly, its success can be largely attributed to the dedicated preparation and responsive feedback from the team at apt awards, who organised all relevant content, updates, checks, amendments and approvals to agreed deadlines.

Both dv8media and apt awards are based on Tamar Science Park in Plymouth, so it was a pleasure being able to take a leisurely walk to our initial meeting, and to have the team do the same to visit us for their post-live CMS training!  A lovely team to work with and we are very much now looking forward to working on Phase Two of the site.

Phase two of the site is now in progress and is scheduled to be up and running this Summer.

This month’s print offer is for HALF PRICE folded flyers, which start from just £221 £110 for 250.

The flyers are printed in full colour on both sides, on a good quality 280gsm stock, with an ultra-shiny gloss finish, giving them a premium, eye catching look for a very reasonable price indeed!

If you’ve had this type of print before and stocks are running low, or if you’re looking to promote your business or a specific product or service, maybe through your own/other people’s venues, as part of a promotional pack, through the post or at a forthcoming trade show, this is an ideal time to order your folded leaflets.

Please note: Artwork must be with us by close of play on 28th March in order to qualify for this discount.  And if you need help with your design, please ask us for a quote!

This week sees the launch of the third website produced by dv8media for Tecalemit, one of the Automotive Industry’s best known global brands.

dv8media is proud to work with the Tecalemit team, not least because the Company has such a such a successful, long-standing reputation, with a history of more than 90 years! This latest eCommerce website demonstrates the business’s ongoing commitment to lead the field within its industry.

The online store provides a catalogue of products, some of which are available to order through the site, others providing information only, with a response system for tailored quote requirements. The Tecalemit team controls their catalogue, easily adding, editing and removing products.

The client has done a fantastic job of providing relevant content for the website, in various formats. We can’t stress enough to our clients that rich, useful content is essential when it comes to providing a website that will be found by search engines and referenced regularly by target audiences. This site not only shows product images and descriptions, but also offers technical specification on products, downloadable PDF data sheets, a library of video demonstrations and an integrated news section. It’s a great content mix!

The last website we built and launched for Tecalemit was for their Michelin Air product in October. We’d like to congratulate the business on the launch of this new online presence and to thank them for continuing to choose dv8media!

Call the office and you are likely to speak with our very own Ross Wildman.  One of our in-house developers, Ross is fondly known as dv8media’s Google Guru.  He’s possibly even better known for his commitment to two wheels.  Ross is a BIG road cyclist.  If asked, he will tell you he is a ‘champion’ cyclist – we’ll have to take his word for it .  And 2013 is a big year for Ross, who will be taking part in The Ride London-Surrey 100, following the Olympic road racing route in London.

The Ride London-Surrey 100 begins in wave starts between 06:00 and 08:00 on Sunday 4 August 2013. 20,000 amateur cyclists are expected to take part and participants are seeded with starting positions allocated on ability and fitness.  All participants are expected to be able to finish the 100 miles within around 9 hours.  Clearly, Ross hopes to finish sooner (he is aiming for 6 hours)!

Ross is riding for charity, Anthony Nolan.  Anthony Nolan matches people willing to donate their blood stem cells for transplants to people with blood cancer, saving their lives. Ross has been a registered blood donor with the charity for years and has recently registered for bone marrow transplants, having found out more about the work done by the charity in this field since he became involved in raising money on their behalf.

Ross has already completed 3,500 miles of training in the last few months since confirmation of his place in the event.  Phew! He aims to raise £1000 and will be running a charity quiz nights as well as this sponsored charity ride in August.  If you would like sponsor Ross for the event, please visit his Fundraising Page on Virgin Money Giving.  All support is greatly appreciated!

We’ve print offers a-plenty this month in our half price January sale!

Half price invitations and mailers for your special event or direct mail campaign

If you have a special event or a direct mail campaign coming up, send your message in style with half price Opuleaf showcards (250 from £325 £162), Embossini showcards (250 from £325 £162) or Starmarque Flyers (1000 for £218 £99).

More great half-price offers

Gloss leaflet print, glossy postcards, stickers, scratchcards and much more are all HALF PRICE!

For more information, visit our print offers page online and call 08456 123831.  Offers are available on all orders placed in January for which artwork is approved by Thursday 31st January, no later than 3pm.

I recently attended the General Meeting of the South West Landlords Association (SWLA) based in Plymouth.  The “Meet the Experts” event was organised by the SWLA on behalf of its members in order to connect both them and non-members with experts in a variety of sectors servicing the property management industry.

dv8media has delivered marketing solutions to a number of businesses in the property sales and lettings market, including Barton Wykes, Ward & Chowen, Student Rooms 4 U, Liddicoat Sanderson Potter, Millfields Trust, Student Rooms 4 Plymouth and the SWLA themselves, and so we were considered well placed to offer advice on web, print and marketing opportunities.

‘Meet the Experts’ was very well attended by over 100 members and non-members and I’d like to say a big thank you to the SWLA and everyone I met at the event.  Hope to speak with you again in the very near future!

 Are you a landlord based in the South West?

In conjunction with Plymouth City Council and Teignmouth District Council, the SWLA has devised the Landlord Accreditation South West (LASW).  This is a voluntary scheme to promote a high quality private rented sector throughout the region.  The course allows landlords to be made aware of all recent legislation and obligations, effectively committing to providing an approved letting service.

As a landlord of Plymouth-based property, I sat this course in October and can highly recommend it.  The LASW had gone to the expense of hiring an excellent, professional  trainer and using quality training materials, immediately delivering good value for money.  I came away from the course not only approved as a landlord under the scheme but, more importantly, enlightened as to my most up to date responsibilities and commitments as a landlord and how to protect both myself and my tenants.

The launch of the new website for the LASW is immanent, so watch this space if you’d like to know more about the accreditation or contact them on 01752 510913.