Ecommerce Web Design Blog

Just like major clothing brands are often subject to cheap manufacturers producing look-alike copies of their products complete with logos, there are a number of people who are determined to copy the most successful businesses online without any respect for their intellectual property.

Don't let this put you off opening an online shop. You have plenty of options when it comes to dealing with competitors trying to steal your products, website content and images. Here are just some of the things you can do.

1. Ban their IP from your site or server. Look up their IP address and ask your hosting provider to block them. You can get their IP address from a tool like 'whos online' in the admin section of your site, or a third party tracking tool like your chat or real time tracking. Also ensure that 'hotlink' protection has been enabled by your hosting provider. This stops competitors from linking to your images within their own sites.
   
2. Join a programme like Copyscape. Copyscape scans the Internet for copies of any of your webpages. It will send you an email telling you the exact URL of the pages who have copied you.  You can verify the copying and then write to their hosting provider to force them to remove the content or have the site banned. You can also write to the copiers to order them to cease and desist their copying of your site. If they do not heed your warning you can take legal action.
3. Keep ahead of them. Competitors who spend too much time fixated on what you are doing with your shopping cart today are competing with the past. If you keep doing new things, adding things and improving you will stay ahead. Be a leader not a copier. Work on the search optimisation of your site while they work on what you were doing yesterday.

In case your competitors or copiers don't listen to your warnings you have the ACCC, your legal team and your external solicitors at your disposal if necessary. A friendly 'prompt' from  your legal team or external solicitors is ususally enough to help your copiers see the errors of their ways.  If not your lawyers will know what to do.

Writing for your website is not the same as writing for a print publication. Online you have very limited time to make an impression on your audience. Only writing that is clear, interesting and easy-to-read will get the attention of your potential customers. You also have to be mindful of search engines - you need to ensure that you have the right density of keywords otherwise your page will appear either unimportant or spam to Google. Getting the mix just right is essential.

So how do you choose a good copywriter for your shopping cart website?

The first step in the process is to evaluate the websites of the people or businesses on your shortlist.  Does their website sound like it was written by Australians for the Australian market or by somone with poor language skills? If they can't write for themselves and promote their own business, how can they promote yours? Be careful of sites that do not make sense or appear to use the same word over and over and over for effect. These are the kinds of sites that will eventually get hammered by the search engines for 'keyword stuffing' so stay clear of them or your site could suffer when they come crashing down.

Hiring a professional website copywriter for your shopping cart website can help your website stand out from the crowd, which can be essential in a market that is highly competitive and crowded with competitors selling similar products.  There are plenty of people and international companies claiming to be professional copywriters on the freelance job boards, but if they can really write quality copy, expect to pay top dollar. 

As an experiment for this blog we have hired some freelance copywriters from job boards with a theoretical copywriting exercise for our own website. We will report back in another post when the results are in.

Lessons: What to look for the following when you hire a web copywriter

• Do their writing samples seem interesting an inviting? Would you buy from them?
• Is the writing actually useful to the target audience or does it appear to have been written for search engines rather than people?
• How much do they charge? Is it per-word, per-dollar, or per-article?
  

Osc Works offers website copywriting service for current customers or non-customers alike.

 

How can you get a competitive edge for your shopping cart website?

If you have a shopping cart website, you are already taking advantage of the hundreds of thousands of Australians and New Zealanders who use the Internet to search for products and services to buy.  How can you get more from your shopping cart so you really stand out from your competitors? Competition is tough and studies show you have about 8 seconds from when a customer clicks on your site to make a lasting impression on them and keep them clicking. Every little edge will help your shopping cart get filled with products and not your competitor's.

One way to gain an edge is adding a talking character (avatar) to your website. Just like the one below.

You can wait for your site visitors to click on the play button or set the page to play automatically. The choice is yours.

You could add a talking character to your home page, a content page or even as a side box on your whole site to add and enhance the shopping cart experience for your cutomers. If you have a complex product, want to highlight a sale or just explain your products and services in more detail then a talking character is for you.

To order a talking character for your website (with free installation if you are an ozCart shopping cart customer) please visit our website add-ons shop.

This week, the credit card turned 50 years old.  Credit cards are an invaluable part of everyday life and for many owners of online shops, essential.

The worldwide credit card network was started by American Express in 1958. Bank of America followed quickly with their BankAmericard. The Bank launched the card in a novel way, sending out 60,000 cards to consumers in the area. At first, few had any idea what to do with the cards but they learned the benefits of credit cards quickly and a year later customers had spent more than the equivalent of over $70million Australian dollars on their cards. This inital drop of cards was followed by another 2 million cards throughout all of California, USA. The credit boom never looked back.

Bank of America's overseas affiliates programme which operated with their card evolved into the system that eventually became Visa. A group of banks then also set up rival MasterCharge in 1966 - which later evolved into MasterCard.

Accepting credit cards is an important ingredient in running a high volume, successful shopping cart. There are many payment options online: third party providers like Paypal and Paymate as well as internet payment gateway providers like eWay, Camtech, ANZ eGate, CommWeb, and DirectOne.  All of these payment gateways are supported by ozCart shopping cart software. New Zealand customers can also opt to use NZ based payment gateway providers like Payment Express (DPS) or Paystation.

For an introduction to payment gateways or information on starting your own shopping cart website that accepts credit card, have a look at the information on our website and contact us at Osc Works to find out how we could help you run your own online shop.

Want to turn a paid shopping cart into a free one?

Osc Works offer shopping cart software packages from between $34.95 to $109.95 per month, but with some smart lateral thinking, you could have an ozCart shopping cart website for free. So can you get your own free shopping cart website?

The answer is to take advantage of the Osc Works affiliate programme, that all ozCart and Information Website customers are entitled to join.  Just purchase an ecommerce website from us and put a special banner or link to  Osc Works on it. If your website visitors click-through and then buy their own ozCart shopping cart website within 30 days, then you can earn cash for every sale!

This makes it really easy for you to take advantage of the many new businesses getting online  or expanding from 'brochureware' to online shops.

If you were to refer just two customers to us per month, then you have paid for your own starter shopping cart website, with credits left over to buy ozCart add-ons.  Three customers pays for an Advanced site (allowing you to accept credit cards).  For just five new customers buying sites from us a month and you could have your own Platinum shopping cart with all the Platinum Privileges that come with it! For free!

Take the Osc Works affiliate challenge today and you could be on your way to your own ozCart shopping cart website for free.

UPDATE 16-Jan-2009: With our new payout rates you can reach these goals even faster! We now pay up to a massive $100 per sale for referrals to our Platinum shopping cart.