The World of eCommerce

The Island & Wilshere

devday — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 20:22:58 +0000

Sometimes it’s beyond belief amazing a holiday can be… the island of Fiji is awesome and today we’re heading over to Mara Mara – the activity island for some snorkelling, scuba diving and a few crazy death defying stuff… I’ll be back at some point to let you know what’s been going on and to review all things Arsenal.

In the meantime, I will leave you with the wonder that is Jack Wilshere. A gem of a player, something both JAT and Bob Wilson have commented on earlier. Both him and Ramsey look like really exciting players and we’ll see more of both at the Emirates Cup this weekend….

More soon…

Web 2.0 vs Web 3.0

devday — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 22:55:55 +0000

The emergence of Web 3.0 is become more of a real proposition, with mixed reactions. For those of you not in the loop, here’s an insight into Web 2.0 and 3.0…

Web 2.0 was the “second generation” ways of working within a web environment. Many websites have historically been a set of pages and these pages link to each other, exchanging data via URLs and QueryStrings. Use of frames, forms and server side scripting gave the user the passage from the start to the end.

Web 2.0 is all about exposure of data and seamless transition of data. These two points can be illustrated by RSS feeds and Ajax respectively. Web 2.0 is commonly become the standard that uses XHTML as a code-base and a CSS stylesheet to control the layout. Ajax allows Javascript to grab data real time. Throwing in terms like XML and DOM complete what’s it’s all about.

There are many examples of using Ajax in the net at the moment, where a user requests pulls data from a server and changes what the customer can see without refreshing. Web 2.0 also has adopted the “social networking” facade which allows more interaction from customers with user comments, blogs, forums and member networks.

Designers have also adopted this and the new BBC site is a combination of all things 2.0…

So what is Web 3.0. Well, it’s the next evolution in the web and masterminded by Google. The idea behind this is that there will be a central repository of services. Websites will be able to work with third party systems seamlessly.

You may already see this working on some sites that use post code lookups and find my nearest stores. It’s basically have an interface to the many existing tools out there. Google has been busy creating libraries to do all sorts of things, and even now you will be able to integrate your web site real time with services such as Google Maps and Google Calendars. Soon there will be more… but the question is how can this help an eCommerce site?

Web 2.0 didn’t give as much, but as on offset to the website, you could do snazzy little “basket additions” etc using Ajax if required.

Web 3.0 promises to give much more to the eCommerce arena, with integrated services and libraries of web services continually becoming available. Google being the pioneers and many other services from payment gateways, social networking sites and of course Microsoft, soon the world of Web 3.0 will be your oyster.

The Etiquette of Salutations

devday — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 14:13:01 +0000

It’s an interesting thing, salutations, what is the standard way of wording a greeting? With postal mail, there was a simple rule. If you knew the person, it was “Yours Sincerely”, if you didn’t it was “Yours Faithfully”. All letters started with “Dear” or “To whom this may concern”… you’d never send a letter without the greeting or the sign off.

So how should we approach emails?

I’ve always started my emails “Hi X” and signed them off “Kind Regards, Y”.

Some research on the Internet sent me to this site called EmailReplies.Com and here’s a good definition.

You can start your e-mail with ‘Hi’, or ‘Dear’, and the name of the person. Messages can be ended with ‘Best Regards’. The use of Internet abbreviations and characters such as smileys however, is not encouraged.

Source: http://www.emailreplies.com/Email_policy.html

So that leads to the question… if someone in a professional company sends you an email which doesn’t have these – are they being rude? Or does the company have not email etiquette?

Let me know your thoughts…

A Brilliant Zoom Tool

devday — Sat, 15 Mar 2008 16:12:13 +0000

Some sites have product zooms which just don’t work, other’s have popup’s which take ages to open and then just show the same image… it’s really annoying sometimes when you just can’t make out the product you’re trying to buy!

Websites need to sort this one out, and that’s exactly what Foot Asylum have done.

They’ve just relaunched their site and they’ve got a pretty good way of working with product zoom’s.

When you mouseover over the image (on the left), a zoomed in portion appears (on the right) and you can move your mouse around and the selected portion moves with it.

The site is one of the most innovative and well designed sites I’ve seen.

The link is http://www.footasylum.com, gone on take a look!

Building Your Web Team

devday — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 10:20:09 +0000

In the last 24 months, the world of eCommerce has been rapidly growing. An increasingly significant portion of sales for a lot of top mail order companies is now happening online. This rapid transition from marginal curiosity to business critical sales and marketing channel has created a skills gap within organisations that is hampering the growth potential of their businesses.

The white paper from Paraspar talks all about the team that’s required for building a successful web team. I’ve downloaded it and it’s worthy of a good read. Here is a brief outline and link:

1. What is the scope of the team?
2. What are the roles in the team?
- Senior Management roles
- Marketing roles
- Technical roles
- Customer Service roles
- The Agency roles
3. Putting The Team Together
4. Skills, Availability and Pay

The full white paper can be downloaded directly from their site:
http://www.paraspar.co.uk/Building-Your-Web-Team-Ateampaper/

Dropdown Menu’s & How To Use Them Effectively

devday — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 16:50:27 +0000

Today I am taking a look into dropdown menus featured in many eCommerce sites. A very useful tool if used right.

Dropdown menu’s have historically been used for showing sub categories, for example, the main category would be at the top of the page and when moused-over, the subcategories would appear. In the fashion industry, for example, the main categories would be Mens, Womens, Kids. A dropdown menu is handy here to subsquently show the subcategories. Mouseover Mens and items such as Jackets, Trousers etc would appear. Mouseover Womens and items such as Skirts and Blouses.

This type of menu system really helps and makes the subcategories available instantly.

My favourite interpretation of this is on John Lewis, here’s a screen grab.

As you can see, when you hover over technology, the site shows you more details on four subcategories and then further links to sections within there.

Welcome to “The World of eCommerce”

worldofecommerce — Wed, 12 Mar 2008 13:33:20 +0000

Welcome all and thanks for reading… In this blog, I will be blogging my thoughts of the market, good ideas I see, help on some subjects that I find interesting and links to other blogs and site that I think are useful…

I’ve been working in the internet arena for over 10 years now and I’ve always thought, there is so much I’d like to share… and finally I’ve created a blog. I’m a developer by trade, but interested in all aspects of the web and eCommerce. I like to think I have an eye for design even if I can’t seem to portray what’s in my head onto Photoshop like some of you guys can!

I hope you find an interesting read… happy reading!