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Video Game Industry Lessons for eCommerce Businesses
Before you dismiss the notion that video game industry is actually a good example for eCommerce companies, I'd like you to consider the following information. Over 25% of men aged 18 and below play video games. The majority of video game players in the US are between 18 and 35 years old. So either most of them have the purchasing power now or will be the bulk of people that have it in the nearest future. These are the millennials, who currently spend the most money shopping online in the US.
That's why the video game industry is a great example: it has the right consumer base. These are also the people, who are likely to be good with new technologies in the future. The consumer reactions to various decisions by game producers and publishers can tell businesses a lot about the mindset of their prospective clients and the business practices that won't fly with savvy online shoppers. Let's take a look at some of these examples, which might help you build an ethical and prosperous business online. The following tips should work for the majority of eCommerce niches.
Here's Why Your Magento Store Needs Dedicated Hosting
When evaluating dedicated server solutions for Magento, it might be tempting to go for low cost alternatives such as shared hosting.
But, you always have to remember: cutting costs that may potentially lead to decreased performance of your store is very dangerous. Dedicated hosting solutions offer scalability, stellar performance, flexibility and optimal security. A shared hosting solution can’t guarantee any of these features.
In this article we’ll show you exactly why a dedicated server for Magento has the perfect combination of great features, crafted together to create the ideal conditions for running an online business.
Top Magento 2 POS Extensions (Point of Sale)
Point of sale integration is very important for businesses that combine offline and online presence in their operations. In fact, for many industries, POS integration is a must-have. It provides the necessary level of flexibility and control that allows businesses to easily adjust to the fluid and, sometimes, unpredictable market conditions.
If you're running a Magento store, then finding an adequate POS solution is not a problem at all. There are dozens of great providers, who will also consult you and even perform the integration for you. There are tons of great point of sale extensions at Magento Connect that you can test. But what about Magento 2? What's the situation with point of sale solutions for the latest iteration of the biggest eCommerce platform?
Unfortunately, the current lineup of Magento 2 POS extensions is limited, to say the least. In fact, there's only a handful of providers, who offer a solution at this point. Mainly because POS integration requires complex coding and Magento 2 is relatively new. It's expensive to develop POS solutions for Magento 2. But, the situation is getting better.
In this post we'll review the available POS extensions for Magento 2 and detail their differences, so you could make a more educated final decision.
Top 6 Magento Form Builders
Forms are essential for lead generation. In fact, they're essential for most of the customer acquisition efforts. It's pretty obvious and doesn't require that much explaining. You have newsletters, you have mailing lists for specific offers, etc. And for most of these people signed up through a form, in one way or another.
And that's why it's unfortunate that Magento, by default, doesn't have that much functionality when it comes to creating custom forms for your users. Be that a pop up form on your blog or a sign up form in a sidebar - there isn't much you can do to make it work. That's even more true, if you're not a tech person.
Fortunately, there are tons of great Magento extensions that can help you create amazing forms for your promotions, deals and other lead generation efforts. We wanted to highlight and review some of the most popular Magento form builders that can work for any type of Magento store and eCommerce niche.
5 Rules for Building a Successful Online Store on a Tight Budget
Many people feel that they can’t open an online store because it seems like a costly endeavor. But the truth is very different. We live in the internet age. Freemium business model is the go-to-market strategy for many businesses. There are many tools and guides online that can help you build a good online store with very limited investment, both in time and money. If you're on a tight budget, but really want your own eCommerce store - the following tips are for you.
Top 6 Magento FAQ Modules
Frequently Asked Questions, or more commonly known as FAQs, are an important part of your website's navigation and customer care experiences. FAQs provide valuable tips about anything, related to your company and/or your products. FAQ sections take the load off your customer support, increase sales and even boost your SEO. They are particularly useful for small businesses.
Having all of this mind, we decided to collect some of the best Magento FAQ modules that meet some of the most important requirements: usability, ease of use, quality, reliability and value. If you think that your site's FAQ section needs a makeover - this collection is a great place to find the perfect solution for your store.
How to Get Less Sales for Your Extensions
Yes, you read the title right. Now let us explain. If you follow our blog, you probably know that we review Magento extensions all the time. It's part of our marketplace and the product that we offer. That's why we go through a lot of extensions. Some are just reviewed, others used and implemented in stores, running through MageCloud.
This inevitably means that we look through a lot of websites/companies that offer Magento extensions: some are examined through Magento Connect; others - through the developers' websites, where you can also purchase the particular extension. So we have a large pool of websites/companies to compare from a customer's point of view.
And to be honest, a lot of times, it seems like the developers are not interested in selling the extension. We're not even talking about any competitive functionality. The way the extensions are presented to potential customers makes them less appealing. This could also be extended to any other Magento-related products, like themes. And that's why it seems that the devs are intentionally trying to hinder their sales with their sloppy attitude to product display and information. It's like they're trying to get less sales for their products.
So in this post, we'll review some of the common things that you can do to make your extensions LESS appealing. Of course, these are the things that you should NOT do, if you want to increase your sales. This post should help developers provide detailed/informative and appealing product info, which will convert more visitors into buyers.
Top Magento Infinite Scroll Solutions
Let's answer a simple question first, why would you need infinite scrolling at all? If you're running an eCommerce store then infinite scrolling might not be the best option for you. So, if you're a Magento store owner or manager - this would be the right time to re-consider you UX decisions. However, if you're focused on user-generated content or find that it worked for you in the past, then this option is not off the table. Not to mention, that in today's world of mobile devices, infinite scrolling might be a good design decision.
In this post, we'll review some of the most popular and effective Magento infinite scroll solutions, which also may be referred to as Magento AJAX scroll.
8 Awesome Magento Tab Extensions
Tabs are an important aspect of your website's usability. In fact, tabs serve as a tool for analyzing, sorting and prioritizing data, especially for younger generations of Internet users, who perceive tabs as standard functionality.
Tabs are especially important for product pages, as they allow you to separate product info and other useful details through a set of properly thought out tabs. This differentiation allows you to make your product pages more 'clean' and easier to perceive by your visitors. There are tons of great Magento tab extensions that you definitely need to check out, if you're still struggling with proper product information presentation and management. Maybe this is something that can boost your conversions. Some of the best solutions in this category are featured below.
Top 8 Magento Custom Menu Extensions
Menus are an important part of navigation and the overall user experience of your visitors. Think of menus, as discovery opportunities - a great menu allows visitors to easily find the products that they're looking for and stay on your website for extended periods of time. Out of the box, Magento doesn't offer that many options for making your website menus more user-friendly. That's also true for many of the themes that are available out there. Being able to control the content, usability and design of your menus is very important for conversion optimization.
This post will highlight some of the more popular and diverse Magento custom menu extensions that have been 'battle-tested' by thousands of Magento users. While some people argue that mega menus are awful for website navigation - we decided to include these products in the list too. First of all, mega menus are pretty much a standard for online stores with tons of categories and products, since there aren't that many other options to display all of categories and products at once. Secondly, today's users are very familiar with mega menus, because top brands, like Columbia, use them. It's not something the users have to accustom themselves to.