Internet Marketing and eCommerce Expert – Nigel Burke's Blog

Imagine if there was a way where you could find out if someone mentioned your name, business name, product or service on the Internet.

Now you can with Google Alerts!

Why do you need to know?
Before I tell you how to setup a Google Alert, I need to let you know why it is so important to monitor this kind of activity.

It’s an exciting time because Adobe have just released the latest website authoring tools that most website designers and developers use everyday.

I cannot think of day when I do not use Photoshop or Dreamweaver. As I write this post, they are both open.

The industry standard for web design is Adobe Photoshop and Dreamweaver. For over 10 years, web developers have used Dreamweaver to build all sorts of web pages.

Google Place Listings is the results box when you even a search query that may be location specific.

There is no hard rule for when the business listings will be displayed but it usually appears when a keyword is about a location or the type of keyword would be loacation specific.

If you entered pizza into Google, it would then show the business listings. The same would happen for accomomdation, hotel or motel.

These listings can be a very powerful tool that you can use to list your business above everyone else. Managed right and you will be up the top. Do the wrong thing, and you will be removed very quickly – within hours!

The iPad has now been released in Australia. Some iPads have been circulating around in Australia which were imported from the US. It has now been launched in Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and the UK.

In Sydney, eager customers waited overnight to be one of the first people to purchase an iPad in Australia. Most Apple stores sold out of the iPad within the first day of release.

Magento have released a new version of their shopping cart system. It is called Magento Professional aimed at small businesses.

What is Magento?
Magento is an open source shopping cart system. It is a very complex shopping cart for advanced shopping carts. I have only setup a couple Magento shopping carts where are I have setup dozens of osCommerce, CRE Loaded and Zen Cart shopping carts.

YouTube has just turned 5 years old. This is a website that changed the Internet. If you imagined 10 years ago that you could upload a video and share it with millions of people around the world, you would have been told that you were mad!

Today – YouTube has 24 hours of video being uploaded – every minute!

Today – YouTube has over 2 billion views – everyday!

What is Google Wave?
Google Wave was launched last year which is an online document service allowing a number of users to edit documents and collaborate. There was a lot of excitement when it first launched but that excitement soon faded away. It is now a product in it’s own right.

At the Google I/O conference this week, Google unveiled GoogleTV. This is a similar concept to WebTV and AppleTV. None of which have become mainstream.

Maybe with Google’s branding, they can push it further than any of company can?

Google has teamed up with Sony, Intel and Logitech to produce products that will compliment GoogleTV.

Facebook has had it’s challenges. Growing to over 400 million users within a span of a few years is one of those challenges. With this many members, it’s hard to keep everyone happy. Just look at the backlash they got when they changed the interface. That caused all sorts of PR problems.

Big W has taken the plunge and entered into the online retail market. They have launched their online store available here – http://bigw.com.au.

Compared to the North America and Europe, Australia is lagging behind in the world of ecommerce. Large department stores such as Myers, David Jones and Target do no have an online store.

The launch of the Big W store is great news for ecommerce in Australia. It means that the large chains may start investing some real money into selling online.

Online stores such as OverStocked, DStore, and Big Brown Box have been open for a number of years now. Australian consumers are getting used to buying products and services over the Internet.

About Big W Online
The Big W store has over 4,000 products in a variety of categories -

• Electronics
• Baby
• Photo
• Home & Garden
• Fashin
• Entertainment
• Toys
• Sports & Leisure

Delivery Options
Australia post is being used for delivery of products. It seems like a fairly simple pricing structure is being used. Pricing for packages are as below -

• Packages less than 500 grams will cost $4.98
• Packages less than 10 KG will cost $9.98
• Packages over 10 KG cost around $20
• Express Post is also an option but costs extra

Payment Options
PayPal is being offered as a method of payment. PayPal is not offered on other Woolworths websites such as Wooolworths and HomeShop.

Prices Online
Big W have stated that there is no price difference between it’s online store and it’s normal stores.

Features
Front page
The website appears to be nice and simple to navigate. The frontpage does have a lot of pictures and banners trying to get your attention. I think this could have been cleaner in design.

Reviews
There is a reviews and ratings for products. Customers like to read reviews and ratings from other customers. Just like testimonials can make customers feel satisfied that they are ordering a quality product.

Product images
The product images have a nice popup display. Other images of the product are displayed as thumbnails. This makes it really clear that other pictures of the product exist. I think this is very nice.

Estimate delivery
The estimated delivery charge is a great tool. By entering your postcode on the product page, you can see exactly how much you are going to be charged for delivery. There is nothing more annoying to a customer when they need to go through the checkout procedure to see the cost of delivery.

Tell a friend
The tell a friend tool has made an appearance as well. A nice lightbox appears with the opportunity to email the details of the product to a friend. Many online stores benefit having this tool.

Stock levels
You can check the stock levels of particular products as well. By entering in your post code, you can see the stock levels at many of the Big W stores. It also displays the distance to each store. If the store is low in stock, it displays the phone number so you can call that particular store. You could call the store and check for stock and maybe they could reserve the product for you.

Overview of features
The features of the website have been nicely done. You would expect that from a large department store but even they can get it wrong sometimes.

The lightboxes (popup windows) load very quickly. There’s nothing more annoying then these being broken.

The website still has a couple of formatting issues to resolve. Some of the text goes over the background in some places. I am sure they will will these up as the site continues to be improved.

Wrap Up
It’s great to see a large department store go online. Overall, I think it will help push online sales in Australia and hopefully the other department stores will follow suit.