Ecommerce Pulse

How many apps or services do you use for your online store that let you track the ROI on your investment in that app, down to the dollar?

Jordan Gal of CartHook.com joins me today for a discussion about abandoned cart recovery emails. By sending effective abandoned cart followup emails, you can significantly boost your store's revenue with your existing traffic, and you can see exactly how much these emails are increasing your store's revenue.

Topics covered in this episode:

• How to get as much revenue as possible from the money you're already putting into driving traffic to your site
• Factors that have an impact on abandoned cart conversions
• How much of a difference abandoned cart software will make on your conversion rate
• Jordan’s recommended abandoned cart campaign to buyers and why it works
• Should you use discount codes to get people to come back to an abandoned cart? If so, when?
• What to consider when choosing an abandoned cart followup service
• Jordan’s new app that allows you to customize and optimize your Shopify checkout page to improve conversions

Links mentioned on the show:

• CartHook
• Klaviyo
• AbandonAid
• Rejoiner
• Bluecore
• One page checkout for Shopify
• CloudFlare
• Slack
• Help Scout
• Intercom
• My Notebook
• Trello
• Pomodoro
• Calendly
• Snagit
• Joe Rogan Podcast
• Tim Ferriss Podcast
• Zero to Scale
• Startups for the Rest of Us
• Hardcore History 
• Bootstrapped Web
• Carthook Podcast
• Jordan Gal on Twitter

I’m excited to announce that Richard Lazazzera and I have decided to partner up for a series of episodes. We haven’t set a definite end point, but we’re planning to do regular shows together about twice a month.

My main goal with this podcast is to help my listeners build and grow their ecommerce businesses, so we’ll be talking about strategies and tips for how to build your store and market effectively. We’ll also be talking about current events in the world of Shopify and ecommerce, our favorite apps and tools, and the projects we’re working on.

As we mentioned on the show, we’ll also be doing listener store critiques. One of the most common requests on the Facebook communities we’re part of is “Please review my store and tell me why I’m not getting sales,” and we’ve agreed to do live critiques on the show of stores submitted by listeners. To submit a store for us to critique, email your store URL Leighton at hello@envision.io. Make sure to mention how you’re driving traffic to your site and what kinds of results you’ve seen so far!

Topics covered in this episode:

• How to know when to put money into redesigning your site and how to go about it.
• What to look for when choosing a design agency/freelancer.
• Resources for finding awesome font and color combinations
• Tips on how to be prepared to work with the design company.
• Knowing if and when to hire professionals or do-it-yourself.
• Tips for designing your website yourself and making it look professional.
• How to get good photography for your site.
• Our favorite tools to manage your business.

Links mentioned on the show:

• A Better Lemonade Stand
• PixelDreams
• Upwork
• TailorBrands (affiliate link)
• Fiverr
• CreativeMarket
• GraphicRiver
• 99designs
• Crowdspring
• Font Pair: Find awesome Google Font combinations for your site
• Coolors: Find beautiful color combinations for your site
• Paletton: Use a color wheel to find great-looking color palettes for your site
• Gyazo
• ToDoist

Mojca Mars is a social media consultant who really knows her stuff, and today she shares her best strategies and tricks for making the most of Facebook. Mojca shares the secrets behind how to know when you should boost a Facebook post, why you should post valuable content directly within Facebook (rather than making someone click on a link), the next big social media platform you should get in on early, and why using tools like Hootsuite or Buffer can actually hurt your social media efforts.

Links mentioned on the show:

• Mojca’s blog post on Facebook Lead Ads: Everything you should know about Facebook’s Lead Ads before you get started
• Snapchat
• Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook
• The Buffer Blog
• Social Media Examiner
• @MojcaMars
• Super Spicy Media's Facebook page
• mojca@superspicymedia.com
• Mojca's free email course on Facebook ads

One of my most popular posts of all time is 11 top blogs you should follow as an ecommerce entrepreneur. That list was written back in 2013, and it's currently result #2 in Google when you search for "ecommerce blog," so I figured it's time for an update!

Here are the top ecommerce blogs I recommend you follow to stay on top of what's going on in the world of ecommerce. The blogs listed below will teach you loads of invaluable info about choosing an ecommerce niche,, conversion rate optimization, SEO, the latest tips and tricks for marketing your products, and lots more.