12-11-2000

Welcome to the inaugural edition of Total Site, Inc.'s NetCompass Newsletter!

Widely known for their modesty and reticence (and keen sense of irony), the employees at Total Site would like to introduce this service with as little fanfare as possible. NetCompass is Total Site's newsletter covering internet news and web trends. We're not looking to clutter inboxes, only to provide a quick read with information that might prove relevant to our clients. As our first foray into the e-zine space, you can expect NetCompass to be refined over time. In fact, we encourage our readers to provide us with feedback and criticism. Just be gentle, we're talking about artists' fragile egos.

Successful E-commerce Transactions

Most researchers report a conversion rate of 2-4% for good e-commerce web sites. I may be a writer, but even I know those figures mean up to 98% of shoppers abandon a cart or leave a site without making a purchase. Potential customers on an e-commerce site can run into more obstacles than a Microsoft mediator. Some of those obstacles are discouraging enough to cause customers to abandon purchases immediately, while others produce a cumulative deterrent. Deterrents that might stop a customer cold range from limited credit card acceptance to a lack of informative content. A recent usability test showed that a widely used online pet food store actually lost sales because the store only accepted MasterCard and Visa – some customers only carried American Express and Discover. Now I don't know any of these people, but rest assured they're out there, and your company had better be prepared. The same tests also showed that a consumer shopping for a modem abandoned the purchase because information on computer and operating system compatibility was not readily available. Obstacles of the cumulative variety begin as mere nuisances, but can just as easily terminate a transaction. When combined with other minor annoyances, something as small as different font sizes in form fields can lead to a dead sale. One of the web's greatest assets is the ease with which most of these hindrances can be modified. Take the time to learn about your customers and what might impede them in making a purchase.

Yahoo Drops Free Submission Option in Commercial Categories

Joining a growing number of search engine and directory services, category killer Yahoo has dropped free submissions for commercial sites in the corresponding portions of its directory. Businesses seeking site placement in the "Shopping and Services" or "Business to Business" sections must now pay a $199 fee, the same fee charged for the older "Business Express" option. Free submissions will still be accepted in all other areas of the directory, including regional commercial areas. Like its predecessor, the new pay service guarantees only that your site will be reviewed within seven days. No guarantees are made for inclusion. With competitor Looksmart now charging for all directory submissions and the recent growth of GoTo.com's pay for placement service, the move from Yahoo was almost inevitable. As long as Yahoo maintains its market share among directory services, Total Site will continue to recommend their pay service. Yahoo is like Coke, it's the oldest and most popular brand.

To Learn more about Yahoo, click here http://www.yahoo.com\0

Make-or-break Holiday Season for Many Pure-plays

Anything short of a prolific holiday shopping season could leave large "pure-play" online retailers as shaky as an Irish peace accord. Analysts say that most suffer from the same problems: grossly underestimated startup costs and an overabundance of competition in specific market spaces. The past few weeks have seen a number of the bigger e-tailers fall, like Garden.com, Pets.com and MotherNature.com to name just a few. The trend of e-tailers acquiring and merging with competition should continue with more market corrections and a steady reduction of startup money. Forrester Research reports that as shareholder and consumer confidence in pure-play retailers diminishes, online shoppers will look to brick and click names such as Land's End and L.L. Bean – companies that have successfully incorporated their online ventures with their brick and mortar/catalog operations. The decline in consumer confidence can be traced directly to poor customer service. In fact, service was so poor last holiday season that a number of large online retailers who mislead customers about shipping delays agreed to pay over $1 million in civil penalties and write formal letters of apology to me. Customer service is a costly business component and with cash already in short supply, online retailers have been forced to cut corners. Research has shown that small web merchants and e-tailers with already well-established brick and mortar customer service receive the best consumer response. Insert shameless self-promotion here: And it just so happens that our Gold Cart e-commerce application is designed specifically with the small web merchant's needs in mind. This holiday season should provide quite an interesting shakeout – one in which companies that can make sock puppets famous but can't sell enough Whiskas will vanish as quickly as an overweight actor to a Polynesian atoll.

Add Alta Vista to Growing List of GoTo Partners

One of the last bastions of free search engine placement has crumbled. Well not really, but search engine portal Alta Vista has joined a growing list of partners that include GoTo's paid search results with their own. Several GoTo links now appear in the "Sponsored Listings" at the bottom of AltaVista's search results page. Whether you agree with the pay for placement model or not, companies that fail to recognize GoTo's strategic partnerships may miss an opportunity to extend their message across a number of web properties. GoTo's partners include Netscape Search, AOL Search, Lycos and Hotbot. With Alta Vista on board, GoTo now supplies four of the top ten most popular search engines with some kind of paid results. Total Site is now working with GoTo.com and thus far, the results have been promising.

To learn more about Alta Vista, click here http://www.altavista.com

To learn more about GoTo, click here http://www.goto.com\0

HTML Mail: A Powerful New Tool

You've probably heard of HTML email, but you might not be sure of what it is or why you should care about it. HTML mail uses the same coding as an HTML web page, providing users more formatting and graphics options than plain text email. If you see Total Site's web site links in this message, then you're looking at HTML mail. The HTML email format has been in use for several years now, but because it is just catching on, the vast majority of email delivered to your inbox is still plain text. Many email clients today have the capacity to read HTML mail including, Microsoft Outlook '98, Outlook 2000, Outlook Express 4 (with Internet Explorer 4), Netscape Communicator and Eudora 4+. There are various reasons why you might not be able to read an HTML email, but the problem often lies in email processors - particularly in corporate email systems – that have a habit of stripping the necessary formatting codes. As email systems upgrade and compatibility issues are rectified, there is little doubt as to whether HTML mail's popularity will grow. Forrester Research reports response rates to HTML mail twice that of plain text email. Clearly, it is a more visually potent mechanism to communicate your message. The NetCompass newsletter is powered by HTML mail and the Mail Mule email list management system. For more information on either of these, please contact Total Site or visit our web site, www.totalsite.com.

Domain Name Hoaxes

Total Site warns all of its readers of a domain name registration scam operating out of Canada. "Hits" receive letters warning them that applications for domain names similar to their own have been submitted for registration in 'bad faith'. The goal is to scare people into registering the specified domain name for $35 /year. One of Total Site's clients received such a letter and immediately called us for consultation. Be advised, the letters appear legitimate. The link below takes you to a sample:

http://www.electronicdomainnamemonitoring.com/\0

Is Customer Service Dead?

Perhaps shoppers always enter into an unwritten contract when they choose to make purchases online. There's certainly an implied risk in exchanging monies electronically and a degree of uncertainty interacting with machines rather than humans. In the end, however, humans are behind those machines. Or so I thought. Two weeks ago I attempted to give an online computer superstore my business. Apparently, they didn't want it and at best, they wanted it on their own schedule.

I initially made a purchase for a spindle of recordable CD's. With rebate included, it would have been a great deal. I placed the order and quickly received notification via email that my order was being processed. All was well. The Thracians hugged the Persians, CBS made entertaining television and the French stopped shooting at Greenpeace boats ‹ it was a good day. I should have tempered my delight in the simplicity and efficiency of the transaction.

The order: November 28th. Cause for concern: December 4th. The original email notification claimed that my product would ship in 24 hours. Unfortunately, I missed the fine print where it also said that this company invented the internet and that cold fusion research is a waste of time.

I called "customer service" because I had neither the product nor any communication from the company. I waited 30 minutes on hold, only to be transferred to another line by one of the curt, unresponsive lower primates employed at this online venture. I waited an additional 45 excruciating minutes without talking to a single human being and finally hung up out of sheer frustration.

That same afternoon I emailed customer service in the hope that some response would be issued. I have yet to receive any type of reply. I can only assume that the email was lost in a pile of electronic communication to which the bonobos pulling levers at the store's customer service department are supposed to retort.

The next afternoon, I placed the first of two calls and was again thrown into a telephonic limbo, the likes of which has only been seen in Dante's Fifth Ring of Hell. I waited no less than 35 minutes to speak to a human or otherwise. Suffering a mild heart attack at the mere prospect of human interaction, I quickly recovered and explained to the quasi-sapiens that I wished to check the status of an order. The "employee," most likely enduring a degenerative brain disease, HUNG UP ON ME.

After cleaning blood from the recently exploded vein in my head, I foolishly made a subsequent attempt to reach a being with higher functions. I can assure you, I did not achieve success. I spoke to one of the assembly line attendants in Corporate Sales after re-visiting phone purgatory for 10 minutes. I made my request of human interaction lucid to the derelict employee, using colloquial English as well as a series of grunts and similar guttural sounds. Utterly disregarding said request, the wastrel returned me one last time to the communications netherworld. Waiting a full 30 agonizing minutes, I again hung up the phone out of frustration.

This so-called superstore's ineptitude is, in a word, shocking. To say that my experience with the company was unsatisfying would be like saying that the Beer Hall Putsch was a bunch of German frat boys playing drinking games. The spindle finally arrived and just over a week late. Naturally, the rebate failed to make the trip. Two results from my experience. One, I will never shop at this store again. Two, every opportunity I get, I will do my best to steer customers away from them. Business 101: Never Underestimate Good Customer Service. In the end, I was wrong - there are no humans behind those machines.

Note: The views of the editor do not necessarily reflect those of Total Site, Inc.