Sell to International Customers

One powerful thing about internet is people from all over the world can see your web site. Make sure to sell to those international customers.

Format
Your online form should be designed for international users. For example, many order forms have a nice drop down menu of the 51 US state codes, but reject non-US addresses. Also, the forms reject phone numbers that are different than the 10-digit, North American format, 555-555-5555. Each country has its own format; if your form only takes your home county's format, international users cannot order your products. Give your forms flexibility for different local address and contact information.

Encoding
Having a multilingual website attracts more customers from all over the world. If you want to do this, using UTF-8 encoding is the best bet. It is the only encoding type that allows you to display multiple languages on the same page. (Most likely, that's why all major international search engines -- Google, Yahoo, and MSN -- use UTF-8.) And, you don't have to worry about compatibility. UTF-8 is supported by both the Mac and Windows operating systems, and most Internet software like FireFox, IE, Outlook, Thunderbird, do too. Keep in mind, some cell phones do not support UTF-8. If you are making content specially for cellphones, you need to check on this.

Measurement
When you give size of your products, show them in different measurements, i.e. for shoe size, US 8, UK 7-1/2, Japan 26, or for length, 5 inch and 13 cm. You should not expect all of your customers to be able to convert measurements correctly on their own. You may think these are "just measurements," but giving these conversions will greatly reduce the return/exchange rates for your products and increase your customers' satisfaction.

© December, 2006



Article by Akinori Furukoshi of http://www.thatswise.com
For complete list of FREE articles, please visit at
http://www.thatswise.com/free_articles.html

Say No to New Technologies

A couple of years ago, I said not to use nifty effects on web pages [Open in New Window] . There has been a giant leap in web technologies, but now I want to emphasize even more: don't use nifty effects.

Server
According to research by WebsiteOptimization.com, an average web page contains 50 objects and weighs more than 300KB. That's insane. It would take too long to download. Most servers, even Microsoft, cannot send data faster than 500kbps, per visitor (Apple and Google are a couple of exceptions). That's because dozens of people visit your site simultaneously (otherwise, you aren't making any money), and even if you have a dedicated server, you are sharing the internet connection with somebody else's servers. So, no matter how fast users' internet connections are, it will take 5 seconds to send a 300KB-page (300 kilo "binary bytes" / 500 kilo "bits" per second = 4.9 sec.). That is too slow.

Browser
After downloading all the objects attached to the page, you'll be lucky if the browser displays the page with that irritating, choppy scrolling effect. The browser will often crash or freeze. When that happens, that will be the last time people visit your website.

Search Engine
Moreover, web objects won't work well on search engines' cached pages. There are people who prefer cached pages over originals because the searched keywords are highlighted, but even though your page is ranked highly on search result pages, the web objects turn people away.

I Say Again
As I said two years ago, don't add anything to your web pages that doesn't help to sell your products.

© September, 2008

Article by Akinori Furukoshi of http://www.thatswise.com
For complete list of FREE articles, please visit at
http://www.thatswise.com/free_articles.html

Why I think PayDotCom is the Best Affiliate Marketplace on the Net!

Hi

Arnold Manlises here...

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- OR - (the best part)
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