William Cameron | Beyond the Keyboard

In computer programming, SOLID (Single responsibility, Open-closed, Liskov substitution, Interface segregation and Dependency inversion) is a mnemonic acronym introduced by Michael Feathers for the "first five principles" identified by Robert C. Martin in the early 2000s that stands for five basic principles of object-oriented programming and design. The principles when applied together intend to make it more likely that a programmer will create a system that is easy to maintain and extend over time. The principles of SOLID are guidelines that can be applied while working on software to remove code smells by causing the programmer to refactor the software's source code until it is both legible and extensible. It is typically used with test-driven development, and is part of an overall strategy of agile and adaptive programming. S - SRP - Single Responsibility Principle - A Class should have only a single responsibility. O - OCP - Open/Close Principle - Entities shoul...

For the 2013 holiday shopping season, consumers will increasingly rely on marketplaces and comparison-shopping channels.  Amazon, Newegg, Ebay, Google Shopping — all have huge numbers of motivated shoppers.  Ecommerce merchants large and small can sell on these channels. But not all of them will do it profitably.   1. Products. Identifying winning products is the first step. Research last year's best sellers, evaluate new products, and consider niche offerings and up-sells.  2. Sourcing and inventory management.  Ensuring product availability is crucial. The necessity of placing orders early and check for add-on items. 3. Product content and feeds. Compelling images, descriptions, and videos are all important for selling products on marketplaces and comparison-shopping channels. Optimize your product content and data feeds. 4. Pricing. Understanding your margins is vital for profitable multichannel selling. Understand dynamic pricing and stra...

Lots of developers understand that object oriented code offers advantages over procedural programming. And so, they begin working on creating objects in their own projects, and eventually feel pretty good about what they've done. After all, if they're using objects, their code must be object oriented, right? Well, not exactly. They quickly find out just how limited their code is when they try to implement the concepts of object oriented programming, like reuse and extensibility. And they quickly find that their code is really procedural code wrapped up in classes, not the grand object oriented application they thought it was. But how can you know ahead of time what kind of code you have? Is there a set of tools you can use to determine if your code is truly object oriented, or is it just procedural code wrapped in classes? Let's take a look at the hallmarks of truly object oriented code and find out. Object oriented code splits responsibilities between classes. The big...

Add link back to category that allows sort-by-customer-review. Include star ratings on cross-sells. Use Expert / Staff Reviews Show money back guarantees right on product page when available. Allow customers to ask and answer questions on your page. Include manufacturer’s website URL and contact number on the product page. Enable comments on customer reviews. Know when to offer live chat. Source: http://www.getelastic.com/thinking-positively-negative-reviews/

Shopping cart abandonment is an epidemic in online retailing, with some companies reporting that more than 60% of checkouts end without a conversion. Preventing even a relatively small percentage of these abandoned carts would significantly improve revenues and profits. While purchase price and shipping costs are the leading reported causes of shopping cart abandonment, ease of use is close behind. Fighting Frustration One increasingly popular method used to slash cart abandonment rates is to introduce single-page, Ajax-driven checkout forms that combine the convenience of a single page format with asynchronous form validation. As we start this discussion of the pros and cons of single-page, Ajax checkouts, I need to describe why these two methods—one pagers and Ajax—are employed and what frustrating problems they seek to solve. Single-Page Checkout is Faster, Easier to Understand Single-page checkout is faster and easier so that more customers convert. When you're trying t...

Recent studies indicate that 7 out of 10 online shopping carts are exited before a sale is completed. This abandonment rate seems to be rising, as online shoppers become more comfortable comparing prices and other product or service attributes. SeeWhy , a website conversion service, reported that shopping cart abandonment rates rose from about 71 percent in mid-2010 to 75 percent by June 2011. These figures are much higher than the rates of about 46 percent that Forrester Research reported in early 2010. In the past, each cart abandoned was seen as a sure sign that a sale had been lost, but this may not necessarily be the case. “Shopping cart abandonment is an important part of the normal buying cycle for many customers and for many types of purchase,” wrote Charles Nicholls, founder and chief strategy officer for SeeWhy in a whitepaper on the topic. “This leads to the conclusion that abandonment, rather than being a rejection of the brand’s value proposition, can be a step in ...

An abandoned shopping cart is like a broken promise. For the merchant, there is a lost sale and unclaimed revenue. For the shopper, there is an unfulfilled need or want. Fortunately, a quick series of cart abandonment emails may renew that promise, helping both the customer and the retailer. Roughly two out of every three (67.35 percent) ecommerce shopping carts are abandoned after consumers have selected items and placed those items in the cart, according to April 2013 data from the Baymard Institute , which averaged documented online shopping cart abandonment rates from 19 separate studies conducted in the last few years. Shopping cart abandonment can happen for a number of reasons. Forrester Research, as an example, has consistently blamed shipping and handling costs. Imagine that a shopper finds the perfect $25 item, adds it to the cart, and learns that it will cost another $15 — more than half of the product’s price — just to ship. At other times, a shopper might have become...