Brian's blog

One of the biggest customer complaints we're seeing on our stores are fund holds due to failed AVS checks. Here's what happens:

1. A customer visits your store and attempts to make a purchase. The customer enters an address that does not match the billing address for the card. This fails address verification system (AVS) that most merchants use to detect and prevent fraud. The order doesn't progress past the store's payment gateway and does not turn into a sale.

Come on over to our forum and join in the conversation!

The eCartReviews forum is home to a ton of info that every e-commerce merchant needs to know. All the bases are covers from shopping cart solutions, merchant accounts, shipping solution, SEO, marketing and much more.

eCommerce Merchant Forum

Please stop on by and say hello. You'll find the merchants to be friendly and helpful.

Link Building Brain Dump

Here's a list of link building ideas and rules of thumb for store. I'll update as I think of ideas. Got any of your own? Drop them in the comments below and I'll add them to the master list.

Cookie Stuffing - The Reason Why You Should Not Have an Affiliate Program.

Merchants need to aware of a tactic used by sneaky affiliates to rob store of marketing money.

What is Cookie Stuffing?

What is really being described is the practice of automatically simulating a physical click of an affiliate link. Generally, it is used to described a simulated click that is happening on a web site versus a simulated click happening through adware. Although occasionally people will use the term in conjunction with adware.

Check out this software for creating and editing RSS feeds:

http://www.jitbit.com/rss-feed-creator.aspx

RSS feeds are an easy way to bring in fresh contect to your site. FeedBurner is a powerful tool and can be used for SEO.

ebay reports decline in Q4 earnings. This this a sign of the times?

New Aplus.net Premium Shopping Cart: Built for Online Store ...

A press release from Vcommerce.

Nortel Breathes New Life into the eCommerce Experience, Announces ...

Interesting press release about SEO and Shopping Carts.