When a shopper provides a merchant website with their credit card they are going to first look for the closed padlock symbol in their web browser indicating that your site is using a valid SSL Certificate.  If your site processes credit card numbers or other confidential information like social security numbers or even addresses then you should be using an SSL Certificate, which encrypts personal information into an indecipherable set of gibberish.

In fact, SSL Certificates are one of the criteria in order to be PCI Compliant.  You will need to make sure your site is utilizing PCI Compliant Hosting as well.  When shopping for a web host, this should be one of your first questions.  If they are confused or don’t understand PCI Compliance then you should move on to the next host because this can put your livelihood at jeopardy.

In order to prove that you are a reputable business you should always put a physical address of your business to prove that you actually exist.  Even if you are running your e-commerce business out of your spare bedroom, you want to make your site look as professional as possible.  It is also always good to have a phone number where customers can reach you in case they have a question or a problem.  Shoppers want to feel confident that if there is a shipping problem or other issue, you will be able to be reached and are honest.

In the e-commerce industry, the PA-DSS has been a major topic lately.  As of July 1^st, all e-commerce payment applications must be compliant with the new Data Security Standard.  Payment applications include software like shopping carts.  It is imperative that as a storeowner, you make certain that your shopping cart is compliant.

Miva Merchant Hosting provided by WebNet Hosting is fully compliant with the PA-DSS and have been premier Miva Hosts since 2004, making them experts in the e-commerce sector.

Each month we profile a client that is operating a successful e-commerce site in our newsletter and blog.  This month’s company is Russell Rhodes,  located online at RussellRhodes.com.   Russell Rhodes is a seller of customized and personalized Christmas ornaments, many of which are original designs.

Russell Rhodes is happy to extend a special offer to receive 25% off all personalized ornaments using the following coupon during checkout:

Coupon code: 25WN0810
Offer: 25% off all personalized ornaments
Expiration: Aug 31, 2010

The following is an interview with Denys Slater, President of RussellRhodes.com:

When did your site launch?  Give us a brief history of your business.
We launched in 1997.  We sell over 2,000 unique and custom personalized Christmas ornaments, many of which are original designs by Russell Rhodes.

How long have you been using Miva Merchant?  WebNet Hosting?
I used Miva Merchant once around seven years ago and I didn’t like it.  I tried it again last year, thought it was much improved and I now use it on over eight websites.    I have been with WebNet for about six or seven years.

If applicable, were you using Miva before you switched to WebNet?  If not, what made you switch?  If so, what made you signup with WebNet?
I was looking for a robust shopping cart software that could handle a lot of custom data fields, as everything I sell is personalized.  Nothing involves just a “add to basket” button.  I switched primarily to leave a suppressive, horrible, unfriendly company called Dydacomp and their shopping cart called Sitelink.

What do you like most about Miva Merchant?
It has the power to handle a lot of customer data input very well via attribute fields.

What do you like most about WebNet Hosting?
The service and help desk have been absolutely amazing.  I have NEVER had an experience even half as good as WebNet Hosting.  WebNet is the fifth hosting company I have used in nine years and I have every reason to believe I’ll never need to go anywhere else.  Seriously, I cannot tell you how wonderful it is to get a technical question answered at 1AM right when I need the answer.  The longest wait time I’ve ever had in the peak of the day has been 40 seconds.  Every need has been met and it’s really the people at WebNet that make it what it is.  PJ and Vincent have been invaluable to me.

What do you like least about Miva?  What are some common problems?
It’s still very “1990″ in terms of uploading data.  You can’t upload categories, headers, footers …  the list is long.  Even when you take into account all the modules out there, nobody makes a module to upload all info (for example: categories).  I have two different modules that upload various parts of categories, but nobody makes a module to import the category images.  So, I have to go hand code the image paths x 180 categories.  Very antiquated in terms of data upload.

What do you like least about WebNet?  What would you change?  What features would you add?
Seriously, the only thing you could add would be a personal masseuse while I am speaking with tech support.  I’m joking, of course, because I don’t have the slightest complaint about anything.  I can’t find one.

How many items do you offer for sale on your site?
I have nine Miva websites with WebNet Hosting.  I’m adding two more over the next two months.  All together, I offer over 5,000 products.

What Miva features do you use most?
All my %^&(* modules.  Without them, I couldn’t use Miva at all.

Which are your favorite modules and why?

I couldn’t live without toolkit and the prod and cat templates.  However, without the other import utilities, I still wouldn’t use Miva.  I simply can’t enter 25,000 pieces of data by hand.

Have you had any third-party development done on your site?
Yes.  I’ve taught myself html and a little php, but I couldn’t find a book on “Miva script” so it was a better use of my time to hire someone.  But even that was difficult.  There were not a lot of “Miva coders” clamoring for my business.  I felt lucky to find two very good ones.

What do you use for credit card payments and what have your experiences been?
MasterCard and VISA.  I won’t pay Amex fees.  I added Paypal and, as expected, sales went up 20%.

How many employees do you have?
Eight of my nine websites are seasonal for the Christmas season.  So from January through August, there’s one employee — me.  From October through December, there are usually about fifteen people working in various capacities.

What are your strategies for SEO?
You’d have to hire me as a consultant.  My main site is PR6 and ranked in the top 2 spots for over 100 keywords.  All other sites are the #1 page for their dozen or so keywords.

What were some of your biggest mistakes? (so that others can possibly learn from them)
The biggest mistake I made was paying an SEO firm $500/month for 10 months until I fired them.

What have been your biggest successes?
Deciding to do my own SEO.  Studying Google’s algorithm for 700 days.  I did a lot of live site testing, with the final result a close approximation of their mathematical model for ranking sites.  And then continuously testing and following SERPs over time because Google’s algorithm is dynamic.  And so are their penalty models.  In the end, it’s a big math formula, and I’m amazed in hindsight how much “opinion” there is about a math formula.  In the end, it is only and utterly math.  Brilliant math, but still math.  This means it can be understood by anyone.  There’s no need to have a “professional opinion” about what Google will like.  In addition, listening to what Matt Cutts says on video or writes in his blog doesn’t hurt either.

Take the time to peruse the inventory at RussellRhodes.com today!

The definitive goal of SEO is to move your site to the top of the SERP, thus increasing traffic, page rank, visibility and conversions – otherwise known as web presence. As research has proven, increased sales are the direct result of a strong web presence and what company wouldn’t want to boost their sales? SEO is primarily accomplished by building quality organic backlinks through various methods such as article marketing, directory listings, press release distribution, e-newsletters and signature linking on blogs and forums.

The meta tags (title, description and keywords) of a web page are also key elements that search engines use in order to categorize and rank web pages. Most times, these tags remain invisible to the visitors of a site because they are in the head section of the HTML document. Meta tags provide information regarding page content and consist of keywords describing the page’s subject matter. In-depth keyword research is at the heart of a successful online business. Utilize Google’s Keyword Tools to figure out the best keywords for your site.

For the owners and operators of businesses operating on the Internet, especially those carrying a vast array of products and/or services, creating exclusive meta tags for each and every item/page can be a daunting, lengthy and drawn out process. The Miva Merchant Shopping Cart simplifies this procedure and consequently, gives the online entrepreneur more time to focus on the actual operation of their business.  In face, Miva Merchant is regarded as the most customizable shopping cart software on the market.

With Miva Merchant 5.5, you can attribute unique descriptions, keywords and titles to the bulk of your pages by simply editing three page templates. These templates are known as Storefront, Category Display and Product Display. By utilizing these templates, you can save time, headaches and ultimately money.

The Storefront template allows you to create and easily apply the most effective meta tags and title for your home page. On the other hand, with the category and product display templates, you can quickly and painlessly create and apply tags and descriptions to all individual product and category pages.

It is imperative to use the most searched for words so that page rank can improve and traffic to the site can grow. This will, in turn, lead to higher sales. Always remember that finding and using dynamic keywords is a crucial component of the SEO process.

Each month we profile a client that is operating a successful e-commerce site in our newsletter and blog.  This month’s company is Youngevity,  located online at Youngevity.net.  Youngevity is an authorized distributor of a line of healthy mineral supplements created by Dr. Joel Wallach.  The following is an interview with Christopher Scruby of Youngevity.net:

When did your site launch?  Give us a brief history of your business.
Originally we started on the web in 1995 writing natural health articles and marketing products for Dr. Joel Wallach (of “Dead Doctors Don’t Lie” fame).

We did not even have a shopping cart then. At that time it was phone in only and needless to say it was a slow process. We built our first websites with Notepad. There were few service providers that were stable at all and would crash constantly with nonexistent tech support. It was hard to keep a business up and running.

How long have you been using the Miva Merchant Hosting services from WebNet Hosting?
We found Miva in 2004. But we did not use it right away, mainly because our old host was having trouble making it function.

We moved our first site to WebNet in September of 2009, and then in December we moved our entire web presence to them.

So you were using Miva before you switched to WebNet?  If not, what made you switch?  If so, what made you sign-up with WebNet?
The hosting company we were with was not really able to support Miva well and minor problems became disasters. The site was not able to stand without constant intervention, sometimes offline for 24 hours or more. It was not a good way to do business online; totally self-defeating. We spent weeks working on the site to finally see orders coming in then it would stop, only to discover that the site was down and my last host was clueless as to how to fix it. Finally, we were out of business during Christmas and our old host was moving the server (during Christmas)? This was too much and it was then we found WebNet to be the best solution.

My hat is off to PJ and Vince of WebNet, who took a disaster (my Miva storefront), moved it, fixed it and had it running in 24 hours.  Actually, they moved two Miva storefronts. One was damaged and we had a hard time getting the files to make the move. We would have lost a year of work, not to mention Christmas sales revenue, if the WebNet team had not jumped in to fix it so quickly.

I cannot say enough about the WebNet crew! They are PRO and they respond quickly when I need them and seem to have the right answers. I have never seen this type of instant service in 15 years on the net.

What do you like most about Miva Merchant’s shopping cart software?
I like the Miva interface mainly because it is predictable in form and function. Once you get the learning curve behind you it becomes second nature to make modifications.

Making mods is well supported in the forums and if you do make mistakes, it is easy to revert to a copy that was working before.

Making product changes is not a big hassle as the fields are well defined and you do not have to be a tech guru to update product data on the fly. For us, this is crucial since we offer about a thousand items and they change all the time. Miva makes this so easy to manage that even our non-tech staff can update product data with little hassle.

What do you like most about WebNet Hosting?
This all comes back to the point, we were doing ok before WebNet, we stayed in the game but there were always problems on our site that would make it tough for us to grow. Plus, we had no real solid tech support to point us in the right direction. We are finally able to show a consistent growth of sales and revenue starting from the time we came to WebNet until now. We are having one highest ever monthly profit after another.

It is the same site, what is the difference? There has been minimal disruption of service for one thing. These servers are very stable and I always get immediate response from support. WebNet’s servers are fast; this translates into customers not leaving because of slow response.  A hidden benefit of fast servers is that search engine spiders will get deep into your site where you want them, as the time a spider stays on one site is short and limited by design. I can compare this activity to my older logs and see that there was nowhere near this much activity by the spiders before moving to WebNet.

This is key to being in business on the web. Speed of service, stability, durability of service.

How many items do you offer for sale on your site?
We currently have about 800 different products from 14 different product lines with more to add.

Do you use any modules?
Just the show basket and the mini basket. We try to keep the site as simple as possible because it seems as though our customers are more interested in getting right to the point which is getting their product ordered securely, rather than shopping on a flashy site.

Have you had any third-party development done on your site?
No, we have been hands on since the start in 1995. It makes more sense to me to be able to keep hands on rather than count on a “would be” developer to keep it updated for you. I have seen that go far astray of what is considered optimal in managing a site.

What do you use for credit card payments and what have your experiences been?
We have always handled credit card payments in house and never had problems.  Then again, we are still old school in that area. We have always taken security very seriously in this office and work behind layers of firewalls and limited access to our processing system.

How many employees do you have?
We have a small crew here of less than ten team members so everyone has overlapping functions.

What are your strategies for SEO?
First and foremost, I don’t spam the head tag with unrelated tags and keywords. Also, I spend time daily studying my logs to see keyword trends. Don’t make the mistake of guessing what people are searching to find you. Always remember that trends change and if you are not paying attention you will be yesterday’s news. Also, write real content (articles with some real meat on them) and never ever copy another person’s articles — having duplicate content is a sure path to page 1000 on the results. Furthermore, follow the Miva Forum for SEO tutorials because one can always glean new insight from the Pros.

What were some of your biggest mistakes? (so that others can possibly learn from them)
Read the SEO section above. Those lessons were learned through painful experience. Also, as you can see, the wrong hosting provider can do more damage to your online marketing efforts than you could ever possibly imagine. It hides out there as a hidden “WHY” things are not happening for you. If you are not on top of it you will be out of the game before it starts. Make sure the host is not limiting your bandwidth or dumping you on an overloaded shared server with a spammer that keeps getting your whole IP block banned for Viagra ads. You laugh — but it happens frequently! Don’t cheap out on domain services. We had a few heart stoppers in the early days with domain registration services. Go ahead and register your site for at least five years just for piece of mind. We had a (not to be mentioned here) cheapo registrar that actually gave my prime domain to my competition over the phone. So save the heartache. Spend the bucks with a reputable service.

What have been your biggest successes?
I guess the biggest success has been that I am still here doing this business online after starting from scratch with a 33mhz computer, 4megs of ram, two 20 meg hard drives, Windows 3.1 and a 1400 bps modem that was so slow, I could put coffee on and get the kids ready for school in the time it took to load a web page and download the email, providing it did not crash … 15 years ago!

Finding WebNet was a stroke of luck and for the first time I have been able to get back to building new sites and upgrading my existing sites, instead of constantly having to deal with crisis management. The professional hosting environment frees up a lot of energy one could waste on substandard providers, which by their nature are a risk due to incompetence.

Thanks for everything, WebNet! I feel we have finally arrived!

Take the time to visit Youngevity.net to learn more about their healthy mineral supplements and Dr. Wallach’s ideas!

ENSURE COMPLIANCE NOW WITH MIVA MERCHANT:
Today, June 1st marks the day that all e-commerce websites must ensure that they adhere to the new PA-DSS (Payment Application – Data Security Standard) as established by the PCI (Payment Card Industry). The PCI is composed of all major credit card companies and establishes the guidelines all merchants, payment applications and web hosts must adhere to.

Featured WebNet Hosting Site for February 2010

AwesomeAlmonds.com

Each month we profile a client that is operating a successful Miva Merchant site in our newsletter and blog.  This month’s company is Dr. Lankin’s Specialty Foods, LLC, located online at AwesomeAlmonds.com.  This site specializes in selling all natural flavored roasted almonds containing no cholesterol, artificial preservatives, added cooking oils or the guilt that goes along with most snack foods. Here is an interview with Dr. Kenneth Lankin, MD, owner and operator of AwesomeAlmonds.com.

What is the name and URL of your business?
Dr. Lankin’s Specialty Foods, LLC
http://www.AwesomeAlmonds.com

When did your site launch?
2002

Can you provide us with a brief history of your business?
As a physician, I founded the company because I was inspired by the research demonstrating the many potential health benefits of almonds including lowering cholesterol and reducing the risk of colon cancer.   In 2002, none of the large food companies were selling almonds based on their nutritional value.  So along with my business school classmates at the University of New Haven, I created Awesome Almonds® — a line of flavored, roasted almonds made with no added cooking oils.  Since I was in full-time practice, family members and other partners formed a team to run the company.  Going “online” with a website and online store was critical because maintaining a brick and mortar facility wasn’t feasible.

How long have you been using Miva Merchant?  WebNet Hosting?
We’ve been using Miva Merchant since 2002 and WebNet Hosting since 2007.

So you were you using Miva before you switched to WebNet Hosting.  What made you decide to sign-up with WebNet Hosting?
Yes, we used Miva as we started the business.  We switched to WebNet because we were having problems with frequent glitches with our previous hosting service, resulting in lost orders, missing payments and countless hours spent trying to rectify all these computer generated mistakes.  For our Miva makeover, WebNet was one of two companies suggested by Chuck Lasker.  I contacted both and decided on WebNet Hosting because of their superior customer service.  No regrets.

What do you like most about Miva Merchant?
The many available modules and the flexibility to grow proportionally to the needs of your business.

What do you like most about WebNet Hosting?
Customer service is #1.  I enjoy talking to real people who speak clearly and take a genuine interest in resolving issues.  The expertise level is high hence problems are solved quickly compared to talking to a call center halfway around the world where the rep has to put you on hold for 10 minutes while “checking something” (probably finding a supervisor who actually knows something or doing a Google search on your time).  Having said that, the inherent quality of the service is so good; we don’t need to call that often.

What do you like least about Miva?  What are some common problems?
Miva is not intuitive in many ways.  For example, to make adjustments to coupons, one must enter under the hyperlink about “order fulfillment.”  OK … I get it now but that’s not where I’d think to look.  To see the 2^nd page of the list of coupons one needs to hit a button called “update” (rather than “next page”).  Also the maintenance requirements seem complex.

What do you like least about WebNet?  What would you change?  What features would you add?
I can’t think of anything I don’t like about WebNet.  The online features are very useful, for both account and website management.

How many items do you offer for sale on your site?
We offer our three almond products: Cinnamon-Vanilla, Orange-Vanilla & Cocoa-Java — roasted, flavored almonds in various combinations.  We also have Awesome Almonds® mugs for sale.

What Miva feature(s) do you use most?
UPS pricing.

Do you use any modules?  Which ones?  Which are your favorite and why?
Yes.  Basket Tracker.  Buy X Get X Free.  Payment via PayPal.  Checkout button label.  Bread crumbs.  Basket tracker and bread crumbs are among my favorites because they help our customers navigate and track their pending purchase.

Have you had any third-party development done on your site?
Yes.

What do you use for credit card payments and what have your experiences been?
We use First Data Services and Authorize.net.  Authorize.net is awesome.  We have only been with First Data a short while.

How many employees do you have?
None.  We are all very part-time and virtual.  But put together the team makes things happen.

What are your strategies for SEO?
We are consistently on the first page of Google for the search term “almonds.”  The main ingredient, I believe, is our original and relevant content.  Ninety percent of our site is dedicated to providing information rather than selling.  Secondly, we’ve been at this for over 8 years, long before other companies became aware of the health benefits of almonds.   I have to believe the search engines give us some “credit” for our longevity on the topic. We also liberally provide samples of our products to bloggers specializing in the review of quality foods.

What were some of your biggest mistakes? (so that others can possibly learn from them)
Not realizing the differences among hosting options.  We started out with a good but very generic company.  It worked fine as long as we weren’t busy.  Being with a smaller but more specialized hosting company that understands the technical requirements of Miva has resulted in much improved uptime, faster page load times of our site, faster online processing for our customers and less time spent correcting errors.

What have been your biggest successes?
Top 3 Accomplishments:

1)Awesome Almonds® won first prize for two consecutive years for “Outstanding Snack Award” as voted by the Connecticut Specialty Food Association.  The Cinnamon-Vanilla flavor won the 2008 award and the Orange-Vanilla flavor won the award for 2009.

2) Awesome Almonds® was chosen as a supplier to Well Baskets, an enterprise that creates healthy baskets centered on health and wellness.  Like us, they are a family-oriented company who believes in the power of healthy food to help prevent disease and maintain good health.  Well Baskets, LLC is clearly among the premier companies in the healthy gift basket segment.  Their customers are precisely the people who would appreciate and enjoy our products: a physician-created snack.  We are not trying to be all things to all people.  We have a special product.  We really don’t want to be in Wal-Mart or other mass “big box” stores. Well Baskets is exactly the kind of specialized retailer we enjoy working with:  great people, great products, and a harmonious business model.  As we both have substantial presence online, it re-emphasizes the power of the Internet.  Our website is not only for the retail consumer, but also a way of forging new and creative business relationships.

3) We have a customer in England who has been ordering from us online during the holidays for over five years straight.  At times the cost of shipping has exceeded the cost of the product.  I’m sure there are plenty of excellent snack foods available in England but despite shipping costs, Awesome Almonds® has become a holiday tradition for that family.  That’s success!  It wouldn’t have happened were it not for the Internet, continuous improvements, and the excellent service we receive from WebNet Hosting.

Thanks to Dr. Lankin for participating in our interview!

Featured WebNet Hosting Site for January 2010

PlumbTile.com

Each month we profile one of our clients who are running successful Miva Merchant sites in our newsletter and blog.  This month’s company is Plumbtile.com – the premiere online retailer of luxury bath, tile and kitchen products all with the industry’s most competitive pricing.  Here is an interview with Lucy Rojas, CFO of PlumbTile.com.

What is the name and URL of your business?
Plumbtile
http://plumbtile.com

When did your site launch?
January 2004.

How long have you been using Miva Merchant?  WebNet Hosting?
Three years for Miva Merchant and WebNet Hosting.

Were you using Miva before you switched to WebNet?
We signed up at the same time.

What do you like most about Miva Merchant?
The variety of modules and can be applicable for different types of businesses.

What do you like most about WebNet Hosting?
No hosting problems.

What do you like least about Miva?  What are some common problems?
The customer service and technical support. They tend to refer us to the module vendor often times.

What would you change about your hosting?  What features would you add?
We don’t like to request tech support by email. If there’s an important issue we prefer to solve it with a phone call.

How many items do you offer for sale on your site?
Over 275,000 items.

What Miva features do you use most?
Import/Export, upload products.

Do you use any modules?  Which ones?  Which are your favorite and why?
Import/export, discount, feed shopping carts. Our favorites are those too. We get a lot of use out of those. We use a bunch more though.

Have you had any third-party development done on your site?
We have had outside consulting on page views, social media strategies, and the visual design of our site.

What do you use for credit card payments and what have your experiences been?
Authorize.net. We’ve been satisfied with it.

How many employees do you have?
10.

What are your strategies for SEO?
We have directory links, multiple blogs showcasing our products with links back to our site, Facebook and Twitter accounts, meta tag rewrites, properly spider-crawled .txt pages and domains that make sense to our business.

What were some of your biggest mistakes?
Working with inexperienced consultants.

What have been your biggest successes?
Steady increase of sales at above industry rates in a down-turned economic cycle.

Thanks to Lucy Rojas for participating in our interview!

If you are a Miva Merchant merchant, Miva host or just interested in learning about e-commerce, then you should check out sunny San Diego and get educated! I sure wish I was going to be in San Diego in February rather than the cold, dark and dismal abyss of the DC metro area!!

For detailed information, visit the 2010 Miva Merchant Conference page.