In two previous posts (part one/part two), we discussed how to do an ecommerce site audit. Using the recent example of an audit we conducted for a multinational client, we described what to collect and how to present your findings.
Here is part three, something that may surprise you. It’s a list of the many technologies and pieces of software that comprised the site, a Yahoo! Store that we had developed for our Global 1000 client over several years.
Breadth of Ecommerce Technologies
Most retailers don’t realize how much code is added over time to their original site configuration. As new technologies and services become available, retailers (or ecommerce experts such as FastPivot) must decide which to test. (After deciding, you need to do a lot of A/B testing to confirm which can raise sales and profits). Here is the inventory of technologies we identified and itemized for the client:
- AddThis code: for social engagement
- Baynote Cross Sell
- bazaarvoice: product reviews link
- Bill Me Later
- Channel Intelligence Beacon
- Clickshift code
- Custom Webtrends Tags
- DataXu scripting
- Facebook “Like” plugin
- Floodlight tags on some pages
- ForeSee results: customer/visitor surveys
- Google AdWords
- Greenbooks/WDSR files (Order Motion / Rackspace server)
- jQuery (JavaScript library) – version 1.6.1 or higher
- Meta page types (homepage, category, sub-category and product pages)
- Misc Shopping Comparison Engine tracking beacons
- Monitus (Google Analytics tracking code)
- Moxie Chat code: 3rd party solution for real-time chat
- MSN adcenter tracking
- Scripts stored and used from Yahoo’s hosting environment and Rackspace
- Site search: governed by Rackspace server scripting
- VWO (Visual Website Optimizer) testing
- Yahoo Web Analytics
In the final post in our four-part series, we’ll discuss the recommendations we made to the client to ensure the Yahoo!-to-Magento migration was as friction-free as possible.
