Video Tutorial: CSS Design, Part Two
In the conclusion of our two-part video tutorial on CSS layout and design, we will take the layout we created in the beginning of this tutorial and begin to apply graphics and other visual stylings to it, in order to achieve the look we are going for.

In Part Two, we will be looking at how to identify the basic graphic elements we need. From slicing the images out of our original Photoshop document to optimizing the images in Photoshop to applying the images correctly to our page, we do it all in this tutorial.

We start by breaking our Photoshop document down into the basic graphic elements we need to achieve our design goals, and then proceed to optimize each graphic element. Once created, we apply graphics to our page using a variety of CSS techniques that can be intimidating to designers. By the end of this tutorial, we will have quickly made a basic web page using HTML and CSS that almost exactly matches our original Photoshop document.

Please feel free to download and…

Click Fraud Not Top PPC Concern
Click fraud has been a popular topic of discussion for a number of years, and it doesn?t appear the issue will fade away anytime soon. The industry is full of various numbers thrown around putting the click fraud rate anywhere from .02 percent (claimed by Google) to 30 percent or more. Who should you believe about click fraud, and how much should you be worried?

First of all, it?s important to understand the real rate of click fraud can vary significantly from one company to another; thus, you should take any click-fraud rate numbers with a grain of salt. The percentage of click fraud will depend on a dozen different factors, such as ad position, bid price and specific industry type. The more competitive the industry and the more you pay per click, the more incentive there is for others to try to defraud you.

Second, it?s very important to understand that click fraud by itself is not the determining factor in whether your pay-per-click (PPC) campaign is a success. I have…

Shopping Cart Software And Ecommerce Information

SEO: Metrics That Matter
Out with the old, in with the new. In terms of SEO, what?s falling by the wayside?
Obsessively watching indexation numbers and rankings on ?trophy? keywords (like the one you know the CEO always checks first thing in the morning).Worrying yourself sick over ?duplicate content penalties.? Relying on Sitemap XML files to fix your indexation problems (News flash: Your rankings will still stink!).Exchanging links.

What?s hot in SEO?
Truly understanding and leveraging the power of ?long tail? dynamics.Becoming a trusted contributor within Wikipedia, Digg, StumbleUpon, Netscape and Reddit. Building your network in MySpace, Flickr, LinkedIn, YouTube, Bebo, MyBlogRoll and the blogosphere in general, and then reaping the rewards of ?network effects.? Building custom search engines and rallying your community to help improve it.Link baiting.

So how do you measure the impact of this sort of stuff? A new generation of SEO metrics, that’s how. Gauging your success on…

Product Spotlight: Mercado 4, Surveys, And More
One Stop Site for Wholesale Products

WorldwideBrands? new OneSource is an online database of thousands of wholesalers representing millions of wholesale products. Users can search by product category for specific items and can export results to Word and Excel. The site contains market analyses for each wholesale product, keywords that consumers use to search for that product and more. One-time fee of $299 gains access to the site. Worldwidebrands.com.
Merchandise Products Automatically

Mercado Software?s new Mercado 4 helps ecommerce merchants maximize both conversion percentages and overall profits. With Mercado 4, merchants can automatically position best-selling products, close-out products, high-margins products and so forth. Using this software, merchants can customize site search results (best sellers, highest margin, most inventory) and can also quickly deploy banner ads for preferred products. Mercado 4 pulls from analytics programs, inventory management programs,…

Shopping Cart Software And Ecommerce Information

eBay Isn’t The Only Auction Site
In the time zone-crossing, closing-bid-countdown world of online auctions, everyone knows the place to turn a quick buck ? or at least where to get started: eBay. Yet in a transformation that mirrors the way the Internet continually reinvents itself, the auction world has changed. It’s no longer all about eBay.

“Ten years ago, you could probably sell pencil lead for 10 bucks,” said Crystal Wells-Miller, cofounder of the Online Web Traders Alliance and an employee of software developer and merchant service provider Vendio. Now, however, “sellers are disposable on eBay. I hear a lot of people saying, ‘hmm, there’s gotta be something more than just doing this grind every day.’”

“It was like a gold rush,” says Jason Jacobs of Coresense, which develops management software for ecommerce businesses, “and it did what gold rushes do.” That is, the initial frenzy quieted down.

Now, scores of auction prospects promise the same big payoff as the original. Sites like uBid, Bid4Assets,…

Product Spotlight: Mercado 4, Surveys, And More
One Stop Site for Wholesale Products

WorldwideBrands? new OneSource is an online database of thousands of wholesalers representing millions of wholesale products. Users can search by product category for specific items and can export results to Word and Excel. The site contains market analyses for each wholesale product, keywords that consumers use to search for that product and more. One-time fee of $299 gains access to the site. Worldwidebrands.com.
Merchandise Products Automatically

Mercado Software?s new Mercado 4 helps ecommerce merchants maximize both conversion percentages and overall profits. With Mercado 4, merchants can automatically position best-selling products, close-out products, high-margins products and so forth. Using this software, merchants can customize site search results (best sellers, highest margin, most inventory) and can also quickly deploy banner ads for preferred products. Mercado 4 pulls from analytics programs, inventory management programs,…

Shopping Cart Software And Ecommerce Information

Video Tutorial: CSS Design, Part One
Designing search engine friendly websites can be intimidating, particularly for designers who are just learning how to use CSS formatting. One of the most intimidating aspects to learning CSS design is creating page layouts that do not rely on tables. In the first of a two-part video tutorial by Practical eCommerce’s online director Brian Getting, we will look at some of tricks and techniques used to create flawless CSS page layouts.

In Part One, starting with a Photoshop layout, we will look at how to markup an HTML document based on our design needs, and create the proper code we will need to get the results we are looking for. Once we have our markup in place, we finish Part One by using CSS to create a formatted two-column page layout that does not rely on tables or other non-compliant code.

Once we achieve a lean, efficient layout, we will find ourselves ready for Part Two, where we will learn how to apply graphics and visual styling to our layout in order to match it up…