August – the month of sunshine, holidays, inflatables and the following not-to-be-missed eCommerce news.
Pack it up, pack it in
Branded packaging superstar, Arka, has partnered with shipping API superstar, easypost – bringing custom packaging to your fingertips. Unboxing experiences have increased in popularity over the past year – enhancing the customer experience and gaining free #Insta coverage. This equally beautiful partnership creates an easy way for eCommerce sellers to enhance shipping for them and their customers.
Chitter chatter
Shopify has released Shopify Chat – a native live chat function that allows Shopify store owners to have real-time conversations with customers. Once installed, the Shopify chatbox will appear on all website pages – making it easy for customers to ping you questions and give you feedback. Even better, you can use the chatbox to share product recommendations, discounts and draft orders.
And, that’s not all that Shopify was busy with this August. Two big infrastructure upgrades have been automatically enabled for all online stores – reducing the time it takes for traffic to get to their servers and providing automatic support for the highly optimized WebP image format to online stores. All at no extra cost.
New mandatory eBay item specifics
eBay has given sellers a heads-up about new mandatory item specifics effective from 8 October. The categories covered include:
– Home, Furniture & DIY
– Clothing, Shoes & Accessories
– Jewellery & Watches
– Toys & Games
Find out the specific details here.
Etsy’s advertising
Etsy has introduced a new powerful advertising platform: Etsy Ads. Working across Etsy and Google Shopping, users will be able to set a single daily budget and monitor performance in one place – making advertising simpler. Etsy Ads will appear in your Shop Manager shortly, and those already using Promoted Listings and Google Shopping will receive an email too.
Caipirinya!
Brazillian payment platform, PagBrasil, has released its revamped PrestaShop module – providing a seamless payment experience for online shoppers. Accepting local credit and debit cards, online banking transfers and boleto bancário, PrestaShop sellers can take full advantage of the largest market in Latin America. We’ll raise a caipirinha to that!
Amaz-ing tools
Some great news for Amazon sellers this August. The marketplace giant announced that it is well on track to investing more than $15 billion this year in infrastructure, tools, services, people and programs to help online sellers succeed. 150 releases have been launched so far this year, including Sold by Amazon, Target Inventory Levels and the global rollout of the Amazon Marketplace Appstore.
We can’t wait to see what’s next.
When you wish
Dreams are coming true over at Wish. To encourage a wider selection of new and unique products, Wish sellers can receive free additional impressions across the channel.
Not selling on Wish? Create a new merchant store before the 26 September 2019 and your $2,000USD fee will be waived.
Wooooooo 3.7
WooCommerce 3.7 has been released and it’s snazzy. The second major release of 2019 includes new and improved product blogs, performance enhancements and a new PHP and WordPress minimum version requirement (for ultimate optimization).
Head here to find out more.
Beautiful entrepreneurs
Beauty and wellness brands are all invited to participate in Shopify’s new program: #iAlso. Partnering with the Beautycon Festival LA 2019, the new program will “empower business owners with the education and tools to start, scale and grow their beauty and wellness brands.”
Congratulations Magento
Adobe Magento has been named as a Magic Quadrant Leader in the Garner 2019 Magic Quadrant for Digital Commerce report. The report specifically recognised Magento’s rich features, customizability and seamless third-party integration. Congratulations!
Aye!
Amazon opened its first Scottish Clicks & Mortar shop in bonnie Scotland this month. Offering smaller eCommerce sellers the opportunity to promote goods in-person. 10 Clicks & Mortar stores are set to open across the UK this year – we’d love to know if you’ve been taking part.
Price increases
Unfortunately, there have been a couple this month including:
– DHL express price increases of an average 4.9%; and
– Amazon seller fee increase for French sellers.
BigCBD
BigCommerce has launched a streamlined way for merchants to sell hemp and hemp-derived CBD products via the platform. BigCommerce for Hemp & CBD contains tools and services tailored to the market to ensure legal sales and distribution.
In other eCommerce news
eBay is collecting and remitting internet sales tax for Ohio from September 1st, Etsy is looking for research volunteers, Etsy’s got growth, FedEx ended its partnership with Amazon, Amazon is repricing products for you and eBay sellers are moving to Managed Payments.
Over on Expandly, we’ve been running a series all about selling on eBay. Topics covered include: Starting an eBay business, eBay product research tools, eBay listing tools, eBay order management software and much more. Check them all out on our eCommerce blog page.
And, when it all got too much…
Amazon told how just how much it loves dogs.
If you want to be featured in next month’s eCommerce news roundup – drop us an email here.