Posts Tagged ‘marketing’

Dabs bundle irrelevant products together

Thursday, June 17th, 2010

I am searching for a high resolution LCD/LED monitor. So when dabs send me an eshot promoting Samsung 23″ Wide SM2333SW 5ms DVI TFT Gloss Black, I open it up.

I am very excited to see “Get A 2m HDMI Cable FREE! Use Bundle Option 1!” on the product page. It makes me think Samsung SM2333SW support HDMI, and stimulates me to buy it. Then suddenly I am very disappointed after reading its specifications:

Signal Input
DVI-D, VGA

Where is HDMI? No, there isn’t one. Why bundle HDMI cable with a monitor does not support HDMI? Who knows!

Make an offer of getting Y quantity of any products for free in Magento

Wednesday, June 2nd, 2010

最近我还写了一个程序,是为了一个非常特殊的促销模型写的:买 X 送 Y。具体是这样:从产品 A 组里每买 X 件,可以从另一堆产品 B 组里任选 Y 件,白送。但 B 组产品同时也是独立销售的,如果有人买了 X 件 A 组里的产品,同时买了 Y+1 件 B 组里的产品,那么其中 1 件 B 组产品不白送,该卖多少价就是多少价。

我认为 Magento 自带的促销模型已然非常强大,能用一个非常好用的 GUI 组装出千变万化的规则。无奈 my client 脑子更强大,总是想一些 Magento 天然功能以外的点子。我研究了 Magento 天然的 Buy X get Y,发现它是针对 X 和 Y 是同个产品而作的规则。论坛上也有人变通作出 buy X of product A, get Y of product B,但我这个难点是 get Y of any product from B group,meanwhile all products from B group are for sale,我想是不可能通过 Magento 自带的促销模型完成的。

设想一下,顾客购物车里有三项产品

  • product A1 from group A: Quantity X
  • product B1 from group B: Quantity Y
  • product B2 from group B: Quantity Y

因为 Magento 是逐条套用规则,再逐条套用 quote item,所以上述情况下,product B1 和 product B2 都满足规则,统统赠送。为了解决不该送的数量被送掉了的问题,必须抛弃 GUI 了,动手编程吧。还好,这个特殊规则并不难写,我写了两个小时,搞掂。

附注:不编程的话,还有一个不是办法的办法——turn product group B into a configurable product, and all the products become options。然后告诉用户,如果想得到免费赠品的话,add this configurable product to cart。但这样生添了一个 configurable product,其实这是 product group B 里产品的同质产品,同质产品却不同效应?这会给用户带来困惑,所以不可取。

Email notification best practice

Wednesday, April 21st, 2010

我见很多购物网站花很多力气组织语言,把邮件正文用日常交流的通顺的口气写出来,以为顾客会喜欢读这样的邮件,但我认为事与愿违。在快节奏的社会里,大家阅读任何邮件时已经习惯最多扫一眼,通知邮件类似于营销邮件,能得到顾客一眼的停留亦属非常奢侈。

比如,货物发运通知:

xxx先生,

我很高兴地通知您,你的订单xxx号的货物已交由xxx物流公司隔天送达。订单项下xxx商品预定数量xxx件,因库存不足,此批发送xxx件,余下的xxx件将于xxx天后发出。

谢谢惠顾!

通知中有很多重要信息,如果写进大段的文章,客人skim阅读时认为这是“你好我好大家好”式的寒暄,往往被忽略。因此,通知还不如写成bullet mark style:

  • 订单号:xxx
  • 物流公司:xxx
  • 预计抵达:隔天
  • 预定数量:xxx件
  • 已发:xxx件
  • back order: xxx件
  • back order ETA: xxx天

当然,以上纯bullet mark格式是另一个极端。在实战中,应以bullet mark展示重要信息为基本原则,适当组织可读的礼貌用语,通知邮件才会有理想的效果。

Make best use of Godaddy Free Products

Saturday, December 5th, 2009

我不算一个好顾客——很挑剔,但可以算是 Google, Godaddy 和 Tesco 的忠实顾客,因为他们的产品或服务几乎无可挑剔——又扯远了。

我要讲的是如何把 Godaddy 购买域名后的免费赠品用足用好。Godaddy Free Products 有 Free Hosting, Free Blogcast 和 Free Photo Album。虽然我另租 1&1 的服务器,但 Godaddy 这么客气,我想不要浪费了人家的热忱。再说,在  Godaddy Free Products 上搞搞实验,物理上跟生产服务器隔绝,用得也心安。

只是 Godaddy Free Products 既然是免费的,同时广告也来了。拿它来建商业站点肯定是不合适的,就是自己人搞实验对着广告也烦。有没有办法去掉?我稍作搜索就有答案:可爱的 css 发挥一下

#conash3D0 {display:none; }

因为答案来得太容易,没有我发挥的空间总不心甘。于是我又想,我每装一个软件都要去改 css,太烦;有些 一键安装的产品(比如 Free Blogcast 和 Free Photo Album)也不允许我改 css,怎么办?答案是 user css。以 Mozilla Firefox 3.5.5 for Fedora 11 为例,具体做法是:

打开 /home/{myusername}/.mozilla/profile.ini,看里面说的 profile path 是什么,通常是跟 profile.ini 同级的一个目录,名字是 {randomchars}.default。

在 /home/{myusername}/.mozilla/{randomchars}.default/chrome 目录下新建一个 userContent.css,内容是:

#conash3D0 {display:none !important; }

使用 !important 只是保证这条规则的优先权,对付目前 Godaddy 的广告条,不用也可以。因为不在服务器端动手脚,恐怕 Godaddy 到死也不会意识到它的广告被屏蔽了。万一它改进 javascript 来探测广告条的 display 状况,那 user 再换一条规则:

#conash3D0 {position:absolute !important; left:-10000px !important}

也是一样效果(你的显示器不会大于 10,000 pixels 吧)。不过 Godaddy 不会有时间整天琢磨这些玩意,所以有两条规则备用足以。

以此类推,对付 Godaddy Blogcast 广告,可以使用:

iframe.adFrame, div.adBanner { display:none !important; }

对付 Godaddy Photo Album 广告,可以使用:

div#wrapper div iframe { display:none !important; }

至于其他浏览器怎么建 user css,我摘抄一段前人讲的

Internet Explorer for Windows

1. Create a .css file in a convenient location using Notepad.
2. Tools menu, Internet Options, General tab, Accessibility button.

Opera

1. Create a .css file in a convenient location using Notepad.
2. File menu, Preferences, Page Style.

Do it inhouse

Tuesday, February 17th, 2009

技术方面,我喜欢亲力亲为,另一方面,我还没有资源可以让我不亲力亲为。

我曾分析过 outsourcing seo 服务的弊端,here is another negative case of outsourcing email marketing.

I received a newsletter from Tesco today, and happened to click on one of the embedded links. (I am not a newsletter reading fan. I seldom click on embedded links.)

I got a “404 Not Found” error when I natigated to that url. After a few seconds, I became aware Tesco link tracking system is hosted on http://ad.doubleclick.net/, which is on my black list. I assume Tesco have a third party doing email marketing for them, otherwise Tesco on their own have no reason to use ad.doubleclick.net as a click tracking provider.

Authsmtp verify Return Path address as well

Wednesday, December 10th, 2008

I use phpList to send newsletters to customers. I recently add bounced messages automatic processor, which require a seperate email address to accept bounced messages. Bounced messages are sent to From address if no Return Path is set in email envelope. Email programs such as outlook are not suitable to serve as a newsletter program because they do not have a setting for Return Path.

However, when I try to send out a test letter after I set up bounced messages in phpList, I kept receiving error messages from authsmtp saying From address was not authorised. I was confused because I had been using the same From address since I purchased authsmtp. It took a couple of hours to figure out From address referring to Return Path address.

So, I need verify the Return Path address as well before I can use authsmtp again.

向google学习

Friday, December 7th, 2007

Google不但在技术上领先,在marketing方面也是专家。现在g级容量的邮箱已经不稀罕了,google肯定比我更清楚这一点,但google的方案实在是高明——它不在容量上跟其它服务商攀比(就算给你5g的容量又怎么样?你还是会问万一我的邮箱存满了怎么办?如果你还是想着以防万一(其实哪有那么多万一),那你一开始肯定想找一个容量(在当时)最大的服务商。Google肯定不想落入与hotmail,yahoo的容量攀比之风,但google也不想落后,于是搞出一招容量扩增计划:而且每分每秒都在扩增。这招挺有意思,我粗略关心了一下邮箱增长速度,还挺快——每天扩增25m,如果新增的空间都被往来的邮件填满、往来内容都是文本的话,你一天24小时不吃不睡看右肩也看不完这些邮件,所以根本不用担心容量以后会不够用。

至少在可以预见的将来是不用担心的。