In January, Jason Billingsley and I presented a webinar on holiday and special event marketing for online retailers. We also have a number of blog posts related to the topic.

There truly is much opportunity to get creative with special event promotions. Today happens to be February 29, the only day that comes around only once in 4 years. It ain’t no Valentine’s Day, but many creative e-tailers are taking advantage of leap year with $29 deals, 29% off sales and other offers - some using jumping or frogs in imagery. (My favorite is the Container Store’s “Leap year happens every 4 years. Filing your taxes doesn’t. Get organized today!”)

A&E / History Channel

Aeropostale

Bluefly

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Well, it’s the end of the week and the end of the month - so it’s time to sit back and have a little chuckle. If you’ve ever given a Powerpoint presentation or been subjected to sitting through one, I’m sure you’ll “LOL” at this video!

And if you know of any ecommerce/business viral/funny videos for future Bloggers Digests, please pass them along to linda.bustos AT elasticpath.com, and we’ll link to you as a thank you.

• Bryan Eisenberg blesses us with Hidden Secrets of the Amazon Shopping Cart. Bryan’s been collecting screenshots of incremental changes to Amazon’s add to cart process for years (the first design of Amazon is priceless)! Each shot includes Bryan’s conversion optimization comments. A must-read.

• No doubt Amazon does extensive A/B testing on its design, but 75% of online retailers don’t. Perhaps the whole concept is intimidating? If you have burning questions, Future Now is teaming up with Google for a free webinar/clinic on website optimization and testing on March 11. If you have questions, even about your own site, you can submit them in advance and pick the experts’ brains.

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Public relations guru and author of Micro Persuasion, Steve Rubel, has taken a lot of heat this past week over his post SEO Shenanigans Pose a Clear and Present Danger to Social Media.

Rubel’s PR firm Edelman dipped into the dark-gray/black area of social media marketing (SMM) a while back - and the blogosphere hasn’t forgotten. Other intelligent comments on Rubel’s post come from SEO professionals defending their industry’s honor.

I don’t want to add to the debate here, but I will say that I agree with Steve that if you are “launching social media marketing programs solely for the purpose of influencing search engines, rather than with the intent of fostering collaboration and genuine communication” you fit the description of an unethical marketer.

But that doesn’t mean expecting an SEO benefit from social media marketing campaigns is evil. I don’t think that’s what Rubel was implying anyway (remember it’s the word solely that was empasized). But I wanted to throw in my 2 cents and clarify which social media marketing activities I believe really help SEO, which have minimal value and which are simply spam.

Social Media Marketing as a Link Building Strategy

The primary way social media or any other site can help your SEO is through attracting links. Social media can drive traffic that may convert, but search engines won’t factor that into their algorithms. So any dabbling in social networks for SEO purposes is essentially link building.

These links can be acquired directly or indirectly. This is what I mean:

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I heard a true story years ago about a telephone service in the UK, where lonely women would call to hear a soothing, pre-recorded male voice say things like “you know what, you’re really beautiful.” Apparently it was hugely popular.

Well, Australian natural male grooming product company Vitaman has put this idea on steroids with its interactive and innovative online store.

Meet Nikki, a leggy Micha Barton lookalike with an Aussie accent. She is your personal shopping valet. When you drag items into your shopping bag, Nikki complements you on your selection with lines like “Mmmmmm, this smells amazing on your skin,” and “Oooh, I love a brave sportsman who puts his body on the line.”

What’s genius is, Nikki changes her outfit for each product category, so that motivates guys to at least check out each product category. Unfortunately, most of the products on the shelf have identical packaging, so it might be a bit better for Nikki to give a quick spiel on each category’s offering and what makes them so amazing. You’ve got a captivated audience, girl, sell!

Another unfortunate is that products must be added to the bag to be rewarded with the purring praise for your selection. This means many overloaded carts filled with products not really intended to buy. But Vitaman makes it easy to remove items from your cart when you’re ready to check out. The best part of the cart is when you view your cart, Nikki says “Are you sure that’s all you want?” Don’t you wish you could say that from your cart page?

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Gmail is a popular email service, and chances are your opt-in subscriber list has more than a handful of these accounts on it. Did you know that Gmail disables images in HTML emails by default, even if your customer has added you to his or her safe list? Email recipients have the option of turning images on in Gmail, but many won’t because they haven’t noticed you can, or are simply too lazy.

Likewise, many email designers and marketers could improve their emails so they render nicely even with images blocked, but they’re too lazy. Or they never noticed there was a problem.

Well now you have no excuse. This post will show you what typical emails look like in Gmail - the good, the bad and the ugly. Plus, 8 tips for optimizing emails when images are turned off.

1. Provide a link to a web-based version of your email near the top of your message.

This is the simplest way to salvage a skeleton email. Unfortunately, Delia’s has no link - the email recipient must find Gmail’s link in the green area to see the offer.

Make sure the link is easy to find. Comp-U-Plus does a nice job:

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We social media marketing types toss around buzzwords like “user generated content” all the time. But Etsy is a unique ecommerce-slash-social-shopping-network that has truly made “user generated products” its hallmark. Selling only handmade items from different crafters around the world, Etsy is like eBay minus the auction.

In this electronic press release, Etsy sellers talk about the site, and how they enjoy connecting personally with their customers through the community, and with other sellers.

The site itself has a number of amazing Web 2.0 features like shop by color and a home page that shows you a live feed of new items as they are added - a bit like YouTube’s home page that shows currently viewed videos.

The Treasury is like Polyvore, where users create “sets” that others can browse and buy from - or user-generated cross-selling.

And the community can participate in forums, live chat, “Teams” (special interest groups) and even Virtual Labs where you can join live workshops and classes or get tips on setting up and marketing your Etsy shop.

If you sell handmade items through your own website, you may consider tapping into this marketplace if you haven’t already.

PS, the electronic press release is a great way to make you stand out. When someone’s getting barraged by pitches daily, giving them a video to look at and post gives you a nice advantage.

Let’s kick Blogger’s Digest off with this week’s “Whiteboard Friday” from SEOmoz: Creating Great Online Content. You can check out the full post here, it’s humorous and informative.

• Are interactive chat applications worth it? Evan Schuman describes two ways you can leverage customer service chat without irritating customers.

• Adam Covati from Bronto explains why Netflix “gets email.”

• Justin Consuegra from Drop Ship Digest explains why you might get an email like “Hey, you guys charged my credit card twice for the same order! I want the second charge reversed immediately or I’ll…,” and what you can do about it.

• Alexis Brion weighs in on 4 web checkout processes with usability improvement recommendations.

• From the New York Times, A Referral Service That Ensures Someone Actually Makes a Sale
  explains the concept of TrialPay, an affiliate-type-referral program where retailers save sales from indecisive customers by giving away freebies, provided the customer makes a purchase at another participating retailer.

Eddie Bauer recently revamped its online store design using customer feedback. At first glance, it’s hard to see much difference other than the doesn’t look like much has really changed. But when you look under the hood, you find Eddie Bauer’s packed its new site with plenty of Web 2.0 to improve usability and customer satisfaction.

Before

After

The Changes

Larger Product Images

Eddie Bauer now shows images 25% larger in category pages, so customers can see more detail without clicking on the product to get a better view. Rolling your mouse over some images will show alternate views.

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We do so much to encourage holiday gift shopping (or birthday, anniversary etc), but do we drop the ball in catering to the special needs of gift givers like gift boxes, gift wrapping, gift announcements / messages and gift receipts?

There are many ways you can accommodate gift givers to improve customer and recipient experience with gift options.

Gift Boxes & Gift Wrap

While it may be fine to ship something in a plastic bag or a brown box or a manila envelope (that’s what they send those MacAir computers in, right?), this doesn’t fly with gifts sent directly to the recipient. It also stinks for gift givers who ship items to themselves to wrap and give personally. The customer now has to find an appropriate box to put that personalized t-shirt in, and all he has kicking around is an empty GAP box from last Christmas. Providing a gift box solves a customer problem.

Then there’s gift wrapping. For some people, it’s a hassle. Gift wrap’s not cheap, and it may require an extra trip to pick it up at the drug store. And for customers who ship items direct to the gift recipient, it’s essential.

A couple examples: GAP offers one complimentary unassembled box for every three paid items ordered (why not one for one)? The other option is premium gift wrap service for $5 per order. Victoria’s Secret will send you a gift wrap kit for $3, or wrap the gift for you for $6.

These add-ons also give you an opportunity to brand yourself to the recipient. If you sell items carried by many other retailers, the recipient has no clue where the gift giver bought the item. Why not put your logo on your gift box, or as a watermark on the white side of the gift wrap?

Whether you include gift wrapping or boxes as upsells or freebies is up to you - one will bring you easy additional revenue, the other a fantastic customer service experience.

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Yesterday we talked about Karmaloop’s SEO success. Today we’re going to talk about its innovative affiliate marketing widget. Most of Karmaloop’s customers and Facebook group members have no clue about what affiliate marketing is. But many are masters of their MySpace domain, or Facebook profile, or maybe even a blog. So they’re qualified to evangelize Karmaloop through these profiles with the widget, while earning “Rep Points” to reward them for their participation.

GET YOUR CUSTOM WIDGET HERE!
Now you can promote your favorite Karmaloop products and EARN REP POINTS on your Myspace page or facebook or website with the Karmaloop Widget. Just fill out the form then copy and paste the code on your Myspace page or facebook or website.

Example:

See the widget in action on Facebook.