From the category archives:

eCommerce

Google Asynchronous Analytics for X-Cart

by Jason Diehl on March 4, 2010 · 0 comments

Even when I first started using Google Analytics I always preferred to put the tracking code at the top of the page. It just made more sense to me to make sure that I didn’t loose or miss some visitors in the statistics. I understand why it is normally recommended to add it to the bottom. By putting it at the bottom it allows your entire page to load, and the last thing to load is the Google Analytics so that the visitors can view the page faster. But here’s where the Asynchronous Tracking can help out. This code is designed to load first in the tags of your page, and it will load at the same time as your page. This prevents any delays, but also ensures you are getting the statistics you really need.

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Improving X-Cart Speed Performance – 2 of 3

February 26, 2010

In this post I’m going to entertain some intermediate level tasks to improve website performance. Some of these steps will require some editing of files that not every user will feel comfortable changing. If you don’t feel comfortable making the changes, contact your web host or a competent web developer to make the changes for you. The bonus on most of these changes is they can affect more than just X-Cart. You can use them for other shopping carts, and they’ll even speed up the performance of other systems such as Wordpress or Forums that you might be using.

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Improving X-Cart Speed Performance – 1 of 3

February 26, 2010

There are many reasons to improve the performance of your X-Cart eCommerce Store, the primary reason of course is to make sure that your visitors aren’t hanging around waiting for pages to load. Studies show that the visitors patience is getting shorter and shorter, especially as the new generation never had to live with dial up speeds. In addition, some search engines like Google will even soon begin using the speed of your site as a ranking factor.

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Saving Your Customers From Their Own AutoComplete

February 25, 2010

Your browsing the web. You find something you want to buy. You go through the checkout process. On the payment page you type the first number of your credit card and a little drop down appears with your entire credit card number. What’s your first thought? Do you ignore it? Do you go oh crap how’d that happen? I know when I’m browsing I don’t want my credit card number stored in the browser that I’m visiting strange websites with. Just doesn’t sound safe at all to me, especially since that AutoComplete feature doesn’t encrypt anything.

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Determine Your PCI Compliance ‘Level’ and Requirements

February 24, 2010

The noose is tightening around those that are processing credit cards. I hear a lot of complaining from merchants. Something we should keep in mind is that as a merchant you are being trusted to protect the information that your visitors provide. This is financial information that has direct access to their money. Working for a hosting company I know LOTS of websites and owners that do not put enough weight on the seriousness of the information they’ve been trusted with.

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