Hosted by Robert Rand, The JetRails Podcast presents interviews with industry leaders, visionaries, and veterans with insights and expertise into websites, eCommerce, and digital marketing. Learn tips, recommendations, and items of interest as we help you stay ahead of the curve.
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Mage-OS - A New Magento Non-Profit For a New Era
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Magento is more than an eCommerce software platform. It's an ecosystem that's driven by a passionate open-source community. That's why some of the most active Magento experts got together to create https://mage-os.org/, a new non-profit focused on a strong future for Magento and those that rely on it.Learn about why this new non-profit was formed, …
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Why weren't we invited to MageChat until now?
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Kalen Jordan has spent the last decade working on projects like Magetalk, MageMail, Sweet Tooth Rewards, and Commerce Hero. He's a serial entrepreneur and is once again making a bet on the Magento ecosystem with MageChat, a Magento group built around a managed Slack community. So, we chatted with Kalen about what's driving this project forward, wha…
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MMNYC 2022 - The Return of Magento Events To The USA
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There hasn't been an in-person Magento event in the USA since 2019... that's about to change! If you're thinking about attending or planning to attend Meet Magento New York 2022, you're in luck! This episode will fill you in about the pre-party, after-party, and everything in between!To get tickets or learn about sponsoring the event, visit https:/…
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Why eCommerce Payment Orchestration Will Make Your CFO Smile
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From cryptocurrencies to subscriptions, to buy now pay later solutions, to fraud prevention technology... the eCommerce payments space is constantly evolving.Most online stores want backup payment gateways in case one fails. Large enterprise needs to offer shoppers in different regions of the world local payment methods. All the while, finance team…
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Is Content Marketing Crucial for eCommerce, or Oversaturated?
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Conventional wisdom is that your eCommerce brand needs to keep pumping out content. Blog articles, social media posts, viral videos - your team wants it all. In this episode, we take the time to discuss if this is indeed a working strategy and what it takes to generate the desired increases in online sales.Guest: Andrew Maff, BlueTuskr.comHost: Rob…
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Centralizing Ecommerce Inventory and Orders
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Managing orders and inventory sounds easy until you're managing multiple sales channels and vendors, supply chain issues, cost fluctuations, and other common challenges.For this episode, we invited an industry veteran with almost 20 years of industry experience to discuss the ins and outs of keeping your sales channels accurate and orders flowing.G…
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The Future of Magento: 2022 and Beyond
1:22:54
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The first episodes of our podcast were focused on Magento. That was over 3 years ago.We've gone on to publish over 90 episodes that speak to eCommerce professionals and digital marketers. Many episodes have focused on topics that are specifically important to the Magento ecosystem. However, in this 95th episode, we've gone back to our roots to take…
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If Your CDN Goes Down, Does Your Site Have To?
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If there's an outage at a modern cloud provider like AWS we have the technology to notice the issue and failover to one of their other data centers.However, it's not so easy when a content delivery network (CDN) is having issues. By their very nature, these networks are distributed across servers in data centers all over the world. This makes track…
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eCommerce merchant FOMO - Where are your competitor's ad budgets going?
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As an eCommerce merchant, you want to focus on your business plan. At the same time, there's a fear of missing out on the successes your competitors are having. The last thing you want is to overlook marketing strategies that are leading consumers to other web stores instead of yours.However, some data may be hard to come by, and there's just so mu…
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If eCommerce Shoppers Experience Checkout Problems Can You Win Them Back?
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Sometimes eCommerce orders fail to go through. Whether caused by problems stemming from the shopper's credit or debit card, payment gateways, fraud filters, or even issues with checkout pages themselves, it happens. In a physical store, you'd work with the shopper to help them complete their transaction. When it comes to eCommerce, however, shopper…
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The Best Digital Marketing Channels for DTC eCommerce in 2022
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According to Cloudflare, Tiktok became The #1 most visited domain in 2021, surpassing even Google.com. Are you advertising to consumers through Tiktok yet? Have you been comparing it to other platforms, like Snapchat, Pinterest, Twitter, LinkedIn, Quora, and Reddit? Are you still primarily focused on Google Ads or Facebook/Instagram Ads? Are you re…
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Most eCommerce merchants start off advertising through platforms like Google Ads and Facebook Ads, but those are pretty saturated networks. In this episode, we talk about opportunities to make direct media buys with audio and video streaming services, podcasts, and other highly-targeted platforms.If you've wondered where else you could or should be…
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Caching Dynamic eCommerce Content At The Edge
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As the holiday shopping season continues, hopefully, you're enjoying a nice code freeze along with some great weather. What better time to cozy up with a mug of hot cocoa and a podcast episode all about the next frontier of site speed optimization!Caching static site elements with a CDN is already commonplace - it's crucial to your site's overall p…
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How Live Chat is Generating a 5X eCommerce Sales Lift
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On just about every episode of our podcast, our guests describe different ways for merchants to improve an eCommerce store's bottom line. Few tell us that they can come anywhere close to generating a 5x increase in eCommerce sales, which makes this episode especially intriguing.While we may be biased about businesses that have "Jet" in their name, …
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Creating a Data Driven Culture In Your eCommerce Business
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eCommerce stores are in the data business. Data helps with everything from forecasting sales and stocking products, to understanding profit margins on items and optimizing the online shopping experience.In this episode, Nick shares his wisdom from his years at Etsy and Jet, and from his role as CEO of DAS42. Learn about common data analysis challen…
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Balancing eCommerce Ad Campaigns to Generate Higher ROAS
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Marketing to eCommerce shoppers is similar to attracting consumers to brick and mortar stores, but it's not the same thing.When someone visits a physical store, they're exhibiting a stronger intent to make a purchase. Online shoppers are often earlier in the researching process. That means that treating every ad click like it's going to convert int…
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Elegantly splitting orders to improve Magento order fulfillment
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Some businesses have complex order fulfillment systems. Others rely on succinct solutions to problems like splitting orders. Why split orders? Maybe you'll be fulfilling an order from multiple stores or warehouses. Maybe you want to split an order between in-stock items, and back-ordered items. Perhaps items need to be shipped separately or uniquel…
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Ecommerce Acquisitions - Learning from Failures and Successes
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Every year, more eCommerce businesses are bought and sold. At the same time, many owners find themselves unable to find the right buyer in order to achieve their goals. In this episode, we discussed what you can do in order to set your eCommerce business up for an eventual successful acquisition. We also discussed common mistakes, pitfalls, and ove…
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You Can No Longer Rely On Email Marketing Open Rates
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Apple's iOS15 is going to severely limit the amount of data marketers receive regarding if emails are opened by their recipients. Digital marketers need to be prepared for this shift in data availability. More importantly, they'll need to consider which metrics to look at in order to best optimize campaigns, including campaigns for eCommerce mercha…
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Consumers open their text messages. Their e-mails... maybe... maybe not.This leads eCommerce merchants toward a crossroads. Treat SMS like the 3rd rail, or embrace it while making sure to treat this communication channel with the respect that shoppers demand.Most of us get text messages or push notifications from major brands regarding our order/de…
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Generating eCommerce Sales Through Platforms Like Google and Instagram
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Learn how eCommerce stores continue to experience growth through ad networks like Google Shopping and Instagram. Beyond simply setting up campaigns, you'll hear about common challenges and strategies for achieving success.Guest: Tony Capetola, SalesAndOrders.comHost: Robert Rand, JetRails.comAdditional Resources: If you enjoyed this episode, catch …
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How Your Website Platform Impacts Your ADA Compliance
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Recently, some popular tools that marketed themselves as tools to make websites accessible to people with disabilities have been coming under fire for not living up to their mission. So we thought it would be interesting to look at this topic from the ground up. In this episode, we discuss the role of your CMS or eCommerce platform in ADA Complianc…
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Is It Ever Ok To Link Shoppers Away From Your eCommerce Store?
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The eCommerce industry tends to put a lot of emphasis on getting shoppers to purchase immediately. Every store owner wants a higher conversion rate. This had led many shops to shy away from linking to off-site content.However, what's not talked about nearly as often is that online shoppers aren't ready to buy something 100% of the time. In this epi…
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Open Source vs Closed Source eCommerce Platforms
1:23:12
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In our last episode, Ben Marks and Robert Rand took a deep dive into eCommerce platform Total Cost of Ownership. That conversation leads directly into this episode, in which Ben and Robert discuss Open Source vs. Closed Source eCommerce. If you're tired of sales teams pitching what's great about their eCommerce platforms and simply want to learn th…
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eCommerce Platform Total Cost of Ownership
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Captains Log, Stardate -302360.5We've entered a new reality in which eCommerce platforms can't stop talking about their low Total Cost of Ownership (TCO). They all seem to believe that they provide the lowest TCO, although our data scientists have proven that can't be correct. How are they all coming to different conclusions... and should TCO reall…
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The Backdrop:Luma is the default theme that Magento 2 websites around the world have been using for years. It's several years old, trying to compete in the fast-paced world of eCommerce. So the question is "Is it the best solution?". There are Magento themes for sale that are full of bells and whistles. They're intended to give you lots of extra fe…
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The longer your business is operating and growing, the more software you've inevitably deployed. Over time, your organization can easily wind up with a variety of software subscriptions and solutions that aren't in alignment with your needs or goals. Some aren't well used or are redundant and should be eliminated. Others stop being a good fit as yo…
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eCommerce Loyalty and Improving Customer Lifetime Value (CLV)
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For eCommerce stores, 2020 was heavily focused on acquiring and supporting new customers. In 2021 those same eCommerce merchants are putting a bigger focus on retention and customer lifetime value (CLV). So, we wanted to spend some time discussing organized ways to keep your shoppers engaged with your brand and loyal to your store. Through the proc…
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The Growth of eCommerce Buy Now Pay Later
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eCommerce shoppers, in the words of a famous cartoon character, will "gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today". While the words of J. Wellington Wimpy, a well-known character from Popeye were meant to be entertaining, there's a serious underlying concept. Shoppers don't all have lines of credit at the ready. They may have steady incomes but ha…
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The Intersection of eCommerce and LTL Freight
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Some items don't belong on a standard UPS or FedEx truck. Perhaps the items are heavy or big. Maybe you're just moving items in bulk quantities. That's where less-than-truckload (LTL) freight comes in. These services have been in high demand in recent times, delivering items from B2B and B2C orders alike. As a merchant, if you need to spread out yo…
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These Aren't The Coupons You're Looking For
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Browser extensions like Honey and Capital One Shopping (formerly Wikibuy) promise to give shoppers the best coupon codes at checkout automatically. For merchants, it's like someone's standing at the checkout handing out photocopies of exclusive coupons - something they'd never stand for at brick-and-mortar stores. Shoppers wind up using coupons tha…
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Magento Training and Certification Tips, Trends and Advice
1:29:44
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Whether you're a frontend dev, backend dev, eCommerce manager, marketer, or other stakeholder, figuring out how to gain expertise in Magento can be difficult. If you want to improve your work and advance your business or career, you'll appreciate this episode! We cover everything from where to get started, to how to become a rockstar in the Magento…
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How Privacy is Getting Both Harder and Easier for eCommerce Merchants to Manage
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As consumers, we are the product. The data that we generate has value. Individuals, however, are increasingly getting a say in what happens to their data. Much like sales tax collection, this puts a burden on eCommerce store owners, who need to comply with an increasing number of laws from different jurisdictions. This includes GDPR from the EU, CC…
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Learning from prices on competing eCommerce websites
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Online shoppers compare your prices to those of other eCommerce stores. How do you track and use competitor pricing and inventory availability? Can this practice help you to increase your prices? Which products should you track, and how often should you adjust prices? Not sure? Well, get ready to learn how eCommerce merchants are tracking competito…
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Best Practices for Auto Updating Your Website
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Highly customizable applications like Drupal and Magento have made auto-updating elusive. For some, allocating resources to patch and update software in a timely fashion can be a challenge. So, we asked an expert in the area of auto-updating these kinds of platforms what a healthy workflow can look like. Tune in to learn about the pros and cons of …
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eCommerce Customer Experience Optimization Tips for 2021
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We frequently discuss increasing conversion rates, average order values, and customer lifetime values, so we thought it would be helpful to focus this episode on the mice, as opposed to making it all about the mousetraps.Guest: Will Laurenson, CustomersWhoClick.com Host: Robert Rand, JetRails.comBy JetRails
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Which parts of your eCommerce email campaigns can you outsource and which can't you?
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Email marketing is important to most successful eCommerce organizations, but lots of organizations are bottlenecked and don't leverage all of the bells and whistles that their email platforms support. So, we thought it would be helpful to talk about what you can get help with, and what you should avoid trying to outsource.Let's assume that your new…
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B2B and B2C eCommerce Insights for 2021
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eCommerce is always evolving. In this episode, you'll hear stories from 3 industry insiders as they discuss what's already changed, what's changing... and even some predictions. Along the way, you'll learn about the intersections of eCommerce with other important areas, like Sales Tax and ERP solutions. You'll also hear about different disruptions …
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Allowing eCommerce Shoppers to Personalize Their Own Shopping Experiences
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There's something to be said for experiences where we look past AI and allow shoppers to help optimize their own experiences. If you've ever been a regular at a restaurant or a local store, you know what I'm talking about. You walk in, and the staff already know what you like - because you've told them. It's not about guessing and averages, it's ab…
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Google Analytics 4, Microsoft Clarity, and Other eCommerce Analytics Insights for 2021
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eCommerce businesses are now data companies. Data helps merchants find the best marketing channels and campaigns. It assists in optimizing on-site experiences, and even efforts to retain customers for the long haul. In this episode, we focused on tips, tools, and recommendations for merchants that want to use data to be more successful in 2021. Tha…
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Do you have to sell on Amazon to Advertise on Amazon?
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Sure, you can list products on Amazon's Marketplace and Amazon will be thrilled to take your money to promote those listings... but the Amazon DSP is capable of a lot more. You can leverage Amazon's vast reach and data sets to target shoppers with ads that lead to your own eCommerce store. You can also run ads across Amazon's advertising network, w…
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Magento Extension Insights for 2021
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What Magento extensions are in demand? What are merchants and developers asking for? How has demand for different extensions changed in the last year? What are extension developers doing differently to better service eCommerce businesses? We had a lot of questions, and we certainly weren't disappointed by the answers. Tune in to learn more!Guest: S…
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Tackling the Challenges of eCommerce Operations
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eCommerce businesses experience operations challenges as they grow. Sometimes, it's with forecasting and inventory management. In other situations, there are delays in fulfillment operations, or there's time wasted and errors introduced through manual data entry. While every business is unique, in this episode, we pull at some common threads that e…
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BFCM 2020 is now history - Let's learn from it!
1:09:49
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Black Friday/Cyber Monday (BFCM), and the rest of the holiday shopping season is in the rearview mirror. Black Friday was up 22% year-over-year. Cyber Monday was up 15%. Bots were buying up all the Playstations. It's 2021 and shoppers are still returning holiday purchases to Amazon sellers. Those returns will wind up going to...With so many unique …
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Gift Card, Coupon, and Loyalty Optimization Strategies
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Many merchants treat gift cards, loyalty programs, and coupons as business features rather than strategies. In this episode, we do discuss the features that set eCommerce and multichannel merchants up for success, but we also discuss strategies for using these features, including in combination with each other. The goal is always to find ways to ap…
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The eCommerce Conversion Rate Optimization Mindset
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Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) isn't a specific set of tasks. It's a state of mind. You have to know your audience, test, measure, realize you don't really know your audience as well as you think you do and continue a cycle of improving your eCommerce operations. You start to understand what helps and hurts your sales stats as it relates to dif…
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The Next Generation of eCommerce Workflows
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Integrating data is one thing, but transforming that data through automated workflows is a whole other challenge. Learn how technology providers and service providers are coming together to solve challenges and increase eCommerce business efficiencies.Guests:- Ramesh Cooke, LYSI.co- Nate Roybal, Workato.comHost:- Robert Rand, JetRails.com…
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Should eCommerce stores send shoppers personalized videos?
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When shoppers visit a physical store, they get to interact with people, build relationships, and have unique experiences. Video technology can bring shoppers one step closer to in-person interaction with your team. In this episode, we explore how personalized video can be effectively leveraged in by eCommerce merchants.Guest: Oli Bridge, Bonjoro.co…
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eCommerce Accessibility Compliance is Finally Becoming Mainstream
1:03:32
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Shoppers with visual, auditory, and cognitive disabilities have historically found online shopping to be challenging... and that's putting it mildly. However, today's shoppers are being drawn to brands that do a better job of servicing their needs. Along with them can come some great PR and other benefits, but at the end of the day, why wouldn't yo…
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How to know if your Magento site is healthy
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A Magento website is a beautifully balanced mix of database tables, files, and code, all operating within a perfectly optimized hosting environment. Unless it's not, in which case you're in for a bumpy ride. That's when it's time for an audit. What should be included in that audit? We've got answers!Guest: Guillaume Le Tual, MageMontreal.comHost: R…
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