In this section we explore the key areas by which you can drive sales for your e-commerce business. This includes looking at how Affiliate Marketing can bring you targeted business. We'll look at the new Social Commerce engines that bring you sales in a way you perhaps never thought of before. Also, take a look at the different ways you can sell through a large selection of different Channels.

Once you have your customer firmly on your website we look at the ever important Conversion techniques. This is of paramount importance. So, you've received 50 orders today. You might think this is pretty good, but perhaps if you look at your web traffic you notice that 10,000 people visited your site. If you converted 1 in 50 people rather than 1 in 200 people, you'd be looking at 200 orders. There are many ways you can fine-tune your customers' e-commerce experience by implementing some of our simple ideas.

So you've converted your visitors to customers successfully and achieved 200 orders today. They each ordered on average £20 worth of merchandise, making you a turnover today of £4,000. Pretty average, you might be thinking. But what if you could help and advise your customers about products they never even knew existed? What if your website became your best salesman? Increase the average order value by just £5 per order, and your turnover today increases to £5,000.

How much did it cost to bring 10,000 people to your website today? A fair amount probably. If you're averaging 30p per click and 20% of your traffic came from PPC campaigns, you're looking at around £600 in PPC costs. The other 8,000 visitors came from a variety of SEO, affiliates and banners. That might have cost you another £200 today. So in total it cost you £800 for 200 orders - £4 per customer, assuming they are all new customers. What if a large percentage of your orders were from customers that already bought from you? There are simple ways to encourage your customers to return, saving you buckets of money!

Do your customers trust you? Does your website give you a good reputation? With competition hotting up over the entire e-commerce industry, ensuring your online business is transparent and provides a fantastic service is of great importance, and you need to convey this message clearly on your site.