MarketingSherpa covered an interesting new study by ScanAlert yesterday indicating that comparison shopping tools are giving buyers too many options (I knew it …), prolonging the purchasing decision from an average of 19 hours just two years ago to now over 34 hours.

They recommend four tips to reducing this conversion window and building awareness:

1. Add “About Us” blurbs to every conceivable entry point
2. Grab emails early on — before the shopping cart
3. Content: give more product info than the competition does
4. Exclusive here-only bonuses

A ChannelAdvisor Store that does a particularly good job at grabbing email addresses early is GolfEtail — front and center is a giveaway (for which you have to register) and on the right of the banner buyers can sign-up for exclusive email-only deals.

Now hurry up and shop already.

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eBay will be making some good changes to its PayPal Financing Program next week which should drive incremental sales (anything you can do give your buyers more payment options is a step in the right direction):

Starting the week of July 9th the more popular standard buyer financing offer will automatically appear - free of charge - on listings that are currently selling for $50 or more and are from U.S.-based sellers who qualify for PayPal Buyer Protection.

Other financing options will be removed from the site, and sellers will no longer be able to select them during the listing process.

More details can be found here.

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A little-used customization feature of the ChannelAdvisor eCommerce store is the Add To Cart button. Even one of my new favorite CA Stores, Cozykid in the U.K., is using the default image on their product detail pages. The GetElastic blog recently posted 107 shopping cart icons from top online retailers (in addition to a few good tips on design and usability).

It’s pretty easy to replicate one of these buttons (tweak it to your needs) and use it in your ChannelAdvisor Store. Simply go to “Store > Store Design Center > Customize Theme > Buttons & Icons” and then point to your new image.

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