Today’s spotlight showcases a wildly successful provider of organic pet products, Organic Pet Boutique. Within the first few weeks of opening shop with us, Organic Pet Boutique received over $2,000 in orders. In the first year alone, revenue projections are set to exceed $200,000 – what a success story!

We’ve got yet another exciting customer success story to share with you. This spotlight features Volusion customer, OrganicPetBoutique.com, the most comprehensive e-tailer of organic pet food and products. After joining our growing community of merchants, storeowners Shana and Len Bentivegna received over $2,000 in orders during the first few weeks. Even better, they’re expected to gross about $200,000 in the first year!

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As with all stories, the beginning revolves around an idea and a passion. For Organic Pet Boutique, the inspiration grew from the love of their two Shih Tzus, Ceasar and Milo. Shana and Len were increasingly alarmed by numerous alerts of companies recalling pet food containing toxic chemicals from China. They thought to themselves, “we eat organic food to protect our health…but what about Ceasar and Milo?” After scouring the internet for an all-organic site with no luck, the pet lovers decided to launch their own online business featuring the highest quality, organic pet products. From there, OrganicPetBoutique.com was born.

The couple wanted to launch their new online store in time for the 2009 holiday season in order to take full advantage of the busiest shopping season of the year. This means that time was of the essence and there wasn’t much of it to spare. To make matters more stressful, the start-up company didn’t have a budget for traditional agency designers or a site developer. After a long period of researching shopping cart software, we had the honor of stepping in to help. (more…)

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Last week some Volusion team members made their way out to Las Vegas to exhibit at the annual MAGIC convention, the largest collection of apparel merchants in the country. Keep reading to learn more about the experience and to pick up some tips from successful business owners!

We’re always thrilled to meet aspiring and established entrepreneurs wherever we can find them. During the week of February 15-19, we sent a team to the legendary apparel convention, MAGIC. This convention is the largest collection of apparel and accessories merchandisers in the country. This year the show had over 70,000 in attendance!

After arriving to the welcoming lights of the Vegas strip, our team pieced together our exhibitor booth and got ready to learn from the huge collection of merchants. We were also eager to share the benefits of our award-winning shopping cart software and inform others of the fantastic opportunities of selling online. Volusion Sales Engineer, Terra Ickes, attended the event and offered the following:

“WWD Magic was an inspiring showcase of entrepreneurs who have combined their creativity and business acumen to successfully position themselves in the apparel industry. As a leading ecommerce provider, we strive to empower and help these entrepreneurs continue their growth as they expand their business online.”

In addition to doing business, we also had a lot of fun. Our booth was stocked with items from several of our storeowners who graciously sent us products for raffle and distribution. Take a look at some of the images from the show:

Terra and Justin demonstrating our software

Adelle showing off the well-designed booth (more…)

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In the fourth installment of our Stay Safe Series, today’s Volusion blog discusses the troubling tactic of keylogging. Keylogging is the act of installing a piece of hardware or software to keep a log of the keystrokes typed into your computer. Keep reading to learn how keyloggers are installed, what they’re capable of and how to protect yourself.

Have you ever had the feeling that someone in the next room is talking about you? You know, when the keyboard is clicking a mile a minute and you’re sure every other word is your name? Maybe it’s sheer paranoia, or maybe someone 3000 miles away actually has that information at their fingertips. Thanks to an unknown keylogger installed on a computer, hackers can track every single keystroke and learn quite a bit about your everyday life.

Keyloggers have actually been around for years, being used as a spy tool to gather important information. In its early stages, these devices were physically attached to a machine but have now developed into more of a software application, particularly malware. Regardless of format, the end goal is the same: capture your keystrokes to gather personal information.

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There are three main types of keyloggers that you should be aware of:

1. Hardware keyloggers – This type of keylogger is a piece of equipment that is physically attached to ones computer, typically between the keyboard and the machine itself. While this type is the most powerful and readily available (try a Google search for ‘keylogger’ and you’ll be shocked), it also requires direct access to a machine to be installed.
2. Keylogger software via a hooking mechanism – This is the form of keylogging that you should be most aware of. In this case, the keylogger is attached via malware, typically through a trojan horse. Thus, you’ll download an unsuspicious file (the trojan horse) that contains the keylogging software (malware). Once installed, the controller has full access to all of your keystrokes and passwords, even those on autocomplete.
3. Kernel keyloggers – Kernel keyloggers are the most invasive of all. Since the software is installed at the kernel level (the connecting pathway between software and hardware), it’s virtually undetectable and replaces the core software for interpreting keystrokes. (more…)

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Today’s Volusion blog post discusses how you can use Twitter to help your search engine presence. You’ll receive information on how search engines rank tweets and best practices in optimizing your Twitter account for search engine success. Keep reading to learn more.

With the latest partnership announcement between Twitter and Yahoo!, the online community is in a flurry on how to take advantage of the social channel’s search engine potential. As you may know, Google and Bing have forged partnerships to include tweets in their search results, both branded and keyword oriented. In other words, people can find your Tweets when doing a basic search, so make sure you’re giving them something worth clicking.

Of course, there’s always a cloud of mystery around optimizing content to appease the almighty algorithms of search engines. So how can your online business take a max of 140 characters and turn it into SEO bait? First you need to have a Twitter account. Then you need to take a look into your Twitter strategy. Take a look at a few basic tips from a great Mashable article to get started:

• Choose a good handle (handle = username). Make sure it’s short, simple and helps define your business. Our handle is “volusion” – pretty straightforward.
• Spend some time on your bio. You actually receive 160 characters instead of 140 for your profile’s bio. Define your business here and be sure to use critical keywords.
• Write keyword rich tweets. If search engines are searching for keywords and your tweets will show up in search results…you get the idea.

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That makes sense, but it’s fairly basic, right? Luckily we’ve received word from a real-time search expert at Google on how the powerhouse engine ranks tweets. It’s pretty rare that we learn algorithm information directly from the source, so pay close attention: (more…)

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In the spirit of Corporate Philanthropy Day 2010, today’s Volusion blog post is dedicated to sharing our efforts over the past year in giving back to others. Some highlights include our Stores to Change the World program, our partnership with Carbonfund.org and The Volusion Foundation.

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Yesterday the world celebrated the seventh annual International Corporate Philanthropy Day. Started in 2004 by the nonprofit organization Committee Encouraging Corporate Philanthropy (CECP), the fourth Monday of each February is dedicated to promoting philanthropic efforts by the corporate community.

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Volusion Foundation
As we’ve grown over the years, so have our efforts in helping others. Our very own Volusion Foundation was created in the spirit of demonstrating how just a fraction of one’s time, resources and revenue can make a world of difference. In regards to time, all of us at Volusion receive paid time off to help organizations and charities of our choice. We also provide free stores to deserving non-profit organizations each month, giving a fraction of our resources to truly make a difference. And finally, we give 1% of our total revenue to those in need, spanning our reach across the globe.

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Carbon Negative Organization
We’re also very proud of our efforts to help the environment. On top of the dozens of recycling bins across both offices, we’ve gone above and beyond by becoming a carbon negative organization. By working closely with Carbonfund, we’ve been able to offset our carbon footprint through renewable energy, energy efficiency and reforestation efforts. (more…)

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