My poor Son has lost his voice this week due to a cold. It is bad enough that he can't talk yet, but to then have his only communication method (shouting/crying) taken from him is a real tragedy. For some reason in the wee hours this morning I had the picture of the casual e-Commerce shopper arriving at your/an online store. On arrival there is no 'contact us', no live chat, no email address and poor usability confronting them. It seems that more and more people believe you can set up an e-Commerce store and leave it thinking the 24/7 nature of the internet will ensure sales. This is a basic failure on the part of any e-Commerce store.

Having customers wanting to connect, communicate and hopefully convert is brilliant. But if their voice is taken from them as they have no communication channel by which to speak through they will without doubt lose confidence, become frustrated and leave.

Sales lost, frustrated customers and bad word of mouth at the next coffee session with friends.

Be online with your customers is my advice. e-Commerce is not set and forget anymore than a bricks and mortar store is.