Best Magento Instagram Free Extension in 2019

Social media is necessary for any business that wants to perform its best, which is why so many eCommerce businesses are turning toward media for higher conversions. Instagram is one of the most prominent forms of social media, which might lead you to the question what the best Magento® Instagram free extension is.

Why is Social Media Presence Important for eCommerce?

More than a third of the world’s population is on social media. Using social media expands the reach of eCommerce businesses and owners. By using social media, you’re allowing more people to have access to your site than you would otherwise.

Not only this, but word-to-mouth is more effective on social media. When someone with hundreds of Instagram followers shares your products, you’re more likely to have people visit your site.

Anyone who’s signed up for Facebook has decided to provide the social media giant with their personal information. In doing so, they’ve helped to create one of the best marketing methods in the digital age.

By having access to this information, organizations can tailor the feed of individuals so that advertisements work for those are more likely to buy specific products. If you’re a person who enjoys reading about sports and who follows several pages on just that, you’re more likely to see extensions about sports.

This form of marketing is different than any that have appeared in the past. That’s because while ads have always been used and popular, the marketing techniques on your television or your computer did not use your personal information.

Because these marketing techniques didn’t have access to as much of your personal information, they didn’t have the resources to get information about their customers. Without social media, it’s much harder to get ahold of phone numbers, preferences, and addresses.

Choose Your Magento Instagram Free Extension

If you want to choose your Magento Instagram extension, you’ll have to know what you’re looking for. The section below will show you the following extensions:

• Instagram Feed Plugin on Magento by POWr
• Free Responsive Magento 2 Module by Magnetech
• Magento 2 Instagram Integration by MageComp
• Instagram Feed Widget by Technology Mindz
• Magento Instagram Extension by eGrove Systems

These extensions allow you to incorporate your Instagram feed into your eCommerce business. With it, your Instagram followers can see everything that your store is up to and your Instagram visitors can access your store easily.

Instagram Feed Plugin on Magento by POWr

This extension allows you to install your Instagram account right on your Magento store. Match your plugin’s colors to those of your site and to place your Instagram feed wherever you want on your eCommerce website. Installing your Instagram feed on your website increases your chances of ranking higher in search engines. It also provides your Instagram followers with access to your eCommerce website.

You can start using this extension by free and then extend additional features with a package price.

The best parts about using this advanced Magento Instagram extension can be found below:

• Free
• No coding
• Mobile-friendly

Free Responsive Magento 2 Module by Magentech

This Magento extension uses a grid layout to showcase the images on your Instagram feed. The addon also features pop-up images and a single admin page to help you manage your feed.

This addon is compatible with many Internet browsers; including, Firefox 2 , Safari, Chrome, etc. It is absolutely free which will be as a benefit and great to try it out.

Since this Magento extension is entirely customizable, so you can cause it to perform as much as you need it to. With it, you can:

• Set Instagram users
• Access tokens
• Support responsive layouts

Magento 2 Instagram Integration by MageComp

Instagram is a tool for anyone who enjoys sharing their images and videos with the world. By installing this addon, business owners can increase their visibility. Because of how many people use Instagram, pictures and videos from a given company will appear in the feeds of those that might be interested.

The basic community edition of this product is entirely free. That said, you can decide whether you want to upgrade your extension for the premium version for more money.

With Magento 2 Instagram Integration, you’re able to:

• Share content with hashtags
• Enable and disable extensions
• Approve posts

Instagram Feed Widget by Technology Mindz

The major benefit of this tool is that you can install your content on every post or page. This allows owners complete control and flexibility over what appears on their websites. You can limit the number of items that are shown on your page. For anyone who might be worried about the speed of the pages, this doesn’t have too much of an effect on your load time.

The community edition of this Magento 2 extension is inexpensive (currently costs $34), which makes it appealing to many in the eCommerce field. Instagram Feed Widget uses, as the name suggests, a widget to link an Instagram feed to an eCommerce website.

The benefits of using this extension include:

• Install content on every post or page
• Complete control over websites
• Limit the number of items on your page

Magento Instagram Extension by eGrove Systems

The interface of this extension is easy-to-use and very useful, which is one of the reasons why eCommerce business owners love it. Nowadays, business owners don’t want to have a website that needs to be reprogrammed and continuously retouched; instead, they want to ensure that they can use it whenever they need to. If you’re one of these people, consider installing the extension.

You can find this extension in several Magento versions. You can pay for six months worth of support and an initial installation fee.

Here’s a list of everything you can do with this extension:

• Limit the number of photos shown on your site
• Send emails or thoughts to customers
• Connect easily with your customers

How to Increase Sales with Friendly Interface – A Sight for Sore Eyes

When deciding on buying online, we always want it to be convenient – no one wants to forge through endless pages and waste time. A clumsy interface is one of the most important reasons for users to leave the website. Well, it is easy to say how vital interface is, but there should be tips on how to make it better. So, let’s find out what should you pay attention to in your store and how to increase online sales with these tips.

Does Your Navigation Safes from Getting Lost?

Imagine you have come to a shop to buy a fiction book, but instead of getting straight to the fiction section, you get lost among endless poorly organized shelves without any information signs. That’s poor navigation.

Navigation in a web store is as important as it is in a real one. When customers are unable to find the desired thing, they leave the shop with a deep feeling of sadness for wasted time and efforts. On the contrary, convenient navigation will keep users satisfied and help them in buying.

In its turn, navigation is the issue too complicated to be considered in one piece, so it is better to divide the issue into several parts and examine them solely:

Search

Many people already know what they need and want to find the particular item quickly and easily. Provide them with a direct path to it. The traditional yet efficient solution is to add a search bar in the upper part of the website – the most expected place for it.

To make search even more comfortable, you can add autocomplete. Some users don’t know the exact name and the offered variants will help them. There is also an issue of spelling errors, so take it into account as well.

Convenient Filters

Some users don’t have a solid vision of the item they need, but they have some specifications. Let them narrow their search by applying filters. It will release your clients from scanning an enormous amount of goods they don’t need and drive them right to the point they find interesting.

Sitemap

Sometimes it is easier for a customer to see all the pages your website has and then choose the one that has drawn his or her attention. A site map will be the best solution here. Just put a link to it on every page and by that reduce the searching time of your clients.

Go to Section and Scroll Up

No one likes much scrolling. But it is inevitable if you have products with a huge description and lots of sections. So don’t forget that after reading all of it, clients will have to return to the upper part, where the functionality is located.

Allow your users to jump to the start with one click using an extension like, for example, Scroll Up. Ease their pain and give them a little table of content with clickable links at the beginning of the text just like Wikipedia does:

Benefits of Mobile Optimization

Mobile eCommerce is rapidly growing each year. According to the OuterBox research, in 2018 62% of phone users have purchased something with their devices. However, the more interesting fact is that 84% have faced some troubles during the mobile purchase. It shows that for now, show owners don’t pay much attention to the mobile platform, underestimating its value.

Don’t make the same mistake. New clients may appear only because of smartphone optimization. However, to have a high and stable conversion rate, it is better to have the mobile version working correctly. Luckily, Magento® 2 has some means for essential responsiveness like SEO optimization and easily adjusted interface to any screen.

Do You Suffer from Shopping Cart Abandonment?

Customers are fickle folks. Even having all the desired products in the cart, they can still change their mind and leave without buying. This is usual practice – according to SaleCycle, a bit more than 75% of all the carts are abandoned. Moreover, the reasons for it lie in the interface. Here is the table with quickly from the Barilliance research.

Main Reasons for Cart Abandonment in the USA

There are many issues. But when you think of them, you realize that some of them may be resolved. So, let’s see the possible ways out.

Improve Shipping Methods

It’s hard, but various shipping methods offer new opportunities. Not all the people are ready for customer pickup, and lots of them will pay for convenience. Add this convenience in their life with express shipping and enlarge your interface. Even more, some users prefer to have products of a single cart to be delivered to different addresses. Though vanilla Magento doesn’t have such an option, you can add it with, for example, Extended Table Rate Shipping extension.

Give Folks a Coupon

Not just for nothing, of course. But a little bonus for a huge purchase or on the particular date will give you more credibility and make your customers more loyal. Or you can excellently greet them a happy birthday and present a slight discount coupon. If you do not tend to follow all the users’ birthday manually, you can install an extension like Birthday Coupon.

Simplify the Checkout System

A list with lots of lines to fill in is a challenge for a client. Just do it simply and remove all the unnecessary questions, like mother’s maiden name and hobbies. It is possible to place an order without this information indeed. One step checkout will help here as well.

Make Users Feel Secure

Search for security is vital for all of us in all the spheres of life, what to tell about payments. Improve your general store security by adding advanced password settings, password authentication, and encrypted connections (SSL is meant). Frequent Magento updates with security patches are also great. Still, to have all the possible tools for security improvement, it is better to have a security extension, like Security Suite instead of check all the issues manually by yourself.

Remind Them About Their Cart

It is not a problem if they decide to buy something later. It is a problem when they forget about it. Remind them of you with a cart abandonment email. If sent within a short period (up to three hours) it even can convince clients to buy the items right now. If not – it will be a reminder for them.

To increase sales more, you can use a cross-selling technique right in the email. Just add here featured, most viewed, or other products to keep their interest. Moreover, you can add these tabs with products to your web store with Featured Products extensions. Cross-selling is too effective to underestimate.

Creating Another Account Should Be Quick

There are various reasons for creating another account – it’s nothing bad in it. Still, to help, clients, you can make the procedure of signing up easier. Just remove all the unnecessary registration lines again or offer the connection with social networks – it will simplify the registration.

Show All the Costs at Once

Hiding something, especially additional costs, is a bad idea. Clients will learn about them anyway, but they can feel deceived. To avoid it, display all the costs a client will have to pay clearly – it is fair.

Are Your Products Appropriately Displayed?

Visual representation is an ace in the hole of a store owner. It is because of our psychology – if we see something beautiful and eye drawing, we want to buy it. There are not empty words – according to Martech, 93% of clients take visual representation as the main buying factor.

But visual doesn’t only mean the product photos, though they are essential as well. There are a few other things that touch upon the website interface and products representation that is worth being implemented. That’s how to increase your business sales and make your brand stronger.

Make a collection

Though it works better for clothing websites, stores or other specification may also use it. The idea is in setting all the items according to their collection or trend. Still, these “collections” may be of various types – if you sell an instrument, you can make a professional collection for locksmiths or plumbers.

See, what your targeted audience may find interesting and provide them with it. Sorting all the products in the right order and following their in-stock availability is also a great thing. To perform it easily, you may use such extension as Product Sorting.

Video Explanation

According to the Hubspot’s statistics, on the average we watch 1.5 hours of video content per day and 15% of all the responders watch even up to 3 hours. A broad opportunity for creativity, knowing that 97% of marketers claimed that videos had helped them in sailings.

Make a video of someone using your item instead of written guidelines and put it on the product page. Your users will probably find it more useful than a text explanation.

360-Degree View

Despite the type of products you sell, your clients want to see it from all the angles. Offering this opportunity will positively affect the user experience and will lead to more sales. Moreover, customers like extra interactions with items and we can see how Addidas perform this feature flawlessly.

Product Comparison

Sometimes people can’t make a quick decision and need some time to think. Provide your users with a possibility to compare products and see all the characteristics. Probably this may require some changes in your interface, but this is the point – to make it more user-friendly.

Offshore Software Development Guide 2019

Whether a business is in its early stages or is already making a big impact in their market, they must consider outsourcing some of their projects. Outsourcing of projects provides many advantages if the business owner can understand what it means to outsource. This is particularly true concerning offshore software development.

However, web development is not something that you will confide to some unknown company. Yet, you might need some time to consider whether it is better to have an in-house team or outsource your project. This guide will explain what to expect before dealing with offshore development.

What is Offshore Software Development?

It refers to a business outsourcing work to a software developer in a different country. The third-party offshore developer is hired to handle a project for the business that will free up time and resources.

These developers are completely dedicated to their craft. If the company has a solid experience in a certain field, that means developers are working with technologies continuously. An advantage to using this option has a knowledgeable team tackle a project with speed and accuracy, delivering a better product with less cost.

How does the Offshore Software Development Model look?

There are various models that can be used by a business to make offshore development work for them. However, there must be a clear understanding of what the business needs, so they can choose a model that best fits their goals.

• Complete Outsourcing: This is when a business figures it would be best to completely outsource the technical side of the house. Meaning the offshore developers will handle the creation, maintenance, and implementation of all software applications.
• Partially Outsourcing: Here a project manager within the business will be assigned to monitor and manage the outsourced team developing certain applications.
• Project Based: Some companies already have a good handle on their software and web applications, but need some help with certain projects. Only small projects or pieces of a project are outsourced for better solutions.

What are some Offshore Software Development Services?

A business will need to understand what they are looking for before making a choice. Services from an offshore developer can range from Product Development to Analysis. It can also involve the following services;

• Custom Software Solutions
• Architecture
• UI/UX Design
• QA and testing
• Maintenance
• System Administration
• Support
• Web Development
• Mobile Applications

Although, services provided by a development company will vary depending on its expertise. Most will offer the services in this guide listed above, however, some offshore development companies providing with best practices in specific tasks, while others just starting. It is important to research each offshore developing company before making a decision based on price alone.

How to Manage Offshore Software Development

Dealing with a business in a different country, or even a different time zone can bring some questions. Lots of countries have their ways of doing business, and there is also a language barrier. However, most of the experienced companies will provide you with English speaking specialists and highly professional project managers then it won’t be a problem to build communication with a team.

Offshore benefits can give a company an advantage against the competition, but it must be appropriately managed. Leave no room for doubts. Ensure your goal is clear with specific details and milestones. Constantly check in on the developers to keep them in the direction desired to accomplish the goal without delay. Creating a framework before meeting an offshore company is what makes the difference between a great product and a bad product.

How to Calculate Offshore Development Costs

Conducting thorough research about costs before deciding on Offshore development is a no-brainer. There are several sites that contain some general pricing information, but it is always wise to communicate with a company directly to get clear rates.

Offshore Software Development Rates by Country

By country, the hourly rates can be broken down in this infographics. The USA and Europe have higher wages due to their standards of living and the average wages in each country.

Rate mainly depends on the years of expertise, developer’s level (junior, middle, senior) and country. If we will compare specifically each zone, you can see that if you are European businessman and you want to outsource your project to the USA, you will pay around $100 per hour of work of the junior or middle developer.

In the case of Western Europe, if we will take Scandinavian countries, they are more likely to get $70-90 per hour of work. German development companies could charge you $40-55 and the average Western European rate per hour is around $35-65.

By comparison, Ukraine is the median for Europe coming in at an average hourly rate of $30. Highlighting the main reasons, most of Ukraine speaks English and they have a multitude of developers in a vast area of expertise.

What about Quality of Services?

In order to ensure the quality meets the needs of the business the manager must set those standards before reaching out to an offshore developer. It is important to clearly define what is expected with milestones in the progression of the project.

If you have a project and you start working with a certain offshore development team, you want to get clear code, precise explanation of each stage of work and support if needed. Constant checking in will help with any hiccups that might occur. Recurring meetings to discuss the progress and the end goal is another way to get the best from offshore developers. Indeed, you define the scope, timeline and other standard parts of the project. The development team should provide expertise and fit the deadlines.

Summary

Offshore software development can present an opportunity for a company to expand their horizons and compete with the ever growing competition. Communication is the key to conquering offshore software development. Once this is understood a business will have no issues with offshore development and can turn their complete focus on expanding their legacy.

We at WEB4PRO know how it is essential to work within the priorities and timeline of a client as we provide experience dedicated teams and developers. Most of our team consists of middle developers, and we focus mainly on eCommerce development on Magento® 2. Besides the area of our expertise relies on Drupal, WordPress and PHP frameworks like Yii, Zend, Laravel, Symfony

Tips to Grow eCommerce Business in 2018

Do you own an eCommerce business? Are you wondering how to improve it this year? If so, then you already know what a struggle it can be to expand in this industry. With so much competition, you might be at a loss trying to figure out where to start.

That’s why we’ve created this article, which will provide you with only the best tips for eCommerce success. Before we start, though, here’s a short table of content so that you know what’s ahead.

Table of contents:

What Else to Do To Grow eCommerce Business in 2018: Keeping up with the Times
eCommerce Site Personalization: Making Every Experience Unique
Building Your Brand is Still Important in 2018: Branding for Best Results
Video Content For Success: How Diverse Content Shapes Your Brand
Gather the Best Team: Developing the Team That Will Lead You
Try New ECommerce Email Marketing Strategy: Emails and Your Future
Summary

What Else to Do To Grow eCommerce Business in 2018

Now that you’re familiar with the goal of this article, we can move on to how you can build your eCommerce Business Strategy. Overall, it’s essential that you keep up with new technologies and features because this will help you to stay ahead of your competition. If you’re using tricks that they aren’t, you’re going to generate more leads in the end!

eCommerce Site Personalization

Website personalization is one of the most impactful ways for you to increase your conversions. There are many more benefits of personalization in eCommerce which we’ll talk about a little more.

With website personalization, you can determine the overall dynamic of your website. When your pages are more interactive, it makes it easier for potential customers to navigate through your site and, therefore, they’re more likely to stay loyal to you rather than another company.

Offers are a great way to personalize your website as well because you can completely customize the product so that you’re providing an offer like no other. You can introduce time limits to get your customers buying right away, and you can edit the look of the off announcement banner.

You can introduce pop-ups to your website if you want to optimize your conversions completely. In doing this, you’ll personalize the offer and the content of the pop-up so that it’s unique to your customers. There are a few different pop-ups that you can introduce to your site: including on-click, timed, scroll, etc.

Building Your Brand in 2018

You might think that once your brand is established, you don’t have to continue with new strategies or to develop your current one anymore. This isn’t true. You have to continuously build your brand so that it stands out and so that it’s memorable.

Now, how do you build your brand? You need to establish a voice in the branding process. We don’t mean that you have to include voice clips; instead, your brand should speak for itself. Everything from the color palette of your site to the font, to the photography, should give your visitors the same vibe.

To do this, you have to find out how to set yourself apart from the competition. You don’t want the same page layouts or fonts as everyone else. If you have a brand that needs to make a profound statement, you might consider bold fonts.

To build your brand, you also need to exploit the best parts of your business. Instead of only focusing on what needs to be worked on, you should identify what’s great about your business and advertise.

Let’s say you’re in an industry that has a hard time shipping quickly. You should find a way to ship within two days. People will have deadlines and events, so you need to be ahead of the game and make sure they get their items on time. Overall, customers will notice what sets you apart from everyone, and that’s what will attract them to your eCommerce business.

Video Content For Success

Video content is increasingly popular. That’s because we live in a digital world, and people don’t want to read as many long descriptions. Because of this, the companies which have video content are also the ones with the highest conversions.

If you have a clothing store, for example, you should consider including shopping hauls; wherein, popular YouTube channels buy hundreds of dollars of clothing to showcase and review the items. If you see that someone had many followers and liked your clothing, you can ask them to include the content on your site.

Companies tend to rank higher in Google when they have diverse content on their pages. You’re going to have more visitors if you have pictures, videos, and articles rather than just articles. As always, make sure your videos are branded with links that lead back to your main page because this will always bring visitors back to you.

Gather the Best Team

Building the best time can be a difficult task. This doesn’t just involve developing the right dedicated team for your company, but also for the development of your website, applications, etc. and for the store’s support.

All of these things will determine how well your store runs. If you have a team that doesn’t work efficiently, you’ll spend more time to set up right organization strategy. This will slow down you from getting the most sales results and, therefore, your company can’t expand fully.

When you build your team, you have to think in the long-term. These are people who will represent your business, and you have to find out whether they’ll be with for the next few years or more.

Try New eCommerce Email Marketing Strategy

Email marketing is underrated. This is because prices for advertising continue to increase. As they do, email marketing will become your main method of advertising and will be one of the features that provides you with the most leads.

Building your email list is the best way to get people to keep coming back to your site. Since you already have data on them, you’ll be able to target specific customers based on their past spending and search history.

Some claim that you should be getting almost a third of your overall revenue from email marketing. If you’re not getting that much, then you might want to consider increasing your email marketing importance.

Best Magento 2 GDPR Extensions Free & Premium in 2019

GDPR means General Data Protection Regulation. It is a piece of legislation involving information gathering and use. Since GDPR became law, every EU website is required to follow specific requirements in the collection of personal information. Companies out of compliance are subject to heavy penalties. Therefore, it’s essential for all eCommerce websites to include extensions and strategies to honor these regulations. In this piece, we’ll explore the best extensions to meet GDPR requirements for Magento® eCommerce platforms.

GDPR Overview

The GDPR came into force in May of this year. It addresses how information is collected by processors and controllers. Controllers are the companies and individuals that collect information. Processors are company workers and representatives. The aim of the GDPR is to protect data for all EU residents and citizens. If companies offer services and goods in the EU, they are obligated to follow GDPR law, even if they are foreign-based. If your website uses an EU language, accepts payments in Euros, or mentions EU clients, then regulations require it to act within GDPR law.

There are three main elements to the GDPR. Protection of personal data, protection of people’s rights and freedom regarding information gathering, and restrictions regarding the sharing and use of this information. Information which can identify a person qualifies as personal data. Regulations also require data collection details to be made transparent in the Privacy Policy of your website.

GDPR Regulation

GDPR aims to create awareness about and offer control over how information is collected and used. The goal is to simplify information collection and management. GDPR is oriented around seven principles:

1. Processing: Information processing should be done with transparency, legally and fairly.
2. Limitation of Purpose: Information can only be gathered for legitimate, precise, specific purposes and processed only for those purposes.
3. Minimization: No information should be gathered beyond the stated purposes. As little data as possible should be collected to fulfill this purpose.
4. Accuracy: All inaccurate information should be updated or removed immediately upon discovery.
5. Limitation of Storage: Personal information should be removed once it has fulfilled the company’s stated goals.
6. Confidentiality and Integrity: Information should be used only in legal and authorized fashions and protected from exposure to other parties.
7. Accountability: Persons and companies responsible for processing and collecting information are accountable for any damage, destruction, or loss related to illegal or unauthorized information handling.

As per GDPR, information which can be used as an identifier is personal data. Names, ID numbers, online identifiers, locations, and other information which can be used to identify a specific person all fall under this category. GDPR makes allowances for technological innovation and changes in information gathering methods. It covers information collected automatically or gathered manually for filing systems.

GDPR also addresses sensitive information. This category includes genetic and biometric data. Philosophical views, religious views, and political views also fall under the heading of sensitive personal information. Sensitive data is protected under extra safeguards. Data protected with a pseudonym or key-code is regarded as personal data, if it can be connected with the individual, indirectly or directly.

Information is only regarded as personal if it “relates to” or concerns a specific person. Consider informational content, processing purpose, and potential impact. Inaccurate information can be regarded as personal data, but anonymized information is exempt from GDPR regulation. Data regarding the deceased, companies or public authorities are also exempt. On the other hand, information about employees, company directors, sole traders, and partners is protected under GDPR.

What Are GDPR Requirements?

Before gathering personal information, a company must establish a valid reason for its collection. The GDPR established six valid reasons, or lawful bases, which justify information gathering and processing. These are:

1. Consent: A person can permit to process certain data for a stated goal.
2. Contract: Specific information can be necessary to establish contract legitimacy.
3. Legal Obligation: Legal compliance can legitimately require the processing of certain data.
4. Vital Interests: Information can be gathered to protect life.
5. Public Task: Specific information may be gathered to help officials to act in the public interest according to the scope of their position.
6. Legitimate Interests: The legitimate interests of your company or a third party may require the gathering and processing of specific information.

These are the six legitimate purposes which justify data gathering and use. Should your goals change, information can be used for the new goals only if they are compatible with the previous ones. After defining a lawful basis, each website must explicitly state what information is collected and how it is used. This must be clarified in a site’s Cookie and Privacy statements.

How to Make Your Website GDPR Compliant

To ensure your company complies with GDPR standards, you must understand GDPR principles. Think about the content of the data you collect. If the sensitive personal information is gathered, read up on the additional conditions that apply to this specific type of data. You must also prepare all documentation to ensure that information is being collected according to a valid legal basis. Finally, all EU customers should be informed of the data gathered, the reason for gathering it, and the processing details.

The principles listed above are the core of GDPR. They are not ironclad laws. Instead, they lay out the intentions of data protection regulations. Websites are compliant when they act by these principles. Any infringements upon these basic principles will result in severe fines.

GDPR requires data to be processed legally, transparently, and fairly. To establish GDPR requirements, first, find your lawful basis for information gathering and processing. This gives you validity for the handling of information. Be open, honest, and clear regarding the information and its uses. Do not mislead the customer, and ensure that the data isn’t used detrimentally. Finally, follow GDPR standards and any other relevant regulations. This includes ensuring the information is not processed in any way that constitutes:

• Confidence breaches;
• Exceeding your legal powers or exercising them improperly;
• Copyright infringements;
• Contract breaches;
• Breaches of industry-specific regulations; or
• Breaches of the Human Rights Act of 1998.

Documentation

Extensive documentation is needed to demonstrate that you are prepared. To be compliant, you must be able to produce a set of documents upon demand. The documents required by the GDPR are as follows:

• Subject Access Request Forms and Procedures
• Retention and Erasure Policy & Schedule
• Records of Processing Activities (where applicable)
• Records of Consent from Data Subjects or Parental/Guardian Consent
• Processor Agreements (where applicable)
• Procedures for Subject Access Requests
• Procedures for Non-EU Data Transfers & Documented Safeguarding Measures
• Procedures for Data Breaches & Notifications
• Procedures & Notifications for Subject Rights
• Privacy Notice with Article 13/14 Information Disclosures
• Documented Technical & Organisational Measures for Processing Security
• Data Protection Policy
• Data Protection Officer Appointment, Duties & Notifications (where applicable)
• Data Protection Officer Appointment, Duties & Notifications (where applicable)

There are several additional forms which extend beyond mandatory requirements. These forms constitute best practice and show dedication to GDPR:

• Access Request Response Templates – These templates ensure compliant and consistent SAR responses.
• Information Audit – Record details of gathered information.
• Internal Audit & Review Policy & Procedures – First, establish GDPR policies and compliance measures and procedures. Review, audit and assess regularly. Adjust and adapt as necessary to maintain compliance.
• Privacy Notice Register – Keep Privacy Notice records. Make sure details like purpose, and last revision date are accessible.
• Staff Training Program –Training methods and policies, evaluations and assessments, any other relevant details.

Assigning Roles

GDPR requires you to assign roles for information processing and gathering. GDPR defines two key roles: processor and controller. Controllers define the goal of information collection and handling. Processors are entities working for a controller, dealing with information records or processing data. For companies employing over 250 individuals processing information from more than 5000 subjects, GDPR regulation requires a Data Protection Officer responsible for compliance.

Legislations relate specifically to each role, so each individual involved in information handling should understand their role. Processors must keep records of information processing and gathering. They are held liable if this information is breached. Controllers are not exempt from these obligations. They are legally obligated to ensure that processors act in compliance. All organizational activities within the EU are subject to these regulations.

Notifying Customers

Transparency is a key principle for GDPR. Your customers should be made fully aware of any information gathered, your reason for gathering it, and how it is processed. Inform the customer of the lawful basis for collecting data. Include written Cookie policies and Privacy policies which fully detail your information collection and usage practices.

Set Up Extension

There are several extensions which help to ensure GDPR compliant data collection. Each extension offers features which allow you to customize your data collection and processing practices and procedures. The sections below explore the features and pricing of each extension in further detail.

GDPR Magento 2 Extensions for eCommerce Stores

GDPR eCommerce can be complicated for companies both within and outside the EU. GDPR extensions ensure that your Magento eCommerce platform complies with GDPR. They help to bring all aspects of your business operation into alignment with current regulations.

GDPR Compliance Manager from OnTap

OnTap manager keeps tabs of all customer data. It also gives your customers access to their data and request erasure. Here are key features offered by OnTap:

• Offers Subject Access Requests to Customers.
• Provides a Compliance dashboard.
• Gives customers comprehensive access to information.
• Handles the deletion of data through Magento.
• Offers a workflow which tracks external system data deletion and shows external data sources.
• Informs you of obligations and notifies you of breaches.
• Installation is fast and easy. Installation services are offered in more complicated cases.

OnTap’s compliance manager retails at £199. It offers free installation and a 30-day money back guarantee. Free 90-day support is included in the purchase, with the option of 180-day support for £79.60 or 360-day support for £199 pounds.

GDPR Extension for Magento 2 from Amasty

Amasty’s GDPR extension for Magento 2 collects user consent for information gathering and handling. It manages privacy issues and creates privacy policies, adapting them to your operating region or creating several for different regions. It also provides policy updates for new regulations. This extension lets you:

• Reach GDPR EU regulation;
• Add Privacy Policy check box to relevant pages;
• Collect user consent on relevant pages;
• Establish and update privacy policies;
• Handle necessary documents;
• Let customers anonymize or download profile data and request deletion;
• Export customer lists according to consent;
• Obtain consent through email and manage consent via a grid;
• and Update customers on Privacy Policy changes via email.

Amasty Magento 2 GDPR extension retails for £199. Installation costs £59, however, Amasty offers a year of free support.

GDPR Extension for Magento 2 by Aheadworks

Aheadworks offers yet another GDPR extension with impressive features and at a competitive price. These are a few features this extension offers:

• Automatic deletion for accounts linked to abandoned carts or incomplete orders
• Complete Base Management for Customers
• Full customer access and means to request data deletion
• Email-driven customer verification
• Means to delete user information
• Means to export customer lists based on lack of consent
• Means to export data access and data removal requests
• Monitoring systems for customer removal requests
• Tracking systems for customers by consent or lack of consent
• Tracking systems for data access requests
• Means to request consents
• Regular automated updates for information protection policies

Just as with the OnTap and Amasty extensions, the AheadWorks GDPR extension for Magento 2 retails for £199. It comes with a 45-day money-back guarantee and 90 days of free support. This offer also includes free installation and free updates for life.

GDPR Magento Compliance Extension from Magebit

Magebit is a full-service provider of GDPR tool and all other eCommerce web platform solutions. They offer a free open source GDPR extension. Magebit also has a track record of bringing online stores into compliance with GDPR. They offer 24/7 service if you need your site brought into compliance urgently. Magebit also offers a free GDPR requirement checklist so that you can evaluate what your site needs.

Magebit tailors its services to your site, so they don’t give a single price for all web platforms. Magebit ensures that:

• You have a comprehensive list of all personal data, the sources, the uses, where it is shared, and how long it is kept.
• You have a detailed analysis of where personal data is stored and how information flows between these locations.
• The privacy policy is accessible to the public and details all processes relevant to personal data.
• The privacy policy includes a lawful basis in compliance with GDPR regulations and a clearly stated policy of use.
• You have a Data Protection Officer with all required documentation.
• Your decision makers and staff are aware of data protection and GDPR guidelines.
• Policies are in place for reporting breaches in data.
• You have a detailed list of sub-processors and contracts to cover data sharing under GDPR guidelines.
• Your customers can access, update, halt processing, or request deletions of data.
• Your system automatically deletes any data which is no longer in use.

These are just a few of the features that Magebit offers. It is a great tool to make your store GDPR-ready.

Prepare Your Store According to GDPR Requirements

GDPR requirements list is a major feature of current eCommerce web platforms operating within the EU. Given the extensive regulations, it can be challenging to meet all current requirements. However, with the extensions and information above, you can easily adapt to GDPR and keep your company on top of the game.

Meet Magento UK 2018 Summary

It was a couple of weeks ago, but to refresh memories of those who were there and those of you who wanted to know about such or similar events we’ve prepared our short recap of this event.

What Is Interesting About Meet Magento UK?

We have attended the Meet Magento® UK on June 13th, 2018 at The Mermaid Theatre in London. Let’s start with the venue: It had two halls: main – for the business topics and the other for technical discussions.

The MMUK18 has gathered 400 visitors from almost all around the world. There were two tracks: for merchants and technicians. Merchant track has been dedicated to investors expectations in the future of eCommerce and Magento obviously. Also, a big talk was devoted to ideas to help you plan, execute, and analyze research for your online store.

We’ve got some important insights from Peter Sheldon on Adobe and Magento future and benefits that it will bring for their joint solution. Mainly it could be the Cloud platform with unique personalization features.

Also, he spoke about a customer’s journey and all the opportunities that brands have to create to improve the user experience. There was a great example of Tesla to show that experience is differentiated brands which will stand with a time.

There were more topics about innovation in eCommerce, research and each panel had a unique case that helped to understand each subject in practice.

The technical track was covered up questions about PWA, DevOps and Magento Page Builder. PWA was the hottest trend, and there were a lot of discussions around how it would be implemented, but also other topics were interesting for developers and merchants to think about having new features in future.

Magento 2 Extensions for Personalized User Experience

Are you interested in the world of eCommerce? Have you heard of Magento® 2 extensions and Magento’s customization before? If so, you’re not the only one. Magento is one of the best-known platforms for eCommerce websites and companies. That’s because it provides a unique experience for everyone and increases conversions, leads, revenue, etc.

That said, how does Magento affect user experience and why are people so likely to convert to this eCommerce giant? In our below guide, you can read about customizable options in Magento 2.

Magento Personalization Features

Before we get into detail, you should know about Magento 2 product personalization and the benefits of using this platform for both you and your customers.

Customer Oriented Content

You can increase your conversions by creating content that targets your customers. By doing this, you can make every shopping experience unique. This happens when extensions collect data about your customers based on their search history, location, interests, and more.

If you’re looking for the best Magento 2 extension to use for this feature, you should try Fresh Relevance. By creating a unique experience for your customers, the extension provides you with more loyal customers. In short, people are more likely to stick with you if they feel valued by you.

How Does Fresh Relevance Allow You to Customize Experiences?

All you have to do is get used to the extension’s useful toolset. You can do this through either email or web content with the use of online profiling. Here is a short list of Fresh Relevance features:

• Recommendations for products
• Online profiling
• Personalizing content
• Integrates emails

Product Content

Product personalization is a sure way of making your customers happy. It’s one of Magento’s strengths because it provides the best recommendations out there. Magento chooses its recommendations based on purchase history, online habits, customer profiles, pricing, and several other factors.

As such, product recommendations are tailored to suit the habits of individuals and not groups of people.

Additional Magento Store Functionality for Better UX

For those who want to know more about specific features of Magento 2 to improve user experience, you can read about brand selection, instant checkout, and much more!

Shop by Brand Section

You need to make sure that the layout of your eCommerce website is as convenient as possible for your customers and potential buyers. This means you have to think like a customer when you’re going through your site. The brand section is one of the most important parts of any eCommerce website. It provides a variety for people who are looking for more than just a general selection of the topic they’re trying to buy in.

If, for example, you have a clothing retail website, you might want to add brands like “Calvin Klein to the sidebars so that those who are looking for something specific can find what they wish to conveniently.

Instant Checkout

Instant checkout benefits any eCommerce website, and it just so happens that Magento 2 users can have it all that much easier.
A smooth process ensures conversions. This remains true for checkouts and transaction processing. You shouldn’t try to complicate it too much because you can deal with abandoned carts afterward.

Magento personalization has greatly improved their checkout process, making it smoother and faster for everyone involved. Magento 2 offers One Step checkout, which has been proven to be 40% faster than previous ones.

Advanced Search and Navigation

Easy navigation is the secret to a successful business. Magento 2 allows you to make your navigation direct and simple. Its various navigation settings enable customers to choose from a limited number of categories that will later guide them until the final product is shown.

A great example of one of these extensions is Mega Menu, which has been endorsed by many in the eCommerce industry and IX experts.

AI Personalization

The use of personalization AI can help with the overall unique customer experience for each of your customers. This is done through automated email personalization; wherein, recommendations can be made on past customer experience.

Not only this, but this AI has pricing that might appeal to you because it only charges around 4% of the revenue that’s generated by the AI personalization. In comparison, hiring physical individuals to spread the word about your company will cost considerably more!

AI is evolving in the world of eCommerce because it can pose as your clients’ personal shoppers. This is done through the Chloe extension for Magento 2 stores. It can help them through the entire shopping process so that they have help right away.

8 Elements to Include into Your Magento eCommerce Design

In the decade since its launch, Magento® has become the leading eCommerce platform. The reason for its success is that Magento is flexible and user-friendly. It’s packed with features, highly customizable, and easy to both use and scale. It is an ideal platform for business owners who seek innovative ways to engage with their clients. Magento is effective for small business and large ones. Its scalability helps growing business to reach global proportions. Let’s have a look at some of the design elements to include in your Magento eCommerce design.

What to Design at Your Magento Store

The main key to a successful design is to understand your customers. What do they want? How can you best meet their needs? You also want your site to be user-friendly and engaging. Try to present users with products and services they will want or need. Include calls-to-action and opportunities for the customer to interact with the site.

Here are eight elements which will improve the success of any Magento eCommerce design:

1. Customer Name Field

One of the best ways to connect with people is to use their name. When someone uses our name, we become more open and more willing to engage. This also applies to the relationship between businesses and their customers. Many early designers overlook this element of eCommerce design.

Customers are more comfortable sharing their names than more sensitive information. You can gather names easily by using contact forms or pre-purchase opt-in forms. With a name, you can personalize the customer experience.

2. Related Products

One key to successful eCommerce design is to present your customers with related products. Previous searches can be used to personalize the customer experience. Related products are the most viewed elements on eCommerce websites. They draw attention and increase conversion rates.

Most people won’t want to spend much time searching. The goal is to make it easy for each customer to find things that they are interested in. Try to make your most in-demand products highly visible and place them on the homepage.

3. Product Collections

Product collections are lists of products focused on specific topics. They will dramatically increase sales for your Magento store. Product collections increase your search rankings. This means that prospective customers will be able to find your site more easily. They also let you showcase the best selling products or offer personalized product recommendations. Try to keep these collections updated. New products and deals will raise customer engagement and keep your customers coming back to the site.

4. Rating and Reviews

Ratings and reviews are excellent for building trust. The eCommerce website is like any business. It is a relationship between the owners and managers, and the customers. Cultivating this relationship means making the customer feel comfortable about their purchase.

People often use feedback and recommendations to inform their decisions. Ratings and reviews offer the customer confidence. They make your eCommerce website more trustworthy and more successful. You can gather reviews by requesting feedback in follow-up emails. An alternative is to offer bonuses or discounts to users that provide reviews.

5. Different Fill-Out Forms

Building a relationship also involves offering clients an opportunity to engage with the site and the business. You can do this by including fill-out forms in your design. Feedback forms will give your customer a voice while also gathering reviews.

Rating forms are also an excellent addition, as they are comfortable and quick for the customer. You can also use a form to gather customer contact details! With these details, you can personalize customer outreach and increase engagement. Remember that all information should be collected under GDPR law. Also, make sure to inform customers of the information you gather and how it will be used.

6. Call-to-Action Buttons

Call-to-action buttons can funnel the site experience towards products your customers will like. The Magento 2 design guide offers several tips on how to include call-to-action buttons in your site. It is a designer’s guide to the development of Magento eCommerce web platforms. It explores many elements of design in detail. CTA’s can be tricky design elements, but they can exponentially increase conversions. More than 90% of those who visit your site will read CTA’s. It’s important that they are visible and that they speak to the target audience. With a well-crafted landing site, the CTA will be the last step between customer and conversion.

7. Wish Lists

Magento website design also makes it easy to create personalized wish lists. Browsing customers often see products that catch their interest but need time to consider before they buy. Later, they may find the product on a different site or forget about it altogether. With wish lists, you can maintain customer interest in your products. They also make it more likely that they will buy them from your site.

If you have gotten customer contact details, then you can send follow-up emails. Tactful reminders and notifications of deals or price changes can result in easy conversions. Remember that most of the site’s appeal will be visible. You can raise conversion rates even more by making your wish lists visually appealing.

8. Sharing Products

Product sharing is a powerful element for eCommerce platforms. It’s made easy with Magento store design. By sharing products, customers can receive encouragement from friends or help others to find your site. Many eCommerce platforms overlook this feature.

Yet it can raise interest, make your site more engaging, and increase conversion. Sharing can be made more accessible with URL shorteners. Eye-catching buttons are excellent for product sharing. They let customers share without having to copy and paste. You can also provide buttons that allow your customer to share products on social media.

Magento 1.x End of Life is June 2020 (Updated)

Friends, now read carefully, especially those, who owns the online store based on Magento®. A little bird told us (Twitter, to be exact) that a new Age of Magento was nearby. Yes, Magento 2 has all the chances to become the next strong foundation for your super-powerful online store. So you should start considering it as a new eCommerce tool right now.

June 2020. Remember this time. It is when official Magento 1.x support will stop. And Magento 2 continues to conquer the market.

What does this mean for you?

• You should keep up to date because it will be the complete renewal of the eCommerce market: the new version is a future of technology, as always.
• The official updates stop. Therefore, the risk of vulnerabilities in the system grows many times in case you use not an updated Magento version. Your website security requires much attention.
• Magento community works on new extensions for Magento 2. Gradually, the number of modern solutions compatible with the Magento 1.x website will be not enough for your needs, while the number of Magento 2 extensions will increase on a daily basis.
• You can now check the exact support dates for Open Source and Community (Enterprise) editions and plan when it is better to upgrade your store.

The main ideas you may come up with are the following:

• If you’re planning to get the eCommerce project developed, you should choose Magento 2 instead of Magento 1.x;
• If you already have the Magento 1.x based eCommerce business, you can start migrating it to Magento 2.

The questions are: “Why?” and “What are the pros and difficulties you can meet?”

Let’s make it clear.

According to BuiltWith, almost 20% of Magento based websites use Magento 2.x (68,207 websites). That means a significant number of eCommerce business owners have already made their choice on the side of Magento 2.x. Is it the right decision? Let’s consider the pros and other details.

That means most of the eCommerce business owners have already made their choice on the side of Magento 2.x. Is it the right decision? Let’s consider the pros and other details.

The Pros of Migration to Magento 2

Though Magento 2 is not fully-equipped with many useful features that were presented in Magento 1, it’s still much more flexible. There are some features you’ll discover when working with Magento 2:

Increased Flexibility of Magento 2

Magento 2 is super-flexible and extendable when it comes to customization. It includes a lot of features. It’s all because of Magento 2 improved architecture and modular code base that broadens the limits for fast and efficient project development.

Better Management of Magento 2

Now administration of the online store is also more flexible. You can:

• include links to images and videos to your products;
• work with the orders better, because you can see the various types of data related to the orders on the Dashboard, (such as lifetime sales, average orders, etc);
• keep up with analytics (learn about best customers and sellers, view tax rates and quantities);
• upload new products easily;
• enjoy the user-friendly interface.

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Magento 2 API

The huge advantage is that Magento 2 comes with a Rest and SOAP-based API, unlike Magento 1.x. Magento API is a functionality that allows the web developers to integrate Magento with the other third-party services. While Magento 1.x came with a SOAP and XML-RPC based API, it was more difficult to perform integrations: it required the separate configuration of access rights for each user’s role. REST and SOAP had a different business logic. Now, in Magento 2, REST and SOAP business logic is equivalent, and the Magento 2 REST API allows the browsers based access to API calls.

Updating Magento 2 with Composer

It could be a useful feature when you are going to update Magento 2 version. The steps you should make are the following:

• choose the version you need to upgrade via composer upgrade;
• run the relevant command;
• upgrade the database (don’t forget to backup).

Migration to Magento 2: Pitfalls

As you can see, Magento 2 is quite a powerful and even a cool tool. But also, we can’t miss a fly in the ointment. The technical and hosting requirements are very high for Magento 2. Here are some of the most important of them.

Magento 2 Technical Requirements

• RAM 2GB
• PHP 5.6
• MySQL 5.6

Also, if talk about hosting, SSL security certificate is required for HTTPS. SSH access is required for hosting anyway, otherwise, it will be impossible to install new extensions, themes etc.

You can look through the full list of technical requirements here.

The next thing is the cost. It’s not cheap to move from Magento 1.x to Magento 2 if your online store is complicated enough. Additionally, Magento 2 doesn’t support Magento 1 themes. These facts are not very pleasant, right? But we have good news for you: migration to Magento 2 is an easy-going process with an experienced team of Magento developers.

How to Migrate from Magento 1 to Magento 2 and Why?

We, at WEB4PRO, have already completed a lot of Magento 2 based projects. Most of the project involved the task to migrate from Magento 1.x. Of course, this process could be challenging, but we have a lot of experience and effective solutions to perform it at the highest level.

Also, there are several good ready-made modules for migration from Magento 1 to Magento 2. So, it’s possible for sure! Now you are aware of the things that will happen in a year, and you can be completely ready for these changes.

Must-Have Magento 2 B2B Extensions in 2019

Any business owner knows the importance of creating the ultimate user experience. Of course, this is often a challenge when you don’t have the right tools at your disposal. That’s where Magento® comes into play. With Magento 2 B2B extensions, you can increase your sales, leads, and conversions by introducing extensions for pricing, account management, product reorders, and multichannel integration.

Features of Magento 2 B2B for Enterprises

Before we get into specific extensions, here’s a list of Magento 2 B2B features.

Price for Magento 2 B2B

The price options for Magento B2B extension might be the one thing that will determine whether you decide to go with this tool. There are plenty of options on the market, after all, so what makes Magento so special?

Magento B2B provides you with the option of only showing prices to your merchants. This means that if guests want to see prices, they’ll have to become merchants with your online store. This increases conversions and traffic by insisting that people delve deeper into your business to see prices. Beyond this, you can add a custom message for when customers add items to their carts.

Account Management for B2B

Magento B2B extension allows you to develop and absorb more customer information before they become part of your eCommerce site. You should also note that you can add extra fields to your customer registration page to tailor specific information to your store. If you need to know how they heard of you, what their interests are, their annual salary, etc., you can include this from the very beginning.

The benefit of having these extra fields is that you can learn more about your client base; thereby, also allowing you to tailor products, ads, emails, etc., toward each client. There are a few other features of Magento’s B2B Account Management; including, sending emails to accept or reject potential customers, send emails to admins, etc.

Magento 2 Reorder for B2B

Quite simply, reorder function allows customers to save essential time. This B2B extension has a section available called “My reorder product”; wherein, they can look over all of their previous orders to choose the ones they want to reorder. By saving your customers time, you’re ensuring that you care about them providing qualitative service and give them the necessary option to purchase something they like.

Multichannel Integrations in Magento 2 Commerce

Magento B2B offers eCommerce businesses a variety of multichannel integrations. The purpose of these tools and extensions is to provide your store with a greater reach.

Some extensions will ensure that you’re connected to an Amazon or eBay store, while others will connect you to social media platforms. By opening accounts throughout the internet, different customers will be able to find your store, and you’ll see greater conversions.

Top Magento 2 Extensions

Now that you know about Magento’s various B2B features let’s move on to the best B2B extensions.

M2E Pro Amazon and eBay Integration

Let’s begin with the M2E Pro Amazon and eBay integration. A major plus to this extension is that it’s free for those of you who have the enterprise edition.

This extension ensures that you don’t need to use the cloud to back up any files or to share data; instead, everything can be accessed from your Magento 2 interface. While this might not seem like a big deal on the surface, it affects the overall internet security of your sites.

Since you won’t be using the cloud, you don’t have to worry about the security concerns that come with it. Since you’re only operating out of one interface, you have to check the security of that interface; thereby, cutting costs and threats in half.

Multi-User Account Extension for Magento 2 by Creative Minds

This extension allows for customers to create sub-user accounts rather than having to stick with a single one. This extension costs around $200 for the community edition and $400 for the enterprise edition.

Some might find it unnecessary to have a multi-user account, but the major benefit of this is that each sub-user account will have different permissions. You should be aware, though, that sub-user account may have to send their cart for approval depending on their different permissions.

Improved Layered Navigation by Amasty

Improved layered navigation is important unlike any other because it makes the overall design of your eCommerce site more accessible; thereby, allowing customers to browse more freely. This layered navigation provides you with the opportunity to add filters to your menus and for customers to narrow down their desired products.

Here are a few more benefits to using improved layered navigation: no page loading time, better navigation, reviews, custom URLs that can be made to be SEO-friendly, etc.
You should be aware that this extension is quite pricey. Sitting at $639 for the enterprise edition, you’ll find that this is well worth it.

Connect POS by SmartOSC

This free Magento 2 B2B module connects your physical location to your virtual store. That means your data, stock, and other information will be updated in real-time. You don’t have two different product and customer lists; instead, you can keep everything organized within the same platform. This extension allows you to accept orders, payments, deliveries, and more!

Fastly CDN

Fastly is a free marketplace extension that works with a cloud to provide you with increased security and delivery. This will benefit you and your online store because as you customer experience improves, so will your conversions and purchases do.

Remember, the happier your customers are, the more likely they are to return! This tool provides your customers with only the most accurate information.

Reorder Product List by BSS Commerce

Similar to one of the other commerce extensions Magento 2 on this list, reorder product list allows your customers to reorder the products that they want and need. The list that is shown to them provides them with all of the information they need to reorder the products: product image, price, the number of items in stock, etc.

It costs $80, and it could be one of the less expensive features on your list. All your customers have to do is log into their accounts and click on the My reorder product section of the website.