Spotlight Features

Technology that truly is innovative doesn't look to solve a problem that isn't there. The next big thing -- or things -- will address the demands of consumers and the needs of businesses and make life better. Tech innovation could come in many different forms.

Moves that allowed major e-commerce players to jockey for position both off and on the Internet made headlines in 2017. "The year was a triumph for market leaders," said Mike Comstock, a senior adviser at GrandCanals. "Leading companies like Amazon, Target and Walmart just got stronger, as they have...

One thing the latest holiday sales season made crystal clear is that mobile commerce is on the rise. On Cyber Monday -- which set an all-time-high overall sales record of $6.6 billion -- mobile shopping totaled 47.4 percent of visits to retailers' websites, according to Adobe. However, etailers coul...

2017 may be the year that developments in the tech world truly were overshadowed by other world events: deepening divisions in the United States and the looming threat of war with North Korea; numerous sexual misconduct scandals; terrorist attacks in Europe and elsewhere; and the announcement of yet...

This holiday selling season may have been a good one for retailers, but every silver lining has a cloud. In this case, one shadow will be cast by chargeback fraud, which can occur when shoppers request credit card chargebacks from the issuing bank instead of from the merchant. "Merchants bleed $227 ...

For many online shoppers, shipping has become a pivotal issue, and one of the worst things an etailer can do is allow a shipment to be late. On-time arrival is such a high expectation that many shoppers find late delivery worse than other notoriously disagreeable things, a recent survey of online sh...

Let's face it: Your website is central to your e-commerce business. Upgrading your website is one of the most important things you can do to bring in new customers and sell more products. Sometimes, though, it's difficult to know exactly how to improve your site. To help you out with that dilemma, h...

At least 145 million Americans -- half the United States population -- were impacted by a data breach at Equifax that netted thieves personal information such as names, addresses, birthdates, Social Security Numbers and driver's license numbers. That pales in comparison to the earlier Yahoo breaches...

Getting customers -- and keeping them -- is the name of the game in e-commerce. "The e-commerce market is crowded and noisy, and brands need to do everything they can to differentiate themselves from the pack," said Eric Hansen, CTO of SiteSpect. "Loyalty programs do just that, giving a brand the ed...