Affiliate.com is running a great contest with these awesome t-shirts they gave away at Affiliate Summit recently. I wasn't lucky enough to attend (being busy with the Email Summit in Miami in January and about to head off to the Miva Merchant conference tomorrow), but Tom Wozniak at Affiliate.com was nice enough to send me one in the mail (along with anyone else who emailed and asked). And the person with the most creative blog posts wins the contest - the prize being $1000 in case, and a $1000 cash donation in that person's name to the American Red Cross Haiti Relief Fund. It's a win-win...at worst I get a great t-shirt, and at best I get cash and Haiti gets $1000 no matter what!

This got me to thinking about all the things online retailers have been doing to show their support for relief efforts following the tragic earthquake in Haiti on January 12. One of the first ones I noticed was when my favorite members-only sites, Rue La La, closed its boutiques for almost 24 hours. In a quote from their facebook page:

Rue La La joins the rest of the world in grieving the tremendous losses to the people of Haiti. Out of respect for those who have lost loved ones, their shelter, and life's basic necessities in this tragedy, we cannot stand by while relief efforts are underway without taking action. We are halting our Boutiques from now until Saturday at 8AM ET. We ask that instead you take this time - as we are - to make a donation to the American Red Cross Haiti Relief and Development Effort.

Then, this weekend, as I was on a mad hunt for children's soccer cleats for my daughter (which they apparently do not carry anywhere in the entire county), I discovered fairly prominent "Donate to Haiti" graphics near the top of all pages on both Foot Locker's and Champs Sport's websites.

When you click on the links, the following page describes how the company (Champs is owned by Footlocker Inc.) has made a cash and footwear/apparel donation to Haiti and how you can too. There's even an easy way to send a text message that will make a $10 donation that simply gets charged on your next cell phone bill.

Melissa Joy Manning is another site I came across last week for a different post. She is donating 10% of all first quarter proceeds to benefit Haiti through the Red Cross. I like the fact that this company's donations are long-lived...it didn't just last a week or two, but an entire three months.

If you prefer to show your support openly, how about a To Haiti with Love t-shirt? They can be found at a number of retailers online and off. Theory is one (also in mens).

Are you a retailer supporting Haiti? Or a shopper whose favorite store is making in-kind donations or other efforts? Let us know about it by leaving a comment.

Cisco Adler, in his new eBook "The Landing Page Bible", offers an answer to the "Internet age"-old question of who controls a company's website: IT or Marketing. Rather than involve technical resources and attempt to revamp a section of the corporate website (or the entire thing!), Cisco suggests companies focus online marketing initiatives on landing pages, which can be more agile than a company's main website. Read more

If you've been running an e-commerce site for awhile and been lucky enough to watch it grow, one of the things you may have noticed is that your workload doesn't stay fixed as sales increase. In fact, there are times when doubling sales may triple (or more!) your workload. This is the time when you should start looking at ways to increase your productivity, or the productivity of your website itself. Read more

Day two of the 2009 Shop.org Strategy and Innovation Forum got started with brief talks by Fiona Swerdlow, Head of Research at Shop.org, and an overview of the eCommerce Forecast 2009-2013 by Brian Walker of Forrester Research. After these discussions, the keynote for the second and final day began - and it turned out to be one of the most inspirational business and marketing talks I've ever attended.

The 2009 Shop.org Strategy and Innovation Forum kicked off today at the Gaylord Palms hotel in Orlando. The convention is filled with the top names in ecommerce, a variety of vendors, and a small but fun and elite crowd of attendees.

Read more