Amazon drops free shipping minimum to $25 as Target goes the other way:<\/strong> Laura Heller<\/a> at Forbes<\/a> reports that Amazon has lowered the minimum order price to receive free shipping to $25 as its price war with Walmart heats up. The previous minimum of $35 was only established in February after Walmart dropped its free-shipping minimum to $35 from $49. Amazon didn’t formally announce the change but the new information is on the website.\u00a0Continue reading…<\/a><\/p>\n Amazon Echo Show: Home assistant lets people watch users through camera:<\/strong> Aatif Sulleyman<\/a> at The Independent<\/a> reports that Amazon has just launched the Echo Show, its latest Alexa-powered home assistant. Like existing versions of the Echo, it plays audio, responds to voice commands and is capable of controlling compatible smart devices around the home, such as lights and thermostats. The Show, however, is the first in the range to feature a display. Continue reading…<\/a><\/p>\n eBay UK Spring 2017 Seller Release: Active Content (and impact to sales):<\/strong> Chris Dawson<\/a> at Tamebay<\/a> reminds eBay sellers that if you haven\u2019t removed any active content from listings by 7 June, then eBay will simply block it. eBay won\u2019t actively penalise you if you still have active content but if it impacts your feedback or buyers simply can\u2019t see the listing description, you could quickly find yourself dropping down best match rankings. Continue reading…<\/a><\/p>\n Ending your emails with this 1 word vastly improves the response rate:<\/strong> Betsy Mikel<\/a> at Inc.<\/a> reports that emails that closed with a variation of thank you<\/em> got significantly more responses than emails ending with other popular closings.\u00a0Emails that ended in Thanks in advance<\/em> had a 65.7 percent response rate. Of emails that ended in Thanks<\/em>, 63 percent got responses. The third most effective closing was Thank you<\/em> with a 57.9 percent response rate. Continue reading…<\/a><\/p>\n Wal-Mart web CEO says he’s still playing catch-up on Amazon:<\/strong> Matthew Boyle and Brad Stone at Bloomberg<\/a> report that Wal-Mart’s ecommerce chief feels the company is still lagging behind fierce competitor Amazon in certain areas. Former Jet.com founder, Marc Lore, said in an interview this week, “There are certainly areas where we are playing defence, and we\u2019re behind and need to catch up. One example is the long-tail categories that we\u2019re going after with acquisitions”.\u00a0The term \u201clong-tail\u201d refers to the seemingly endless assortment of products that online retailers can offer. Continue reading…<\/a><\/p>\n It’s nearly the weekend…are you excited?<\/p>\n