A 22 percent increase in sales from last year’s day after Thanksgiving put more money in the pockets of online retailers this year.

Despite a slow start in November, online US non-travel retail topped $7 billion for the first 18 days of the holiday season, an increase of $1 billion from the same period in 2006.

Whether an online retailer is also on top of the (virtual) world or is just starting out, they’ve likely got a lot to learn.  And as worlds both physical and virtual move forward, Donna Hoffman of the Sloan Center for Internet Retailing (and UC Riverside) has shared “10 Trends You Can’t Afford to Miss.”

Visitors to one’s online retail website have a great likelihood of starting from a page of search results, as shown by last holiday season’s activity.

ChannelAdvisor, a provider of ecommerce channel management solutions announced the addition of 30 new retail customers who have selected ShoppingAdvisor or SearchAdvisor to manage their paid search or comparison shopping engines.

A 23 percent climb in non-travel online retail contributed to a substantial gain in spending for the second quarter of 2007.

Social networks and online communities have little impact on online retail sales according to a report from JupiterResearch, "Us Retail Consumer survey, 2007."

Consumers are willing to pay extra to buy items from online retailers when they know how a retailer’s policies will protect their privacy, a new Carnegie Mellon University study shows.

Being able to research products online is important to retail shoppers. Ninety-one percent of online shoppers said it was "important" or "very important" for retailers to offer in- depth product information online according to WebCollage’s 2007 "Survey of Online Consumer Product Research Habits."

Online retailers Netflix, QVC.com and Amazon lead in customer satisfaction, according to the ForeSee Results Top 100 Online Retail Satisfaction Index out today.

“Netflix, QVC Score Well With Online Consumers”

Internet retailers who use email to reach customers could improve their sales by using segmented email lists, according to an Internet Retailer survey analyzed by Vovici.

Around 40 percent of respondents said their email efforts returned conversion rates of 2 percent or less.

It should go without saying that functionality issues that hamper usability are a major stumbling block for users, and will discourage them from coming back to the site in the future. The big things are easier to catch, of course, but it might be the small things in the long run – the annoying little bugs – that drive users away as well.

Brick-and-mortar commerce has a powerful ally in the Internet, as many people research a potential purchase online first before heading to a local business to buy.

Shopping online the day after Christmas is becoming a family holiday tradition, says Nielsen//NetRatings. Overall visits to Internet shopping sites that day jumped 35 percent over last year, adding eight million more people to the virtual elbowing party.

The year 2006 was a record breaker for e-commerce as online retail spending passed the $100 billion mark, according comScore.

Online retailers may seen payment fraud siphon $3 billion away from their enterprises for all of 2006, and there is impact beyond the Internet.

Getting to an online retail storefront doesn’t always involve going straight to the front door, as many people depend on the traffic cops of search to point them in the right direction.

A visitor hits your retailing website and waits, and waits, and by the time you finish reading this sentence, she’s back to the SERPs to find a better site than yours.