Enterprise WooCommerce, Amazon Prime Day, eCommerce & ADA, and Dark Patterns with Matt Medeiros

In this show, we are joined by Matt Medeiros from the Matt Report.

In episode 23, BobWP and Brad Williams are joined by Matt Medeiros from The Matt Report and Pagely.com.

In this show, we chat with Matt about enterprise WooCommerce site hosting and eCommerce hosting in general. We also touch on the results of Amazon Prime Day, eCommerce sites and should they comply with the Americans Disabilities Act. Lastly, we delve into Dark Patterns at Scale on shopping websites.

Matt Medeiros from the Matt Report and Pagely

Matt shares some of what Pagely is doing in the WordPress/eCommerce space. He also talked more about the bigger picture of eCommerce and WordPress—specifically the challenges for WooCommerce large store owners and the costs that come with adding required functionality to meet their needs.

Although some platforms may offer a simpler cost base, there are still pros and cons to either going that route or having the flexibility of a WordPress site. Of course, WordPress, as a content management system plays into it as well.

Matt adds his prediction about where we are going with headless eCommerce in the WordPress space based on what we are already seeing happen.

Of course, you will need to listen in for the real nitty, gritty around this topic.

Amazon Prime Day

It is the consensus that this was the best Amazon Prime Day yet. The three of us give our personal feedback: did we shop on those days or not?

This year, more than 175 million products sold. Over 100k laptops, 200k televisions, 300k headphones, and, yes, more than a million toys.

Brad ends the conversation with the prediction that Prime Day will become bigger and bigger each year. It will be interesting to see how much this concept reaches beyond Amazon, with several other major retailers already having launched ‘prime days’ of their own.

Are E-Commerce Sites Covered by the Americans With Disabilities Act? Retailers Ask Supreme Court to Weigh In

This is an interesting piece of news. Several retailers are asking the Supreme Court for clarification on how much online eCommerce retailers need to adhere to the ADA. Ongoing lawsuits have brought this issue to the forefront.

We all agreed that accessibility is important, but this brings up some interesting points. As one quote from the article stated:

It is straightforward enough to measure the height of a restroom grab bar to test its ADA compliance, the NRF wrote in a 2018 blog post. It is far more complex to accurately measure or predict how a specific website will interact with a specific assistive technology and its user.

Dark Patterns at Scale: Findings from a Crawl of 11K Shopping Websites

This is an interesting study and one you will need to check out.

Dark patterns are user interface design choices that benefit an online service by coercing, steering, or deceiving users into making unintended and potentially harmful decisions.

This study looked at 11k shopping sites, many of them large retailers. The dark pattern categories were: Sneaking, Urgency, Misdirection, Social Proof, Scarcity, Obstruction and Forced Action.

The question is which go too far. To be honest, much of what they show here are provided as features in many WordPress plugins. The article shows specific examples that I’m sure you run across daily.

Where You Can Find Matt

You can check out Pagely.com and also find Matt on his podcast site, Matt Report or on YouTube.

Links Mentioned in the Show

Amazon says this year’s Prime Day surpassed Black Friday and Cyber Monday combined (CNBC.com)

Are E-Commerce Sites Covered by Americans With Disabilities Act? Retailers Ask Supreme Court to Weigh In (Footwear News)

Dark Pattern at Scale: Findings from a Crawl of 11K Shopping Websites (Webtransparency.cs.princeton)