San Francisco, Calif. – June 2, 2010 - TRUSTe, the leader in online trust, and Miva Merchant, a leading provider of ecommerce software solutions for online merchants, today announced a partnership to enable online brand trust in the ecommerce environment for the 50,000 customers that Miva Merchant serves.
Miva Merchant will now offer privacy services to its vast customer base by re-selling TRUSTe Privacy Services for small and mid-sized businesses. Clients using TRUSTe Privacy Services may display the distinctive TRUSTe Privacy Seal on their Website, obtained only after undergoing privacy scanning and creating a custom privacy policy using TRUSTe’s new Privacy Policy Generator (PPG). TRUSTe also provides its clients with free consumer privacy dispute resolution support, resolving thousands of privacy complaints each year for its customers.
As consumers demand more online trust assurances, we’ve seen that brand trust and sales have an increasingly close correlation,” said Fran Maier, President of TRUSTe. “As the leading privacy trustmark, the TRUSTe partnership with Miva Merchant enables a larger distribution of privacy over the web. We’ve found that 82 percent of consumers who have seen the TRUSTed Websites seal trust it, which translates directly into increased site engagement. That’s the privacy payoff and it’s a much needed advantage for small and mid-sized business.”
A recent Consumer Reports survey found that 71 percent of those shopping online look for a trustmark before doing business with that retailer; additionally, TRUSTe research has shown that people spend more time and money on websites with a TRUSTe seal. By introducing trust to this online community, customers of Miva Merchant will increase conversions, revenue and profit.
"As the ecommerce space rapidly becomes more competitive and complex, online trust is a critical element of sales conversion,” said Rick Wilson, President/COO of Miva Merchant. “The privacy services brought by our partnership with TRUSTe add an important element to our offerings, giving our customers a one-stop shopping experience that will allow their Website to stand out from the crowd.”
TRUSTe’s Privacy Policy Generator enables small business owners of all kinds to quickly construct a TRUSTe-hosted privacy policy for their site using an intuitive widget interface. A customer indicates what kind of personal data they are collecting from consumers, how they use the information, and a number of other key elements, and the PPG provides an accurate and consumer-friendly policy, featuring graphical icons to enhance consumer understanding.
"As an online merchant, having TRUSTe Privacy Services in conjunction with a Miva Merchant shopping cart is an attractive and fool-proof way for me to ensure that my customers feel safe and secure when shopping,” said the founder of West Florida Components, Patricia Pepe. “The increase in consumer trust in our site coupled with the increase in average order volume has been incredible to watch as our customers respond to our commitment to safeguard their personal information.”
"My time, resources and technical knowledge of privacy are limited, but I know that online trust is an important component of any ecommerce business model so that my customers feel confident when shopping on my site,” said DirectFix.com President Robert Stanley. “My purchase of TRUSTe’s Privacy Services through Miva Merchant offered me an increase to my bottom line for minimal investment and with one click of my mouse. To me, that was one of the easiest business decisions I’ve ever had to make.”
About TRUSTe
TRUSTe is the leading global provider of data privacy management solutions, offering a broad suite of products to help companies safely collect and use customer data to power their business by building trust, driving engagement and ensuring compliance across all their online channels – websites, mobile apps, advertising and cloud services. More than 5,000 companies, including top international brands like Apple, Disney, eBay, Forbes, HP and Microsoft, rely on TRUSTe to build trust and address evolving and complex privacy challenges. In addition to privacy assessments and certifications which enable businesses to display the globally recognized TRUSTe Certified Privacy Seal, TRUSTe offers innovative technology products, including website monitoring, online behavioral advertising (OBA) compliance controls for desktop and mobile ads, and EU cookie compliance controls. For more information, please visit http://www.truste.com.
About Miva Merchant
Miva Merchant has been building feature-rich e-commerce software since 1995. Over 50,000 merchants use the company’s highly customizable, intuitive and scalable shopping cart solution. These merchants range from the hand-selected boutique products store to the manufacturer directly integrating their manufacturing with distributor access and an online retail presence. To see examples of stores running on Miva Merchant, visit http://www.mivamerchant.com/
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