Ecommerce "Holiday Shopping" Insights from Experts in Ecommerce

eTaildTail friends at SLI Systems weigh in on Holiday Shopping and offer some very helpful links to tips and advice from ecommerce experts to help online merchants postion their Web Store for the last week of Holiday Shopping.

I hope this helps!

-- Chip Arndt

By Geoff Brash, VP of Marketing geoff.brash@sli-systems.com

"If you’re like every other retailer your biggest question this holiday season is, is my online storefront well-positioned to attract lots of holiday shoppers – and turn browsers into buyers?  Early returns are showing that more shoppers are flocking to the Internet to make their purchases this year, so it’s important to ensure your site will keep visitors’ attention if they happen to stop by to browse your wares.  We recently conducted a few ecommerce interviews with some interesting folks in the industry as part of our Ecommerce Podcast series, and thought the discussions might offer some useful information as you try to maximize your own site’s potential this holiday season and heading into 2009.

"In our interview with ecommerce expert Brian Walker, senior analyst with Forrester Research, he reveals that retailers with an online presence are likely to show healthier holiday sales than those that are purely brick & mortar, even if this season doesn’t promise to set records. He explains that in this tough economic climate, he’s seeing online retailers shift their focus from customer acquisition to customer retention – and they’re taking a harder look at technologies and best practices that keep existing customers coming back, like product reviews and alternative payment methods.  Site search is one of those technologies that can play a big part in boosting customer satisfaction online – if done right.

"In another interview, Aaron Magness of Zappos says the company relies mostly on word-of-mouth, but also utilizes paid search, SEO and social media sites (e.g. Twitter, Facebook) for its marketing efforts.  Aaron offers advice to other ecommerce companies that are thinking about using Twitter, which is to simply be yourself; be transparent; be honest.  (SLI Systems is also now on Twitter, and we’d be happy to offer tips to any of you thinking about using it to supplement your marketing efforts.)  It’s also interesting to hear Aaron talk about Zappos’ approach to customer service and how time in the call center is required for ALL employees.

"Finally, we just posted an interview with Alan Lim of UK’s Purely Gadgets.  Alan explains their 95/5 approach to inventory – basically, how they offer a wide variety of low-margin products and a small percentage of very high margin products that comprise most of their sales.  He also talks about how this “once-in-a-lifetime crisis” is really a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” given that many of their competitors have folded in the past year.  And he talks about the challenges and opportunities with running marketing teams in 2 locations – London and Hong Kong – and how this helps them cover the globe and respond to issues quickly, no matter what time zone it’s in.

"I hope you’ll find these interviews informative and useful.  If there are any topics you’d like us to cover in the future, or if you have some experience or advice to share and are interested in being interviewed for our podcast series, please just drop me a note at geoff.brash@sli-systems.com.

Happy holidays!"