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!"

Spruce Up Your Storefront to Meet Holiday Shopping Demand: Special eTaildTail Guest Commentary

I have a special Guest Blog Commentary for the eTaildTail community today from our friends at SLI Systems. 

It is great read and helpful for the holidays to increase Webstore conversions.

Happy reading!

- Chip Arndt

Spruce Up Your Storefront to Meet Holiday Shopping Demand

By Geoff Brash, VP of Marketing, SLI Systems

With the holidays just around the corner, below are some tips for how you can deliver the best possible online shopping experience for your customers, and capture your share of online sales.  All of these tips are fairly simple and can be implemented in little to no time, so there’s no time like the present to get started (if you haven’t already!).

1. Create a “gift finder”: A gift finder is a useful tool that helps online shoppers find just the right gifts for the various people on their holiday lists. It’s easy to deploy, and can be promoted throughout your site. Generally, gift finders let people narrow their search by certain criteria, such as price, who the recipient is (kids, friends, co-workers and so on), or gift type. They’re then presented with a list of all the products that match those criteria. To see a good example, check out the gift finder on Vivre (click on “Giving” at the top of the page).

2. Prepare your site for holiday traffic: Make sure your site infrastructure can cope with the onslaught of holiday shoppers – you don’t want the site to perform slowly -- or worse,  crash – when people are trying to buy. This is one area where it might make sense to use hosted ecommerce technology solutions, so your site performance won’t drag during peak traffic times.

3. Make sure your site search results are relevant: The holidays are a great time to gain new customers, but if people can’t find what they’re looking for, they’ll quickly move to one of your competitors – and possibly never come back. Try searching your site yourself. Does your site search deliver results that are relevant? Can it account for spelling errors? Can you provide results for those “long-tail” terms that aren’t as commonly used but have higher conversion rates? If you answered no to any of these questions, you might consider finding a new site search provider – one that can get your site up and running in very little time.

4. Show off holiday specials: Promote holiday merchandise or holiday-related items with on-site banners or other highly visible promotional tools. And be sure to use search terms visitors use on your site in these banners, so your messaging resonates.  You could also place the banners on site search results pages, when you have a captive audience.  If you offer free shipping for holiday purchases, heavily promote that benefit as well.

5. Put keyword data to work: To improve the chance that your products will show up on the first or second page of search engine results, review your site search activity and create landing pages related to the consumers’ likely search terms. Since customers may not be familiar with the brand names of your company’s products, optimize your site for the terms your visitors actually use – those they enter in the search box on your site.

Are you doing anything differently this year than last, or did you try something last year that worked so well you’re going to repeat it this year?

If so, I’d love to hear from you. Please email me at geoff.brash AT sli-systems.com

Holiday Fixes To Your WebSite and SEO Search By Click Z

Friends of eTaildTail at Click Z have some great advice and "quick fix" help tips to optimize your Webstore for the Holidays.

It is a quick read and very helpful to all online merchants.

Here is the beginning of the article:

"It's that time of year again: just after Halloween and just before Thanksgiving. That means your Web site is probably frozen, with no more development possible. Your IT guys are bracing the site and making sure it can handle the traffic the holidays will (hopefully) bring. Usually at this time of year, I remind readers to harness the traffic in Q4 long after it's over or how to turn interactions like customer returns into acquisition opportunities.

Today, however, let's look at quick fixes you still have time to make to your site, even though it's technically locked down. Obviously, we will concentrate only on the easy things. Nothing on this list will change logic or technology on your site that your QA people will fuss over. Given that restriction, we can only address minor issues in this quick-fix list. But added together, these quick fixes could have a major impact on your success this holiday season.

Before the holiday season ramps up, try these fixes:..."

<<<CLICK HERE>>> for full details.

- Chip Arndt

Shopping.com Improves Its Consumer Shopping Engine To Help Online Merchants Reach More Customers

eTaildTail strives to keep online merchants up to date on changes and upgrades at all consumer shopping engines, affectionately known as CSEs, or comparison shopping engines.

Yesterday, Shopping.com announced some improvements and enhancements to their comparison shopping engine navigation features that should help online merchants better reach customers and customers better reach online merchant listings.

All online merchants, please incorporate these important changes to improve performance when using the Shopping.com CSE.

I hope this information helps. Please read Shopping.com's helpful advice, understand it, and make adjustments accordingly.

If you are a MerchantAdvantage client, please consult with your technical representative and they will help you leverage this new feature immediately.

 

From Shopping.com Merchant Support Team:
October 28, 2008

"In an effort to improve the end-user experience, we are starting to require that merchants supply product condition in its own separate field. 

The Condition field should hold only the key words "New," "Used," or "Refurbished." This information is not currently visible on product listings, but will be used to focus the search process. The special projects mentioned above will ensure that functionality will be built into the user interface of Shopping.com so that we will make use of this information in a much more viable fashion.

The indication of product condition on top of stock description will help your conversion to sale by reducing cart abandonment due to the consumer having too little information, pre-checkout.

When you make use of the stock description as well as product condition fields in your feed, you ensure that the consumer has the highest amount of information needed to intelligently make a purchase."

Happy Halloween Week!

- Chip Arndt

Survey Says: Site Search, SEO and Email Marketing are Key for E-tailing Success

eTaildTail and MerchantAdvantage are proud to offer insights from our friends in the ecommerce and mobile commerce industries to help online merchants improve their online maketing efforts and increase sales and return on ad spend.

This week, Geoff Brash of SLI Systems, the industry leader in intelligent storefront site search solutions, provides an insightful look into those technologies that help online merchants most effectively.

The study, and Geoff's subsequent commentary, covers what technologies online merchants found the most important to implement today to improve onsite conversions and build trust in the marketplace of their storefront and brand.

Thank you Geoff for participating in the eTaildTail community and helping us all learn a little bit more on how to be effective etailers!

Guest Commentary from Geoff Brash, SLI Systems:

"Are you giving top priority – and adequate resources – to making the most of site search, SEO, and e-mail marketing? 

We recently polled more than 300 U.S. retailers about what e-commerce technologies matter the most when promoting their online businesses, and these three e-commerce technologies scored the highest among several others, including user-generated content, static and dynamic ads, social media and more.  In fact, 90% of the survey participants said that search is a “critical,” “very important” or “important” factor in the success of their business. 

Those surveyed also said that the effectiveness of site search and SEO will continue to get better over the next three years.  Meanwhile, 40% of the retailer respondents are testing out new online tools as a way to strengthen their marketing efforts, by starting company blogs and podcasts. 

Almost the same number (38%) said that user-generated content – for example, ratings and reviews – is also gaining in popularity.  Have you incorporated any of these innovative approaches into your marketing efforts? 

What have your experiences been?

There are many more interesting findings from our survey, including the fact that about 90% of the retailers who tracked results said that after adding site search, sales increased or conversion rates improved.   

With the holiday season just around the corner, now is the perfect time to incorporate some of these important technologies if you’re not already.

If you’re interested in seeing the full results of our survey, please visit www.sli-systems.com."

Thank you Geoff and onward we charge to make our online storefronts the most productive that they can be for the Holiday shopping season -- even in a touch economy.

-- Chip Arndt

NexTag Says: "Economic Woes Won't Spook Smart Halloween Shoppers"

Is the following synopsis, by the highly successful comparison shopping site NexTag, a "Trick or Treat"?

Some analysts are "bearish" and see this announcement about Halloween Shopping as a "trick", especially when one considers that the USA is experiencing some hard financial times - even with the biggest one day gain of the New York Stock Exchange in history registered today.

But, if it means anything, I see NexTag's synopsis as a "treat"!!!

I do believe that we will see an overall decrease in all retail shopping 4Q 2008, due to general tough economic times and Americans deciding to live more within their means, but this does not mean that online shopping will see a decline from last year.

Actually, I see more and more people going online to shop because:

1. of several assumptions based on my prior post titled: Credit Crunch Sends Shoppers Online for Cheaper Holiday Presents
2. Americans find shopping online cost-effective and easy
3. consumers are becoming more and more comfortable with online shopping and with mobile commerce ("mcommerce"), and
4. month-to-month growth rate of 15-35 year olds shopping online is growing faster than ever before

So here is NexTag's analysis, which is a "little" bias as they want people to shop with them, but I believe it is accurate, especially when I see statistics on shopping across over 150 other comparison shopping engines ("CSEs").

Economic Woes Won't Spook Smart Halloween Shoppers
NexTag offers users the tools they need to save this holiday season.

From NexTag, October 13, 2008

The economic outlook may be grim for many Americans, but that doesn't mean Americans will skimp when it comes to costumes, candy and decorations this Halloween.

The latest report from the National Retail Federation shows that despite a slowing economy, Americans will be celebrating the holiday this year in greater numbers than ever before (64.5%, up from the previous year's high of 58.7%). Average spending is also on the rise at $66.54 per person, an increase of more than $20 in the past seven years alone. And it's not just parents and children who are getting into the spirit of the season, seniors, singles and even pets will be donning costumes and strutting their stuff.

However, while shoppers are spending more they're also spending smarter. Increasing numbers are turning to the internet, and specifically to price comparison shopping to find the best deals. NexTag offers consumers the information they need to find the best value for their money as well as access to hundreds of quality sellers.

It's Trick-or-Treat Time: By far the most popular Halloween activity...

<<<CLICK HERE>> to read full article, it is a good read!

-- Chip Arndt

Credit Crunch Sends Shoppers Online for Cheaper Holiday Presents

It is nice to look at the cup half full, even in gloomy economic times. 

Or maybe it is just smart business to see that the collective world repsonse to the recent credit crunch market collapse, the stock market recovery today worldwide, and America's endless desire to consume may actually drive more shoppers to the internet to look for bargains and products for the Holidays.  We still "need" presents!

I don't believe that the online Holiday shopping season will be as robust as we have seen in the past, and it definately will not grow significantly beyond 5-7% over last year's performance, but online and mobile shopping will maintain itself and ecommerce merchants should be able to have an "okay" Holiday shopping season as:

1. people are used to shopping on line more and more
2. people are looking for bargains to save money and doing it online is easier, and
3. Americans are addicted to consumption

So here is the silver lining for the Holiday Shopping Season and how ecommerce merchants can prepare, as reported by eTaildTail friends at Tech Central.ie.

October 13, 2008

E-retailers Urged to Prepare For Christmas
Credit crunch sending shoppers online for cheaper presents

Businesses are being urged to ensure that their online stores are up-to-date and competitive as a growing number of shoppers turn to the internet for bargains.

A recent survey for ISP Eclipse Internet found that, with the credit crunch biting down, 54 per cent of respondents will be spending less this year on presents, and one in 10 are expected to buy more online thanks to lower prices and greater variety.

Around one in five now buy more than half of all Christmas presents online, jumping to nearly a third for 25 to 44 year-olds.

"The rising importance of online shopping has been accelerated by the current climate of economic uncertainty, with people looking to reduce the cost of Christmas without compromising too much on the overall event," said Mark Thomas, head of sales and marketing at Eclipse Internet.

Price and convenience are the two biggest factors driving shoppers off the high street and onto their PCs, according to the survey....

<<<CLICK HERE>>> to read full story

-- Chip Arndt

MerchantAdvantage Helps Increase The Return on CSE Spending

It is always nice when the marketplace takes notice of our hard work at MerchantAdvantage to help ecommerce merchants work cost-effectively with over 150 consumer shopping engines and comparison shopping engines ("CSE"), including Amazon, buySAFE, eBay, Cooking.com, Greenzer, HGTV, Like.com, PriceGrabber, Pronto. Shop.com, Shopzilla, Smarter.com, and a myriad of other CSEs.

Today, BizReport reported on the importance of using a robust analytic tool to:

• measure how marketing campaigns are working across CSEs, and
• gauge and calculate return on ad spend ("ROAS") when using these marketing channels. 

In the article, BizReport highlighted MerchantAdvantage, and our "Chanalytics" reporting tool, as an important element to providing essential, easy to understand metrics for an ecommerce merchant.  These metrics are provided in a user friendly report which empowers a merchant to be proactive in adjusting marketing campaigns using CSEs to increase ROAS quickly and easily. 

The "Chanalytics" product is available to any ecommerce merchant, as a stand alone product, to measure and compare all marketing campaigns in one user-friendly interface.

"Chanalytics" is also incorporated into other MerchantAdvantage tool-based products that help ecommerce merchants feed their product catalog data to over 150 CSEs or marketing channels seamlessly.

In addition to the free white paper report on "Chanalytics", identified by BizReport, MerchantAdvantage also offers several other helpful resources free. <<<CLICK HERE>>> to access that library of information.

I hope these additional reports and resources prove helpful to all ecommerce merchants to grow sales going into the holiday shopping months.

<<<CLICK HERE>>> to access that library of information.

- Chip Arndt

BizReport
by Kristina Knight
October 3, 2008

How to Increase the Return on CSE Spending

"Consumer shopping engines (CSE) are becoming much more integral to ecommerce but many etailers are still unsure how to ensure the best return on their spending. While nothing beats the tried and true "try it and adjust" philosophy, here are two ways to increase the ROI of CSE spending from the start.

First, don't go it alone. Marketers can spend all day tracking down the metrics of a campaign. Instead of doing this yourself, consider using an analytics program, like Chanalytics from MerchantAdvantage, to offer technical support. Chanalytics regularly feeds the data merchants need as they need it; it can also process any technical issues that face the marketer before those issues become huge, time consuming matters. Managing the CSE channel from the beginning can free up time so that etailers can focus on selling more products.

Second, don't stop reviewing the information sent from feeds and the responses received directly from consumers. Consumers feelings can change in an instant. Most want a simple shopping experience, fast shipping and a good product;..."

<<<CLICK HERE>>> to read full article by Kristina Knight and BizReport.

Mobile..."IZE" Your E-Commerce Storefront

Many ecommerce merchants have asked MerchantAdvantage about the benefits of having your ecommerce storefront accessible on mobile devices.  MerchantAdvantage believes that every ecommerce merchant should list their products on mobile devices because of:

• the advent of improved mobile interfaces and devices to accomodate shopping
• trends in consumer behaviour patterns, and
• flat pricing by mobile technology providers to surf the Web.

Apple's iPhone led the way to providing a user friendly shopping experience on a small mobile device.  This included being able to locate products, compare prices of products, and buy products.  Because Apple's iPhone appealed primarily to a 15-35 year old demographic, this led to a pattern of increased usage by "younger" people to "mobile shop." An article from USA Today, titled Shop By Phone Gets New Meaning, confirmed these findings.  And here is another article, First Data's McCarthy Examines MCommerce Trends, from industry experts Mobile Banker, August 2008, which speaks to why they believe that "...everything is in place...finally..." for mobile commerce to explode in 2009.

Just this week, Practical E-Commerce wrote an article on new open source mobile commerce platforms referencing Nielson's, which stated that 9 million Americans have already made a purchase from a mobile device and that 50% of the 250 million odd mobile handset users in the USA are willing to make a purchase. Can you feel the trend?

While the mobile shopping experience is far from perfect, youth today expect to be able to "do it all" from their mobile device including buying anything at any time they want. And the marketplace is catching up because this is the demographic whom all companies and ecommerce merchants must reach to drive sales and increase brand exposure into the future.

Soon after the iPhone release in 2007, every major mobile device company upgraded their interfaces to compete with Apple to ensure that customers can virtually do whatever they want using their mobile devices.  The most recent announcement came from T-Mobile and Google. For November 2008, T-Mobile and Google are launching a new 3G/JavaFX mobile device to compete directly with Apple.  This new mobile device's shopping experience will be powered by Amazon and offer consumers a complete shopping experience from one of the best and largest e-retailers in the USA. Information on this new launch can be found by <<<CLICKING HERE>>>.

T-Mobile and Google had a soft launch of the product in New York two weeks ago and are launching their new offering first in Europe, where adoption of such technologies is quicker than the USA.  Introduction of the new "Google/T-Mobile Andoid, JavaFX Phone" will reach the USA 1st quarter 2009. MerchantAdvantage believes that all ecommerce merchants should realize that mobile shopping is becoming a part of our culture and stay ahead of this trend so they can be more competitive.

These mobile shopping experiences include the ability to instantly buy a gift or product, compare prices while shopping at one store or anywhere where they want, download coupons, take a picture of a product - share it with a friend - and then purchase it, and receive special offers from companies they like shopping from and trust. 

Further evidence of the proliferation of mobile shopping is evidenceed by wireless carriers building out the national infrastructure for mobile commerce and their continued flat pricing to surf the Web.  Internet Retailer reports that, by the end of 2009, 51.9% of merchants expect to operate their own m-commerce site for users of wireless devices and 57.1% also expect to design and maintain pages on social networks that give shoppers options to download digital coupons, upload videos, and participate in blogs or forums.  These m-commerce sites would be in addtion to working with shopping portals as Amazon, which also can get an ecommerce merchants products in front of consumers.

“We are seeing a fundamental shift in how retailers are deploying new web technology and that trend is going to accelerate over the next year,” says Evan Gerber, principal consultant, user experience, with Molecular Inc., an e-commerce consulting and web design firm.

“Web shopping isn’t about creating the best desktop experience on a hard-wired personal computer any more. The retailers that make best use of emerging technologies such as mobile commerce and social networking are the ones that will build the best brand recognition and create the most diverse means for shoppers to complete a transaction.”

The whole concept of mobile shopping is intuitive but the execution can be complicated. For instance:

1. How does an ecommerce merchant list/feed their products to Amazon easily so there products can subsequently get listed on the new T-Mobile/Google mobile device?
2. How does an e-commerce merchant list their product catalog into other supported mobile shopping networks and syndicated comparison shopping engines to ensure that a consumer can find their products and brand on any mobile device?
3. How does an ecommerce merchant create their own user-friendly, mobile Web Store that a consumer can go to directly and navigate through easily, and finally...
4. How does an ecommerce merchant update their product catalog and inventory management across all of these channels when a sale on a mobile device occurs?

There are answers to help ecommerce merchants "Mobile...IZE" their ecommerce storefront and excellent companies to initiate an mcommerce (mobile commerce) strategy.

MerchantAdvantage is one company that helps by:

1. supporting mobile shopping technologies that set up mobile commerce storefronts
2. supporting Amazon, and
3. feeding product catalog feeds, cost-effectively to over 150 comparison shopping engines, coupon sites, and other maketing channels that support both online ecommerce and mobile commerce

mShopper and mPoria are examples of excellent companies, whom MerchantAdvantage works with, to set up a mobile storefront in less than 24 hours from a clean data feed.  MerchantAdvantage also is glad to put any ecommerce merchant in touch with a myriad of other companies to accomplish all that an ecommerce merchant needs to leverage the growing mobile commerce space and we recommend that you start today to stay competitive.

While I disagree with Bill Mirabito below who says that "mobile technology is not ready for actual transactions/mobile checkout", because I find it is and getting better every month, I do encourage all readers of this post to check out the following Webinar hosted by eTaildTail friends at ElasticPath.

The Webinar is free and will give you valuable insights into the best use of mobile shopping technology for the holidays.  And, when you are done with the Webinar, give me a call and I would me more than happy to go into further details of how MerchantAdvantage and our many mobile strategic relationships can help you reach customers this holiday season via their mobile devices.

Holiday Wish List for Mobile Commerce: Free Webinar: October 23rd, 2008 @ 9am PT/12pm ET

Guest Panelist: Bill Mirabito, Founder & Principal Consultant, B2C Partners

<<<CLICK HERE>>> to register for this free Webinar from our friends at ElasticPath.

Retailers love growing store traffic and improving the brand experience, but mobile devices are rarely part of the equation. Present-day technology isn’t ready for mobile checkout. However, today’s cell phones can be used by in-store consumers as an effective “kiosk on the hip.” In this session, Bill Mirabito will outline how mobile technology can help retailers drive cross-channel sales this holiday season.

In this webinar, you will learn how to:

• Engage in-store consumers and get them to register their device
• Deliver enhanced product information to consumers in the aisle
• Direct shoppers to alternate store locations with available inventory
• Create wish lists in store and share gift registries for holiday shopping
• Personalize recommendations and promotions for cross-channel consumers

<<<CLICK HERE>>> to register for this free Webinar from our friends at ElasticPath.

- Chip Arndt

"Free Shipping" For The Holidays: Not So Fast

The economy is "bust", the "bailouts" are upon us, and who cares who fault it is. So what do e-commerce merchants do for the Holiday Season to get sales?

In the past "Free Shipping" worked wonders, but now e-commerce merchants have to think twice about absorbing this cost, as margins on products sold shrink.

I am no expert so I instead turn to friends of eTaildTail who are experts. 

Here is some great advice for e-commerce merchants who willl battle with the dilemma of how to "entice" customers withoiut providing free shipping and get away with it, during the holiday shopping season.

This is an important read!

-- Chip Arndt

From: Natalia Zumeda, Advertising Age

No Such Thing as Free Shipping?

Facing Rising Costs, Online Retailers Likely to Attach Strings to Holiday Promos

"Retailers counting on online shopping to buoy sales in a tight economy are wrestling with a big problem: free shipping.

Shipping discounts, which have become a mainstay of the holiday season, are being carefully analyzed by retailers as they weigh the benefits against the mounting costs. Transportation costs have skyrocketed in the last year, with diesel prices rising 50% year over year. In response, fuel surcharges applied by UPS and FedEx have more than doubled to 10.5% for ground packages and 34.5% for air packages..."

<<CLICK HERE>>> to read full article.