Online Merchandising Taking Standards to a New Level: More Efficient, More Enriched, More Category-Centric
Friday, 27 January 2006
Results of the e-tailing group's 8th Annual Mystery Shopping Study conclude that merchants have raised the bar on what is considered the norm from a merchandising perspective.
"Among the 100 e-commerce sites that we shopped ‘more’ was definitely the operative word relative to merchandising," observed Lauren Freedman, president, the e-tailing group, inc. "As online merchandising evolves to meet the demands of the ever more sophisticated multichannel customer, we are seeing merchants deploy more robust homepages and product pages, with feature sets that are more focused, more informative; coupled with more clear differentiation by category."
More Suggestive Selling
Features like what's new are now standard. Top sellers are deployed on 66 percent of all sites shopped but categorically they are on 100 percent of the sites selling books/music, mass merchandise, or pet-related products.
Customers are being served up alternative selections for consideration (a new metric in this year's research) as well as requisite up-sells and cross-sells, which are staples on the product page plus more frequently seen in the shopping cart.
More Web Site Real Estate Devoted To Gifting:
Shopping during the holiday season we found seasonal areas on 79 percent of the sites scanned vs. 75 percent in '04.
More gifting-oriented information is wisely concentrated in gift centers and their presence continues to grow (77 percent in '05, 75 percent in '04; 71 percent in '03).
While the number of sites offering gift certificates/cards is stable (85 percent in '05 vs. 86 percent in '04, many more sites are conveniently making them redeemable online (98 percent in '05 vs. 86 percent in '04).
Another new metric tracked this year is the wish list which was present on 42 percent of the sites, often serving as a simplified registry (20 percent in '05 vs. 22 percent in '04).
More Efficiency Throughout the Shopping Process
Freedman’s e-tailing group applaud the increase in functionality that makes the entire process easier like those charted including a new metric, size finder, present on 30 percent of the forty-four sites where it is applicable.
More Product Enhancement Techniques:
The presence of zoom keeps growing (79 percent in '05, 70 percent in '04; 62 percent in '03); similarly alternative views are now present on 45 percent of the sites while in '04 they were on just 21 percent and in '03 they were deployed by merely 12 percent.
The use of color change has increased year-over-year (34 percent in '05, 24 percent in '04; 13 percent in '03) with the greatest occurrence among those merchants selling accessories (75 percent) and sporting goods (67 percent) followed by the apparel (44 percent) and home/garden (42 percent) categories.
More Broadband Enabled Features
More customers logging onto the Internet using high speed connections justifies merchant investments in streaming video (20 percent in '05 vs. 8 percent in '04) and audio (15 percent in '05 vs. 8 percent in '04), particularly in categories like books/music (67 percent).
Faster load times resulting from higher bandwidth may also factor into more creative design of email. For example, of the merchants who are sending post-order e-mail confirmations (96 percent) the trend is toward more visually appealing html formats (33 percent in '05 vs. 26 percent in '05) while text is now the choice of 67 percent vs. 74 percent in '05.
More Controlled Promotional Offerings
Sales and specials abound online (91 percent in '05 vs. 85 percent in '04) but on a more conditional basis with 22 percent of these merchants keying in on limited hour sales vs. 9 percent in '04 or offering Internet-only events (19 percent in '05 vs. 14 percent in '04).
Dedicated online outlets are also more abundant, existing on 51 percent of the sites shopped vs. 27 percent in '04. Whether limited time or limited inventory, these strategies encourage customers to act with immediacy.
Vendor influence within categories is evident with rebates, existing on just 20 percent of the e-tailing 100 sites, found on 100 percent of those selling office supplies and 82 percent of the technology merchants. Conversely sales/specials are least often deployed on health and beauty sites (60 percent).
More Comprehensive Content
A prevailing trend is toward providing product information and buying guidance. Serving as a virtual expert, this enables both online customers and in-store associates to be more educated and better equipped for their buying/selling roles. Accordingly there is an emphasis on tips and glossaries as shown in this chart of key content metrics:
More Cohesive Multichannel Presentations
Merchants appear to be moving toward delivering seamless shopping experiences, across all channels with more centralized catalog information and more visible store-related tools. However, while other related metrics either stayed even or increased, the sites with shop the catalog functionality decreased to 51 percent in '05 from 66 percent in '04.
More Branding Differential
Strategically, using the Internet to position one's brand is smart marketing as well as savvy merchandising. An obvious tactic is to offer exclusives which 45 percent of the sites shopped did in '05 vs. 26 percent in '04.
More targeted email (85 percent in '05 vs. 80 percent in '04) and newsletters (32 percent in '05 vs. 28 percent in '04) are also indicative of how merchants are using the online channel to communicate their brand messaging directly to customers.
Other branding tactics are category-specific like brand boutiques, deployed by 84 percent overall but utilized at 100 percent of the sites where customers tend to seek specific brands (department stores, mass merchants, accessories, technology, health/beauty; toys/games).
More International Reach
Multi-national site entry increased to 18 percent vs. 13 percent of the sites shopped in '04. The ability to shop in another language also grew (21 percent in '05 vs. 17 percent in '04 but slightly fewer sites offered international shipping (28 percent in '05 vs. 31 percent in '04) - perhaps as a result of more internationally served sites.
More Difficulties Too
Despite the array of merchandising prowess demonstrated by these metrics, the actual shopping experience was more difficult this year as reported in the e-tailing group's press release on Customer Service findings from the 8th Annual Mystery Shopping Study dated January 10, 2006.
In summary Ms. Freedman noted, "We are encouraged to see this heightened level of online merchandising. As best-in-class merchants raise the bar, keeping up with requisite functionality will be just the beginning. More differentiation and more creative execution of merchandising, both onsite and via email will be the next initiatives to require resource commitments."