Keeping up with technologies and trends for online retail is just about as hard as trying to follow the latest fashions in apparel: There’s always something new, and someone else always seems to look better than you do.
Here are some success tips I’ve found useful, based on experience working with online retailers of just about every stripe. The first four may seem counter-intuitive, even surprising, but they’ve proven to make a difference. I’ll end with a bonus tip that seems obvious, but isn’t as common as it should be.
First, the surprises:
1) Tell people how many times each item has been returned. Retailers can boost sales by letting customers know how often a product has been returned in relation to the number of times it has been purchased. Online retailer Shoeline.com claims to have lowered returns and raised its conversion rates since adding a “Return-o-meter™” to its Website.
2) Don’t overlook seniors as a target market. Most of today's online merchants focus on the 18- to 45-year-old age group, leaving fast-growing baby boomer and senior markets inadequately served. In a research study Guidance commissioned last November with market intelligence firm Synovate, 69 percent of respondents ages 65+ claimed to have made purchases online. Today’s seniors are less stressed about the economy than other age groups; and they tend to be loyal consumers, switching brands less often than their younger counterparts.
3) Give your shoppers some control over your site’s content. According to a study conducted by PowerReviews and the e-tailing group, 82 percent of online shoppers prefer peer customer reviews to researching a product in-store with a sales associate, and 68 percent of shoppers read at least four reviews before making a purchase. If you don’t offer reviews, you risk losing those consumers to other Websites that do. Give them every reason to stay on your site and complete the transaction.
Product ratings, message boards, blogs, live chat, and other online features also can get your buyers talking about your brand or products with other shoppers. Allowing your visitors to generate content on your site and interact with each other can boost sales.
4) Don’t remove negative reviews. According to research studies by Forrester Research Inc. and Bazaarvoice, less than 20 percent of user reviews are negative. But even that small 20 percent can make your online store more credible, and at times it may even help you sell ancillary products to overcome a product limitation. (Example: A negative review about an appliance’s short electric cord may prompt buyers to buy an extension cord along with the appliance.)
Now for the tip that’s seemingly obvious, but not as common as it should be:
5) Analyze customer behavior on your Website and regularly mine your data. Keep track of items your customers are viewing, keywords they’re typing to find those items, and links they’re clicking to get there. This process helps you create relevant cross-selling and up-selling activities, such as similar product recommendations (known as YMALs for “Y'all Might Also Like”).
Online shoppers respond well to suggestive selling techniques, and, according to Forrester analyst Sucharita Mulpuru, product recommendations and similar systems make up 10 to 30 percent of an online retailer's revenues.
The stakes are high for online retailers, but the key to success is often found in one of the basic tenets of good marketing: Know your audience and give them what they want.
— Jason Meugniot is owner and CEO of Guidance, which designs, builds, and maintains e-commerce Websites
I agree with EliteC. Return counter aka ReturnOMeter is an excellent concept. On the same line author's note to not remove the negative comment also works very well. Personally I look at both positive and negative reviews on the Amazon before buying a book. Bottomline: 'Honest communication' is paramount in building long term relation with the customers.
As an online buyer, I would love to have a return counter. It would also be nice if they paid for the shipping opposed to having you spend money to return merchandise you did not request.
Return counters are a great idea. I read about it for the first time not too long ago and thought that whoever came up with it, really hit the nail on the head when it comes to making the online shopping experience as real as possible. Glad to see someone else writing about it!
Hopefully we'll see more return counters on e-stores pretty soon.
Your post concludes with one of the basic tenets of successful retail. It is an ideal that transcends online retail and brick and mortar. I suppose it could even pertain to entertainment and even pastors trying to reach someone with a message.
That is truly only half of the equation where the audience is concerned. Not only to you have to know your audience, you must also understand many things about them. What they like, what the demographics are and how they effect the YMAL items, how the weather or politics or anything may effect the end result of all your best efforts to market a product or service.
Your tips are very good. Anyone trying to market themselves online or off should take another read, and then take to heart and implement as many as possible as soon as possible.
The ThinkerNet does not reflect the views of TechWeb. The ThinkerNet is an informal means of communication to members and visitors of the Internet Evolution site. Individual authors are chosen by Internet Evolution to blog. Neither Internet Evolution nor TechWeb assume responsibility for comments, claims, or opinions made by authors and ThinkerNet bloggers. They are no substitute for your own research and should not be relied upon for trading or any other purpose.
If you’re a slightly gray, mid-level manager who travels a lot, you may be on the way up and worthy of professional respect, but one thing you most definitely are not is “cool.” Still, while today’s youth may think you just crawled out of a paleolithic cave, there may be hope. The iPad from Apple Inc. (Nasdaq: AAPL) (supreme arbiter of coolness) just might make you older guys (or actually old guys like me) cool.
As we well know, the online echo chamber and its increasingly viral and social components can magnify the propagation speed and distribution of stories and rumors, whether true or false.
In his recent Congressional testimony, Dennis Blair, the U.S. director of national intelligence, stated that the U.S. is "severely threatened" by cyber attacks and that the recent Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) attacks should serve as a wake-up call.
Fatal System Error, the book just released by West-coast-based journalist Joseph Menn, is really a public policy statement written as a thriller for a wider reading public. UPDATED 2:45 PM
Smarter Collaboration: How to Thrive in a Challenging Business Environment Market conditions are changing faster than ever, and organizations need to improve their agility and adaptability in order to provide better service and improve processes. The ability to work with customers, business partners, and employees as effectively as possible - while at the same time holding down costs - is a key to success. READ THIS eBOOK
your weekly update of news, analysis, and
opinion from Internet Evolution - FREE! REGISTER HERE
Wanted! Site Moderators Internet Evolution is looking for a handful of readers to help moderate the message boards on our site – as well as engaging in high-IQ conversation with the industry mavens on our thinkerNet blogosphere. The job comes with various perks, bags of kudos, and GIANT bragging rights. Interested?
To save this item to your list of favorite Internet Evolution content so you can find it later in your Profile page, click the "Save It" button next to the item.
Research shows that the youth of today like Facebook – but not blogging or Twitter. Does that mean Facebook has won, or just that it's not yet out of favor? Will all the services we see today fade into Ovaltine-or-Wheaties status in just a few years?
What kinds of companies are doing the most innovation in the data center? Turns out it's midtier enterprises that are taking the "Just Right" approach.
Digg
Del.icio.us
Reddit
Email This
TWEET THIS
