As of March 2010, three of the top five UK websites were focused on enabling users to broadcast views, judgments and information about themselves. Online media and discourse is progressively more public and increasingly used by online vendors for CRM, marketing and direct sales. The way we make use of user-generated content (UGC) and online content, however, is on the cusp of a radical change.

This trend of openness online is not, of course, limited to what we might conventionally think of as ‘social media’. There are several categories of information that we reveal about ourselves online, which is extremely valuable for online commerce. We constantly provide clues to objectively verifiable information that can be exploited by e-tailers and businesses. We divulge our preoccupations, professional and social, our locations, education, ethnicity, and, thanks to social sites, personal connections – creating tremendous opportunities for marketers. We are, therefore, routinely targeted with pay-per-click advertising, toolbars and adwords.

The Internet, however, is an increasingly qualitative place. A quick survey of Twitter will reveal both a huge volume of bland corporate broadcast material and retweets, the sort of thing that will provide clues to our intellectual and professional interests. This is, of course, balanced by a huge volume of highly charged and opinionated content. Personal blogs and spontaneous commentary typically take a more opinionated line than traditional media or commercial PR output. It is entertaining –and occasionally shocking – to delve into the comments at the foot of articles on the BBC and websites of major newspapers, sites that typically ensure that commentators reveal a clue to their names and location to anyone caring to look.

The commercial possibilities are clear. At a very basic level, a search based e-commerce application will be a much more lucrative proposition if it provides intelligence and sales opportunities, or simply serves links that are informed, not only by the topics of an individual’s online concerns, but the qualitative nuance of an individual’s comment. If a commentator or consumer were to comment about a certain product, a typical search-based application might deliver content based on that category of product and/or basic categories such as likes or dislikes. Now, for the first time, if a consumer expresses a certain level of emotional content, it’s possible for a search algorithm to ‘score’, assess and present that content.

An example of this development is Yellow Pages Group’s adoption of Urbanizer, a restaurant recommendation widget for the iPhone. The nuanced capability, its capability to discern how formal (or otherwise) a restaurant is, or, for example, how trendy it’s perceived to be, is evident from the fact that it doesn’t just put restaurants in boxes but operates on the basis of a sliding scale interface. So far this sort of application enjoys a limited currency, but it is likely to proliferate as more vendors seek to incorporate this sort of capability.

The potential of this technology, however, become even clearer when we consider the implications with regards to other kinds of online media, whereby consumers express sentiment and opinions and pass judgment. At present, the limitations of speech-to-text have limited the worthwhile information we can extract from online audio and visual material. However, the advent of reliable, effective speech to text means that content from videos is already falling within the ambit of search ontologies. So, for example, on President Sarkozy’s website at www.elysee.fr and that of TV news channel France 24 (http://lab.france24.com) speech recognition software automatically generates a searchable transcript precisely for that purpose. It’s only a matter of time before similar technologies are applied to online video content posted by individuals, on websites such as YouTube and Facebook.

So, how will this work in practice? The evolutionary direction is increasingly apparent. User generated content is already widely used to provide cues that are fed into a search ontology. For example, Real Travel uses website search, in conjunction with a customised interface community’s travel blogs to generate geographical content, provide travel recommendations and to excerpt user commentary on places, travel itineraries and businesses.

By aggregating and applying the means to establish the nuance of users’ judgments across spectrums of sentiment, and applying existing search capabilities to audio and aesthetic criteria (take a look at http://chromatik.labs.exalead.com) it is possible to identify commercial opportunities and approach consumers on the basis of very precise sentiment analysis, without falling foul of concerns about privacy.

As the web increasingly becomes the default reference source and ecommerce establishes itself as a core component of modern shopping habits, consumer expectations of choice and convenience have risen to unprecedented highs. Retailers have had to come up with ever more innovative ways of making the user journey as fluid and effortless as possible.

Highly interactive, content-rich websites offer customers an immersive experience, often incorporating social media to enhance engagement and brand loyalty. Unless this innovation is extended to the fulfilment process, retailers risk undoing all of their hard work.

In ecommerce, delivery is the final mile of any online journey, when the virtual transaction becomes real, and is vital to satisfying and retaining hard-won customers. Returns present a chance for retailers to show how much they value customers by solving problems quickly and helpfully.

A successful delivery or a hassle-free return may not be something customers shout about, but a bad experience certainly will be. Despite the risks, fulfilment remains low down the list of priorities for many retailers, even as they rush to enter the buzzing playgrounds of Twitter and Facebook.

Of course, the cost of delivery is often a crucial factor in a customer’s decision to purchase an item, so it’s vital that charges are easy for users to find. But, is ecommerce being undermined by the assumption that consumers can afford to stay at home all day waiting for a delivery?

The scale of the issues was highlighted in recent research from IMRG, the industry body for online retail, which showed that more than one in ten deliveries fail first time and the overall cost of missed deliveries is almost £1bn per year[1]. The research also revealed that the average trip to a parcel depot to collect a missed parcel is almost 8 miles[2] and this will be compounded if one third of post offices are forced to close over the next two years[3]. Even more telling is the impact that failed deliveries are having on brand loyalty, with 38% of consumers claiming to have been put off a retailer as a result of a poor delivery.[4]

Retailers need to work harder to fit in with their customers’ busy lifestyles, so offering a range of delivery and returns options is essential. Couriers have innovated with timed and weekend delivery slots, improved tracking and SMS alerts. Click & Collect and ‘buy online, return in-store’ options have been hugely successful for brands such as Argos and Halfords and now new services allow all retailers – even pureplay online businesses – to offer their customers this convenience  and freedom from delivery times.

What happens in this last mile is becoming business critical and, unless addressed, may undo the hard work online and multi-channel retailers put in to developing deeper relationships with their precious customer base.

As competition for customers continues, businesses and retailers are attempting to integrate their internal multi-channel operations to provide a seamless and consistent customer experience. They will increasingly realise that ‘CCD’, or customer centric delivery, has a pivotal role in keeping customers happy.

[2] Consumer Delivery Survey 2010: e-Retail Industry Review – February 2010

[3] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/7637066/Third-of-post-offices-could-close-in-two-years.html

[4] Consumer Delivery Survey 2010: e-Retail Industry Review – February 2010

E-commerce has literally exploded into a huge part of the entire retail economy in recent years and as a result, no business can afford to exist solely in the offline world. Online purchases now account for billions of pounds worth of transactions a year and are still growing rapidly; 2010 estimates show online sales growing 12% in the UK and 20% across the EU.

However, as more than one businessman has said before, “it’s called the net, because it’s easy to get tangled up”. Far too many companies see online customer sales support as an afterthought rather than as a necessity. Other businesses get distracted by the lures of a new untapped revenue stream and end up focusing on the customer-facing front-end of the website, before cobbling together the essential ‘process driven’ back office.

This is a fundamental mistake. Always remember that every online transaction should be as straightforward and simple for the customer as possible. Every crease, crack and niggle that exists will lose you customers and money.

With this in mind, consider the following top tips:

1. Give web shop customers the same level of service they would expect in a regular store
Customers expect to find what they are looking for, and to find it quickly. It should be easy to find the answers to all questions. Information about returns and customer support should be highly visible, to help create trust. Provide customers with a personalised customer experience. Finally, ensure all commonly used online payment solutions are accepted; there is no excuse for losing customers at the final hurdle!

2. Avoid the price trap. Make sure you have more than just price to compete with
If price is the only competitive advantage offered, services such as kelkoo.co.uk may quickly tell potential customers that someone else is best within this category. Good selection, good service, and easily accessible, can also be important competitive advantages.

3. Be “search engine friendly” and consider web advertisements
It does not help to have the best products, reasonable prices and a pretty web shop if no one visits. Any online site has to ‘get found’. Web shop must be optimised for search engines such as Google and Kelkoo. Also consider web advertisements and various paid services provided by the search engines. As part of this, it is crucial to keep sites up-to-date. Out-dated products and information will only make customers run to the nearest competitor. Furthermore, regular updates will further enhance internet visibility, as well as increasing customer confidence.

4. Select an integrated e-commerce solution
Due to the commoditised nature of online retail – Internet margins tend to be very thin and customers expect short delivery times. So process efficiency is key, particularly when there is a high volume of low value sales. As a rule websites need to be integrated with accounting, payment, stock control and logistics systems. Manual processes to handle web orders will be too expensive, inefficient and prone to error. In short, Businesses that spend lots of time updating various systems that are not compatible, lose out on sales through having the wrong choice of e-commerce solution.

Obviously, this is far from an exhaustive list; but it does provide a solid framework for you decision making. A successful foray into the online world can be a huge boost to a small business; make sure that is the story you get to tell, rather than being left with an IT nightmare.

For additional advice on e-commerce and IT check out: http://www.mamut.com/uk/

The team here are interested to know if you have ever used your mobile to purchase physical products using your mobile.

Some people still feel it’s not secure enough, even if that is just a perception it does appear to hold the same feelings that consumers originally had when standard internet e-commerce was first coming alive online. Indeed that is still the case for many even today.

With many new dedicated mobile apps appearing on devices such as the iPhone from companies like Amazon and Ocado it would appear at first glance that there is a large and growing marketing for e-commerce via mobile devices.

So, dear readers, we would love to know your take on this… we’ve even included an option for you to enter a specific reason as to why you have or haven’t… alternatively just leave a comment below.

We will be releasing the results shortly so make sure you are subscribed to our email, the comments below or via rss.

Shopping online is now as popular as shopping in-store – whether it’s grocery shopping or a Christmas blow-out, the variety of goods and cheap pricing have made the Internet a powerful force in retail.

The great thing about online shopping is that nothing is out of reach and more often than not, internet prices are lower than the high-street. However, as with any service, there are the occasional hiccups. Problems for online shoppers arise in particular when orders don’t arrive on time. In fact, the issues usually occur at the checkout stage when problems with the website mean that the order is never received in the first place.

Missing out on orders is clearly bad for business. To ensure this doesn’t happen, e-tailers need to speak to their web host before any type of busy period begins.  Busy periods can be Christmas, sales or a positive review in the newspaper. Web hosting is the engine behind a site that drives a fast online experience. E-tailers need to make sure they’ve got this right or they could end up with sites crashing as the rush hits, forcing customers to shop elsewhere.

There are many things e-tailers and their web hosting providers can do to make sure that the customer shopping experience is stress free and the virtual tills keep ringing

The cause behind many web performance problems is a ‘network bottleneck’, which can be due to anything from an overloaded server, to an overloaded network. It can be prevented by making sure the hosting provider is able to scale up or down, depending on the expected site traffic. For example, shopping sites including ASOS reported high traffic figures during snow days – sites will need to be able to handle this seamlessly. This is where the web host comes in.

Most online stores include a lot of images and need to ensure the site’s back-end technology can handle this. Images are heavy files and can cause stress. Using a content delivery network (CDN) to cache images is a good way of managing the load. If the hosting provider can’t provide this, e-tailers may need to look elsewhere as storing a large amount of image files is a vital part of e-commerce hosting.

Another problem is that many online retailers only have one server and don’t use shared load-balanced systems. Load-balancing is the process of distributing activity evenly across a network so that no single server is overwhelmed. Shared load balancing especially important for networks when it’s difficult to predict the number of requests that will be issued to a server. Busy websites typically use two or more web servers so that if one starts to get swamped, requests are forwarded to another server with more capacity. Therefore the website stays online and its customers enjoy a smooth and fast online shopping experience.

One of the most important aspects of e-tail is speed. A site that takes five minutes to load will soon be abandoned. Speed is especially important at the checkout. If a website hangs at the vital ‘Pay’ moment, the customer may lose patience and confidence in the site and will head off elsewhere. To make sure the shopping cart is fast, e-tailers can use the load testing tools to simulate ten times more users and check their site stands up. This way, they can anticipate problems early and they’ll know whether they’re prepared for the shopper onslaught. In addition, fast websites attract more economical advertising rates from the likes of Google, if you are looking at online advertising costs.

Other online tools available such as www.loadimpact.com, allow the e-tailer, or in fact anyone running a website, to enter the URL and run a free test that assesses the number of visitors the site can handle. These tools can simulate behaviour right down to the shopping cart and anticipate situations like receiving ten times the normal level of traffic.

In summary, e-commerce businesses should look for hosting providers that can offer flexible monthly contracts that allow for seasonal peaks in traffic, accommodating both up-scaling and down-scaling as necessary. Even better, a hosting provider that will alert you should you go over your allowance, ahead of you incurring over usage charges is critical. Your host should carry redundant stock, and offer a minimum one-hour fix with 24/7 staff in the data centre. Ensure your host backs up your data to SAN not tape, otherwise data retrieval could take all day- and time really is money. A responsible hosting provider will have a compensation policy that protects their customer’s business and ensures the host itself has its own incentive to avoid shoddy service delivery in the first place.

If all else fails and despite going through the above to make sure the site is set for success, if it still goes down, the e-tailer will need a hosting company who can get the site back online in a couple of hours. Before signing up with a host, online retailers should insist on a fixed timing for when they can get the site back online, and get it written into the Service Level Agreement (SLA).

The key to ensuring a site can handle any rush is to test it, and fix it before traffic hits and the e-tailer starts losing sales and its reputation.

Supermarkets are explicitly designed to maximise consumption and in some cases the conversion rate is almost 100 per cent. The job of store design is to encourage people to buy as much as possible while they are shopping. For instance, putting popular items like milk towards the back of the shop but in line of site focuses people to navigate through the entire store passing lots of goods on the way. The same is true of changing rooms in clothes shops.

One of the problems with many retailers is that they may have used the persuasive design approach to their physical stores but have forgotten about applying it to their online presence. Rather than looking at the online store as a ‘bolt-on’ to a bricks and mortar location, retailers need to view their store as an intrinsic part of the eco-system and treat it as such. Shoppers will research information online and then go into a store to see the product in person. Similarly, consumers will buy online but want the convenience of local pick-up and repair. All of these aspects need to be considered to improve conversion rates.

The key to creating a successful website lies in providing an engaging experience for the end-user. Websites offering a poorly-defined and badly executed customer experience often frustrate users and drive them away. Establishing how individual customers think and feel, means retailers can go about creating targeted content and design to ensure they are satisfying customer needs.

When setting up a new e-commerce site, retailers need to think carefully about the elements that might break up the shopping process. Distracting customers by forcing them to jump through numerous check-out steps or irrelevant questions is a sure way to push them out of the conversion funnel.

A clean, simple website, with pages labeled in user-friendly language means that consumers can find the correct information, allowing them to easily navigate their way to the online checkouts.

A small amount of usability testing can fix a lot of the low-hanging fruit and can help highlight the key areas where people are having problems with the web process. Observing real user behavior can provide a better understanding of how to improve your website experience and convert this into sales results.

Buying a product online isn’t simply a transactional process. Potential purchasers often have doubts and fears about their decisions as to whether a product is right for them. It’s difficult to reassure people through the online shopping process as there is no shop assistant on hand to provide the information they need.

Online shops can take advantage of psychological concepts such as social proof to help restore the purchaser’s confidence in their own decision. For example, sites such as Amazon present shoppers with details of ‘what others like you’ are buying. Creating the impression of acquiring the latest ‘must-have’ item can be very persuasive for the online user.

By understanding the thought process and behaviour of online customers, retailers can use persuasive design to realise the full potential of their online presence and improve sales conversion rates.

Multi-channel retailing is one of the current areas of excitement in retail. In my company, we identified this as a potential high growth area some years ago, but its value is only just becoming apparent. The following tips scratch the surface in listing some of the points to be considered when implementing a multi-channel strategy.

1. Remember the customer.
The heart of multi-channel is allowing the customer to interact with you in the way they choose. The systems, processes and staff training to provide multi-channel should be assembled while always thinking about your customer.

2. Keep prices consistent.
Having headline prices the same across all channels will avoid debates with customers. You can still differentiate pricing through shipping charges or special discounts only available in one channel.

3. Provide a consistent product range.
As far as possible, have the same range available online and in store. That way, people who research in one channel and then try to buy in another won’t be disappointed.

4. Capture every possible order.
If it’s out of stock, make sure it can be ordered for home delivery, from another store, or online.

5. Avoid damaging your brand.
Common sense tells us that consumers see a single brand whether they are looking at a web store or the related retail outlets. So make sure the experience is equally good in every channel.

6. Support online enquiries.
Organise to properly support any new channel, for instance answer emails in a timely way.

7. Integrate your back-office appropriately.
Integration of systems can be expensive, unless your whole operation is based on a package that already provides integration. So do your research.

One last thought: Multi-channel retailing is new, and we’re all still learning. This provides an opportunity to steal a march on the competition, and also enjoy the experience of pioneering in a new field. Have fun!

We’ve collected and bundled together a fantastic set of free icons for use with your e-commerce stores. Perfect for updating your site with some new alerts, better calls to action, or perhaps sprucing up the design of your checkout process so it’s easier to navigate and looks a touch sexier!

Starfish Consultings Glossy E-Commerce Icons

Download here

100 Free Webby Icons

Download here

Chalkwork Payments Icons

Download here

Shopping Icons Set

Download here

Let me know in the comments if you have any other sets you think people would like or that you have used on your site.

Clients often associate ecommerce with having a website that sells products. However, many business-orientated websites are services based. A business website is one of the most useful and important weapons in a clients marketing toolbox, helping generate those all important sales leads, whether selling products or services.

Here’s an example that any business can apply to understand better the true value of website lead generation:

Food Events are a catering company who specialise in marquee catering. They have a customer base across the whole of the South East of England and regularly cater for around 300 events a year, which generates over £2 million in turnover.

Up until 2009 they had no perception of their website’s value. In our initial meeting they stated that:

“We get over 1000 hits per week”
“People often comment on how wonderful the website looks”
“We are not sure how many emails we get as the IT department sorts all that out”

Food Events average event is worth around £6,000. At the beginning of 2009 we began to track all web based enquiries and in the first 3 months, utilising web activity tracking, it was identified that the site was generating:
45 email leads
15 web form enquiry leads
60 leads in total

All the leads were then monitored by “Food Events” to see if they converted into a sale (or live contract). Of these 60, three were successful.
Its here that our average client value comes into play:

Average client value (£6,000) X 3 new contracts = £18,000

We now now had a clear marker to demonstrate that, with very little effort, the website had generated £18,000 of new business in one month. These figures highlighted to Food Events that there was potential to gain sales via its site. Following discussions with ourselves, a Website marketing strategy was implemented utilising a selection of different methods with a monthly budget of £2,000.

Website marketing activities included:

• SEO – Improving the site position for key terms that matched the company’s profile
• SEM – Improving the site with a customer-friendly focus
• PPC – Increasing targeted online advertising
• Newsletters – Using email marketing
• Link building – increasing links from quality complimentary sites
• Telephone – Ensuring all telephone leads are logged as to source

After 6 months the end result of all this work was that in the first 3 three months of 2010 the site generated:
120 email leads
90 web form enquiry leads
80 brochure requests
300 telephone calls
590 leads in total

30 sales were completed over this period that we can directly link to website lead generation marketing activities

Remember our average client value? (£6,000)

Let apply it again – £6,000 x 30 new contracts = £180,000

My experience has shown that many businesses have trouble in visualising their websites potential as an ecommerce sales tool – often businesses in the b2b sector roll out brochureware sites without understanding that they have a 24 hour virtual sales team that is talking directly to a customer trying to find services they supply.

Getting business to visualise this commercial value immediately moves the goal posts when developing online marketing strategies.

Remember Actinic? There aren’t many people who haven’t downloaded and used their software in previous years. The first experience is normally when looking to start selling online for the first time as their ‘wysiwyg’ software helped many get passed a number of technical hurdles and just get straight into the online business pool with little fuss. It was a bit of a learning curve in the early days but helped many people get their products online and take the first steps to being high profile online retailers.

Today brings news of Actinic releasing version 10 of its range of ecommerce software comprising of Actinic Catalog, Actinic Business, Actinic Business Plus and Actinic Enterprise. Actinic v10 incorporates new features and improvements to assist retailers in managing and marketing their online stores.

Chris Barling, CEO of Actinic said:

“The latest version of Actinic Ecommerce introduces several new features that many of our merchants have requested. Retailers will benefit from real time stock control and additional marketing functionality to help increase sales, while their customers will see improvements to their shopping experience.”

Some of the key new features in Actinic v10 include:

• Real time stock control – This provides improved stock management for retailers and automatic, up-to-date visibility of stock levels for shoppers. For multi-channel retailers this also enables stock synchronisation between the website, offline ordering and the Actinic EPOS till system.

• Customer feedback integration with Feefo (Feedback Forum) – Enables the merchant to display independent customer feedback on the website. This can help to increase conversions to sales , as well as enhance the site’s SEO.

• Streamlined checkout – Improves the shopper’s experience by reducing the number of checkout steps.

• ‘Recently viewed’ products – This new marketing feature shows the shopper a list of products that they have previously viewed on the website.

All great additions that fill in some of the gaps that had existed with the software up until now. You can get a full rundown of the new features over at their site.

We’ll be looking to give it a more full and complete test drive soon. In the meantime we’d love to hear what your thoughts are on the software and if you’ll be making the leap to version 10?