'Net Features : e-tailing group

A Merchant's Guide to Meaningful Metrics

Linc Wonham — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 21:00:00 GMT

Baynote and the e-tailing group have collaboratively researched the current state of e-commerce analytics, and the findings show that more needs to be done on the part of most merchants.

For starters, more than half of respondents reported a conversion rate lower than 3 percent on their retail websites, while about 1 in 4 cited rates above 5 percent. While nearly all of the retailers polled said that their evaluation of analytics was a top priority for retaining customers, the majority admitted to falling short of achieving optimum data analysis.

The most significant hurdles cited by merchants include information silos, limited data access across organizations, and a lack of education about which metrics are the most valuable.

"Data will be the driving force behind growing businesses where gaining a clear picture of one’s customer will suggest ideal marketing and personalization strategies," says Lauren Freedman, president of the e-tailing group.

Findings from the research can be found in this infographic and in this white paper, and lead to the following conclusions about meaningful metrics for merchants:

Pure Profit
While conversion may get the most attention from many merchants, gross profitability was seen as the top metric, especially in low-margin categories where profitability percentage points can have a major impact on overall performance.

Getting Personal
Retailers increasingly value, and are investing in, personalization technologies, yet they seem to agree there is an industry-wide need for more sophisticated measurement tactics.

Mobile Madness
Traffic and conversion rates have exceeded expectations across mobile and tablet channels, and a better understanding of key metrics will enable retailers to drive significant growth. Retailers appear to be following a “same metrics/different device” approach, which can work in the short-term but will become problematic for long-term strategies.

Is Social Stuck?
Retailers’ metrics are still focused on the number of Facebook fans and Twitter followers -- 78 percent and 61 percent, respectively, according to the merchant survey -- and not real ROI. Retailers cited measuring interactivity and customer preferences as their top goals.

Holistic Thinking
The ultimate horizon for retailers is to have a 360-degree view of the customer across all touch-points that takes into account interactions and transactions and provides understanding of the most cost-effective ways to reach customers and drive conversion for life.

It's Time to Redefine "Mobile"

Mike Phillips — Fri, 27 May 2011 18:30:00 GMT

These days you can't read a story about business, e-commerce or the economy without coming across something about "mobile." And if you take every report, statistic or survey as fact you might just be convinced that desktop computing has gone the way of the Dodo.

One of those recent surveys, JiWire's Mobile Audience Insights Report, found that 79 percent of mobile users are comfortable making purchases on their mobile devices and 50 percent "...are confident spending more than $100 on a purchase from their device – nearly 20 percent are even comfortable with purchases over $500."

Turn to the person to your left and ask if he or she is comfortable spending $100 using their mobile device. Then ask the person to your right the same question. According to this survey, one of them should say "yes." Ask five people if they would spend $500 using their mobile device, and one should say "yes."

Of course, the chosen mobile device is not necessarily a phone.

According to yet more research (this time from the E-tailing Group), tablet owners do more "mobile" shopping than smartphone users. Nearly 25 percent of tablet users made at least six purchases in the past six months, compared to 15 percent of smartphone users who had done the same.

Here's some more interesting research, this time from Google's AdMob, the world's leading mobile advertising network: In April, they found that 77 percent of 1,400 tablet users surveyed said that their desktop/laptop usage decreased after they started using a tablet. But, 82 percent of respondents said they primarily use their tablet at home.

So, technically, if one were to purchase a $500 item on their tablet, on their couch, this is a "mobile" purchase (and probably a 'comfortable' one, too). Consider this: If you were to go to a car dealership and they used an iPad to help you purchase a $30,000 car – is that a $30,000 "mobile" purchase? Is my laptop on my desk not "mobile" until I take it to Starbucks?

Now the advertising side is raising even more questions. AdMob claims that the network received 2.7 billion daily ad requests in April, up from 2 billion in January. Also according to AdMob, there are more than 80,000 mobile websites and apps in their network, up from 50,000 in January.

If an ad is served on a website on a tablet or mobile phone, is that one of the 2.7 billion ad requests? With today's mobile browsers becoming more sophisticated, mobile screens growing larger and the introduction of HTML 5, is there such thing as a "mobile website" anymore? If my "normal" website loads the same, fully-functional page on a tablet, is that my "mobile" website, too?

What is mobile? It's an important question that impacts everything from analytics to ad rates, which are currently quite different from the handset to the desktop.

But maybe a better question is; what isn't mobile?

Non-store Holiday Sales to Jump 15 Percent

Linc Wonham — Wed, 22 Sep 2010 20:41:00 GMT

’Tis the season for holiday retail sales predictions, and early reports indicate that e-commerce merchants have reason to be optimistic this year – but cautiously so.

One forecast from accounting firm Deloitte LLP states that online sales will see the largest increase from the 2009 holidays, but that overall holiday sales will experience a modest 2-percent rise. A separate survey from the E-tailing Group reported that 79 percent of merchants expect better sales this season than last, but only 31 percent expect the growth to exceed 10 percent.

The Deloitte forecast states that overall holiday sales will increase just 2-percent, but that non-store sales – an estimated two-thirds of which are online transactions – will enjoy a heftier 15-percent growth. The remaining one-third of the non-store sales include postal catalogs and television shopping shows.

Driving the increase in non-store shopping are overall convenience and the emergence of mobile commerce technologies, says the Deloitte report. Overall holiday sales increased 1-percent last year, so Deloitte’s prediction for 2010 shows modest growth on the retail horizon.

E-commerce merchants responding to the E-tailing survey were “cautiously optimistic” as a group (61 %), with the highest percentage of respondents (26 %) anticipating sales increases of between 6 and 10 percent. Other noteworthy responses from retailers in the E-tailing survey included the following:

•    91 percent will market through social networks this holiday season
•    85 percent will make some free shipping offers
•    38 percent have mobile initiatives in place for the holiday season (ranging from text message marketing to fully optimized mobile sites)
•    37 percent will market more aggressively on Facebook and Twitter this holiday season
•    1 percent say they plan to do less on Facebook or Twitter this season