Posts tagged with 'Online shopping'

If it works for Amazon, why wouldn’t it work for your site?

By Ariana Polyviou on 9 August 2010

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When creating a new ecommerce website, one of the key issues that is likely to come up is ‘How to create a successful user interface?’ An easy answer could be ‘Do it like Amazon’ and besides, nobody can deny it, Amazon is one of the most successful ecommerce stores worldwide.

Amazon’s facts speak for themselves:

  • Listed at 17th position within the 1000 most visited sites for June 2010
  • Approximately 81,000,000 unique visitors per month
  • Around 3,600,000,000 page visits per month.
  • Market capitalization of over $50 billion

Sometimes it’s good to copy the big guys. But copying a successful design does not mean that the company’s success will be copied with it!

So, ‘If it works for Amazon, why wouldn’t it work for your site?’

Reason #1 – Amazon’s low prices offsets its imperfect user experience

Amazon definitely doesn’t have a sparkling interface design. So what is it about it that makes it so successful?

Amazon can afford to sell at cost or below cost prices, offer free delivery and still have profit! It relies on its large number of customers and its fast selling pace, which can provide cash before the payment of the goods, is due to their original supplier.

Question #1: Is this type of marketing included in your business plan?

Reason #2: Amazon’s existing customers are more important than new ones

If you’ve used Amazon before then it’s more than likely that you will easily find what you are looking for.  Firstly, because you know that in order to find the product that best suits you, you have to follow the process of:

  • Searching by a product by name
  • Choosing only one category of goods
  • Then have the sorting and filtering options enabled

Secondly, if you’re an existing user then Amazon already knows your purchasing patterns. This boosts up your chances to experience serendipity by receiving more personalised product recommendations.

Amazon has a lot of existing customers who are used to its product search process. Thus, making major changes to it involves the risk of dissatisfying its 81m+ registered customers. But what happens if you’re a new user and there’s no purchasing patterns log for you?

You’re most likely to get odd or not useful recommendations and struggle to search efficiently for the desired product. Therefore, unless you have plenty of time, patience or luck, it’s unlikely that you’ll reach a product’s best matches to your requirements.

Question #2: Can you afford transacting only with your existing customers?

Reason #3:  Amazon is continuously testing

Have you ever noticed frequent change of features in the layout of Facebook e.g. the Newsfeed?

Of course, if you are Facebook  (the website with the most traffic for June 2010) or Amazon, then you can afford to test some new designs and features directly on your users. Besides, losing some of them may not even be noticeable!

The problem with copying Amazon is that you can’t know what’s there to stay and what’s to be removed after a while. You can’t know which features have a positive and which ones have a negative return. Copying Amazon involves a high risk of copying features which are temporarily placed on the site just for experimental purposes.

Question #3: Can your ecommerce site afford having features that are possibly not usable?

Reason #4: Amazon has good customer reviews

Sometimes, people hesitate to purchase goods through ecommerce sites because they’re unable to physically see the item they’re planning to buy. Reading reviews of recent buyers of a product can provide future buyers with a clearer idea about what to expect from the purchase. It’s hard to get people to post feedback on a product. Statistically, 1 in 3000 of buyers are likely to leave a review for an item. Considering Amazon’s traffic, this still gives it enough reviews per product.

Many people choose to buy from Amazon not necessarily because of its good prices or interface but because of the trustworthy community and the content it holds.

Question #4: Is the size of your customer community analogous to the Amazon one?

Reason #5: Amazon’s famous name is enough for making its users feel secure

Have you ever noticed that Amazon does not have an EV SSL certificate? This certificate indicates when it’s safe to transact by changing the URL initials from http to https and turning the URL address bar green.

The use of this certificate is critical for making customers feel safe and confident to purchase goods using their credit card over the Internet.  But, if you’re as popular as Amazon, then there is no trustworthiness issue.  In fact, people may not even check to see if you’re using an SSL certificate.

Question #5: Is your  company as famous as Amazon?

In summary…

If your answers aren’t ‘Yes’ for the questions #1-5, then perhaps you should rethink before copying Amazon.

To sum up, just because the system is working for Amazon, it doesn’t mean it will work as efficiently for you. Each design is created to match a certain type of business model. If the business model of Amazon doesn’t match yours, then perhaps copying the design of Amazon to your site could be a bad idea.

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Online shopping with a twist: Virtual Oxford Street

By Mru Kodali on 13 January 2010

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nearlondon-screenshotLove shopping but hate the crowds? The answer may be Near’s virtual Oxford Street. They’re taking the world’s largest and best loved shopping areas and recreating them in the virtual world, Second Life-style with a focus on shopping. Reports are that big names including M&S and Liberty have signed up to display their shop windows in NearLondon, as they do in their bricks and mortar stores. Users can then go directly through to the product or shop online from this virtual Oxford Street, to view more details and buy.

I found that only some stores, e.g. Accessorize, had their various branches identified through NearLondon’s location search. This is a little disappointing given that lots of chains have more than one shop in the Oxford Street area and you may prefer one over another. I looked up M&S (reportedly part of NearLondon) and the search came up with just one result. This didn’t give me specific address details (other than Oxford St.), so at first glance it was unclear whether I was going to the M&S flagship store near Marble Arch or their other branch, the Pantheon, also on Oxford Street. Additionally, many shop windows appear blacked out with just the Near logo displayed. Presumably these shops haven’t signed up with Nearworld yet; but as a user, my experience is somewhat diminished by this.

Once more shops take part, this could be useful for inspiration, when you have an occasion to buy for but need a bit of help getting started, or when you’re simply checking out which look’s in this season. I haven’t tried it myself but NearLondon also lets you go shopping with your friends virtually, which could work if you’re all in different places.

Personally, I’d miss the delights of walking down Oxford Street in person such as unexpectedly bumping into an old friend or the delectable smell of Belgian waffles by Bond Street tube. But should I ever leave London (and perhaps this is their target audience, tourists who love London shopping), I’d more likely go for a nostalgic trip down Oxford Street virtually.

Are you a NearLondon user? Are you tempted to give up the stress of London shopping? Let us know your thoughts.

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Royal Mail will suffer from lack of innovation, not strikes

By Alexander Baxevanis on 29 October 2009

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Demo of DPD Interactive SMS delivery confirmationThe message in the recent weeks is clear: after repeated strikes more and more businesses, especially online retailers, are prepared to desert Royal Mail for alternative suppliers. However, I think it’s not just the strikes that will drive businesses away from Royal Mail. It’s also that Royal Mail has failed to come up with innovative services that match the needs of ecommerce businesses and their customers.

At Ecommerce Expo last week, I saw a number of delivery companies trying to attract retailers. But what they were advertising wasn’t their lack of strikes - it was services that make life a bit easier for both retailers and customers.

DPD, a parcel delivery company, was advertising their “Interactive SMS delivery notification” system. When a retailer provides them with the parcel recipient’s mobile phone number, they send a text message to the recipient to confirm the delivery day. If recipients aren’t available to sign for the package on that day, they can reply by text message to arrange an alternative date. For customers, this means greater transparency and less of the disappointment of receiving the usual Royal Mail “Sorry, you were out” card.

Home Delivery Network, another parcel courier, have partnered with PayPoint to create Collect+, a network of neighbourhood convenience stores that can accept parcel deliveries. As many of these shops are open until late in the evening, customers can collect their parcels when they come home after work, and avoid a trip to the local Royal Mail delivery office. Some major online retailers, such as Littlewoods and Woolworths have already signed up to offer this delivery method to their customers. Royal Mail could have found a way to use their Post Office network in a similar way, instead of closing down Post Office branches.

With delivery often being one of the biggest customer concerns in an ecommerce transaction, retailers are likely to be looking for advanced delivery services that will differentiate them from their competition. If Royal Mail can’t keep up, retailers may not return to use its services even after the strikes are over.

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Do you need high-street advice to buy online?

By Alexander Baxevanis on 14 October 2009

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Step into middle England’s best loved department store, stroll through haberdashery to the audio visual department where an awfully well brought-up young man will bend over backwards to find the right TV for you - then go to dixons.co.uk and buy it.

1926310454_e19d38395aThe text above, one of a recent series of advertising messages by Dixons won’t come as a surprise to those of us at Webcredible who’ve been through countless usability testing sessions with ecommerce websites. Especially when purchasing large, high-value goods or goods where design is an important factor, customers are right to want to “try before they buy”. And this often means browsing the high street, coming up with a shortlist of products and then looking for the cheapest price online.

Dixons’ campaign hasn’t gone without a reply from some of their high street competitors, who rightly point out that Dixons doesn’t even sell many of the upmarket products found in high street stores. And does Dixons really want to highlight that their competitors can provide better advice than they do?

So, apart from creative advertising, what can online retailers do to make consumers more confident to buy online without browsing through the high street? Here’s some tips:

  • Showcase the product online from as many angles as possible. ‘Catwalk’ videos for clothes and demo videos or 360° views for gadgets can replicate (to some extent) the experience of seeing a product up close.
  • Add product reviews and, even better, Q&As with your expert staff. If customers can ask you a question and get a satifactory reply (or even find that their question has been already answered) then they’re more likely to buy without seeking advice from your competitors.
  • Put a generous returns policy in place, and let your customers know. If customers know they can easily return a product they don’t like, they’ll be happier to checkout even when they’re not 100% sure about their purchase. On the other hand, if they get stuck with a product they don’t like they’re less likely to come back.

In our e-commerce usability report, due out next week, we’ve seen that some sites do better than others in helping consumers pick a product. How well does your site perform in this area?

P.S. Come meet us in Ecommerce Expo at Earls Court, 20-21 October.

Photo credit:  Indiana Stan via Flickr / Creative commons

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Every little helps, except when it comes to online user experience

By Jon White on 3 September 2009

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Everybody keeps telling us that online shopping is constantly growing, and I’ve bought many things online (books, CDs, DVDs), but I had never attempted a food shop online until recently and to be honest, the experience has sent me straight back to the checkouts.

Using the website of a certain major UK supermarket, I spent a good hour and a half loading up my online basket, selecting a delivery time and heading to the checkout.  This was no problem, and I’m reliably informed that when you’ve bought once, the system remembers the items you buy to make it easier (although I’ll now never be a repeat customer), so I was perfectly happy.

It was at the checkout that it all went wrong though. Firstly, I needed to amend my address details (as I had previously registered at my old address, although I had never used it), but the automatic address finder was giving me incorrect address details and wouldn’t let me input the full correct details – Somehow I wasn’t confident that the delivery driver would find Flat 11, London (my postcode was there as well, but it’s still pretty vague).

But, the worst was yet to come.  I returned to my basket frustrated, only to find that all the items I had spent a lot of time selecting had been removed as a result of me attempting to change my address during an order, without even so much as an error message! The lack of continuity in this user journey suggests that it needs much better planning.

The result is a customer who will probably never do food shopping online again because of this poor user experience, and because my nearest supermarket is a store of a different company, the brand in question has lost a lot of repeat business from me.

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