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Posts tagged ‘e-commerce’
Nexus One in True size
A few hours ago Google announced its highly anticipated Nexus One. Google showcased a variety of the phone’s features.
Mario Queiroz, Vice President of Google, answered a question about Google only selling the Nexus One in a webstore: “Most consumers like to go into the store to check out a phone. What about the importance of physical retail? Will Nexus One be in T-Mobile stores?” His reply: “We want this to remain pure and simple. Right now it’s online only. Our store is really impressive. We’ll iterate over time.”
However, since online images and specifications might give a false representation of what the Nexus One really looks like, we present to you: the Nexus One in True size.
Click the thumbnail below to compare the Google Phone with your current mobile phone!
M-Commerce wins ground
Amazon.com is extending its 1-Click checkout experience to mobile customers with the introduction of Amazon Mobile Payments Service. It is optimized for the mobile phone experience, enabling customers to make payments conveniently from any mobile device. There are more mobile payment networks available, like Bango, but with the announcement of Amazon the mobile commerce (m-commerce) market finally seems to win ground.
Retailers contemplating how to sell to the 40 million-plus active users of mobile Internet in the U.S. alone (per researcher Nielsen Mobile) could start their mobile approach by providing shopping info via a mobile device. Recent research from Shop.org found that half of consumers aged 18 to 34 are using their mobile devices to shop offline more efficiently and with better information.
Fast growth in m-commerce sales
Global m-commerce is accelerating in global consumer adoption faster than the pundits anticipated. A nice reflection of this is eBay’s recent announcement regarding its mobile app for the iPhone and its m-commerce site which have generated $380 million in sales so far this year. With the assumption that the current pace continues, the m-commerce channel for eBay will be 5-6% of its total revenue for 2009, achieved without an elaborately defined effort – just an experimental toe dip.
Little in-house development
InternetRetailer.com found that 83.4% of retailers in m-commerce use vendors to build and help maintain their mobile sites and apps. Numerous vendors are building m-commerce sites and apps, but five have emerged as leaders. mPoria, CardinalCommerce, Moonshadow eCommerce, Usablenet and Digby are the players to watch in mobile commerce technology.
Australian researchers warn for a surge in online trading
Australian researchers Sean Sands and Cerla Ferraro predict a shift in consumer buying habits and warn for a surge in online trading and ‘anti-retail movement’ that could doom retail outlets over the next 10 years. According to their Retail 2020 report some traditional retailing is likely to become obsolete by 2020, as manufacturers choose to sell directly to the public and consumers prefer to deal directly with wholesalers.
“Consumers are growing tired of ‘filters’ reducing the transparency of their interaction with the producer of the goods, reducing authenticity of the goods and services they purchase. They want more direct access to the sources of goods and expect more from the retailer – it’s not enough to source the goods alone, retailers need to source better, more often and for less,” Sands said.
The changing landscape means retailers would have to fight harder for customer share and come up with innovative and inventive ways to retain customer loyalty.
Women take the lead in online shopping
Research by Blauw Research for webshop Bol.com has shown that nowadays women account for 51 percent of online buyers where in 1998 nine out of ten online shoppers were male. This shift in gender also influences buying behavior. Internet used to be a male concern, but women have different demands when it comes to e-commerce. Women tend to focus more on product and price orientation. Inspiration and experiences are more important here. The males however, want to choose quicker and therefore require a well-organized shopping process.
The combination of focal points of the different genders is key for today’s webshop development. Special attention for the female approach requires more focus on inspiration and ‘the experience’ during product visualization.
Online shoppers: top reasons for abandoning carts
Online shoppers cite high shipping costs, a desire to comparison shop and a lack of funds as the top reasons they abandon shopping carts, according to a survey by PayPal, which interviewed 553 active online shoppers in the U.S. who had recently abandoned a shopping cart. But the survey shows many eventually return to the web site to buy, or make a purchase in a bricks-and-mortar store.
“Merchants who don’t welcome back abandoners with open arms are leaving hundreds of dollars per shopper on the table,” says Eddie Davis, senior director of services for small and midsized businesses at PayPal. “Merchants need to remember the items that customers abandon and make it easy for them to buy when they return. Sweetening the deal with free shipping, coupons and special discounts is also a great way to encourage online shoppers to complete their purchases.”
Here are the top reasons survey respondents give for abandoning shopping carts:
E-commerce websites grow despite of crisis
Dutch e-commerce websites have grown in the first six months of 2009, despite of the economic crisis. This is shown by research of Multiscope. Not only Bol.com (15%), Neckermann (6%), Otto (7%) and Wehkamp (17%) were able to realize a growth of their reach, but also KPN (10%) and Vodafone (9%) show a strong growth in comparison with 2008.
Consumers more often go online for the purchase of products and services. Motives behind the growth seem to be easy comparison, more choice and more extensive payment- and credit possibilities.
Open-source webshop application popularity
What are the most popular shopping cart systems used by webshops? Nowadays, a lot of open-source shopping cart applications are available. We compared the five largest open-source online shopping applications and found some surprising trends.
The graph below shows the systems and their average worldwide traffic (search volume index, scale relative to average Magento figures) according to Google Trends. It’s no hard science, but the outcomes show great shifts over time.
What strikes is the rapid growth of Magento overtaking osCommerce as the largest player. Both systems today account for 26% of the traffic in this research, followed by Interchange (18%), VirtueMart (15%) and Zen cart (15%). It can be assumed that the increase in popularity of Magento will continue, making Magento by far the most used online shopping cart system in the near future.
Size comparison using references
Viewing products in true size is a great good. This is one of the main reasons why consumers tend to go to physical shops. A common thought is that size determination is only possible by holding, viewing or touching real, existing products.
However, there are examples of size determination in architecture and product photography. As illustrated above, product photographers use other common products like coins, rulers or pencils to give the viewer an idea of the product’s size.
Architects use scaled models, maquettes or renderings to visualize and test shapes and ideas. In architecture, size comparison is often achieved by placing models of people or cars next to buildings and structures. The above image shows a rendering of The bird’s nest (Beijing, China) designed by Herzog & de Meuron with people as references.
Using references is a simple way to let viewers determine the size of products. An important thing to remember is to always use common reference objects like coins, credit cards and people.
The illustration above shows a rubber ducky without any reference in the first image. The second and third image show how a person as a reference can influence the perception of the size of a product.
Forrester: ‘Dutch online shoppers will spend €8 billion in 2014′
Only a few days after Dutch market researcher Blauw Research stated that “despite of the economic crisis and decreasing consumer trust, in 2009 we expect the Dutch online consumer spending to reach € 6 billion”, Forrester Research publishes its online shopping predictions for The Netherlands in 2014. In its report Forrester expects that, by 2014, nearly 10 million Dutch online shoppers (out of a 16 million population) will spend more than € 8 billion via the internet.
Forrester asked more than 1.000 Dutch consumers about their satisfaction with Dutch websites on thirteen large retail websites. 69 percent reported that they were satisfied or very satisfied with their experiences.
Bol.com (86 percent) has the highest satisfaction rates, followed by Wehkamp.nl (76 percent) and Neckermann.com (75 percent). Bruna.nl (58 percent) came in last.
Dutch consumers were mainly frustrated by sites that made it hard to find - or didn’t have - the products they wanted. Another pain point for Dutch consumers was lack of/not enough pictures of products. Forrester recommends retail websites to prove that fixing usability problems is good for their business.
Especially the small, simple improvements can cause a fast improvement of the ROI. A good starting point is to show the board how other companies make changes which lead to improvement of the conversion, more and larger orders, better churn and online sales.
Dutch consumers spend more online every year
Dutch consumers are buying more and more goods from their home. The spending in the Dutch homeshopping segment increased last year with 14,3% to € 5,46 billion, according to recently published numbers by market researcher Blauw Research.
Last year the total turnover for online consumer spending was € 4,85 billion, a growth of 24% in comparison with 2007. The number of online orders increased with 17% to an average of 5,3 orders per person. This influences the average amount spent per online consumer, which increased with 16% to € 618. Altough the growth is less than in previous years, the market continues to grow with 24%, mainly caused by an increase in the number of orders.
Online consumer spending
As illustrated in the graph below, the share of internet shopping in consumer spending for the total retail segment steadily increases. The share increases about 25% every year from 2,8% in 2005 to 5,7% in 2008.
When we look at the share of internet shopping in the home shopping segment (which also consists of catalog and mail orders) a steady increase can be noticed. The share increases about 10% every year from 68% in 2005 to 89% in 2008.
Frank Sibbel (Blauw Research): “For 2009 we once again expect a large spending increase, despite of the economic crisis and decreasing consumer trust. Consumers will use the web more often for their online purchases and they will spend more money and more often online. In 2009 we expect the online consumer spending to reach € 6 billion.”
