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Description:

This white paper, sponsored by Baynote, examines how merchants are thinking about metrics today, and futuristically. A cross-section of retailers discussed a range of topics including the metrics most important for running their businesses and whether, for analysis purposes, senior management focused on the same or other statistics beyond those being used by business units.

Starting with the dynamics of conversion and the average order size, quantitative findings from our 2012 Merchant Survey are integrated while qualitative color commentary provides a broader perspective on these key metrics and the behavior shifts being seen among those surveyed.

Highlights Include

• What are the five most important metrics for running your business and why?
• Is profitability your most critical metric?
• How are KPIS including conversion, revenue, AOV and others trending across the merchant community?
• Do you have the business intelligence you need to make wise decisions?
• Do you have a playbook that aligns goals and is focused on taking action?
• Are you measuring emerging metrics to support mobile, social and cross-channel growth?

	Report $595 Buy Now
	e-tail detail 4.26.12 Download

Description

This report is a comprehensive reference source for strategy, merchandising, and marketing trends online and across channels. A compilation of responses and commentary from 147 senior executives with responsibility for ecommerce, results provide a unique overview – from the sellers’ perspective, with observations and guidelines interjected from the e-tailing group, inc. based on 18 years of ecommerce and over 50+ years of retail experience.

What’s Included

• Input from ecommerce executives representing 32 major product categories being sold online
• Aggregated responses to a 55-question survey completed 1Q 2012
• 55 charts and tables for benchmarking merchandising and marketing initiatives as well as website performance

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Introduction
2. Profile of Survey Respondents
3. Executive Summary/Top-Line Findings
4. Internet Strategy
5. Features and Functionality
6. Analytics and Merchandising Metrics
7. Up-Sells/Cross-Sells
8. Email Performance and Related Metrics
9. Personalization and Segmentation
10. Mobile Merchandising and Marketing
11. Social Media
12. Cross-Channel and Strategic Issues
13. Future Plans
14. 2012 Issues
15. Checklist for Escalating the Customer Experience
16. About the e-tailing group

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Description:

This white paper tackles the technology “pace of change” challenge in partnership with KalioCommerce, a full service SaaS offering specifically for emerging and mid-market online B2C and B2B companies. Some of their perspective is interwoven with the e-tailing group point-of-view gleaned from qualitative and quantitative research within the retail community.

A cross-section of retailers using in-house and outsourced solutions participated in one-on-one interviews to garner the “insider” perspective relative to confronting these dynamic elements with topics that include:

• Platform position, challenges and desires
• Technology demands and internal adeptness
• Merchandising control and flexibility
• eCommerce roadmaps and prioritization

Charted e-tailing group Merchant Survey Findings

• Information on conversion trending
• Initiatives to improve website performance
• Product page essentials
• Merchandising and customer service tactics for customer retention
• Observations about personalization
• The right data for successful marketing.

Food-for-Thought questions throughout the white paper pinpoint important issues that merchants need to discuss within their organizations and keep top-of-mind as decision-making takes place throughout the year.

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Description:

This report reveals online shopper attitudes, opinions, and behaviors relative to live chat. It address many of the recommendations from the 2011 edition which included the desire to discover what leads someone to choose live chat as their communication method of preference, the satisfaction level of chats resultant from both opt-in scenarios and proactive invitations, along with a continued focus on monitoring chat adoption and usage outside of the United States, specifically in the United Kingdom (UK).

What’s Included:

Five key findings, suggested by the data, are investigated using survey statistics to illustrate salient points.

1. Live chat has reached a tipping point of adoption
2. Multi-faceted nature of chat, combined with efficiency and control, puts chatters on the path to fandom
3. While live chat fans are highly desirable, frequent chatters demand special attention
4. Live chat in the UK is on the rise – both in terms of adoption and favorability
5. For online merchants to get the most from chat, they have to treat it as a distinct communication channel

Methodology:

The study was conducted online using a third party opt-in panel, 75% of which were located in the United States and 25% in the UK. Those surveyed totaled 2,027 – up from just over 1,000 respondents last year. Respondents lived in the US or UK, spent in excess of $250USD per year online, and shopped at least monthly.

A companion research study, “Chat with the Chatters” that moves beyond the quantitative to try and understand the mindset of this customer will also be available at a later date.

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Description

While much has been written about consumption patterns, only minimal fodder has been shared about video’s potential for impacting retail shopping experiences. Given that scenario, the e-tailing group sought to understand the consumer perspective and rationale regarding their embrace of video with sponsorship from Invodo, a full service ecommerce video solution. We believe we are the first to jointly conduct a major consumer insight survey on this topic, where online 1,000 consumers explore onsite experiences, cross-channel usage and social embrace along with the myriad of devices that enable video access including smartphones and tablets.

Through this research, we move beyond the numbers and delve into the behavioral details of video consumption. These insights will help retailers make smarter investments; capturing consumer attention through compelling experiences that both inform and inspire shoppers.

What’s Included:

• A myriad of information from consumer survey is encapsulated into five key findings
• A series of examples brings video utilization to life on the product page, home page, and category page
• A review of video beyond the site reveals interest in email, social channels, mobile and tablets

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. Letter from the Author
2. The Consumer Perspective: Survey Methodology and Demographics
3. Top Line Findings
   1. Onsite
   2. Beyond the Site

1. The Consumer Speaks: Five Top Video Insights

Insight #1: Consumers set the pace; they want, expect and watch video across retail browse and buy experiences.

Insight #2: Video plays a multi-faceted role and is ideal for building consumer confidence given its effectiveness in aiding decision-making.

Insight #3: Video quality matters.

Insight #4: While the product page receives the greatest attention, many locations merit video integration.

Insight #5: Beyond the site experiences receive substantial consumer attention

1. Putting Video to Work for Your Business
2. About the Companies
   1. About the e-tailing group
   2. About Invodo

	Report $395 Buy Now
	e-tail detail 2.17.12 Download
	e-tail detail 3.12.12 Download

Description

This study benchmarks 382 features on 100 B2C merchant websites that were mystery shopped in 4Q ’11. Our extensive summary highlights key metrics and trends from both a service and selling perspective. Throughout, the presence of each element is presented via a series of 13 categories including an industry-at-large perspective. Stellar merchants are identified from a merchandising and customer service perspective.

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Description

Personalization has long been a promise of the Internet however its execution among the merchant community has not yet met the elevated expectations of consumers. This white paper takes a two-pronged approach, sharing merchants’ qualitative insights about the topic via commentary from individual interviews, in conjunction with a quantitative survey completed by 130 merchants in late 2011.

Success starts with small steps per a list of eight “not to be missed” in pursuit of personalization. These steps are a must read for any merchant already entrenched in personalization as well as those who may be bantering internally about the optimal solution for their business. The results are tangible from a monetary and consumer engagement perspective, the two critical components for driving businesses growth.

What’s Included:

• Findings from a quantitative survey that explored the current state of personalization including:
  • Performance within merchant organizations
  • Opportunities and challenges that might prevent personalization from realizing its cross-channel potential
  • Its role in driving loyalty and bottom-line sales.
• Data from proprietary e-tailing group research relative to personalization including the annual Merchant Survey and Mystery Shopping Study
• “Eight Steps to Master Personalization” that emanated from merchant responses to a series of questions around unrealized opportunities, personalization roadmaps and what personalization nirvana would be for their company

Table of Contents

1. Introduction
2. Survey Objectives and Methodology
3. Reflections on Personalization
4. Eight Steps to Mastering Personalization
   • Understand Personalization is a Process
   • Align Internally to Ensure Success
   • Foster a Personalization Culture
   • Listen to your Customers
   • Deliver an Experience that is Helpful
   • Put the Personal in Personalization
   • Apply a Cross-Channel Lens
   • Test, Measure, Evolve
5. Final Thoughts

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Description

To understand what makes the connected customer tick and what retailers can do to ensure their brands are top-of-mind when these customers start and finish their browse and buy agendas, we conducted an online survey of 1,000 consumers.

Our goal was to gather in-depth information on their behavior and sentiments regarding cross-channel shopping, connectivity means and devices along with buying behavior and predisposal to a range of behavior.

Top-Line Findings:

INFORMATION EMPOWERMENT: Information has empowered consumers to educate themselves about what product to buy, how much to pay, and where to shop

CHANNEL SHIFT: Satisfaction with online shopping redirects channel behavior

SOCIAL STUDIES: Social has connected consumers to companies and one another where peer insights have turned consumers into advocates and authorities

MOBILE MEETS SHOPPING: Mobile devices have provided unprecedented access in support of efficient shopping experiences

Table of Contents

I. Reflections from the Author

II. Survey Methodology and Demographics

III. Top-Line Findings

IV. Reflections on What’s Next for Shoppers

V. About the Companies

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Description

There is a new “mania” in the marketing world and marketers are riding an ever-changing wave where making the right decisions means developing a solid 2012 plan. As consumers are more accessible via more channels, retailers must make choices about how to best deploy their finite marketing resources. The e-tailing group, with sponsorship from Bronto, a marketing platform for commerce, took a two-pronged approach to exploring the current marketing madness.

We began our project with a quantitative research study fielding a 10-question survey that was graciously completed by 110 merchants. At the same time we conducted merchant outreach to explore retailer sentiment regarding current and proposed marketing strategies, investments and tactical approaches gaining an “in-the-trenches” perspective. Our goal with both efforts was to understand what companies will do in 2012 from a marketing perspective to better prepare for the changing consumer landscape where customers can be engaged almost anywhere.

Top-Line Findings

Rather than look at each of these efforts independently we synthesized the quantitative and the qualitative, addressing three important topics. It is the marriage of the numbers to the wisdom of the retail community that serves as the foundation of this white paper addressing investment, spending, data and their embrace of technology.

1. Overall digital spend will increase with most individual marketing elements commensurate
2. Mobile and social dominate merchant thinking while SMS sees limited traction
3. Data will determine success

Table of Contents

1. Research Orientation and Key Findings
2. Survey Demographics
3. The Readiness Factor
4. Three Key Findings
5. e-tailing group 2012 Planning Checklist
6. About the Companies

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	e-tail detail 10.27.11 Download

Description

The objective of our annual MarketLive/e-tailing group consumer survey was to find the consumer voice regarding proposed online shopping behavior relative to gifting and 4Q11 holiday shopping including tactics that resonate and untapped merchant opportunities.

Research was conducted via an online questionnaire, completed September 2011 by 1,021 adults (50% male/50% female) who shopped online four times or more in the past year, typically spending $250 or more online annually.

What’s Included

• Holiday best practices illustrated by 36 examples of merchant execution on-site, via email, mobile or social networks that can still be adapted in time to impact ROI this holiday season

• Highlights of findings from the MarketLive/e-tailing group 2011 Holiday Survey and related webinar, Consumer Confidence Builders for Capitalizing on the 2011 Holiday Season

• Industry predictions for Holiday 2011

Table of Contents

I. REFLECTIONS ON THE UPCOMING HOLIDAY SEASON

II. SAVING SHOPPERS TIME AND MONEY IS A HOLIDAY PREREQUISITE

III. FROM TRADITIONAL TO DIGITAL–WINNING GIFTING TACTICS ONSITE AND ACROSS CHANNELS

A. Gifting Essentials

B. Customer Service Differentiators to Satisfy Even the Most Demanding Shopping

C. Making Product Sing This Holiday Season

D. Creative Promotions That Don’t Break the Bank

E. Countdown to Conversion Calendar

F. Gifting Reinforcement across Post-Order Communication

G. Embracing Anywhere/Everywhere Selling via Mobile and Social

IV. LAST MINUTE HOLIDAY REFLECTIONS

V. ABOUT THE COMPANIES