Untapped Potential Still Available Online

It’s interesting to read that in a recent study carried out by Tealeaf, we discover that £2.8bn pounds was spent online in the Christmas period, with some 44% of the UK adult population buying online. But what stood out more than this headline grabbing figure was in fact how much more could have been spent.

The study goes on to reveal that almost a 1/3 (32%) of those surveyed abandoned an internet transaction all together through frustration, and 44% of the study group had experienced ‘difficulties’ with their online shopping. These problems consisted of website errors and problems (13%), delivery costs (13%) and delivery timings (8%).

It is paramount that all retailers, whether online only or a multi channel, have a comprehensive understanding of the barriers that might block potential additional revenue. It’s an unfortunate fact that most of the time, it is your customer who discovers the error or problem on your site before you do, and by then it’s often too late as this study has shown.

It’s a very wise strategy to engage with your business on the same level as you want your customers to.

Place a few orders, get friends to do the same and collate the combined experiences to offer insight into the pitfalls and address them before your customer falls foul of them. Christmas shines a very large, very bright spotlight onto all the shortcomings of a business, and if you can take the sting out of some of that during the year, learning from the experiences of the previous peak period, then you are more likely to succeed as the holidays come round once more.

Posted by: Robert Blair