The Webselect team are masters at eCommerce, and turning a good eCommerce site into a great eCommerce site is exactly what we do.
Our latest client,is a leading supplier of tools, equipment, clock and watch materials to the jewellery and horological trades. Since our work with them began, and in under a month after their new eCommerce site had gone live, they have seen a significant increase in their conversion rate of customers. 143.35% to be exact! This is tangible proof of our expertise in eCommerce and testament to the time we take to truly understand what our clients are selling and which buyers they are trying to communicate with. It’s never a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach, and we are well respected in our industry for achieving results like this for online brands and retailers.
What was the problem?
Our client approached us after deciding that their online sales were not performing as well as they could be; the site was old and they wanted to accelerate their online growth. Being very well-known in the industry as a B2B retailer, the potential was there. Sales from their retail outlets in London and Birmingham were performing well, but something was missing from their online offer.
How did we approach it?
We started by investigating the client’s old site, looking for anything that we could enhance or redesign as a first step, as it’s not always appropriate to tear everything up and start again from scratch. Something that we were quick to discover was that their Google Analytics had been set up incorrectly, and was not accurate for all their products, meaning that the sales team did not get the right data to understand the market (strike 1).
We also concluded that the User Experience (UX) was clunky, too focused on lists of products and prices and didn’t sell the story behind the heritage, experience and quality of service (strike 2).
From a back-end perspective, the management of stock, stock levels and availability was broken, workflow was manual and products were potentially available online when not in stock, creating a backorder nightmare. Worst of all, there were products that were showing as not available online, when there was in fact stock (strike 3).
The client has a mature discounting policy for trade, and this was not being managed well in the old site. Discounts were being inconsistently applied, requiring manual over-writing and adding to the overhead of the site management and costing the client money, as well as being a hit to the reputation and revenue (strike 4).
The processing of orders was also taking too long, impacting the customer’s experience of fulfilment (strike 5).
So what to do?
We reported back these findings to the client, and talked through the options with them. Our primary recommendation for the best course of action was to rebuild the site and migrate all the data. It was a simple business case for the client of good money after bad versus a new platform and site that is optimised for the latest technology, that would represent a very positive ROI. We transitioned the client on to our SelectCommerce platform, as a basis for building their website, which empowered them with a working outline of the website very quickly, without causing any impact to the operation. This also allowed them to streamline their back office processes and get to grips with how to use the very intuitive CMS quickly.
The Outcome for the client
The primary reason for an increase in conversion rate, we suspect, is down to the new site’s design and usability (UX). With the previous site, there was very little interaction with the customer; the website simply displayed the products and asked visitors to pay for the items. This gave the site a very ‘cold’ feel to the customer. Now, on their new site, customers have access to blog content, videos, and a method of contact, all of which offer interaction and bring the site to life by giving it its own personality, telling the story and building credibility and community. This helps the customers to build rapport with the website, and the company in turn, by allowing visitors to discover more about the company and navigate their story behind the store, which is an integral part of e-commerce in this current age.
Using our powerful SelectCommerce platform, stock management, page building, product categorisation, integrations with payment providers, fulfilment and finance systems are now all standard. We eliminated some of the manual processing issues in the back office, saving money, time and also reducing variation in customer experience. In addition, we built a bespoke discounting management system to accommodate the legacy discount model. It is consistent, easy to manage and works every time.
Also, changes such as using HTML5 and optimising the site for mobile has helped with shoppers across different devices. As mentioned earlier, the old site’s Google Analytics had not been set up correctly, and as a result of this most, but not all, purchases were being captured. This, in turn, caused a slight miss-representation of the stats from their old site’s conversion rate. The reports from Google Analytics, only 4 weeks after the launch of their new site on SelectCommerce, compared to the previous month, had increased by over 140%!
So what?
What’s the story here? Is it a story of ‘client had a problem and now has a better website’? Or is this a story about how the client was able to work with us, as their digital partner agency, to honestly and openly discover the problems, limitations and opportunities to accelerate their online sales? Hint; it’s the latter.
The client knew that there was a problem, but did not know what the problems were. It requires trust to work with an agency and believe what they are telling you, but we built that trust and were always looking for reasons for them to save money, or at the very least spend their money wisely on solutions and a platform that would provide a ROI quickly. Additionally, it’s not always about the software, we took the time to look at the whole workflow and codify what we could to improve the quality of data, information and therefore controls on the business.
Is your eCommerce site performing as you want it to? Are you looking to accelerate your online sales and spend your money wisely on a solution that will return on investment? Are you getting the maximum levels of conversion from your online customers?
If you are unsure or need a second opinion, talk to us. It’s all about being honest, and we are definitely that.
You can chat to us by calling: 0208 066 1000
Or email us at: [email protected]
Ah, Black Friday. A highly exciting day for shoppers. A far more stressful event for retailers and eCommerce businesses. Tis the season for higher levels of activity in online marketing, seasonal offers and online shopping. So, is this year any different, and what do we think is going to happen?
At Webselect, we have been reflecting on the preparations this year for Black Friday and Cyber Monday (BFCM) and the Christmas ramp up for online sales and ecommerce. But how will the current economic crisis impact arguably the most important period in a retailer’s calendar? It is certainly a challenging time. High inflation, the Bank of England forecasting a deep recession, fuel prices, risk of seasonal epidemic… the list goes on. We are all aware of the issues, many out of our control, but what can we do about this?
First of all, we can stay focused, positive and realistic. It’s not all bad news, even before the pandemic years, online sales were trending up, with more people shopping online than in-stores. A whopping 142.2 million shopped online, vs 124 million in-store according to the National Retail Federation.
What happened last year?
Last year’s results were disappointing for retailers, and Black Friday itself dropped by -14.3% in 2021, which was measured year-on-year against an incredibly hard-to-top 2020 at +38% ( IMRG Capgemini digital dashboard). With the high street opening, retailers struggled to see the same revenue in 2021 as in 2020. So, taking a look at the results from the previous year may shed some light on how Black Friday 2022 could pan out.
Black Friday 2021 can best be summarised with these key points:
- Sales campaigns moved earlier into the month of November
- Revenue dropped ~14% YoY overall; (although 2020 was a huge increase)
- Traffic dropped away, meaning there was competition for customers to even browse retailers’ sites in the first place
- Increase in ‘buy now pay later’ services and decrease in use of debit/credit card spend
The view of 2022 Q4 eCommerce:
- Peak Season is starting earlier and lasting longer. It seems the urgent rush for a 24 hour period of mad discounts has evolved, with longer periods of discounts starting earlier in November becoming more the norm. This is proving to be the case with many of our clients, and is evident from data collected for a number of years from IMRG. The benefits of extending the discount period over Black Friday/Cyber Monday is that this becomes easier for retailers to manage in terms of stock, shipping and utilising tools for nudge direct marketing. It also helps to manage shoppers’ expectations of discounts and stock levels.
- Reduction in discounts. During Cyber Week, the global average discount rate fell from *26% in 2020 to 24% in 2021. This trend is expected to continue in 2022.
- Change in payment options. For the first time, the share of online orders placed via credit card has declined. Customers instead opted for convenience, using financing tools like buy now, pay later (BNPL), with purchases made via BNPL increasing by *29%.
- Social commerce is becoming a hot topic the world over. Studies show that the US social commerce market skyrocketed by almost *38% to $26.77 billion in 2020 and is expected to reach $80 billion annually by 2025. Globally, 97% of Gen Z consumers use social media as their top source of shopping inspiration. We have looked into this further ourselves recently and wrote about it here.
There are several threats/opportunities posed to online retail sales in Q4 2022, with issues such as traffic being distracted by the World Cup; the cost of living crisis forcing consumers to spend less; strikes and impact to deliveries and postal system; and generally poor market performance so far this year. However, stay positive. If your brand is strong, you have well-targeted marketing and media campaigns that are backed up with a consistently performing, excellent ecommerce experience that is frictionless, a broad range of payment options and tools and is easy to navigate, you can help yourself.
Converting your traffic is where you can focus and have control in a world of issues out of your control. Once a user lands on your site, it’s for you to then lose. A consistently solid shopping experience is the last and most important step in the chain.
Often at Webselect we see clients come to us with sites that have been bloated with lots of ‘quick fix’ plug-ins and integrations, many are generic and are full of redundant code you don’t need and the effect is a slower and underperforming site. In addition, not having a video and Image management strategy impacts performance, a poor check out experience, and not being optimised for mobile (yes this is something we still encounter) can also impact your site. A good platform should have these 3rd party services as standard.
At this point in the year, we are waiting to see how this pre-Christmas period plays out, and have our fingers are crossed for everyone in the online retail space. We will be doing all we can to support our clients and guide them through this busy period. However, taking stock quickly and then planning early in Q1 2023 to spend appropriately on the things that matter, execute and sustain for next year will see the difference between thriving and surviving.
Here at Webselect Ltd we have been reflecting on the topics picked up in discussions when attending the ecom expo in London last month.
Amongst other topics, the online shopping expectations of ‘Generation Z’ is a thing, a big thing… Not being part of this generation myself (I’m Gen X – AKA old) I thought we should get the opinion of someone in this age group who works for us…. This is their take:
What and who are Generation Z?
Generation Z are the generation born between 1997 – 2012 (Santora, 2022). This generation will have a significant impact on eCommerce and will form the vast majority of customers online. Our combined purchasing power was more than £130 Billion last year (Santora, 2022).
Gen-Z’s psyche is similar to those of millennials, but we have different expectations when it comes to service and value for money. Unlike past generations, we have grown up alongside social media. For us, sites and apps such as Facebook and Snapchat are not only used to communicate occasionally with friends and family, they are an integral part of our daily lives and provide a means of expression and inspiration – as a result positive customer sentiment is expected to be collected and integrated into a website, but if the content seems too alike it appears that it could not be genuine.
Gen-Z’s are also highly dedicated to ethics, with almost 1:5 saying that they were swayed by brand ethics when making a purchase decision (Djafarova & Foots, 2022). And some companies that are dedicated to scale and profit, fall completely off their radar. When I was working at a well known UK retail store, if there were known issues or problems with a brand, I noticed my peers wouldn’t go near the brand, even asking for anything but the brand (Positive avoidance). As a result, developing, honing and communicating brand ethical values will be essential for online success with my generation.. This being said, we are also impatient and expectations on delivery are high, we want delivery of products within 3-12 hours (Jules, 2022). So managing these expectations AND performing ethically is a major contradictory challenge
How do we shop?
Guess what? – We no longer use google as a main source of information but we do use social media first and then check google for confirmation. This is a direct result of wanting to ‘buy’ information from people not brands and the same goes with products, if your product has some good genuine publicity on a social media platform then we, Gen-Z’s will interact more with the product (Djafarova & Foots, 2022). Another change that is happening with marketing as a result of social marketing and social Commerce has led to Gen-Z’s attention span dropping from 12 seconds to 1.7 seconds. That’s right, if you don’t get our attention in 1.7 seconds we will move on (Stefanski). Research has shown the best way to reach out and influence Gen-Z is through affiliate programs using ‘trusted’ Influencers to boost products and trust in a brand, this is supported by the desire to connect to like minded individuals who can give true reviews on products – In my experience this is true, if a company tries to sell you something it’s for sales, if someone you like gives you positive feedback it is easier to trust the person.
What interests us when shopping online?
The best way to get a Gen-Zer interested in a product is by giving us information on the product, a demo of its uses – We love a story – why we should invest our time, money and life into the product. This is sometimes more important than the actual price, but still do tell us the price!
When marketing to a Gen-Z, don’t bull*hit us, we are, in the main super smart and aware, the use of ‘buzzwords’ does not work as well as it used to (Kim, 2022), if I was to read – “Our bean juice is the most luxurious bean juice that is made with 100% pure organic beans that have been squeezed into each portion, in a way that will definitely change the way you live your life”,
1. It sounds like every other bean juice on the market .. Boring..
2. Yes, sustainability is good but, it tells me nothing of how your product is better than all the other bean juices, tell me why I should pick your bean juice. We don’t like to be sold to, so give me the genuine reason behind a product. And don’t lie to Gen-Z’s as we have really good common sense (ok maybe not) but we can pick out lies really quickly, and above all, don’t make claims that you can’t back up. If I am interested and do the research behind a product and we have been lied to in any way then we will not buy from you.
We can be loyal
If a Gen-Z buys from you once, more than likely, we will buy from you again – We are often seen as disloyal and having to be coaxed back into a brand by using loyalty programs, but this is not necessarily the case, if we like your company and product then we will most likely come back to you time and time again. If you have a pipeline for your reviews to get onto a social media platform we will want to see as many of the reviews as possible, that is why Amazon’s reviews are everywhere. The funny, the good and the bad are always being posted to constantly make people think about their company – A series of authentic reviews can lead to a 82% conversion rate (Brzezicki, 2022).
So what
Earlier I mentioned about old marketing tactics of using buzz words, they can still be used, but the way that they are used should be changed (Kim, 2022). Instead of free use complimentary, instead of Features use Benefits and instead of Objections use Concerns. Trying to sound too corporate is a surefire way to ensure that Gen-Z’s will leave, but by adding an occasional slag / ‘real’ word into the communication can make it sound a bit more relaxed, as a result this can help you connect with us and allow you to present the sales email as a bit more of a conversation.
By throwing a few slang words into the text allows the flow of a sentence to evolve from a simple sentence to a complex but easy to read;
“This is to show how a simple bit of text could be improved to make use of appealing text and keep the same relaxed style of writing so that it will be more appealing to Gen-Z”
“To show how a bit of text could hit different, I decided to make this text a bit longer but still keeping to short words to make sure that the vibe is right so that it will be more appealing to Gen-Z”
The second sentence uses two slang terms – “hit different” and “vibe”;
Hit different – to give a positive reflection of what is happening or being said. So in the text it is used as “To show how a bit of text could get the point across and inspire”.
Vibe – the atmosphere, for the vibe to be good it is relaxed. For a bad vibe or the vibe being off then the atmosphere is more like a riot, chaotic/aggressive.
These two slang terms could also be used at the same time “The vibe hit different”, this would mean that: “The atmosphere was amazing. I want more of that in the world” – good event. Or. “The atmosphere was horrific. I never want to feel that again” – bad event.
If you are ‘OK Boomer’, (look it up) don’t worry, talk to someone in the generation you want to reach and get their input on the copy you write – Tone and slang on social channels may and probably should, be different to the tone and vocabulary on your website.