Liquid Vision's Client Blog

Various topics are discussed below.

Mobile phone becoming part of shopping process

The Effect of Mobile on the Path to Purchase

FEBRUARY 29, 2012

Retailers should view mobile sites as a gateway for in-store and online purchases

While consumer usage of smartphone and tablet devices for shopping purposes is on the rise, the devices’ place in the purchase path is varied. According to several pieces of research by Google, ForeSee Results andNielsen, shoppers may start in the mobile channel for product research but then purchase in-store. They also may use mobile for product research on the go, then later purchase online on a PC or tablet.

Nielsen’s Q3–Q4 2011 “US Digital Consumer Report” indicates that 29% of smartphone owners use their phone for shopping-related activities. The top mobile shopping activities include in-store price comparisons (38%), browsing products through the mobile web or apps (38%), and reading online product reviews (32%).

A 2011 post-holiday shopping study by Google and Ipsos OTX also depicts consumers using their smartphones at many different points in the purchase path. For instance, 46% of smartphone users who used their mobile device for holiday shopping said they researched an item on their smartphone then went to a store to make their purchase. And 37% said they researched an item on their smartphone then made their purchase online on a computer. Holiday shopping data indicates that no matter the purchase channel, mobile devices are likely to play a role in a mobile user’s purchase process.

The Google study also shows that 41% of smartphone users researched with their mobile device and went on to actually purchase on the smartphone. That data point is higher than in some other mobile commerce studies. For example, a study released in January 2012 by customer experience management firm ForeSee indicates that during the 2011 holiday season only 15% of online shoppers used their phones to make purchases. The phone was most commonly used as a research and price comparison tool. However, Google/Ipsos OTX studied only smartphone owners while ForeSee looked at online shoppers as a whole, a group that includes many feature phone owners as well.

Whether a consumer makes a purchase via mobile or elsewhere, Google’s industry director for retail, Todd Pollak, told eMarketer that retailers need to improve the way they connect the mobile experience with the in-store or web-based shopping experience.

“You would think retailers would be hugely invested in ensuring you’d have an optimized experience on the mobile device, as well as trying to understand how people use it,” he said. “But consumers are way ahead of retailers in terms of their investment in mobile and how that plays into the purchase process.”

Although the path to purchase may appear unclear as consumers conduct the shopping process across multiple channels, Pollak encouraged mobile marketers to think about factors such as a consumer’s distance from a store and the days and times when mobile usage spikes. For example, tablet usage peaks during after-work hours and smartphone usage spikes during weekend days. Connecting and strategizing based on those statistics will help mobile marketers provide more targeted and personalized campaigns akin to the marketing experiences consumers are accustomed to on the web.

 

©2012 eMarketer Inc. All rights reserved. www.emarketer.com  http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1008871

Gamestop, Others Gives Up on F-Commerce. Are They Right?

 

Amid growing signs that Facebook commerce, or F-Commerce as it is sometimes called, is gaining momentum comes the story of Gamestop Corp. Last April it opened a storefront on the social networking site. Six month later, it deemed the project a failure and quietly shuttered operations. (via Bloomberg).  Nor is it alone—Gap, J.C. Penney and Nordstrom have followed similar paths on Facebook.

However, there are also plenty of examples of retailers deciding now is the time to open Facebook storefronts as well.

Not a Success So Far

Still, the prevailing sentiment is that F-Commerce does not offer a sure path to success—at least not like a robust marketing presence on Facebook does. Facebook storefronts have not been a leading source of e-commerce transactions, despite the platform's huge user base.

Only 20% of consumers who say they are active internet users have purchased something directly within Facebook, according to a study released by ThreatMetrix in partnership with the Ponemon Institute.

A separate study, by Oracle, found that 34% of American and Canadian consumers say they would never purchase products via a retailer’s Facebook page, compared to 19% who said they would (9%) or already have (10%) done so.

Best Practices for a Sector in Its Infancy

F-Commerce is still in its infancy, however, so it is not likely die off any time soon. As more stores close—and open—on the site, though, it is worthwhile to examine what they are doing well, and not so well.

Don't dilute your overall brand.  If a company is not careful a Facebook storefront could dilute the brand, warns Anton Gething, co-founder & Product Director at social commerce experts nToklo. (via Retail Gazette).  "If clothing manufacturers continue to try and sell their products through Facebook stores, the consumer quickly becomes used to engaging with Facebook to make their purchase, without having any meaningful contact with the brand that they are buying from," he said.

It's a social platform–so be informational and collaborative. So says Mike Magolnick, writing for the Daily Disruption.  "Facebook is all about the emotional connection. … Don’t fall into the sales rhetoric that tells you to sell them on the spot or you will lose them. People are a lot smarter than that. Trust me, if clicking a link on Facebook to go buy what they want from your website is too much work for them, then they are probably not going to be that stellar customer you’re targeting to help explode your business anyway."

Be trustworthy. One reason brands’ Facebook retail endeavors have not succeeded is that consumers do not trust these particular storefronts, according to the ThreatMetrix study. Brands that can develop a more personal and one-on-one–relationship with their consumers may be they can succeed where other Facebook retails storefronts, have not.

 

Source: http://www.marketingvox.com/gamestop-others-gives-up-on-f-commerce-are-they-right-050673

Mastering Google Remarketing Ads

google-remarketing-tipsRemarketing is a popular topic in the web marketing world lately. And it’s no wonder why. Who better to show ads to than your previous site visitors? Personally, I’ve found the ROI on remarketing ads to be incredible, second only to email marketing. If you haven’t yet tried it, what are you waiting for?

For those unfamiliar with Google remarketing, here’s how it works. A visitor lands on your website. Google’s ad network writes a cookie in that person’s browser, identifying them as having previously visited your website. When this same person is visiting another website in the ubiquitous Google display network, your ad appears, “remarketing” them back to your site. The power of this concept is self evident. It’s far more effective to show ads to people who’ve previously shown interest in your products, versus the person whose never heard of you.

With that background in mind, let’s look at some tips for mastering this powerful tool.

  1. Start Tagging Visitors Now: Because you need at least 500 visitors tagged with the remarketing cookie before Google will show your ads, you’ll want to start tagging visitors as soon as possible, even before you’ve developed ad creative.
  2. Test Different Cookie Time-frames: Google allows you to to create different audience segments depending on how recently prospects visited your site. I would recommend creating several buckets to start, 180 days (the max allowed), 90 days, 30 days, 14 days, etc. Your bidding strategy should change depending on how recently the visitors viewed your site. You’ll likely find that you can afford to bid higher on more recent visitors because they’re more likely to convert.
  3. Design Remarketing Ads Differently: If you’ve ever designed a banner ad for an audience whose mostly not heard of you, you need to approach remarketing creative differently. First, you need to catch their attention by showing a brand or product they’ll recognize already. Then you need a compelling reason get them to come back.
  4. Target Visitors by the Content they Viewed: If you have a diverse product line, consider targeting visitors on a department level, rather than just a one-size fits all bucket. Showing an ad featuring women shoes to a visitor who originally browsed mens clothing in an obvious ad fail.
  5. Target Visitors by their Stage in the Buying Cycle: Another popular ad strategy is targeting viewers by their stage in the buying cycle. One of the most effective tactics is targeting visitors who’ve recently abandoned their shopping cart. Or, if you sell products that customers buy on a regular schedule (say printer paper, toner, etc) you can target customers at a particular time after their last purchase, reminding them to re-order.
  6. Create Ads & Landing Pages that Follow Scent: As with any ad-to-landing page relationship, there needs to be solid follow-thru that matches the promise of the ad. It’s extremely frustrating when customers click on ad featuring a specific product or offer, yet landing page offers no such fulfillment of the ad.
  7. Optimize through Site Exclusions: This is the magic pixie dust of any Google display campaign. Once your ads have received a decent number of impressions, clicks, and conversions, visit the “Networks” tab in your remarketing campaign, and click the “show details” under automatic placements. Here you’ll find a list of sites that Google is displaying your ads on. Pay close attention to the performance of each domain. Despite the fact that your ads are always being shown to qualified visitors who have seen your site before, certain sites perform significantly better than others. For under-performing sites, reduce your bid or exclude them entirely. For the high-performers, raise to bid to attract more impressions.
  8. Exclude Site Categories: Because remarketing targets the individual, and not a specific site, your ads will potentially be shown on sites that might not mesh well with your brand. Inevitably, you just might get a nasty call from your brand police who noticed an ad on a website that doesn’t fit with your product. To prevent these minor blow-ups, go to your Networks tab, and click the Exclusions link. There, you can choose to exclude specific sites, or entire categories of  sites you deem inappropriate for your brand.
  9. Take View-Through Conversions with a Grain of Salt: I’m highly skeptical of view-through conversions. A view-through conversion occurs when Google happens to show one of your ads to someone who does not click, but who later completes a conversion on your site. In my view, just because an ad flashes for a second in the corner of someone’s screen, and that person subsequently makes a purchase doesn’t mean that the conversion wouldn’t have occurred otherwise. I’m not saying there’s no value to view-throughs, only that you should focus primarily on traditional click-through conversions when calculating your ROI.
  10. Use All Ad Formats: While testing ad creative, I like to start with just designing one 300×250 image ad, because they tend to get the most impressions. Once you’ve tested and found a winner, be sure to create ads in all the available sizes to maximize your reach.
Article thanks to Justin Palmer - June 27th, 2011 Visit his web site >>

Face to face closing is still important for some industries

Branch contact is more effective than online, in making 
sales across a range of purchase situations, including 
personal banking, mortgages, credit cards and mobile 
telecommunications, a new study has revealed.

According to new research from consultancy Inside Story 
Knowledge Management, personalised advice from someone 
in a company branch or service centre is critical in these 
purchase situations, with branch conversion rates from quotation 
to sale proving 45% higher than conversion rates for company 
websites. Call centre conversion rates were also markedly lower than 
branches and websites.

Liane Ringham, Inside Story's managing director said face-to-face 
became more important when consumers were dealing 
with products that require explanation or which represent a more 
signifi cant investment for them.

"Person-to-person contact in branches can deliver advice 
and many also contain a social obligation which is making a 
signifi cant difference to sales conversion.  Over the phone, the 
social pressure is much less and the customer is less likely to 
make an 'on the spot' decision," she said.

Online, however, was found critical in consumers' search for 
information and quotes. This was the case across all categories 
investigated, but more prominent for broadband services and 
airlines.

The survey, conducted in September, asked 546 consumers 
about the channels they use to find information and buy 
products and services. It covered seven service sectors including 
airlines, credit cards, mobile telecommunications and superannuation.

Online stimulates search but face-to-face drives sales
MADELEINE ROS

Social Media Marketing: 9 tactics for B2B social channel advertising

SUMMARY: Did you know 81% of U.S. online adults use social media? This fact alone should help convince you that social media is a B2B marketing channel. If your customers and prospects can be found on social media, shouldn't you consider social media advertising? 

MarketingSherpa had the chance to discuss social channel advertising with three industry experts. This how-to article offers nine tactics including social advertising testing, using social advertising for lead gen, and why creating a YouTube video might be more effective than advertising on the platform.
  

Social media is a B2B marketing channel. You don't agree with that statement? Here are two pieces of Forrester Research that Jay Baer, author of The Now Revolution, cited in his keynote speech, "Destroying the 7 Myths of B2B Social Media," at MarketingSherpa B2B Summit 2011:
  • 81% of United States' online adults use social media

  • 86% of business technology buyers engage in some form of social activity for work purposes

    • Even if your company isn't involved in business technology, it's a pretty safe bet that at least a portion of your target audience engages in social media for some purpose. 

    One way to reach your customers and uncover new prospects in the social channel is through social media advertising. We had the opportunity to gain insight from three experts with experience in this burgeoning field:

    • Shama Kabani is the CEO of The Marketing Zen Group and author of The Zen of Social Media Marketing

  • Chris Zarski is involved with Interactive Marketing for Camelot Communications, overseeing the company's social media practice

  • Jeff Bander is the Senior Vice President of Client Services of EyeTrackShop, and is responsible for online and social media advertising

    • Here are nine social media advertising tactics ranging from design elements, to combining social advertising with email marketing, to why it might be a better idea to create a YouTube video than to advertise on the social platform.

    Tactic #1. Begin with a goal in mind

    Every marketing effort should have an overall objective to work toward, or measure against, and social media advertising is no different. 
    Here are three high-level objectives:
    • Increase leads

  • Increase visibility across the buying cycle

  • Create conversation and engagement with existing customers

    • Kabani added, "Just remember that social media advertising should be a part of a much bigger online marketing plan strategy. Nothing does well alone."

    She said if you have a social media ad with no content to back it up, or if you are integrating the ad campaign with your email marketing but not responding to the conversations this combination is producing, then, as Kabani put it, "it is all for nothing."

    "The first question should be, 'What are we trying to accomplish?' Then, look at what the tools allow us to accomplish rather than saying, 'Well, it is new. It is fun. So, you know, let's play with it.'"

    Tactic #2. Remember that design matters

    Like pay-per-click advertising, the actual size of the ad and amount of content is likely going to be very limited. Don't allow this limitation to cause you to ignore design elements.

    One important design element is almost certainly going to be out of your control -- page placement. If you find you are allowed to choose where your ad appears on a social media site, Bander said the top left area of the page is the best position. He added the middle right area of the page (where Facebook ads are positioned by the way) is the worst performing area according to testing by his company.

    Even if you cannot chose where your ad appears on a social media site, Bander did suggest some design practices to possibly improve ad performance:

    • Include an image in the ad -- people notice images quicker than text

  • Place the image on the left side of the ad and the text on the right

  • Avoid "pointy edges" in the ad, use curves and smooth edges

  • Keep the ad simple with no more than three or four key points

  • Use color and fonts to emphasize your main point

    • Kabani agreed that having an image in the ad was a vital design element, and added that the actual image used can make a major difference in ad performance.

    She said in one campaign different images were tested while keeping the rest of the ad exactly the same, and tests resulted in "crazy conversion rate changes." 

    Tactic #3. Understand that Facebook rules the current social media schoolyard

    Social media is a constantly evolving channel. When was the last time you logged into a MySpace account? Does anyone even remember Friendster? And there are a lot of different elements -- geolocation services, microblogging, niche communities and more -- with new things always looming on every horizon.

    Even so, the fact remains that Facebook is the number one social media player by orders of magnitude. You might find the audience you seek at other social media platforms, but, at least for now, you will find them at Facebook. 

    Advertising on Facebook requires a different approach than search engine advertising. Kabani explained, "It is almost like approaching someone at a party versus approaching someone who is at a grocery shop."

    When people are searching, you want your ad to appear next to relevant searches. To make your ad stand out on Facebook, you have to grab your audience's attention.

    To do this you want to first understand the audience you want to reach. This is important for any marketing effort, but it is especially important for Facebook advertising because the ads can be highly targeted through demographics -- ZIP codes, job titles, employer, interests, "likes," etc. -- so you want to understand which attributes are most important for finding your target audience.

    Because your audience is on Facebook for social reasons, and not necessarily to be marketed to, creating a striking ad using elements such as the image, headline and ad text is a way to make your ad stand out.

    Tactic #4. Watch your advertising budget on LinkedIn

    "I think LinkedIn is interesting from a B2B standpoint, and a great opportunity," said Zarski. "But it is still a little more traditional (in terms of) banner advertisement type deals, and from a cost standpoint, it is a lot pricier."

    He did state there is advertising value to be found in being able to really hone in on LinkedIn business and user groups and that LinkedIn offers B2B opportunities. Kabani said she has found LinkedIn advertising most successful for recruiting.

    She also agreed that LinkedIn ads had to be carefully monitored to keep costs under control. Kabani mentioned she believes a very large percentage of LinkedIn users can also be found on Facebook.

    "There is a lot of overlap between the sites, so if you target your ads correctly (on Facebook), you can still go after the same people," she said.

    Tactic #5. Use social media advertising for lead generation


    "Social media advertising marketing overall is excellent for lead capture," said Kabani.

    She said you can use targeted advertising to drive traffic to lead gen landing pages, such as a white paper created for CMOs. It is even possible to double up on leveraging the social channel by creating a tab on your Facebook page that includes lead capture information and advertise to drive traffic to that particular tab to collect new leads.

    Zarski added an example from one of his clients that found using social media advertising to drive traffic to a landing page resulted in a higher conversion of lead generation than attempting to capture the lead on the social media platform.

    The takeaway was social media advertising is an effective lead gen tool, but it is a good idea to test and find out where your audience is more likely to convert and use your ads to send traffic to the higher converting platform (see Tactic #7 for more on testing).

    Tactic #6. Combine social media advertising with email marketing

    The most obvious way to combine social media advertising with email marketing efforts was just covered in the previous tactic -- use the channel for lead capture and expand that effort to gain opt-ins for the email program.

    Both Zarski and Kabani agreed that combining the social channel and email involves more than just social media advertising. Kabani said you should include social sharing buttons in your email sends to make it very easy for recipients to spread your message among their social network.

    Zarski added the social channel allows for "instant feedback and interaction" with your email audience. 
    Provide your email recipients any easy way to socially share your messages, and then be sure to monitor different social platforms to keep the conversation flowing.

    Kabani explained, "I think it is a matter of giving your customer base and your prospective customers plenty of options in how to communicate with you, even if you are using one medium to get the message out there and multiple mediums to respond and get that instant feedback."

    Tactic #7. Test your social media advertising

    Testing should be a part of any marketing effort, but testing on the social channel can be a challenge. For example, it is very difficult, if not impossible, to conduct A/B split testing on your Facebook page. Testing ad campaigns is a different story.

    On Facebook you can create multiple campaigns changing one ad variable between the different efforts. The level of control over everything from ad targeting to design coupled with relatively low cost for the campaigns, as compared to PPC and banner ads, offers an opportunity to try out a lot of variable to find out what works best.

    To illustrate the low cost of social media advertising, Kabani said, "I know a company right now that is getting a click for two cents a click. That's astounding."

    Zarski said the fundamental principles of testing still apply:

    • Make sure you have control variables

  • Keep your creative and messaging experience consistent across test versions

  • Make sure you have statistically significant results with a confidence level you are comfortable with

    • In the test mentioned in Tactic #5, Zarski said lead capture and registration was an essential element for engaging with his client’s content, so the test involved an A/B split using a social media ad to drive traffic to an in-platform tab and to an external landing page for lead capture. The result of this test was conversion was much higher -- over 900% -- on the external landing page.

    Once the test produced these results, the ad campaign shifted to only send traffic to the external landing page for lead gen.

    Kabani added a checklist of variables you might want to test on social media sites:

    • Different headlines

  • Different images

  • Time of day to run the ad

  • Geographic regions and countries

    • She continued, "And you can start with very small budgets. We have tested campaigns for as little as $50 a week."

    Tactic #8. Creating YouTube content may be more effective than advertising on the platform

    Kabani pointed out one issue with advertising on YouTube is a lack of oversight. There's not as much administrative control and protection on YouTube as there is on, say, Facebook or Twitter. This means activity isn't as closely monitored, and you don't have much recourse if someone is using software to continually play a video or engaging in automated clicks.

    Kabani stated, "There is more room for click fraud with YouTube."

    She suggested a better option is to create a video yourself and post it to the site. You can even add clickable text to the video that leads to your website, social media properties or a landing page.

    Tactic #9. Capitalize on trends with Twitter

    Kabani explained advertising options on Twitter are limited to three:
    • Promoted trends

  • Promoted accounts

  • Promoted tweets

    • You can promoted a trend to have it show up as a sponsored topic in the trending topic list, and promoted accounts are recommended to Twitter users an account to follow. Promoted tweets will actually show up in Twitter users' timelines.

    Kabani said Twitter can be a tricky place -- it is easy to appear too commercial because Twitter users tend to see the platform as more open and honest and might not be as open to an advertising message. From a B2B standpoint, the platform is a good way to build relationships and drive traffic.

    "My sense is that you would do better spending your budget on actually engaging on Twitter organically versus ads," Kabani concluded.

    She added, "Tactics that work best there is tweeting really solid content and getting some main influencers to retweet. That sort of growth on Twitter is going to be a lot more powerful than any type of advertising."

    Zarski stated he thinks Twitter advertising is a great place to capitalize on real-time trends.

    If something is happening in your industry, or if a competitor stumbles, spending money on Twitter advertising is one way to immediately get a message out there more broadly than just Tweeting to your followers.

    Both Zarski and Kabani agreed an effective B2B tactic on Twitter is customer engagement and using the platform to create relationships with your customers. 

    Useful links related to this article

    CREATIVE SAMPLE: 
    EyeTrackShop ad placement test results
    The Marketing Zen Group

    Camelot Communications

    EyeTrackShop

    Generate Leads with Social Media Strategy: 6 Steps to Fill Up Sales Funnel

    Special Report: Social Media’s Impact on SEO – 5 Trends to Guide an Integrated Strategy

    Social Media Marketing: Finding and winning hyper-social consumers

    Measuring Social Media's Contribution to the Bottom Line: 5 Tactics

    Social Media Marketing: Why B2B marketers need to care, by the numbers

    Social Media Optimization: Engineering contagious ideas

    by David Kirkpatrick, Reporter

    Automated sentiment analysis

    TEXT ANALYTICS

    Automated sentiment analysis is an emerging field that overlaps with many others such as business intelligence, customer service, and brand reputation management, and the market is hard to measure.

     

    Many types of sentiment software use a technology known as text analytics, which extracts insights from text, such as in social media (e.g. Twitter), news articles, or internal documents and databases. Some companies even use software to check the tone of e-mail messages and other communications.

     

    Automated sentiment analysis can tell a company almost instantaneously how people are feeling about a particular business, executive, product, stock, or advertising campaign. Conventional methods of gauging customer sentiment, such as surveys and focus groups, can be expensive, time-consuming, and difficult to measure in real time. The better and more quickly a company can measure customer sentiment, the sooner it can tell how well a product is likely to sell.

     

    Companies such as Kia, Best Buy (BBY), Viacom's (VIA.B) Paramount Pictures, Cisco Systems (CSCO), and Intuit (INTU) are all using sentiment analysis to determine how customers, employees, and investors are feeling. 


    More here >>

    Online search to dominate over next five years

    Online search is set to experience
    16% growth per year over the
    next five years, with the sector
    to continue to dominate digital
    budgets.

    A new report by Frost & Sullivan
    – Australian Online Search
    and Directories Market 2010
    – points to the ongoing strength
    and dominance of the search and
    display markets which together
    are worth $1.1bn. However,
    growth for the combined ad segment
    slowed slightly from 27% in
    the 2009 financial year to 21% in
    2010. A majority of advertisers
    (54%) also indicated that their
    budget allocation to search was
    unchanged in 2010 from last year.

    Search – including search
    engine optimisation services
    – remained as the main point
    of online investment for many
    brands, with the sector comprising
    73% of revenues compared to
    directories’ 27% share.

    Frost & Sullivan predicts the
    online search market will continue
    to outpace online directories
    over the next fi ve years, with
    search set to grow at a compound
    annual rate of 16% to 2015, compared
    to the 8% predicted for
    directories. What’s more, search
    is expected to increase its share
    of revenue, compared to directories,
    to 80% during this time.
    However, the report noted that
    the search market is increasingly
    encroaching on online directory
    territory as the lines between the
    two segments blur.

    Google and Sensis continue
    to be the two main players in
    search, with each having about
    90% share of expenditure in
    their segments. Competition is
    increasing, however, with new
    entrant Bing, the repositioning of
    Yahoo! Search Marketing and the
    emergence of online directories
    such as True Local and Hot Frog.
    Phil Harpur, senior research
    manager at Frost & Sullivan, said:
    “The online search and directories
    market is a market in transition
    and we expect some interesting
    changes in the next few
    years…Online search advertising
    remains the stand-out growth
    segment of the online advertising
    industry.”

    CELIA JOHNSON

    Australian confidence in e-commerce rises

    A vast majority of Australian
    internet users are now purchasing
    goods and services online,
    with young consumers leading the
    trend.

    A report released today by the
    Australian Communications and
    Media Authority (ACMA) revealed
    88% of household internet
    users undertook one or more
    e-commerce activity in the last six
    months, with 69% purchasing at
    least one good or service.

    The most popular things to purchase
    online by Australians were
    travel (56%), tickets to concerts
    or movies (43%) and household
    goods including furniture and appliances
    (37%).

    The report, Australians in the
    Digital Economy: consumer engagement
    with e-commerce, also
    found age, gender, income, education
    and employment as impacting
    people’s purchasing behaviour.
    Those aged 25 to 34 are the most
    avid online shoppers, with 82%
    purchasing goods or services
    online. And men are more likely
    to buy things online than women
    (74% versus 65%).

    The majority of respondents
    said they spent less than $1000
    online during the past six months,
    with 43% spending more than
    $1,000. Meanwhile, 11% of
    respondents spent in excess of
    $5,000. Convenience and price
    were cited as the main reasons to
    shop online.

    Chris Chapman, chairman of the
    ACMA, said: “E-commerce is one of
    a number of internet activities performed
    by Australians online and
    this is the fi rst time the ACMA has
    explored the nature of Australian
    participation and engagement with
    e-commerce in any depth.
    "The internet is empowering
    consumers to purchase more
    economically and efficiently by
    making it easier to locate goods
    and services and often to compare
    costs."

    JOHN CORNEY of B&T

    Shoe Shoppers - New A/B Test: Black vs White Backgrounds for Shoe Shoppers

    Dear Jodie & Michael,
    shoesofprey.com

    FYI guys. Would be worth testing.

    The black background made the product and the add-to-cart button stand out on the page. Tester suspects that it may have affected results. Also worth noting: this is a much bigger product image than most American ecommerce sites use. Image size, alone, is worth testing. We’ve seen larger images win in other tests.

    ---------- Forwarded message ----------
    From: WhichTestWon <nataliem@whichtestwon.com>
    Date: 4 November 2010 02:38
    To: Peter McNamara pdm@liquidvision.com

    If you're an ecommerce marketer, a site designer (or a shoe lover),
    you absolutely have to click to see this week's test images from trendy
    Both product page versions offered the same shoe -- shown in one of
    the largest product image shots we've ever seen in an ecommerce layout
    -- at the same price.  But one version get 39.3% more consumers to
    click on the 'add to cart' button.  That's an outstanding lift (in
    our experience successful ecommerce tests tend to show lifts more in
    the 10-20% range.)

    Natalie Tomasso, Senior Reporter, WhichTestWon.com
    http://www.whichtestwon.com

    The Case for Multivariate Testing

    Multivariate testing is the process of experimenting with different combinations of design elements on a web page to see which is more intuitive or resonates the best with the user. It allows for testing with real visitors - not internal employees who are already familiar with a site or its offerings - and then determining how a page will look based on their actions and the test results. Today, many marketers rely solely on speculation when designing a web page, according to a white paper by Ektron called "Fail Faster with Multivariate Testing." [pdf].  Multivariate testing can goose an organization's conversion rates by the double-digits, it claims.

    More >>

    Australian businesses trying to connect online

    The Episerver Study released today, finds that many firms are failing to maximise opportunities to engage with website visitors by not effectively integrating social media components, online communities, blogging or ‘sticky’ and personalised content.

    Sports and Telecoms companies like to engage, but Retail and Utilities are failing to maximise their interaction with site visitors

    • Only 18% of companies feature a community on their website
    • 44% of companies advertise their Twitter account directly on the homepage 
    • Just 20% have a blog that is updated on a regular basis

    Peter McNamara's comment: Adding social media functionality to your web site is not enough. Too many run out of patience to develop an evidenced based approach to exploiting that functionality.

     

    More here >>


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