The Year of the Acquisition

eBay was a big player in a year that saw mergers and sales across the board. They completed a deal for GSI commerce, bought ZONG and sold Skype to Microsoft for $8.5 billion. However the big deal in our minds acquiring the remaining half of Magento. This solidified eBay’s commitment to x.commerce, their innovate and comprehensive open commerce initiative.

Oracle’s October purchases of Endecas and cloud-based CRM company RightNow show that the technology giant is diving into the commerce arena.

Post-Holiday Recap

The biggest retail season of the year started off with a bang on Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Big promotions and early starts led to a record setting stretch for eCommerce. While returns are up from years past, the holidays reinforced several important trends going into 2012. Mobile shoppers and Amazon led the way.

Looking to 2012

As long as you are prepared to deal with The Post-Holiday Returns Crisis, the next few weeks are commonly a slower period. It’s time to review what went well and what didn’t work out in 2011. Make the effort to review sales trends, product data, check web metrics and explore areas that your company can do better in. Note any especially profitable products or loss leaders, and start to plan how you will act on these observations.

Check back again next week for our predictions for ecommerce in 2012. Here’s a hint: if you plan on using your tablet to shop on Amazon, you won’t be the only one!

While are returns expected to climb after the holiday, this season has seen an increasing number of returns before Christmas has arrived.  ”Buyers’ Remorse” is a big factor. Consumers got excited with all the Black Friday and Cyber Monday promotions and overextended themselves.

Stores have taken a variety of approaches, from reducing return windows to setting stricter guidelines on product conditions for return. Some have started customer loyalty programs to looks out for chronic returners.

The effect of early returns on ecommerce is not clear. There are difference return dynamics in play, in terms of shipping the product versus taking it to the store, and the delay that causes both in returning the product and receiving the refund.

The returned products are a both a hassle and an economic burden for retailers, but for etailers that sell returned goods from large stores at bargain prices, this could mean an influx of inventory.

Click here to learn how to make the best of ecommerce returns!

Has your business seen a spike in early returns?

Would you be more likely to return a product that you purchased online or in a store?

Chase Paymentech showed sales up by 24% and transactions up by 36% from last year. Paymentech President Mike Duffy said, “Cyber Monday has historically been the biggest single day of the season, and so far that’s true again. In addition, e-commerce is now an established part of the Black Friday phenomenon, as consumers take advantage of online shopping deals as well as Black Friday in-store bargains.”

The Big Winner: Amazon

Small businesses and ecommerce giants alike showed solid to exceptional growth, but one company stood out in particular: Amazon. ChannelAdvisor CEO Scott Wingo says: “As we look at the different e-commerce channels, Amazon was a clear winner with more than 50 percent growth year over year – well over twice the growth rate of overall e-commerce.” The mix of increased ecommerce traffic, well-marketed deals and find-everything-here utility was a hit.

How to Make the Best of the Rest of the Season… and Beyond

So what does this mean for the next few weeks? First, if you aren’t selling on Amazon, this is something you really need to consider.  Second, follow Amazon’s lead and keep the promotions coming. After ending Cyber

Deal Week, the eCommerce giant launched Holiday Flurry Deal Week, to be followed “Top Holiday Deals.” In essence, don’t have one promotion, but rather several variations to drum up interests. New promotions or campaigns are new marketing opportunities. Another marketing strategy that has been a hit this season is paid search. With more and more competitive sellers online, getting noticed is a big part of the battle, and paid search has a high ROI.

Whether for the next few weeks or the next few years, it’s time to get your mobile site running smoothly if you haven’t already. The Thanksgiving weekend was a microcosm of the growing trends in eCommerce. Mobile and tablet devices are an expanding market that your eCommerce business can’t afford to miss out on.

As last-minute holiday shopping approaches and things get frantic, remember to focus on clarity and patience with customers. Be helpful, respond quickly, and be honest about things like shipping dates and order status.

While there is concern that pushing sales early and offering steep discounts in the beginning of the holiday cycle will compromise the rest of the holidays, the Chase Paymentech Cyber Holiday Pulse Index shows “Holiday Shopping Momentum Holding Strong.”

Best of luck and happy holidays!

Be Proactive!

Communicate your returns policy clearly. Not only will this go a long ways towards preventing returns complications after the holidays, it is also a good way to build up customer service standing. Many purchases made leading up to holidays will be gifts, so be forward about gift return policies. Have this information easily available on your website for those who – gasp! – want to return gifts without going through the giver. Do you offer gift receipts? You should.

Be Nice To Customers!

There are a myriad of reasons why customers return products. Hopefully none are your fault, but you will probably deal with returns that leave you annoyed for one reason or another. Don’t let the customer sense this frustration. Turn the negative and often frustrating experience of returning a product into a positive experience likely to draw that customer back. Stick to your return policies without being aggressive or rude. Stay cordial and follow through in a timely manner. Ask them what you could have done differently. While you are losing a sale this time around, hopefully you are creating the reputation and relationship that will lead to more sales in the future. Sometimes it is better to be lenient in the short term to develop long-term customers.

Money Talk

You are going to get returns, so budget for them. Who will incur the cost of return shipping and will there be a restocking fee? Will you have space for this reacquired inventory? What is your plan for reselling it? These questions will impact your operating costs and profits, as well as the customers who buy from you. Don’t promise free return shipping if you can’t afford it.

Use the RMAs to gain insight into what went well and what didn’t work for the holiday season. Maybe an item sold really well, but it had a really high return rate. The RMA data will help you more identify the products that were most (and least) profitable.

Returns Aren’t the End of the World

A straightforward and well-communicated returns policy and head start on planning with make the holiday returns cycle a expected and routine part of your winter. Doing returns right eases the back-end burden on your business, and will help out the bottom line.

Don’t forget to send us any suggestions about how you handle returns!

The Basics

There are general guidelines for any email campaign. First and foremost, don’t spam. Not only will it be ineffective, but it will also tarnish your company’s reputation. Generate a list of leads and customers who have given you permission to email them. Have signup buttons clearly visible on your website and communications to grow the list. If you are sending through a mass email service, make sure to use a reputable one. Make sure to provide an unsubscribe option, and honor these requests. Allow recipients to select preferences for which emails they want to receive.

Many emails aren’t properly formatted when they show up in customers’ inboxes. Review the email before you send it out, and consider troubleshooting complex emails with a service like Mail Chimp’s Inbox Inspector. Include an optional plain text version and be prepared for recipients that will be using their mobile devices.

If you do it right, this holiday season won’t be your last email campaign. Therefore, it is a great opportunity to collect data on how customers respond.

Be Personal – Remember That Customers Are Real People

The basics are helpful, but aren’t enough to get noticed. The email campaign has to differentiate your company from every other etailer sending out holiday emails. Start by keeping your emails positive – it’s the holiday season! Connect with customers by including personal touches. Tell them how you are celebrating as a company or send them a picture of your holiday party. Mention a charity that you are passionate about and how you pledge to give to that charity each time a customer makes a purchase.

Your emails should remind customers that you are thinking of them and care about what they have to say. Include a question about your products or marketing, and give the opportunity for feedback.

Promotions

We covered several marketing strategies in Making Your Seasonal Marketing Push that should play a part in your email marketing campaign. Adding incentives for forwarding the message to friends is a great way to expand your email list. Offer special deals that are only available to email subscribers.

Make decisions easier on your customers by suggesting products as gifts for certain people. If you have stores, you can use you emails to get customers inside your stores. Include coupons to be redeemed in store.

Final Installment of Getting eTailers Ready for the Holidays Is On Its Way

Get ready for the aftermath of the holidays with the upcoming and final installment of our holiday blog series, The Post-Holiday Returns Crisis!

Advertising

There are a million ways to advertise online. Some work better than others, and it’s up to you to focus your time and resources. Don’t be afraid to spend money on paid advertising. Be realistic in what you can afford, but if there is ever a time to splurge on advertising, it is during the crucial holiday season.

Among the most popular options is paid search. Paying to get found ahead of your competition can very effective. Pay per click advertisements also works well. One underutilized approach is using comparison search engines. Make sure to research how to optimize your online advertisements. Focus on products that do well and channels that maximize ROI.

Special Offers

When it comes down to it, getting a good deal is very important to customers. The most obvious way to do this is through discounts. Percent off deals are a big hit, as are multiple item deals. Limited time discount offers or spend $X and receive $Y off encourage customers to act now and spend more.

Customers love free shipping. Like all of these offers, it will cut into per item profit. However, the aim is to draw potential customers in and this is sometimes the cost of acquiring new customers

If your business simply can’t afford to cut prices or pay for free shipping, consider other promotions that add perceived value to customers. Offer gift wrapping or personalized cards. Throw in bonus gifts for big purchases.

Sprucing Up Your Web Presence

Your website should reflect the holiday season and your marketing push. Advertise deals across the site, include holiday landing pages and highlight popular gift items.

In addition to infusing your main site with holiday cheer, don’t forget about the mobile version!

You should also keep your social media up to date. Use the holidays as a time to build your social presence. Tweet special offers or send them to people who “Like” your Facebook.

Reaching Out to Past Customers

As always, repeat customers should get a lot of your marketing attention. They are familiar with your products, and your customer service has created a positive relationship with your company. Target them with special offers, early access to products, personalized notes and more.

More Marketing Tips to Come

If you were wondering why this post hadn’t touched on one of the cornerstones of ecommerce marketing, it’s because email marketing deserves its own post. Keep your eye out for Tips and Tricks for Successful Holiday Email Marketing Campaigns!

What holiday marketing strategies have helped you out? Please share!

When developers get together to launch products, trade ideas and check out each other’s work, it’s like getting a sneak peek at the future. These aren’t just new tools coming down the pike—they’re cloud- and mobile-based capabilities that will soon transform and enhance every aspect of our daily lives. We all need to get involved in shaping these changes. That’s why we’re looking forward to the X.commerce Innovate Developer Conference at the Moscone Center in San Francisco on Oct. 12-13. At the event the newest division at eBay Inc., X.commerce which connects developers and merchants through commerce technology will debut its open commerce operating system.

Consumers now use a broad range of cloud-based and other technology-driven trends to do their shopping. In this new world, it’s up to developers, technology companies and merchants to create new tools and capabilities that offer consumers a seamless commerce experience. That’s the goal of this event.

X.Commerce is also doing a unique campaign called “Take the Pledge”. This is for individuals and companies who have early supporters and contributors of the X.Commerce vision. The pledge excerpt is: “We believe that merchants should harness technology, not the other way around…We believe that developers should have one place where they can plug in, get the latest and greatest tools they need to build killer apps and features, using proven code….To win in the commerce game, we need to combine forces, roll up our sleeves, stay caffeinated, and literally shape the future of commerce….We pledge to make this happen in an open, transparent, and collaborative way. After all, isn’t that the way it should be?” Take the pledge today at X.com!

If you’ll be at the X.Commerce Innovate conference next week, please shoot me an email at jon@cloudconversion.com or swing by the monetization panel on Thursday!

Jon Jessup
CEO, Cloud Conversion

Service Means Sales

You probably aren’t able to dress up your employees in red and green costumes and play cheery jingles to entice customers. However, you can take a page out of their book and drive holiday sales with sterling customer service. In fact, nailing the limited and crucial customer service opportunities is one of the best ways to distinguish your business.

Answer Questions… Before They Are Asked

Once a customer has reached your ecommerce site, it’s your job to do everything possible to keep them there until they make a purchase. Keep your website organized and simple, so that everything is easy to find. Brainstorm what questions customers might have about your products, policies, etc. and have answer readily available. This often means an FAQ section. For the holidays focus on what will be the most common questions. Make sure to clearly explain your shipping options and return policy. Even so, not every question will be answered. Make it clear that you are readily accessible. Consider a “Holiday Hotline” for the next few months.

Create Confidence in Your Business

When a customer does interact with you, via any channel, respond promptly, honestly and cheerfully. This is part of making a customer feel comfortable buying from your business. Make this easier on them by offering confidence inspiring services like gift receipts, easy returns, and last minute shipping.

Make It Personal

Most people that buy online have no expectation of human contact. Do your best to surprise them. Send thank you emails to new customers and call your biggest buyers to ask about their experience and let them know you appreciate their business.

Ask customers for feedback, and then respond. Not only will you get helpful information about how to improve your business, but your attentiveness to their concern will encourage customers to come back again.

Coming Up Next

It’s time to pull in the customers that you are ready to woo. Keep your eyes open for the next installment in our Getting eTailers Ready for the Holidays blog series: “Making Your Seasonal Marketing Push.” We will dig into advertising, shipping promotions, special offers and more.

Are You Ready?

Chances are, capitalizing on increases sales over the holidays is vital to your business. The question is, are you ready to seize the next few months? Depending on its nature, your ecommerce business may face a wide spectrum of challenges. Understanding the challenges will go a long way towards increasing holiday profits and leaving the headaches behind.

Get a Move On!

Practical eCommerce names “Starting Too Late” as the number one holiday mistake made by etailers: “For many ecommerce sites, holiday sales–in mid-November through December–can account for 30 percent or more of annual sales.” A strong start in November won’t happen on its own; it is carefully planned and set up by work well in advance. Many of you are surely cognizant of that; for the rest of you, it is not too late.

This year, November 28th marks the big day: Cyber Monday. Following a push by the ecommerce industry, the first Monday after Black Friday is among the highest days of online sales. It is imperative that everything be running smoothly by Cyber Monday.

Be Prepared

Analyze past trends and clean up your inventory. What items do you expect to do well? Will you have enough inventory to handle the increased orders? Maybe you should look into expanding your storage or something like Fulfillment by Amazon.

Will you need more hands on deck to handle the holiday rush? Is your website ready to handle the increase in traffic that your marketing  will surely create? There is no excuse for a great holiday sales push to fall apart because your infrastructure isn’t capable of handling the jump.

Considering these scenarios before they happen will make your personal holidays much less hectic.

What to Watch For

In the coming weeks we will expand on the topics of this post and dig into the secrets of a happy holiday season in eCommerce. Here is the lineup:

- Beefing Up Your Holiday Customer Service

- Making Your Seasonal Marketing Push

- Tips and Tricks for Successful Holiday Email Marketing Campaigns

- The Post-Holiday Returns Crisis

Have a topic you would like to see covered? Let us know!

Just a short time ago, mobile sites were a luxury for companies to have and for shoppers to use, but today consumers expect companies to have a mobile site in addition to their traditional Internet storefront. The number of people actually purchasing items on their mobile device is small, but growing.

Why Purchasing on Mobile Hasn’t Fully Taken Off Yet

According to research firm Experian Simmons in its “2011 Mobile Consumer Report”, 33.3 million people are using mobile devices in the shopping process. That number includes researching products and comparing prices with their phones, but only 7% of consumers have made purchases using their mobile phones.

With new mobile technology appearing seemingly everyday, consumers are concerned about the security and privacy of mobile purchases on unproven channels. These concerns have slowed the adoption of mobile payments, but are also a front and center focus for the industries brightest innovators. It parallels the start eCommerce, where consumers were initially apprehensive to shop online, but is now a burgeoning industry. The question is now whether Mobile Commerce can follow suit.

Mobile Brings New Opportunities for Customer Service

If done right, mobile commerce is an invaluable opportunity to significantly widen the spectrum of customer service. For example, to improve customer satisfaction, allow customers to scan product barcodes with their mobile devices to have access to reviews, pricing and the availability in both online and offline stores.  Customers could add items to their cart or wish list simply by scanning them into their phone.

The opportunities don’t stop there. What if consumers could access live support on their phone through programs like Facetime on the iPhone? Or if they could take a picture of a broken product and submit an RMA on the phone?

What This Means for eTailers

The number of cell phones users with smart phones is over 35% of the US market and growing.

So what does all this Mobile Commerce development mean for eTailers?

All signs point to Mobile Commerce coming on strong, and eTailers need to be prepared to offer mobile sites and functionality. They need to be mindful that of this new channel, and set up mobile sites that are both efficient and user-friendly, as well learn to take advantage of helpful features specific to the new industry.

Even if mCommerce is still unfolding, it is coming. Don’t get caught off guard, start planning your mobile strategy now!

Have a mobile strategy that works well for you? We’d love to hear about it.