RETAIL NEWS FLASH September 16, 2014
Table of Contents Sales & Marketing ................................................................................................................. 3 Strategic Initiatives ................................................................................................................ 7 Ecommerce Operation ......................................................................................................... 10 Customer Service Enhancement........................................................................................... 16 Expansion............................................................................................................................ 18
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Sales & Marketing PayPal rolls out One Touch to greatly speed mobile checkout September 4, 2014 | Internet Retailer http://www.internetretailer.com/2014/09/04/paypal-rolls-out-one-touch-greatly-speed-mobilecheckout Amazon.com has its own one-touch checkout, one of the reasons it’s No. 1 in mobile. Apple soon will enable one-touch checkout on iPhones. Like these giants, PayPal is leading the way to the future of mobile shopping. It’s ironic. The smartphone has always been damned (and rightfully so) as the most difficult device on which to complete a purchase. Soon, however, it may become the easiest. PayPal this week rolled out One Touch, a new mobile payments feature that allows a consumer with a PayPal account that is linked to her mobile device to complete a purchase on that device literally with just one touch, something Amazon.com Inc. mobile customers have been able to do for years. PayPal One Touch is being rolled out on retail mobile apps first, and soon will be available on mobile and responsive retail web sites. For retailers that accept PayPal, and thus have already incorporated the Braintree software development kit, or SDK, into their apps (Braintree is a mobile payments processor acquired by eBay Inc., which owns PayPal), integrating One Touch takes less than 10 minutes, PayPal says. There are no fees to add One Touch. PayPal continues to charge retailers 2.9% of every purchase plus 30 cents per purchase. A consumer must have the PayPal app or Venmo person-to-person mobile payments app (also operated by PayPal) on her smartphone or tablet for One Touch to work. During the first One Touch purchase, PayPal authenticates the device user as the PayPal account holder via the app. From there on out, at any retailer that has integrated One Touch, a consumer simply touches the PayPal button at checkout and her purchase is completed using the default shipping and payment information stored by PayPal. On a related note, Apple in its new iOS 8 mobile operating system has opened up to developers, including retailers, its biometric fingerprint scanner on its iPhone 5s (and soon on its two iPhone 6 models the company will introduce next week). This will allow developers to integrate one-touch log-in and checkout via fingerprint, adding a layer of security to one-touch, since only the person with the matching fingerprint will be able to successfully complete a one-touch transaction on an iPhone. Braintree launched its one-touch mobile payments system last year, on a small scale. What PayPal has done is juice that system up to the scale of PayPal, which reports having 152 million active user accounts. “Last holiday season, more than half of online shopping was touched by a mobile device, but only about 15% of consumers completed purchases on mobile devices, and that’s because of the friction involved in mobile checkout,” says Anuj Nayar, senior director of global initiatives at PayPal. “A lot of that friction disappears with the movement to one-touch checkout.”
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Going into this holiday season, already more than half of online retail traffic stems from mobile devices, and Apple is debuting two new models of the iPhone, both with bigger screens, which mobile commerce experts say will lead to higher mobile conversion rates. Adding one-touch checkout to that mix could be the recipe for much stronger sales on mobile devices, says Imtiaz Jaffer, head of marketing at Pivotal Labs, which designs, develops and manages software and apps and has built mobile apps for retailers including Best Buy Co., Fanatics Inc., Karmaloop.com, Kay Jewelers, Shopzilla and Weight Watchers International Inc. “The longer it takes a customer to initiate and complete a purchase, end to end, the more opportunity you give them to abandon the process at any point in between,” Jaffer says. “Payments is one of the more nuanced parts of the process: entering your payment information including card numbers, billing address, security codes, etc., can be cumbersome, depending on the device and the proficiency of the consumer. That said, doing it repeatedly for each transaction is a thing of the past. Retailers have to integrate with leading payment enablers—such as PayPal, Google Wallet, Square Cash, etc.—to drive simplicity and most importantly, 1-click checkout.”
Staples adds buy online, pick up in-store September 3, 2014 | Internet Retailer http://www.internetretailer.com/2014/09/03/staples-adds-buy-online-pick-store Leading up to the 2014 holiday season, the office supplies e-retailer adds shipping options, an iPad app and more in-store touch screen kiosks. Staples Inc., No. 3 in the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide, announced today several initiatives aimed at boosting sales going into the 2014 holiday season. For the first time, Staples shoppers will be able to buy items online and pick them up in stores as well as shop using an iPad app. The retailer also announced new in-store touch screen kiosks and the Visa Checkout payment system, which allows consumers to check out using a user name and login registered with Visa Checkout. “Staples continues to innovate and develop new technology to improve the customer experience, whether it’s providing convenient shipping options, making check-out faster or adding mobile platforms,” says Faisal Masud, executive vice president of global e-commerce. “The recent updates will make it easier for customers to shop however and from wherever they want. This is particularly important for businesses that are always on the go and can’t wait for a delivery or delay shopping until they are in front of a desktop.” Staples rolled out the buy online, pick up in-store program in a limited fashion in July. Consumers will now be able to select a “pick up today” option as they view a product on Staples.com. Staples says it will have the order ready for pick-up within two hours. For items not available in stores, consumers can still select a ship-to-store option. Both of these are free of charge. Staples also announced the first iPad app in the company’s history. The app lets shoppers check and cash their Staples Rewards balance, reorder past purchases, access deals, check product availability at stores and filter search results by price, category and relevance. Staples is also rolling out new in-store touchscreen kiosks over the next several months. The kiosks allow consumers to shop and order items available only on Staples.com from the physical stores. Sales on those kiosks saw double-digit sales growth during the second quarter of 2014, the company said on its conference call with analysts. “Online customers are actually coming into the store and making purchases online and love the experience,” said Demos Parneros, president of North American stores and online, on the call
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Staples also announced the expansion of Visa Checkout, which allows consumer to register with the service—using any brand of credit card—and complete a purchase with just the Visa Checkout user name and password instead of having to enter in shipping, billing and payment information each time. Visa Checkout has been available on Staples.com since July, and the checkout method is now available on the retailer’s mobile sites, too.
Nearly 90,000 Chinese shoppers search daily for Amazon’s U.S. web site September 3, 2014 | Internet Retailer http://www.internetretailer.com/2014/09/03/90000-chinese-shoppers-search-daily-amazons-ussite Amazon is the leader among sites focused on selling imported goods, with iHerb a strong second. Every day Chinese consumers search the country’s leading search engine Baidu 300,000 times for sites that sell imported goods. That’s only 0.1% of the 300 million retail-related searches on Baidu, but it amounts to nearly 90,000 searches a day for Amazon.com Inc.’s U.S. e-commerce site and 60,000 a day for iHerb.com, a web-only retailer of vitamins and nutritional supplements. Amazon is No. 1 in the 2014 Internet Retailer Top 500 and iHerb No. 214. IHerb has been gaining more sales from China since it began in 2013 accepting as a payment option Alipay, the online payment service associated with Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., China’s leading ecommerce company. “Now what’s really moving it is word of mouth,” says John McCarthy, director of marketing at iHerb. While not providing details on sales to China, McCarthy says it’s among the top five markets for iHerb, after the United States, South Korea and Japan. In addition, iHerb keeps making it more convenient for Chinese shoppers to place orders. The eretailer has added a new service that ships to China and this week began offering free shipping to China for most orders over $60. U.S. orders over $20 ship free. IHerb also is planning to begin soon buying ads on Baidu search results pages, McCarthy says, having completed the lengthy process of gaining approval from Baidu. The search data recently released from Baidu show that there on average 218 million retail-related searches daily from personal computers, a 52% increase than a year ago, while daily searches on mobile devices average 82.7 million times, up 136% year over year. Baidu is China’s dominant search engine, accounting for 82% of searches on personal computers, and 70% from mobile devices in China, according to Chinese research organization China Internet Network Information Center. Baidu is the most-visited web site in China and No. 5 in the world, according to Internet data firm Alexa Internet Inc., which is owned by Amazon.com Inc. And it account for 10% the traffic that arrives at Taobao.com, the largest of Alibaba’s e-commerce marketplaces, and 12% of traffic to JD.com, the No. 1 online retailer in the Internet Retailer China 500. As the owner of online marketplaces like Taobao and Tmall, Alibaba is not ranked because, like eBay, it is not itself a retailer but rather the operator of online shopping portals.
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TrueShip’s Amazon Shipping Plugin Now Supports Multiple Amazon Accounts August 30, 2014 | P R WEB http://www.prweb.com/releases/readyshipper-amazon/shipping-software/prweb12133921.htm TrueShip (http://www.trueship.com) is pleased to announce that their popular Amazon shipping plugin for ReadyShipper now fully supports multiple Amazon accounts. This multiple account feature is ideal for shopkeepers who are hosting more than one store on Amazon. It allows them to manage their order and fulfillment from a single copy of ReadyShipper, even if they host more than one Amazon account. ReadyShipper’s multi-carrier shipping solutions is designed to integrate into the most widely used ecommerce sales channels. Amazon is one of the largest online marketplaces in the world, and hosts millions of online sellers. Users can choose to either opt for fulfillment via Amazon or they can selffulfill their orders using a system like ReadyShipper. ReadyShipper monitors the active Amazon Merchant accounts of the user, and imports new orders as they stream into the system. It interprets the order status and will not import orders that have been marked as “shipped.” It also updates the Merchant Account after orders have been fulfilled, per the biding guidelines of the customer service policy, as set forth by Amazon. As customers place orders and select their shipping method, ReadyShipper is able to convert these methods into a compatible format for all three major U.S. carriers (FedEx, UPS and USPS). It allows for the creation of custom rules, like choosing your preferred carrier and shipping methods automatically, and converts the information into a carrier-specific format. Users can check rates between carriers, process orders one at a time or in batch, edit batches and generate reports at the push of a button. With the newest update to ReadyShipper’s Amazon plugin, the multi-carrier desktop shipping softwareallows users to maintain multiple Amazon accounts in one system. This is ideal for users that are operating two different stores that cover differing niches. The software is able to seamlessly manage the order and fulfillment of each store from one license. “If you’ve got two Amazon accounts or are running multiple stores, there’s no reason to have to double-up on your shipping software. ReadyShipper supports multiple Amazon accounts so you can run your ecommerce business with just one system,” said Dan Koernke, President of Sales at TrueShip.
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Strategic Initiatives eBay hires a global strategy head September 8, 2014 | Internet Retailer http://www.internetretailer.com/2014/09/08/ebay-hires-global-strategy-head Kris Miller spent more than two decades at consultancy Bain & Co. EBay Inc. has hired Kris Miller as global head of strategy. She comes from consulting firm Bain & Co., where she had worked for 24 years, the online marketplace says. Miller replaces Paul Todd, who recently became senior vice president of eBay Marketplaces Europe. EBay says Miller “will oversee Marketplaces’ planning and execution processes to continue eBay’s leadership of the commerce revolution.” At Bain, Miller was a partner and board director, and led the consultancy’s North American retail practice. Previously she had worked at consumer goods firm Procter & Gamble Co. “With an established following across the retail and digital landscape, Miller has deep expertise in building and implementing strategies for retail and consumer product brands,” eBay says. “She has worked across numerous retail sectors, including apparel, footwear, accessories, consumer electronics, and home furnishings. Miller’s extensive experience also includes working with online retailers to create winning digital and omnichannel strategies.”
New initiatives for Walmart Latin America September 5, 2014 | Fierce Retail http://www.fierceretail.com/story/new-initiatives-walmart-latin-america/2014-09-05 Walmart's (NYSE:WMT) Mexican and Central American business units, led by Walmex CEO Scot Rank, have announced a three-prong plan to grow sales over the next year, reported The City Wire. Rank was upbeat about the company's business climate in Mexico as he spoke to a crowd at the Goldman Sachs Global Retail conference Aug. 3. "We plan to grow sales in three ways: Focusing equally on same-store sales gains, adding square footage and more e-commerce transactions," Rank said at the conference. Walmart's recent quarter recorded $103.3 million in international sales, a rise of 5.6 percent from the prior year. For the year, Walmex anticipates sales growth of 4.1 percent in Mexico and 7.6 percent in Central America. The Express models are performing particularly well, as traffic growth in Mexico's Express stores were up 2.3 percent and 3.2 percent in Central America in August.
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The retailer operates 878 Express stores in Mexico, averaging a 12 percent comp sales growth this year. The format fits in well with the country, which attributes 52 percent of all retail sales to smaller-sized stores. In Mexico, the company also plans to improve its Banco Walmart efforts, which currently include 635,000 credit card holders. The biggest challenge in the region has been the turnaround of Sam's Club. New management was put in place in spring but efforts moving forward include increasing more imports from Sam's Club in the United States. Overall, the retailer will open 149 stores in Mexico and Central America this year. In spring, the company announced it would invest $1.1 billion to increase its Central American retail space by 7 percent. E-commerce launched in the region last year. Rank sees future opportunities in grocery delivery and online orders moving forward. "Though many say grocery delivery isn't profitable, it is for us and we see lots of opportunity," Rank said. Looking to capitalize on international success in other parts of the world, Walmart recently announced it would invest $103 million into its wholesale business in India.
1-800-Flowers plans to buy Harry & David September 2, 2014 | Internet Retailer http://www.internetretailer.com/2014/09/02/1-800-flowers-plans-buy-harry-david The online flower delivery company says it plans to operate Harry & David as a subsidiary. The two companies, both ranked in the Internet Retailer Top 500, sold more than $724.1 million online last year. What do you get when you add the purveyor of Moose Munch and other gourmet treats to the leading online flower company? We’ll soon find out, as 1-800-Flowers.com Inc., No. 65 in the Internet Retailer 2014 Top 500 Guide, today announced plans to buy Harry & David Holdings Inc., No. 144, for $142.5 million in cash. The combined company boasts seven distribution centers and 2013 combined online sales of $724.1 million, according to data available on Internet Retailer’s Top500Guide.com. That revenue total would have ranked it No. 54 in the 2014 Top 500 Guide. The retailers’ combined annual revenue— online and offline—tops $1 billion, according to 1-800-Flowers. The deal includes all of Harry & David’s brands and web sites, as well as its headquarters, manufacturing and distribution facilities, a warehouse and distribution facility in Hebron, OH, and 47 Harry & David retail stores. 1-800-Flowers plans to run Harry & David as a subsidiary, with the retailer’s current management team staying on.
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The deal comes more than three years after Harry & David filed for bankruptcy. Since its 2011 filing, the retailer has grown its online sales nearly 20%—from nearly $155 million in 2011 to roughly $185.6 million last year, according to Top500Guide.com. “This announcement is a clear endorsement of the remarkable work that our talented team has put in over the past several years to rebuild the iconic Harry & David brand,” says Craig Johnson, Harry & David’s CEO. “By joining forces, we will benefit by gaining access to a robust infrastructure, distribution network, global presence, and enhanced resources, which will enable us to continue to cultivate and grow the one-of-a-kind Harry & David brand.” Jim McCann, CEO of 1-800-Flowers, says that Harry & David was an enticing addition to his company because of its large customer database, its web site and operational infrastructure that includes geographically dispersed manufacturing, warehousing and distribution facilities. “We believe there are some significant synergies, in terms of both operating costs and revenue growth opportunities, that will further enhance the value of the combined businesses in both the near term and in the years to come,” he says.
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Ecommerce Operation Ikea to resume online rollout after a year-long pause September 9, 2014 | Internet Retailer http://www.internetretailer.com/2014/09/09/ikea-resume-online-rollout-after-year-long-pause Ikea, which operates e-commerce sites in 13 countries, aims to expand online sales to all 27 countries where it has stores. Sept. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Ikea Group plans to extend the reach of its online business to all its markets within the next few years as the world’s largest furniture retailer resumes expansion after a 12month pause. Ikea hasn’t added to the 13 countries in which it offers Web shopping over the last year, though still harbors an ambition to reach all 27 in which it has stores, the company said today after reporting a 3 percent gain in full-year sales. The focus over the past year has been on improving the online offer in existing markets, Chief Executive Officer Peter Agnefjaell said in a telephone interview. Critics have argued that the retailer’s approach to online expansion has been too conservative since it opened www.ikea.com in 1997. “Ikea was slow to embrace the online channel, but has been investing heavily over the past couple of years,” said Maureen Hinton, an analyst at researcher Conlumino in London. “Integrating an online offer, meeting the expectations of the modern online shopper, keeping prices low and making a profit is not easy for big ticket items, so it is understandable that it is honing its service before rolling it out to all markets.” Ikea’s business model is less suited to online selling than for many retailers, as it has mostly relied on shoppers driving to its out-of-town outlets, collecting purchases themselves from warehouses, and spending time figuring out how to transfer flat-packs into furniture. Ikea is No. 243 in the Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide. Maze-Like Stores The model has allowed the retailer to keep prices low, while also making money by tempting customers to pick up items such as Jubla candles and Fantastisk paper napkins when navigating through the aisles of its maze-like stores. Ikea is also cashing in on Swedish meatballs at its in-store restaurants and on purchases of jars of lingonberry jam at its Swedish food markets in outlets across the world. Attracting more Web visitors and having more products available for purchase at existing online shops helped Ikea’s sales increase to 28.7 billion euros ($37 billion) in the 12 months through August, the retailer said today in a statement. Its box-like stores had 716 million visitors during the year, while 1.5 billion people visited the retailer’s web sites.
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Ikea Group, which with 315 outlets owns the majority of the world’s Ikea stores, is seeking to double sales by 2020 by improving stores, opening new outlets, expanding the online offer and introducing new collections more frequently. The flat-pack furniture retailer’s same-store sales gained 3.6 percent in the year. Growth was fastest in China, while North America continued to perform well and Europe improved.
Twitter launches 'buy' button September 8, 2014 | Fierce Retail http://www.fierceretail.com/story/twitter-launches-buy-button/2014-09-08 Shoppers can now purchase products directly from their Twitter feeds with the official launch of the long-awaited "buy" button. A small percentage of U.S. users will be testing the program, a number that is expected to grow over time, according to the social media company. Participating vendors include retail, entertainment and consumer product companies. Burberry and The Home Depot (NYSE:HD) are among those testing the program. Here's how it works: Shoppers tap the "buy" button, receive additional product details and are prompted to enter shipping and payment information. Once confirmed, the order information is sent to the merchant for processing. Twitter users will only see the shoppable tweets if they are following that brand or artist, and the medium could lend itself well to flash sales and limited-time offers, according to Re/code. The entire process is completed in a few taps and works with both iPhone and Android apps, according to Twitter. The feature also saves users' payment and personal information for future purchases after the first sale. Although the sellers already participating are few, Twitter's much-anticipated in-feed purchasing option is expected to expand quickly as the holiday season approaches. In-tweet shopping isn't entirely new. Amazon began allowing shoppers to link their accounts to Twitter in May and place items in their Amazon shopping cart by responding to a hashtag in the retailer's Twitter feed.
Amazon India Faces Regulatory Probe Over Alleged Violation of Retail FDI Rules September 6, 2014 | I B Times http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/amazon-india-faces-regulatory-probe-over-alleged-violation-retail-fdirules-1464252 US ecommerce major Amazon's operations in India have come under scrutiny, as regulators suspect the online retailer to have violated retail foreign direct investment (FDI) rules.
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The Wall Street Journal, citing two people familiar with the matter, said investigators from India's Enforcement Directorate of the ministry of finance are looking to Amazon's operations in the country. They will probe if the company's fully-owned Indian subsidiary has been circumventing restrictions on foreign investment in retail by selling directly to customers while making it look as if the sales are being made by other companies, sources told WSJ. As per India's FDI rules, overseas firms cannot own majority stake in retail companies dealing with more than one brand. Online retailers such as eBay and Amazon are allowed to operate in India only as market places rather than direct sellers to consumers. Local retailers may list their products on Amazon's website, which will help them with payments and delivery. Amazon may charge local retailers for availing of its services and generate revenues. The WSJ sources added that investigators are looking into whether "Amazon is controlling the prices of products sold on its website", making it more like a retailer. "An ideal marketplace should not have any interference from the platform operator," who should do little more than check the seller's background, one of the people familiar with the probe told WSJ.
5% of US shoppers buy on social media September 5, 2014 | Fierce Retail http://www.fierceretail.com/story/5-americans-have-purchased-social-media/2014-09-05 Only 5 percent of U.S. shoppers have ever made a purchase on a social media site, but 20 percent said they would consider it, according to a DigitasLBi study conducted online by Harris Poll. Social commerce sales in the United States are expected to reach $14 billion by 2015. With this in mind, social media sites such as Twitter, Instagram and Facebook are ramping up their commerce capabilities. Twitter has been rumored to be testing e-commerce in its mobile settings and Facebook users spotted a "Buy Now" button on some brand pages. "Our study reveals tremendous untapped potential for growth in social commerce, especially among younger consumers," said Tony Weisman, CEO, DigitasLBi North America. "The 5 percent of Americans who have made a purchase on a social media site equates to around $14 billion in online retail revenue. If we can reach 20 percent, that figure scales to $56 billion. To activate that potential, brands and social networks need to provide social shopping experiences that meet the needs of consumers, including security around financial data, privacy, and a seamless buying process." What is holding consumers back? Of those surveyed, 42 percent said they would more likely shop on social media if they knew their credit card information was secure. Another 38 percent of consumers wanted to know that their purchases wouldn't be shared; 33 percent wanted the purchase price to be under $25; 26 percent wanted to complete their transaction without leaving the social network; 24 percent wanted the ability to save payment information within the site. It seems trust issues over financial security, though still a major concern, have lessened since 2012 when 55 percent of consumers were not comfortable using their credit card information on a social network.
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The study reveals consumers ages 18 to 34 are three times more likely than consumers 35 or older to make a purchase on a social media platform. And 9 percent of those who have purchased on social media have a child under the age of 18. These numbers all amount to one last important finding: 85 percent of consumers would rather make purchases using an online retailer than via social media, meaning the new e-commerce initiatives underway at Twitter, Facebook and Instagram will still need some serious leveraging.
Google expands a mobile-first advertising initiative to the desktop September 2, 2014 | Internet Retailer http://www.internetretailer.com/2014/09/02/google-expands-mobile-first-ad-tool-desktops When consumers search for products on a desktop computer, they’ll see results available in stores near them. The service was first offered on mobile devices. Google Inc. is expanding a mobile-first advertising initiative to desktop devices. When a consumer searches for a product on the company’s search engine using a mobile device, the consumer sees products that are available at bricks-and-mortar stores near them. Now that will happen when a consumer searches using a desktop device. The localized ads are part of Google Shopping. Google Shopping is Google’s comparison shopping service, where marketers pay for Product Listing Ads that include detailed product images and price information. The Product Listing Ads appear prominently on the Google search results page. The ability to advertise in-store only items on mobile devices has been available since last fall. The search engine allowed retailers to advertise items that were available locally on desktop devices—as long as the item was also available online. For example, a consumer searching for a fragrance might see an ad letting her know it’s available at a nearby store. After clicking the ad, she’ll see product and availability information for that fragrance. Now, that will happen if she conducts the search on her desktop computer, too. The new program launches amid an increase in search spending. Total search spending rose 21% in the second quarter of 2014 over the same period last year, according to an analysis by search marketing agency Covario Inc. And spending on smartphones and tablets shot up 98%. Digital marketing agency RKG found spending on products ads increased 72% in the second quarter of 2014, compared to Q2 2013.
US lags Asia and Europe in online shopping August 27, 2014 | Fierce Retail http://www.fierceretail.com/story/us-lags-behind-asia-and-europe-online-shopping/2014-08-27 Americans lag behind Asians and Europeans when it comes to online shopping.
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According to a recent Nielsen study, 63 percent of U.S. shoppers tend to research their purchases online, as well as use online reviews to inform their spending decisions. In addition, 78 percent reported finding online shopping convenient. However, many U.S. consumers are still hesitant to pull the trigger and make their purchases online. A recent BI Intelligence study reported that e-commerce accounts for 5.9 percent of all U.S. retail sales, and e-commerce is still on the rise. In the second fiscal quarter, e-commerce sales were up 15.3 percent from the same quarter one year prior. Worldwide e-commerce rates are expected to reach $1.5 trillion this year, increasing 20 percent from last year. The most popular items purchased online are non-consumables, most being in the entertainment category—hotels, airlines, event tickets, sporting goods and toys. Shoppers in the Asia-Pacific region have the highest online buying rates—so much so that online buying exceeds browsing rates in more than half of all product categories. Western Europe leads the way on CPG e-commerce. Online spending rates in Britain went from $70 million in the first quarter of 2013 to $91 million in the same quarter this year. Similarly, France's online spending on consumables has increased from $32 million to $42 million year over year. There have been some significant jumps in American online shopping. The biggest jump was seen in airline reservations, up from 19 percent in 2013 to 43 percent in 2014. Hotels/tours accounted for 43 percent of online spending, up from 16 percent. Online purchases of electronic equipment also increased in prevalence, jumping from 15 percent of all online spending to 31 percent year over year. E-books, music and clothing/shoes also saw an increase. "While online transactions make it easy to download a book, buy a ticket to a sporting event or book a hotel room, building a consumer base for consumable categories requires more marketing muscle," said John Burbank, president of strategic initiatives, Nielsen. "Finding the right balance between meeting shopper needs for assortment and value, while also building trust and overcoming negative perceptions, such as high costs and shipment fees, is vital for continued and sustainable growth." What is stopping U.S. shoppers from online purchases? Well, 46 percent said it was shipping costs and 37 percent said they don't feel safe disclosing credit card information online. Even if U.S. shoppers prefer to buy in brick-and-mortars, retailers can't ignore the mounting evidence supporting online's growing significance. Of those surveyed in the Nielsen study, 54 percent subscribe to retailers' email lists, and the same percentage spend considerable time browsing online prior to buying.
Macy's to invest $1B in CapEx as omnichannel grows August 27, 2014 | Fierce Retail http://www.fierceretail.com/retailit/story/macys-invest-1b-capex-omnichannel-grows/2014-0827?utm_medium=rss&utm_source=rss&utm_campaign=rss Macy's (NYSE:M) is putting its money where its mouth is, promising to invest up to $1 billion in technology and infrastructure to support online and omnichannel efforts.
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"Internet-generated demand continues to grow rapidly and we believe that will continue, particularly now that we have rolled out Buy Online Pickup In Store, which some people refer to as click and collect, to all the Macy's and Bloomingdales stores," CFO Karen Hoguet told analysts during a conference call. Macy's rolled out a buy online, pick up in-store feature to 675 full-line stores in early August. And while the program was too new for Hoguet to comment on, she highlighted the initiative as one that holds big promise for the holiday season. "We haven't even marketed this capability yet, and we are already finding that many customers like this option," Hoguet said. "Once in the store, these customers are often buying other items as well. We are excited though by what we have seen so far and expect it to be a help in the holiday selling season. Omnichannel strategies are clearly enabling us to accelerate growth and we are just at the early stages of exploring all the opportunities." Macy's is investing primarily in technology that builds out omnichannel programs. "Behind the scenes, we are also managing expense prudently, so we can continue to invest to advance the progress in our core strategies," she said. "We are taking a more holistic view of inventory, so we can effectively and efficiently fulfill customer demand from all directions. We are applying our $1 billion-plus annual CapEx budget to projects that will continue to build our infrastructure for growth." The department store chain is among a growing group of retailers to report growing sales through online channels. Best Buy (NYSE:BBY) and DSW (NYSE:DSW) both announced higher online sales even as those at stores open for at least a year struggled. But unlike Macy's, Best Buy plans to focus its investments in customer facing initiatives to improve the in-store experience, while DSW has formed a partnership with eBay to expand fulfillment capabilities.
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Customer Service Enhancement 3D: The Future of Customer Service September 02, 2014 | Huffington Post http://www.huffingtonpost.com/sanjay-j-patel/3d-the-future-of-customer_b_5711559.html Social media and live chat have become incredibly important resources within the customer service industry as more consumers are turning to the Web for assistance than to the keypad on their phones. Still, achieving that feeling of "live support" on the Web isn't quite there yet and is what most brands and customer service professionals strive for. While still in its infancy, there are many opportunities to use video to create a more personal customer service experience. Thanks to new features like Amazon Mayday, which was announced last fall, live video support is on a path for rapid growth in the industry. Believe it or not, 3D technology will play a significant role in the progression of video in customer service. Specifically with 3D cameras, which are capable of capturing 3-dimentional images and presenting content in entirely new ways. This is different than the 3D technology you might be familiar with - no red and blue glasses or images popping out at you from the television screen. It's more akin to the depth-sensing technology found in the Xbox Kinect, which allows people to interact with the content displayed on their screen. 3D cameras are coming to every laptop, tablet and smartphone and will replace the conventional cameras that exist in these devices. Using 3D cameras, customer service professionals can appear directly on the screen, overlaid on top of the customer's desktop (think of a green screen but without the need for the physical screen or editing), to actually guide them through the support process, rather than trying to talk them through it via text or phone. This makes the experience from the customer's perspective much more fluid and lightweight and more engaging than the traditional video-in-a-box. The real magic though is in the types of interactions that are made possible by the introduction of such immersive customer support. Some online purchasing is too complex and clunky for an average consumer. With a live, on-screen agent available just a click away, 24/7, the online customer can be walked through a purchase that would have otherwise required an in-person interaction. A great example is buying eyewear, which typically requires trying on several different styles before deciding on the right glasses, often with the help of an in-store consultant. 3D cameras in laptops and tablets will enable the online shopper to fluidly and easily try different styles, virtually. In addition, the ability to interact with a consultant on-screen will enable the shopper to make their purchase more confidently and with an overall higher satisfaction in the end. Banking is another great example of an industry in which the customer experience could benefit from 3D technology. Many banks are already evolving their automated teller machines (ATM) to video or virtual teller machines (VTM) to create more personalized interactions with remote bank tellers. With this transition, banks can use 3D technology to maximize screen real estate for the remote bank teller and eliminate any background distractions. Amazon's Mayday button would benefit from 3D technology as well. By leveraging background removal capabilities only possible with 3D cameras, Amazon could significantly enhance the user experience and provide more focus on the customer service agent.
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The transition to 3D customer service is inevitable because there is so much experiential value-add that it can provide. That said, it could still take three to five years to proliferate. Currently, we're in the early stages due to the availability of 3D cameras, but the good news is that the hardware is getting smaller and cheaper. Over the next 18 months, 3D camera hardware distribution will grow significantly, starting with cameras embedded in PCs later this year. Fortunately, the infrastructure required to deploy 3D already exists because it's the same as live text and video chat. Additionally, multiple companies already offer cloud platforms for integrating video interaction into their customer service platforms (LivePerson, for example). There is one primary challenge that companies will need to face as they begin incorporate video into their customer service strategy. Customer service agents will need to be prepared to be live and onscreen. Considering the impact 3D technology can have on customer service, this is a change management challenge that all organizations are going to have to address. It is an integral piece of humanizing the online customer service experience.
Louis Perrochon Named VP in eBay’s Commerce Experience Group September 02, 2014 | eBay http://www.ebayinc.com/in_the_news/story/louis-perrochon-named-vp-ebay%E2%80%99scommerce-experience-group eBay is welcoming a new Vice President of Engineering. Louis Perrochon is assuming responsibility and leadership for engineering in eBay’s Commerce Experience organization. eBay’s Chief Product Officer R.J. Pittman introduced the new Commerce Experience organization in May, and has continued to build out a world-class leadership team for the group.As the VP of Engineering, Perrochon will lead a team of engineers who are responsible for driving global product development across a variety of commerce specific domains. He will set the technology vision and strategy for developing multiscreen shopping, selling, payments and transaction capabilities along with engineering leadership over customer service engagement tools and new commerce advertising platforms. Perrochon joins eBay from Google, where he led engineering teams behind many notable projects, including Google Earth and YouTube. He also worked on Google’s payment product, Google Wallet. In each role, he led all engineering development and operations, including web front ends for users and merchants, APIs, and all backend infrastructure. In 2010, Perrochon was engineering lead for Android Market. Perrochon has also conducted extensive research for Stanford University’s Computer Systems Laboratory and holds both a Ph.D and a Masters in Computer Science. He holds five patents. “Louis brings depth and diversity of technical talent to his new role, including leading and working with hundreds of engineers globally and serving multiple content and advertising partners,” said Pittman. “He will be instrumental in helping the Commerce Experience organization create state-ofthe-art shopping and selling experiences across Marketplaces worldwide.
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Expansion Courts eyes as many as 12 stores in Indonesia September 01, 2014 | My Paper http://mypaper.sg/business/courts-eyes-many-12-stores-indonesia-20140901 PT COURTS Retail Indonesia, a subsidiary of Singapore retailer Courts Asia, is looking to build up to 12 megastores in Indonesia over the next five years. "We have set a schedule to build 10 to 12 megastores over the next five years, but only three or four of them will be established as 'big-boxes'. The remaining stores will be in malls," Courts Indonesia chief executive Roy Santoso said on Friday. Courts Indonesia will open its first megastore in Bekasi, West Java, next month. It has invested up to US$4 million (S$5 million) in the construction of a two-storey, 12,000 sq m building that will stand on a 2ha plot of land in Kota Harapan Indah. The ground-breaking took place in October last year. The store is a free-standing building, what the firm refers to as a "big-box" megastore, and will have sections for various international and local products. Twenty to 30 per cent of tens of thousands of electronic items and furniture will be local-made brands, according to Mr Santoso. Thirty per cent of the building space will be reserved for electronic and IT products, up to 20 per cent for home appliances and accessories, and the remainder for furniture. "We will also provide delivery, and customers can pay by cash, debit card, credit card or use the inhouse credit programme called the Courts Flexi Scheme," he added. The company chose Bekasi for its first megastore due to the city's high population density with a population of 2.5 million. Meanwhile, construction will start on a second megastore this year in Bumi Serpong Damai, South Tangerang, Banten, which will also be Courts' headquarters. Construction is scheduled for completion in the second half of next year. Courts Asia, which is listed on the Singapore Exchange, was established in Singapore in 1974 and in Malaysia in 1987, with 70 outlets that cover 1.3 million sq ft. The company was originally founded in 1850 in Britain as a furniture and electronic goods retailer in the Caribbean and Asia.
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