Should you implement responsive design?

As merchants strive to serve shoppers on a growing array of devices, the concept of responsive design has definite allure. And with over a quarter of merchants planning a site redesign this year and more than 40% saying mobile and tablet development are a priority, according to industry researcher Forrester, responsive design may become one of 2013’s top buzzwords.

The premise is that a single base of code can serve multiple touchpoints by detecting the device and browser used and changing the layout and functionality on display accordingly — promising merchants a streamlined process for updates and maintenance. But is responsive design really the right choice when it comes to building a seamless brand experience? There are a number of pros and cons to weigh, among them:

Ease of maintenance vs. ease of use. It’s true that responsive design makes site maintenance easier for merchants — but it’s even more important to consider the site experience for shoppers. While sophisticated use of code can resize, rearrange and even add or omit elements on the page, it can be difficult to create a truly device-specific experience that meets or exceeds shoppers’ expectations. For example, the footer on the desktop browser version of the responsive site for Perry Ellis brand Original Penguin includes an 800 number and a badge indicating shoppers can pay with Paypal, both of which are dropped from the mobile version of the same page. But arguably, the phone number — with click-to-call functionality built in — is more important than ever on the mobile site, where merchants should use every means at their disposal to build trust and ease communication with consumers wary of making purchases on their phones. Similarly, the Paypal badge should be even more prominent than on the desktop site, given that more than two-thirds of transactions on mobile phones are completed using alternative payments rather than entering credit card data.

Responsive design example from Original Penguin

Desktop footer

 

responsive_op_mobile

Mobile footer

It’s important, too, to consider the content of shared elements and whether they truly scale to fit different formats. U.K. electronics giant Curry’s uses responsive design to deliver different sites to mobile and desktop browser users. The main rotating promotions on the home page, however, don’t exactly fit the designated space when viewed on the mobile browser — and some of the images containing multiple products are just too tiny to be effective.

responsive_currys

Desktop home page promo

responsive_currys_mobile

Mobile home page promo

SEO boost vs. performance drag. Another potential benefit to responsive design is that all inbound links from any device or browser point to a single URL — giving that flagship site maximum potential relevance when being ranked for natural search engine results. It’s a worthwhile consideration, since the number of inbound links originating from mobile is significant; for example, — and potentially share product links, “likes” and reviews there.

At the same time, the complexity of the code required to build a truly responsive site can add to page weight, affecting site performance and frustrating the potential customers who clicked on that page-one search results link. As of 2010, , penalizing slower sites as potentially less credible — thereby potentially canceling out some of the positive SEO impact of having a single URL. And on mobile devices, the expectation for speed is more acute than ever; performance monitoring firm Gomez found that 59% of mobile users expect sites to load in 3 seconds or less, while 46% of mobile users would be unlikely to return to a site that had experienced load time problems.

Of course, using separate sites for different devices can cause problems of its own — namely, the loss of speed associated with redirecting shoppers to the right URL. And as with usability and functionality problems, there are ways to avoid performance problems associated with responsive design, such as starting with the mobile version and adding enhancements for tablets and desktops, rather than trying to go from large to small. But the majority of responsive design sites currently don’t employ these techniques, according to performance firm Akamai, which found that 86% of responsive sites’ mobile pages were at least 90% as big as the desktop browser versions.

responsive_akamai

The upshot? Merchants undertaking a redesign should consider using responsive design, as it has great potential. But they should weigh the costs of doing it right versus the costs of maintaining separate sites for different devices — and recognize that responsive design isn’t a cheap silver bullet for solving all their multi-touchpoint needs.

Social media watch: 5 Ways to Use Twitter’s Vine app

Our 2013 trends presentation touched on the importance of video as a means of connecting shoppers with products. With the recent launch of Twitter’s Vine app, merchants have yet another reason to make video a top priority this year.

For those who haven’t already checked it out, Vine is a mobile app (currently only available for iPhone or iPod Touch) that enables users to capture and share 6-second looping video snippets, which display and play within a Twitter post. The app enables users to capture pivotal, colorful or just wacky moments in live action, rather than with a still image, and share instantaneously. Vine is the latest of several apps to enable quick sharing of mobile video, starting with Viddy and now also including , which features 15-second video status updates.

A perusal of VinePeek, which streams newly-posted Vine videos as they’re added, suggests that the new app will be used to capture plenty of cute moments involving pets. But there’s also serious potential for merchants to engage social followers using Vine and other mobile-video apps. And because the format is quick and simple to use, merchants can experiment without breaking the bank. A few potential uses include:

Promotion of live events. While merchants may well want to shoot extensive video at live events to edit and post after the fact, Vine is designed for instant sharing — enabling followers to share in the excitement as it happens and perhaps get a backstage sneak peek. When a NASCAR driver was featured on ESPN’s “Sports Night” program, NASCAR posted a Vine video showing a glimpse of the interview, as well as the scene from behind the cameras in the studio — enticing Twitter followers to tune in.

Vine example from NASCAR

Demonstrate a quick how-to. While 6-second clips won’t replace extensive product demo videos, merchants can use Vine to highlight a specific feature, expert tip or handy trick. Cadbury UK recently promoted its new “Egg ‘n’ Spoon” product with a quick video showing how to scoop out the candy filling, and encouraged sharing by offering a prize drawing to those who retweeted the clip.

Vine example from Cadbury

A new format for user-generated content. Consider a contest inviting followers to submit Vine clips featuring your products, or encourage customers to use clips to illustrate their product reviews.

Build brand identity. Advertisement-style clips that build on a current campaign or reinforce brand image are quickly becoming popular. Gap asked followers what shoes they’d wear with its Skimmer pants, and illustrated the question with a quick clip that encouraged followers to “be bright.”

Vine example from Gap

Reinforce lifestyle affinity. Like longer-format videos, Vine clips can give followers a glimpse behind the scenes of a brand and demonstrate that staff members are attuned to the tastes of their clientele. And with the brief format of Vine, the clips can be quirky and tongue-in-cheek, as in this post from Urban Outfitters paying homage to National Beer Can Day.

Vine example from Urban Outfitters

Have you tried Viddy, Vine or Tout yet? What potential do you see in mobile-video tools for your brand?

As noted in our last post on 2013 trends, using social login can help merchants individualize the shopping experience for brand followers. And research shows that consumers appreciate the option: according to marketing firm Monetate, on the eCommerce site.

But despite the potential upside, few of the largest U.S. merchants have taken the opportunity to implement social login — just 30 of the merchants in Internet Retailer’s Top 500 have done so, according to marketing firm Sociable Labs. The threat of brand dilution posed by displaying other sites’ logos on the eCommerce site, and the fact that merchants don’t own the data shared by social login users, are perhaps among the reasons driving this reluctance. As , the key is to avoid assuming social logins can solve all a site’s conversion and engagement challenges. Merchants need to assess the potential upside of social logins for their own unique brands and act accordingly.

Despite the caveats, we believe social logins have the potential to drive significant brand engagement, and worth pursuing. But doing so is more than a matter of simply putting a button on the first page of checkout. To maximize the effectiveness of social login, merchants should consider the following strategies:

Know which logins matter to your audience. By far the most popular social login is Facebook’s, according to the Monetate study; fully 60% of shoppers use it, while other social networks’ logins each have less than 15% share. Given that , according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project, most merchants considering social login should plan to implement . But depending on their audience, merchants should also consider adding logins from other social networks, from Twitter to LinkedIn. Careful study of analytics and an assessment of which social networks have the largest audience of brand followers can help merchants assess which logins to use. The key is to offer the right mix for the audience without presenting an overwhelming array of options for shoppers.

Integrate fully. Too many merchants who use social login go on to ask shoppers to set up a separate account password for the eCommerce site — but the aim of using social login should be to smooth the path to purchase, not erect more barriers. Of course merchants should strive to establish their own direct relationship with shoppers; but they should implement a phased approach that encourages existing social login users to deepen their relationship, rather than forcing the issue up front. 1-800-Flowers gives Facebook Login users full access to the eCommerce site’s account tools, such as reminder services and address book creation, without creating an additional password.

Facebook login example from 1-800-Flowers

Develop true social shopping opportunities. As a corollary to the above, merchants should make it worthwhile for shoppers to connect via social login by doing more than pre-populating a few checkout fields. Easily-shareable wish lists are a good starting point, but merchants should also develop shopping experiences that draw on shoppers’ social profiles to bring their network of friends and their personal preferences into play. Apparel merchant Charlotte Russe enables social login users to view a real-time stream of what items are being liked and commented on. Shoppers can filter the stream to view only their friends’ picks, and control whether their own selections are shared or not.

Merchants should also consider reminder services that incorporate social login users’ friend feeds. Amazon.com not only lets shoppers know which Facebook friends have birthdays coming up soon, but also makes gift recommendations based on friends’ prior purchases and history of product “likes” on Facebook.

Give users privacy controls — and message prominently. With Facebook and other social networks often grabbing headlines for privacy gaffes, it’s crucial for merchants to clearly outline how social login functionality will work, what user data will be culled from their social profiles, and what information will be shared with users’ friends by the merchant — and social login users should be able to exercise privacy control at multiple points along the engagement path. When designing their social login experiences, merchants should pay special attention to:

  • Signup messaging. Shoppers offered the option of a social login should understand the benefits and what information will be shared before beginning the process. Then, once they’ve opted to use the social login, they should be able to exercise control over how their information will be shared. On the first page of checkout, Wine.com gives shoppers an extensive explanation in a pop-up window of how Facebook Login works. Those who opt to use the social login are then notified of which data the tool will use and given the option to control how information is shared on the social network.

  • Sharing “likes.” When social login users add products to their list of favorites or “like” the items, they should be alerted to how that information will be shared — and given the option to edit the settings. Department store Barney’s launches a pop-up window when a shopper first uses the “Favorites” tool and lets shoppers select whether or not to share their picks.

  • Global control. From any page of the site, shoppers should be able to access their account and turn social sharing on or off; they should also be able to log out completely. Accessory retailer Claire’s offers a drop-down menu in the global navigation that enables shoppers to switch sharing on or off without leaving the browsing experience; users can also opt to log out completely. A fly-out help menu clearly delineates how sharing works and offers the further option of disconnecting from Facebook altogether.

Are you using or considering social logins for your site? Why or why not?

Webinar recap: Shopping without borders

If there’s one theme that emerged from last week’s webinar on trends for 2013, it’s that this year will see shopping escape the confines of the eCommerce site.

MarketLive founder Ken Burke explained how often-discussed but rarely-implemented concepts such as social commerce and multi-channel execution are due to come to fruition, resulting in an experience where shopping seamlessly blends with a consumer’s individual lifestyle. Rather than having to seek out products nested within eCommerce site categories, shoppers will be able to access items in new formats, presented with their individual devices, locations and situations in mind.

Finding new ways to marry shoppers’ preferences with products is an essential means of brand differentiation, which — as discussed in our preview of the webinar – will be merchants’ core challenge for 2013. By attuning technology to match shoppers’ priorities and the core identity of their brands, merchants can stand out in the crowd. A few top strategies the webinar covered:

Designing tablet-specific experiences. Burke estimated that 25% of all online shopping now takes place on tablets — and there’s growing evidence that tablet shoppers are more likely to buy, and buy more, than mobile and perhaps even desktop shoppers. So it behooves merchants to take advantage of the devices’s unique properties — not only its screen size and swipe-and-tap navigation, but the environment in which shoppers use tablets. Tablet owners use them at home 74% of the time, according to eMarketer, while just over a third use them in stores. By contrast, the vast majority of smartphone owners go online on their devices from on-the-go locations, with 75% using them in stores, industry researcher Forrester found. Merchants should optimize the shopping experience for tablets with display-driven formats that enable swiping to browse, as Staples has done with a  tablet-specific site that includes an array of “hot deals” and best sellers for shoppers to swipe through.

Tablet example from Staples

Connecting on-the-go browsing to buying. Smartphone shoppers are 14% more likely to convert and make a purchase in the store than non-smartphone users, according to data from Deloitte — the trick is to provide deep, location-relevant content that encourages purchasing. As a corollary benefit, developing mobile content intended for in-store use helps merchants quantify and track consumers’ movement across touchpoints – enabling them to tighten the mobile-to-purchase connection and justify further investment in mobile efforts. QR codes are increasingly prevalent, with one in five U.S. consumers having scanned one in the past month, so merchants would do well to experiment with this format for physical stores. As an extreme example, Burke showed how eBay has transformed its Inspiration Shop window at 404 Park Avenue South in New York into a buying opportunity using QR codes to link passersby to products and transactions.

eBay physical store with QR codes

 

Embedding products in pictures. Merchants have long known that multiple images and product videos help increase conversion; now, it’s possible to make the transition from image to transaction even more seamless, with product links and displays built into rich media that can be syndicated far beyond the eCommerce site. Barney’s New York used a behind-the-scenes video to showcase products with a product popup display that allowed shoppers to add items to the cart without disrupting their viewing experience. A timeline across the bottom of the display lets shoppers scroll back to items of interest.

Shoppable video example from Barney's

Redefining social shopping. At first, merchants who wanted to monetize social media focused on Facebook stores as a way to enable shoppers to buy within the social environment. Those efforts have seen mixed success, largely because merely adding a “buy” button fails to take advantage of the unique properties of the medium. Rather, by integrating social data with products merchants can create an engaging experience for brand followers. On social networks, that means building interactive social media experiences that allow shoppers to share and tailor product arrays. But perhaps even more exciting is the prospect of bringing social data back onto the eCommerce site, where merchants can blend shoppers’ personal preferences and social data with relevant products using Facebook login and other social connector tools. When shoppers use Facebook in conjunction with accessory retailer Claire’s, they can access a “Fashion Feed” showing which items other shoppers — everyone or just friends — are tagging as favorites, and they can opt whether to add their product picks to the mix.

Using social login is so important that we’re planning a post dedicated to best practices for implementation — watch for it in the coming week. Meantime, to access more key strategies for 2013, replay the webinar — and tell us: what are your priorities for the year?

Webinar preview: trends to help brand stand out in the crowd

Now that the exuberance of the successful holiday season has worn off, for many merchants the reality of 2013 is setting in – and while they have every reason to be optimistic, they also face a fundamental challenge: how to stand out in the crowd.

The online marketplace is increasingly polarized, as the top mega-brands attract the lion’s share of revenues on one end of the spectrum even as the field of small- and mid-sized merchants becomes ever more crowded. While overall U.S. eCommerce sales grew an average of 14% annually from 2007 to 2011, per year for the same time period, according to industry researcher Forrester.  And nearly 78% of the total 2011 revenues reported by Internet Retailer’s Top 500 merchants was generated by the 50 biggest names on the list. With over two million online retailers in the U.S. alone, according to the U.S. Commerce Department, merchants must differentiate themselves in order to survive, let alone succeed.

The challenge of creating uniquely irresistible appeal will be at the heart of tomorrow’s webinar examining 2013 trends, which will explore three key themes merchants can adapt to their individual businesses to present a relevant combination of products, offers and services across screens and in new formats. Among the topics MarketLive founder Ken Burke will discuss:

Multi-screen shopping becomes the norm. As merchants have deployed mobile offerings, they’ve largely focused on browsing and researching – activities that support eventual offline or computer-based purchases.  After all, , compared with the 96% who’ve researched products and gone on to make purchases offline or on a larger screen, according to research from Google and Ipsos. But the imperative is growing to focus on driving sales directly from mobile offerings. One key reason: the growing audience of than smartphone shoppers, in part due to the larger screen size that makes it easier to view products and complete checkout forms. But even on smartphones, merchants have an opportunity to better drive mobile revenues, whether by smoothing the path to purchase or tightening the mobile/offline connection so that they can better attribute eventual sales to mobile influence.

The end of the product page as we know it. Rather than seeking out static product information sequestered within a hierarchy of categories and subcategories, increasingly consumers can shop from a variety of online settings that are seamlessly permeated with opportunities to browse and buy. This revolution in content and product presentation is an outgrowth of advances in mobile technology that allow device users to search and identify non-textual content – from visual search tools such as Google Goggles, which delivers search results based on images rather than keywords, to Shazam, an app that can identify songs based on an audio snippet.  QR codes that connect consumers to content via scannable codes are also part of the trend; their usage has grown exponentially, with fully one in five U.S. smartphone users scanning a QR code in April of 2012, according to data from comScore. Shoppable videos and artful product-and-text layouts appeal to the same sensibility of being able to “point, know and buy”.

Shoppable video example from Barney's

Personalization moves to the next level. Merchants have been making increasingly earnest efforts at personalization, and for good reason: the rewards for tailoring products, content and service are potentially significant. More than one in three consumers say they buy more from retailers who personalize the shopping experience and 34% say they buy more from retailers who send product recommendations based on past buying and browsing behavior, according to research from personalization firm MyBuys and The E-Tailing Group.  With an ever-expanding array of information available about individual behaviors, and a growing expectation on the part of consumers that products will be relevant to their specific situation, the bar is being raised on personalization. Merchants should now explore ways to incorporate location-based data from mobile devices and personal details gleaned from social networks as way to add further context to the shopping experience. But personalization in 2013 is also about drawing on shoppers’ explicit input and providing individualized services that make every transaction unique.

Sign up now for the webinar to explore these trends in further depth, complete with examples and more data. We look forward to the conversation!

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