IMRG Monthly Members Update
IMRG IS PLEASED TO ANNOUNCE THE FOLLOWING NEW MEMBERS DURING THE LAST MONTH:
eWise - www.ewise.com
Hybris - www.hybris.com
Markco Media- www.markcomedia.co.uk
Mobile Interactive Group - www.migcan.com
VeInteractive - www.veinteractive.com
New developments within the IMRG community during the last month
Pay4Later today introduced a retail finance solution that enables ecommerce retailers to offer customers credit products including Interest Free and Classic Credit.
Featuring seamless checkout integration and instant credit decisions, Pay4Later brings retail finance into the mainstream UK ecommerce marketplace for the first time. Designed from the ground up for online retail finance, Pay4Later supports a raft of powerful features including real time reporting and account management, support for multiple sales channels and integrated fraud screening.
Full Release HERE.
ChannelAdvisor, a solution provider that enables online retailers to improve efficiency and increase revenue, today announced the launch of its Mobile Webstore solution that allows retailers using the Premium Webstore to quickly and easily create a mobile-optimized version of their site. Given the explosive growth of smartphones and mobile commerce worldwide, ChannelAdvisor encourages its customers to take advantage of this channel to reach shoppers anytime and anywhere.
Full Release HERE.
Mobile Interactive Group explain how we are at a tipping point where consumers expect to be able to use their mobile phone as a channel to engage with and purchase from their preferred retailers. A small percentage of retailers have recognized this opportunity and have already launched a Mcommerce offering with amazing results. Others are yet to recognize the opportunity or feel restricted due to legacy infrastructure.
Full Release HERE
Metro Bank, Britain’s first new high street bank in over 150 years, has joined the LINK ATM network, giving its customers access to the entire UK cash machine network.
In addition, around 100 million UK-issued LINK-enabled cards, essentially all debit and ATM cards issued by significant UK banks and building societies, can be used in the Metro Bank cash machines installed in their new branches, the first of which opens in Holborn, London, today.
Full Release HERE.
Avail Intelligence reveal how a Patricia Seybold Group worldwide survey shows that within the next 18 months, a majority of retailers plan to launch e-commerce personalization programs. Perhaps inspired by the success at companies such as NetFlix and Amazon, online merchandisers are now using product recommendations for web and mobile eCommerce upselling, content personalization, improving search results and personalizing ads.
Full Release HERE
RichRelevance, the leading provider of dynamic e-commerce personalisation for the world’s largest retailers, today announced the publication of research conducted among London multi-channel shoppers who use the Internet to aid their in-store shopping excursions.
Full Release HERE
ChannelAdvisor, a solution provider that enables online retailers to improve efficiency and increase revenue, today announced more than 230 new customer additions. Noteworthy ChannelAdvisor customer additions included Dormbuys and Jockey International as well as United Kingdom customers Creative Labs and Toys “R” Us, bringing the number of Internet Retailer 500 customers using ChannelAdvisor to 123. ChannelAdvisor also expanded its relationships with existing customers including Brookstone, Franklin-Covey, iNetVideo.com, National Trade Supply and Pots and Pans.
Full Release HERE
First Cyber Security discuss that as part of an independent project funded by the Technology Strategy Board (UK government funding agency) a team at University College London (UCL), led by Professor M. Angela Sasse investigated consumer reaction and usability of First Cyber Security’s S.O.L.I.D. Authentication® service. The report, entitled “Effective and Usable Anti-phishing and web authentication tool” has just been published. The aim of the project was to review and improve the human factors aspects of First Cyber Security’s security technology when used by consumers transacting over the Internet. S.O.L.I.D Authentication is used by the IMRG to protect its ISIS Internet Shopping Is Safe logo which appears on all IMRG member sites.
Full Release HERE
Peerius Launches The Peerius IMRG Online Merchandising Index: Apparel on 14th July 2010. The index provides a framework to identify and promote best practice online merchandising within the apparel industry in the UK. The top 50 apparel sites in the UK have been marked by IMRG, an independent industry body, using a matrix and a methodology developed by Peerius.
Peerius is founded upon an understanding of how we can describe the intangible world of human choice and decision making with mathematics and logic. This report is all about bringing a touch of mathematics and logic into merchandising performance. We wanted to come up with a methodology that allows one site to be compared objectively with another. By highlighting what we believe to be best practice, we hope that we can contribute to achieving great merchandising in the UK apparel market.
Full Release HERE
Splendia is a luxury hotel brand that provides a top-notch online reservation service for leisure and business travelers. Offering its customers a choice of more than 5,000 hand-picked luxury and character hotels in over 130 countries, it is crucial to Splendia to make the online booking experience as smooth and customer-friendly as possible. To this end, they have selected Payment Service Provider GlobalCollect to facilitate credit card payments from across the world, with the option to explore alternative payment methods at a later stage.
Full Release HERE
Webloyalty, a leading provider of incremental revenue for online businesses, today announced its further expansion into the online retail sector by winning business to work with Freemans, one of the UK’s longest-standing and most successful catalogue companies.
Full Release HERE.
Actinic has completed its first quarterly survey of UK small and medium enterprises (SMEs) which highlights a healthy increase in revenue of 15% in the three months to June 2010 when compared to the same period in 2009. However, e-retailers have had to increase their order volumes substantially by 39% to achieve this growth as the average order value has dropped by 17%.
Full Release HERE
PayPoint.net claims one Briton in two is a frustrated entrepreneur, Just over 50 per cent of the UK’s office workers have considered starting their own business, but start-up costs and administrative demands, among other concerns, have conspired to dampen their ambitions.
These are the key findings from a survey of office workers commissioned by the leading online payments provider, which also reveals that 62 per cent of respondents would start their own business if the task were easier.
Full Release HERE
Chapter Eight believes that you've invested time and money into your business, the website looks great and you have some exciting new products, but without regular traffic your business is going nowhere fast.
Included in a strategic marketing strategy, paying for traffic is the most effective method of increasing visitors to your site. I believe Pay Per Click Advertising compliments other marketing methods and the big advantage is that it will reach your target market much quicker.
Setting up an Ad campaign can be tailored to your budget and it's easy to measure. You'll be able to specifically target your audience and know if they reached your website as a result of an advert.
Full Release HERE
MetaPack - July saw some household names going live on MetaPack’s IDIS Delivery Manager: Figleaves, Debenhams and Past Times, who have also already started experiencing benefits with a 300% increase in despatch rate. Other online retailers going live included Gift Library, Eco Charlie, Rare Fashions, Leaf International and Ajvani Shoes..
Axida reveals how twenty-first century retailing offers the consumer unlimited choice. Whether they choose to buy from a store, using the web or through a mail order catalogue, the opportunities are limitless. Online selling has been the big growth area - and like catalogue mail or phone orders - goods need delivering. Research shows that this is an area that requires specialised focus.1 For the customer, uncertainty about when their goods will arrive spoils the experience of buying online. Faced with the prospect of having to wait at home with no reliable information available about their deliveries, customers quickly become frustrated.
Full Release HERE
PostcodeAnywhere and Meanbee Launch First International Address Look-Up for Magento E-Commerce. Meanbee web design has made global trade on the Magento e-commerce platform possible for the first time this week, with a free-to-download international address auto-fill module.
Full Release HERE
WHITEPAPERS / CASE STUDIES / REPORTS
Avail Intelligence discuss what is behavioral merchandising? Behavioral merchandising was made famous by Amazon.com, but it has since evolved much further. Today, it is practiced at online retailers everywhere on the globe – companies whose turnover can be anything from $1 million to $1 billion and beyond.
Download the full report HERE
Adobe Scene7 has just released the results of its fourth-annual quantitative worldwide survey entitled, "Customer Experience in the New Decade," providing a revealing look at how leading global cross-industry businesses plan to enhance online customer experience and drive conversions in 2010. Discover the rich media/merchandising, social media-based, mobile, and personalization features these leaders are using or plan to use in the coming year. Download the full report HERE.
RichRelevance talk about how Respect the Shopper presents new findings on the consumer of today who shops across channels—physical stores, the Internet, catalogue, and mobile. Featuring street surveys of shoppers in London and New York City, this paper compares the post-shopping behavior of store-goers in both cities, who are increasingly demanding multi-channel synergy. The paper highlights best practices on key metrics such as time spent shopping, signage and flow, to unveil how retailers can accommodate the complex behaviors of their new multichannel consumers.
Download the full report HERE
EVENTS / WEBINARS
FACT-Finder’s Internationalising eCommerce conference will be held on 26th August, 2010, (www.iec-2010.com) at the “Le Méridien Piccadilly” hotel in London. Search and navigation specialist FACT-Finder is a Pan-European software vendor in eCommerce.
The conference addresses CxO executives in the eCommerce market who already have gone international with their business or are planning to do so. Conference language is English. On 25th August, the event will start with a get together dinner at the Le Méridien Piccadilly. Well-known experts from different countries will present on topics like global and local expansion, aspects of multilingual presentation, strategies of search and navigation, payment systems and fraud prevention, logistics and the management of returned items, as well as on trends and challenges in international eCommere.
IMRG members receive 20% discount for this event when they type the code (iec-imrgmemberdiscount2010) in the online registration form.
Click HERE for more information.
SPECIAL OFFERS FOR IMRG MEMBERS
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If your aim is to expand your business internationally, Akamai are offering a limited number of Free Complimentary Global Performance Trials to IMRG Members.
We will use a third party testing service to demonstrate the current performance of your website from each global location you are targeting; and the performance of your website if you were switched on to the Akamai platform. You will receive a detailed report of our finding. Interested? To register for this offer or find out more information please contact Ravi Maira on rmaira@akamai.com or 01784 225391.