Online retailers are driving potential customers away by fatally sacrificing service for "sizzle", with British e-tailers offering a particularly bad Web experience, according to a new e-commerce report.
Only one UK e-tailer made it into the top five of 100 websites evaluated for the study, and of the worst five, four are British sites, according to the report. Jungle.com, the British electronics, music and video retailer, ranked fourth among the top five of 70 American and 30 British sites considered for the study. The bottom five are JJB Sports (UK), Sony (US), Waitrose (UK), Elonex (UK) and Simply Computers (UK). The remaining top five are Toys R Us, Beyond.com, PlanetRX and CDNow.
The sites were evaluated for elements including the overall quality of the home page, site entry and navigation, the shopping and browsing experience, ordering, account management and customer service and support.
The report argues that, contrary to media hype, the Web represents a selling evolution, not a selling revolution. "The Web is simply a new technology that can be used to facilitate an age-old process," it says. The key problem with online retail sites is that few come close to offering the service, attention, range of products and after-sale care that successful, traditional "bricks and mortar" merchants offer, said Ms Shelley Taylor, author of the study and chief executive of research firm Shelley Taylor and Associates.
"The whole browsing, shopping, searching, pre-sales assistance experience is missing," said Ms Taylor. The study, in its second year, found "nothing has improved other than the sizzle", she said.
Rather than focusing on customers and a convenient sales process, websites are loaded down with trendy animation technology, such as Flash and Shockwave. But such add-ons also can degrade the shopping experience and, in some cases, may prevent access to the site completely. In addition, Ms Taylor said that companies underestimate the cost of a truly functional e-commerce website.
As a consequence, she says, 75 per cent of online shoppers abandon their virtual shopping cart before a purchase. She contrasts this with "real-world" shopping: "You don't see Tesco full of trolleys abandoned at the kerb." Most online retailers fail to give customers the basic information they require, particularly in Britain. Only 33 per cent of British sites examined gave customers details of their account status, for example, compared to 74 per cent of US stores.
Just 13 per cent of UK sites take advantage of the opportunity to offer related merchandise to a customer, compared to 40 per cent of US sites. Overall, a mere 10 per cent of sites offer clear links to their policy on returning merchandise, and only 12 per cent offer shipping information. Only 30 per cent of sites tell customers whether a product is available and special browser plug-ins were required by 15 per cent of sites.
Ms Taylor blames youthful Website design companies and their lack of retailing knowledge for the poor functionality and design of most e-commerce sites. Typically, the retail company executives put in charge of the company website "don't understand the Web, and delegate inappropriately to 24-year-olds".
