e-Commerce: Complete. Configured. Connected.
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Plimus’ Second Annual Virtual Holiday Shopping Survey
Dec 5th
Today, Plimus issued the results of the “Second Annual Virtual Holiday Shopping Survey,” which highlights the differences between consumer’s online shopping habits this holiday season versus their spending habits in 2010.
This holiday season is about giving virtual goods and services! Interestingly, results found that consumers are spending more money online than ever before and their purchases have expanded beyond physical goods. In fact, virtual goods spending increased from 21 percent in 2010 to 24 percent in 2011. Similarly, 17 percent more consumers have given someone a virtual item as a gift so far this year.
Our survey was conducted informally via social media channels, such as Facebook and Twitter. The survey participants were entered into a drawing for a chance to win a $100 gift card for their holiday shopping. To learn more, read the entire release by clicking here.
Making Strides
Nov 11th
What better way to bond with your co-workers than for all of you to get up early on a Saturday morning, put on pink-trimmed shirts and accessories, and walk 5 km in downtown San Jose? Well, that’s exactly what Team Plimus did on Saturday, October 28th when several Plimus employees joined in the American Cancer Society’s Making Strides Against Breast Cancer walk.
It’s like the universe knew that we were not so sure about committing to a work event that required arriving at 8am, so the weather gods blessed us with a spectacular sunny morning – just cool enough that you didn’t get too hot walking and warm enough that you didn’t need to wear a coat – that made getting up early completely worth it. There was a grand stand at the event where speakers motivated us and music rev’d us up as we walked the 5km route around San Jose’s downtown Guadalupe Park and Trail.
Team Plimus consisted of 19 walkers – 9 employees, 5 spouses, 8 children, and 1 dog (our most favorite Plimus pooch, Cashew). Thank you to those walkers and to the Plimus employees, friends and family who helped us raise $1,095.00 (not including matching funds) in the fight against breast cancer.
Plimus at ad:tech NYC
Nov 7th
Stop by and see us!!
This week, Plimus will be exhibiting at ad:tech New York. According to its website, ad:tech is the largest gathering of digital marketers – three days packed with more than 35 targeted breakout sessions on social, search, mobile, email, video and shopper marketing. This year, ad:tech NY will be bigger and better than ever and we at Plimus are looking forward to attending the show and visiting fellow vendors and potential customers.
In the Plimus booth, we will be showing how digital commerce vendors in software, software as service (SaaS), games and content have used the Plimus e-Commerce platform and the Plimus ReACT model to increase their close rates, average order values and revenue rates. We look forward to meeting the creative marketing professionals and affiliates attending ad:tech New York and discussing how Plimus’ payment platform is uniquely designed to address their needs.
Feel free to stop by our booth No. 2103 and say hello! If you’re interested in scheduling a meeting at the show, please email: events@plimus.com. Safe travels to NYC!
ad:tech New York
When: Tuesday, Nov. 8 – Thursday, Nov. 10
Where: Jacob K. Javits Center New York
655 West 34th Street
New York, New York 10001
Register: https://www.xpressreg.net/register/adte111/lookup.asp?sc=&aban
Virtual Economics
Oct 17th
When it comes to traditional retail, price is everything. Whether selling through bricks and mortar stores or online markets, vendors of physical goods define success in terms of the amount of money derived from each individual sale versus the cost of goods and extra expenditures. Online merchants selling virtual or digital goods, however, focus the bulk of their effort on driving traffic to their sites and converting visitors into buyers. Whether you’re selling content like videos, online games, or software and services through subscriptions, in the virtual world your digital inventory has no relationship to sales volume. The warehouse is always empty as your goods are virtual, electronic. Because of this, every increase in sales you can make from your traffic goes right to your bottom line.
To many people, economics seems daunting and complex. But the concept of virtual economics here is fairly straightforward. The digital revenue model is built upon four basic pillars; the intersection of their dynamics delivers maximum value.
These pillars are:
• Traffic
• Close rate
• Average order value (AOV)
• Retention
Let’s start with traffic and close rate – and the conversion of desire to action to purchase a virtual good. While traffic can vary greatly, your close rates need not. By removing hurdles in the online purchase process, such as problems with different currencies, languages or payment types, merchants can increase closure rates and significantly boost revenue streams. This is especially important when selling globally, as you want to cater to many different audiences across the world. Additionally, advanced techniques such as single-click buying and user-experience tuning can impact the bottom line. With the vast majority of shopping carts still being abandoned during the online shopping experience, traffic alone is no guarantee of success.
Maximizing the average order value (AOV) per consumer conversion results in greater success. Online merchants need to ensure they do not miss any opportunity to turn a browser into a buyer by connecting with the buyer when his or her wallet is open and they are eager to buy. The best way for merchants to do this is to learn more about what makes their buyers tick. When do they shop online? Who do they primarily shop for – themselves? A spouse? Friend? Co-worker? By understanding the shopper, and taking steps to address his or her needs, online merchants can take advantage of shoppers’ time and convert the sale. Offering an added value during the checkout process or appealing to an impulse purchase, simply adds revenue to your bottom line.
The last step, retention, is not as easily factored and measured, but holds just as great an impact as the previous factors within this equation.
Retention is the key to growth. Keep your old customers – and grow with the addition of new ones. It is nearly an urban myth that the costs to acquire new customers can run five to ten times more than the costs to retain them. Truthfully, these costs will vary by industry, product and company strategy, and are impacted by the rise and fall of economic cycles as much as anything. any implications can be drawn from this simple definition: Customer retention comes from the vendor and is built on retaining the customer without the need for a change of heart or mind (and thus the customer becomes loyal). Retention comes from providing incentives for the customer to return (and restrained from leaving) in the face of competitive actions. Reward the faithful by creating a retention benefit program that recognizes repeat customers. Today’s most effective perks programs do not involve much financial investment, however, every little bit of appreciation shown to the customer pays dividends. It’s important that once the initial transaction is conducted, the seller continues to evolve the relationship with that buyer, developing a business transaction into an emotional bond.
Putting it all together, we’ve got the recipe for converting browsers into buyers. In simplified mathematical terms, the model can be defined as:
(R)evenue (e)quals = (A)verageOrderValue x (C)loseRate x (T)raffic.
We call this the ReACT model, and it shows how any business can flex its marketing strengths to drive online revenues. By using pre– and post– sale promotions to increase AOV, multivariate testing on the checkout page and direct consumer management experience, sellers will build higher Total Lifetime Value from their customers. Leverage the ReACT model and online merchants will successfully increase their close rates, AOVs and revenue rates.
Plimus at Web 2.0 Expo – Step by and See US
Oct 7th
Next week – Oct 11-12 – the Plimus team will be exhibiting at the Web 2.0 Expo in New York. Come on by … we’d appreciate the time to speak with you. And we have some cool flying cows for you to try. What do cows have to do with eCommerce? We will reveal all!
As you may recall, we also attended the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco and met with the industry’s most creative and innovative Web designers, developers, entrepreneurs, marketers and business strategists. We’re looking forward to this show and meeting new folks.
According to its website, “Web 2.0 Expo is a conference and tradeshow for everyone who cares about embracing and extending the opportunities created by Web 2.0 technologies. … This annual multi-track conference brings together people, ideas, connections, contacts, products, and companies to foster stronger Web 2.0 communities.”
At the show, Plimus will demonstrate how digital commerce vendors in software, software as service, games or content have used the Plimus e-Commerce platform and Plimus ReACT model to successfully increase their close rates, average order values and revenue rates.
We look forward to discussing this trend with the attendees at the conference. Come by Booth No. 161 or feel free to schedule a meeting in advance by sending an email to events@plimus.com or look for the flying cows and stop on by.
More details below!
Event Details:
What: Web 2.0 Expo
When: Tuesday, Oct. 11 – Wednesday, Oct. 12, 2011
Where: Sheraton New York Hotel & Towers
811 7th Avenue 53rd Street
New York City
Helpful Hints to Find Your Business Fit
Sep 6th
Two weeks ago, Plimus exhibited at Affiliate Summit East in New York City. We saw lots of inquiries from vendors looking to sell innovative products and services. Throughout the show, we spoke with affiliates from a variety of online verticals, many interested in attractive, new arenas of e-Commerce. Following the show and these discussions, I began to wonder … how does a person choose the best product or service is best to sell?
My first stop in answering this question was Entrepreneur.com. I found an interesting article that discussed five ways entrepreneurs can select their business fit. The article includes tips for evaluating a prospective business opportunity to ensure it’s the the right option for them.
As addressed in the Entrepreneur.com article, here are the five factors for evaluating a new business:
1) Is there a financial fit? Conduct a virtual review of your financial scenarios (best case, average case and worse case). Determine whether or not you can adequately support yourself and the other responsibilities in your life.
2) Does the job match your personality? Evaluate what the job entails – as the business owner, will you be excited to come to work each day, is the work satisfying, will you be good at it? Looking at previous performance evaluations might help in weighing your skill set with the job criteria for your prospective position.
3) Will you fit in with the culture and environment? Get to know the people. Meet the employees, customers, vendors, etc. Are these people interesting? Would you be able to work with them each day?
4) Is there a compelling value proposition? Make sure you believe in the product or service you are selling. Will it be desirable to your customers? Will you be receiving a profit on each sale? Does it provide a larger value than it costs? What’s the ROI? While these questions may be challenging to address, you need to ensure your offering will be valuable to your buyers.
5) Is this calling you to a higher purpose? Finally, before starting this venture, think about your business now and in the future. Don’t just think about the present – what do you want people to remember you for? Think about your legacy.
What do you think? Is there anything else new business owners should evaluate before jumping in? Here are Plimus, we work daily with online vendors and understand how starting a business can be daunting and risky. People often are motivated by the allure of more money, time with their family, opportunities to travel and other “glamorous” aspects of being your own boss. Starting a new business venture, however, is challenging and it’s important to enter in a market that you not only enjoy, but one where you will succeed.
To learn more, check out the Entrepreneur.com article, “Five Ways to Find Your Business Fit,” by Joe Mathews. Use these tips to determine which product and/or service you should be selling, then come to us and together we’ll build the perfect platform for your needs.
Tablets Impact eCommerce
Jul 29th
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/07/25/tablets-give-e-commerce-a-real-world-feel/
I’m an avid iPad user. I was given the device as a gift – it’s not something I ever would have bought for myself. However, after having it for the past six months, I realize that it would be hard for me to survive without it. I’ve become very depend on its accessibility and ease of use. It’s one of those devices you didn’t know you needed until you got one. Now I could not imagine not having one.
Yet, this blog is not about the iPad – it’s about how the surge of mobile tablets has impacted e-Commerce.
I recently read an article by Claire Cain Miller of The New York Times, “Tablets Give E-Commerce a Real-World Feel,” the link is above this post. It covered a recent Forrester Research report on how the increase of tablets in the market have influenced a rise in mobile e-Commerce sales. The survey found that only 9 percent of shoppers own a tablet; however, sales from tablets already account for 20 percent of mobile e-Commerce. Additionally, more than half of tablet owners (60 percent) have used their personal device to shop. For a decade the focus has been on commerce moving to the handheld mobile handset. Perhaps tablets are the ultimate mobile device we didn’t expect.
Sucharita Mulpuru, a Forrester analyst with solid insights, discussed the results as reported in NY Times article. She states, “‘Everyone thinks that mobile phones and mobile commerce are the next big things, and I think what this data shows is it’s probably actually tablets, … We have always capped e-commerce at 10 to 15 percent of total retail sales, but this potentially has the capability of really expanding e-commerce much beyond that.’” This is really exciting stuff for the digital commerce space as the possibilities for offline vendors to increase sales improves.
It is all about the experience. Always was – still is. Consumers want the same buying experience when making purchases online as they do inside brick and mortar stores. There is an emotional response consumers’ feel when being able to browse the store, see and touch the goods available for purchase. Often time, consumers do not make online purchases because they do not receive similar satisfaction offline shopping provides.
Tablets have created the most brick and mortar-like online experience for e-Commerce, offering more than traditional smartphones or computers. For example, tablets allow consumers to browse digital catalogues and view photos with high-resolution graphics. And speaking from experience, the quality of the experience means everything!
Some additional statistics uncovered from the study include:
- 80 percent of shoppers whom use their tables for online shopping, use it in their living room in their homes
- 40 percent of tablet owners use their tablets instead of their personal computers when available
It will be interesting to see how the continued growth of the tablet market impacts e-Commerce. I’m sure my hunch is the same as yours … continued success for online merchants.
More than Metrics
Jul 13th
I regularly read TechCrunch for today’s industry news, as the outlet has a fresh perspective about what’s new in the industry. Recently, I caught a good post about e-Commerce and how successful online retailers must look beyond the common industry acronyms, such as LTV (lifetime value) and COCA (cost of customer acquisition), and focus on knowing their buyer.
“e-Commerce: Beyond The Metrics,” written by Gautum Gupta an associate at General Catalyst Partners who focuses on financial services, enterprise IT, consumer services and new media. With his diverse background, Gupta provides an interesting perspective on the online retail marketplace and the importance of understanding the buyer.
Gupta writes:
Commerce, both offline and online, has historically been largely anonymous and impersonal. Offline, customers walk into stores, see the exact same merchandise, are greeted by employees who don’t recognize them, and are all bound to the same terms and conditions on the back of every purchase receipt. Online, the pen and paper of the old mail-order catalog were replaced with drop-down menus and search boxes.
This statement caught my attention because of its raw truth. There are too many online retailers not selling their products or services the right way. These vendors do not understand who they are selling to and therefore, do not know how to effectively retain current customers – or how to attract new buyers.
The article also discusses how truly understanding the customer is more than knowing his or her name and basic demographic information. Complete knowledge of the consumer means knowing not only the buyer’s purchasing habits, but also those of his or her family and friends. It means understanding a shopper’s brand and style preferences and what factors influence their opinions and purchases. In retail, understanding a customer in this way allows the seller to build a better relationship with the customer, resulting in stronger brand loyalty and higher buyer conversation rates.
While the offline world faces additional challenges in getting to this level of understanding, the online world has and a built-in way to capture much of this information. Each click a consumer makes on a site leaves a trail that vendors can mine for limitless information on a user’s preferences. Additionally, vendors can engage in social media channels to learn more about their customers; they can adjust their websites to include eye catching graphics; and host surveys and polls to better understand what buyers say makes them tick.
Plimus works with several interesting companies that help online vendors develop websites that attract the attention of prospective customers. One, Justinmind, a recent winner of the prestigious Red Herring Top 100 Europe Tech Awards, provides application prototyping solutions to help international banks, governments, IT consultants and technology agencies better define and validate their business applications and websites through highly interactive wireframes. With customized websites and business applications, sellers are able to gain a stronger understanding of their audience and increase overall business operations.
Justininmind is just one of many customers leveraging Plimus’ Digital e-Commerce platform to handle its global online sales. We’re pleased to be able to work with several companies that are pioneering the new digital commerce era with innovative websites and customer offerings.
We’re always excited to work with new customers, give us a shout if you want to learn more.
A Look Back – And Forward – at e-Commerce
Jul 8th
Is it just us, or has e-Commerce been in the news more than usual lately? Last week, a great slideshow from PCmag.com caught our eye. Called “The Current State of e-Commerce,” it covered not only the latest developments in the space like Square and the Dutch initiative to put QR codes on 5 and 10 Euro coins, but also some blasts from the past (remember Beenz and Flooz?). It was a good representation of the evolution in e-Commerce technologies during the past 15 years or so, and it got those of us here at Plimus thinking about what the future of digital commerce will look like.
Truth be told, we’re always thinking about this, and frequent readers will find it no surprise that Plimus has a strong point of view on what our increasingly digital economy will look like.
Our main objective is to help our customers and partners streamline the online purchase process, enabling them to embed the transaction activity within the overall user experience. We call that “frictionless” e-Commerce and it’s an idea that’s time has come. Our Buy Anyware API provides a single-click environment and repeat customer features that allow for customizable order pages and enables digital goods vendors and social gaming sites to make the selling point part of the overall content experience.
We’re not alone in thinking this frictionless experience is the next leap in e-Commerce technology. A recent The New York Times article addressed how some infomercial brands are working to leverage the latest in connected televisions to lower barriers to impulse purchases. While we’re not sure that we need that immediate ability to order Pajama Jeans right now, it’s nice to see there are likeminded companies in the physical goods world. Removing transactional “friction” – whether the purchase is for digital or physical goods and services – seems to be the next evolution in digital commerce.
Interested in helping drive this shift? Give us a call to see how Plimus can help you get there.
Not Surprising… Survey Finds Poor Online Experience Costs Businesses Billions in Lost Revenue
Jun 7th
A recent report from Econsultancy and Tealeaf found that companies are losing billions of dollars in revenue as a result of consumers’ poor online experiences. The assessment, “Reducing Customer Struggle,” surveyed more than 500 businesses across the globe, finding that the majority of companies are losing 24 percent of their annual online revenue because their customers’ report a bad, cumbersome shopping incident.
Come on… this is no surprise to us here at Plimus. We understand the importance of creating a frictionless customer experience in which the selling point becomes part of the focus of the online shopping event. Make the customer feel safe, secure and valued. Ease his or her hesitation and anxiety. Do those things as a seller and you’ll see an increase in revenue. With these simple adjustments, you’ll see significantly less shopping carts left abandoned on your website.
As you may recall, in April we surveyed more than 100 random, consumers via Facebook and Twitter. Results of this social survey mirror the Econsultancy report. The survey, “No Shopping Cart Left Behind: The Buying Habits of Virtual Goods Consumers” found:
More than half of consumers purchase more online digital goods than they did last year
Two thirds of survey participants indicate that ease of transaction is the most important factor when making online purchases
More than 20 percent of respondents reported that sites with complex order forms keep them from completing a transaction
One in five respondents would shop online more frequently if the checkout process was faster
Improving the payment process means increasing monetization. Digital commerce continues to grow daily and doesn’t seem to be slowing down anytime soon. With this continual growth, vendors can’t afford to lose sales. Optimize the shopping experience!
Plimus can help sellers create a better online experience for buyers. With Plimus’ payment processing platform, vendors can provide single-click purchasing, customizable order pages and a seamless checkout process for their consumers. Plimus gives online merchants the tools needed to eliminate the stress and hassle of the buying experience, making each transaction a positive experience for the consumer.
Additional information on Econsultancy survey can be found here.
