Internet users quickly abandon their shopping cart

According to a Paypal study, 45% of Internet users abandon their shopping cart before the final click to submit their orders.

This is actually due to fees and shipping costs which are not always announced on the websites.

Reviews, most useful feature of an e-commerce site

Consumers use to read reviews before buying any product or service. According to a survey (Avail Intelligence) when it comes to making a purchase over a third of respondents (36%) rated recommendations and reviews as the most useful feature of an e-commerce site.

“Despite the credit crunch, UK consumers appear more concerned with the experiences and suggestions of other web-based shoppers than finding the best deal online,” said Pontus Kristiansson, CEO and founder at Avail Intelligence.

For American, it’s quite similar. Recent research from Opinion Research Corporation found that 84% of consumers said browsing reviews influenced their decision on whether or not to purchase a product or service.

Social media is good for brands !

Online shopping is defintely about getting social.

According to Andy Lloyd, CEO of Fluid, a San Francisco-based interactive agency, shopping online is still a solo endeavor, devoid of the interaction many consumers seek. Without that interaction and purchase validation, shoppers, plagued by indecision, often abandon retailers’ sites.

In the coming weeks, two technologies – friend-based merchandising that involves Facebook and collaborative shopping  – are being rolled out to big-name retailers. This does includes vans.com and jansport.com.

More infos here.

German Online Sales Rose Last Year

Even with the economic crises, German online sales rose in 2008. Internet users spent €13.6 billion last year which means 19% more than in 2007.

There are two mains factors: further expansion in the number of online shoppers and buyers. (29.5 million people in Germany last year) and an average expenditure per purchase rose 7% to about €49.

E-Commerce in Europe

A recent study about E-commerce shows that North Europe has more online buyers. Between 2004 and 2008, online buyers have grown from 22 % to 34%.

The gap is very important between for example UK who had 57% of online buyers, Danemark (59%), France (40%) but Romania and bulgaria had only 4 and 3% of online buyers in 2008 !

Moreover, Tourism and clothes are in the top list of what European have bought in 2008.

France’s Cdiscount to launch in UK

Cdiscount, part of the Casino Group, a €5 billion retailing giant, which is very populair in France, sells electrical goods, clothes, homeware and wine, and will be launched in UK next month. Also CDiscount website runs new “flash” promotions each day and offers aggressive payment deals under which shoppers can pay in instalments without any credit checks.

The website is to compete with Amazon and Tesco to attract recession-hit consumers.

ComScore ranks CDiscount France as the country’s eighth-biggest online retailer by unique visitors, just one ranking away from Amazon’s French site.

Why does registration on an e-commerce website isn’t great ?

The Econsultancy blog explains us why the idea of asking the user to register on a website in order to purchase an object is not a good idea. Indeed, a lot of websites ask their users to be registered before buying anything but that seems to annoy some of them who doesn’t keep their cart.

Econsultancy then compare the 10 biggest e-commerce websites in UK. 7 out of 10 ask their users to be register before buying anything.

E-commerce in Europe by 2014

A study from Forrester published in March, shows that E-commerce is going to grow in Germany, UK and France within the next six years.
E-commerce in France should be really important by 2014. French buyers are going to spend an average of 932 Euros per year compared to Germany (994 Euros) and UK (1703 Euros).

The FEVAD (Fédération du E-commerce et de la Vente à Distance) has also said that E-commerce turnover in France was 20 billion Euros in 2008 and is planning on 30 billion Euros for 2010.

E-Commerce in Europe is growing

According to a report from La Comission européenne, E-Commerce in Europe is growing fastly.
Indeed, one out of three europeans have already bought something online in 2008. Helena Kuneva European Commissioner in charge of consumption, however, regrets that consumers are limited to national markets and largely ignore the online merchants in other European countries.

The number of Europeans who have purchased at least one article from Internet, has jumped from 27 % in 2006 to 33 %t in 2008 to reach 150 million consumers. Especially in Denmark (59%), Britain (57%) and the Netherlands (56%) where buying online is extremely popular. On the other hand, in Belgium, only 21 percent of consumers have purchased goods or services over the Internet.

Consumers are primarily directed to online stores for booking travel and hotels. Sports items, clothing, books, toys, tickets, movies, music and software are also popular.
Customers, however, are largely restricted to the domestic market. In 2008, only 7 percent of consumers have purchased online products or services in another European country. According to Helena Kuneva, it’s mainly due to a different language and the fear of not receiving the product.

3,8 billion euros for the Holiday Season on the European online market

Over the first three weeks of November, just before Thanksgiving and the launch of Christmas holiday season, online sales in the US underwent a decline of 4% according to comScore survey results. Led from November 1st to the 23rd, the study evokes 8,19 billion dollars of sales, against 8,51 billions in the same period last year. Never still the American e-commerce had registered such a fall of sales.

Looks like the US don’t have a wide enough market of consumers any more.

Therefore, considering the exchange rate which remains favorable to the Euro, although the economic situation is similar across the Atlantic, on-line traders hope that the coming holidays will smile to them, with an amount of sales estimated at 3,8 billion euros, according to a Médiamétrie/NetRatings study, against 3,1 billion last year.

In conclusion, it would be profitable to both the US and Europe to broaden their consumer range.