Many – particularly moms – manage to shoehorn 27 hours of activities into the standard 24-hour day.² It should come as no surprise, then, that 40% shop online during work hours.  They are buying everything from clothes and books for their family to more considered purchases like electronics and home furnishings.

Given the focus on social for online retail, I guess it will be only a matter of minutes before these women ask you to make it easier for them to connect and collaborate with their spouses, friends, family, etc. in real-time while they are on their lunch break trying to buy that new dining room table or new school shoes for her finicky teenager??

Sources:

1 “The New Female Consumer: The Rise of the RealMom.” Advertising Age, November 2009. 2 “Living La Vida Rapida.” AOL/OMD Global Moms Study, July 2008.

As part of the “Recommendations, Reviews, and Ratings” category that Christine includes in the No. 1 spot, we would also add our ShopTogether Crowd application as an example of a real-time recommendations engine. ShopTogether Crowd displays the most popular items on a retailer’s site in a dynamic display, with products moving in and out as the crowd’s favorites change in real time.  ShopTogether Crowd lets customers see what’s popular with other people who shop when they do.

For example, if you think about online shopping in terms of a real-world shopping mall, visitor demographics tend to change during different times of the day, i.e., there may be older customers coming to the store in the morning, office workers visiting during their lunch breaks, and students stopping by in the afternoon when classes are over. As the likes of those different demographics change during the day, ShopTogether Crowd reflects those changes in real-time, giving like-minded visitors new ideas for what to buy and marketers a new look at their customer base.  Here is an example of how this application works via our customer Charlotte Russe’s Facebook fan page.

It looks like the Altimeter Group has a great show lined up for October and it will be interesting to see what other innovations for online retailers they discuss.

1. Viral Marketing: Retailers need to tap into their customers’ social networks to promote products, find new, like-minded customers and generate traffic or buzz around the brand. There are many companies working in this area, with many creative agencies developing smart, integrated campaigns leveraging Facebook, Foursquare, Twitter and the like, while generating new “fans” for brands to reach.
2. Affirmation: Ratings and reviews initially served to give consumers more confidence in a product’s reliability, worthiness or “cool” factor. But until recently, these have mostly been from anonymous reviewers or people unknown by the purchaser. Now though, buyers can get this affirmation directly from the people who matter most in the purchase decision, namely friends, family and peers.  The Facebook “Like” button and commenting/feedback via social networks are examples.
3. Collaboration: Consumers can work together in real time to choose a car, furniture or an outfit.   Also, some companies are promoting group purchasing and/or steep discounts if large numbers of consumers buy within a certain timeframe.  This area stands out because it can lead directly to a purchase. ShopTogether, Groupon are specific examples of collaboration solutions.

Retailers need to address all three of these areas in their social strategy.  ShopTogether’s flexible interface and turn-key products can help retailers address each one of these aspects to create a complete and effective social commerce solution. We would love to hear how you’re viewing the space.

• High shipping costs - 44%
• Not ready to purchase - 41% 
• Price checking - 27%
• Price too high - 25%
• Wanted to save products for later - 24% 

Charlton states that, “Providing clear delivery charges on product pages and elsewhere so that customers don’t have to add items to the cart to find out total costs would be one improvement, and it also makes sense for retailers to make it as easy as possible for customers to resume their sessions on subsequent visits. However, most of the reasons quoted here have something to do with comparison shopping, and except for high shipping costs, there is little that retailers can do.”

There is something retailers can do, however. Implementing a social shopping solution like ShopTogether can go a long way in helping shoppers complete the purchase process. In fact, another report from Forrester’s Sucharita Mulpuru says that co-browsing and co-shopping technologies are “extremely valuable because they can reduce abandonment by confused or frustrated shoppers.”

Online shoppers who can quickly secure necessary buy-in from a second party via technologies like ShopTogether will be less likely to abandon their shopping carts. Giving shoppers the ability to invite a friend to look at their shopping cart during the checkout process can also serve a similar role to providing product reviews or customer testimonials. Having a quick “thumbs up” from a friend will help mitigate concerns a shopper may have with the final purchase decision, and there are reams of data showing that the opinion of a friend can go much farther in influencing them than a third party. Plus, once connected on a retailer’s site with a friend, shoppers will be less likely to jump around to other sites to look for better deals.

In addition to existing customers Mattel, Charlotte Russe, Buy.com and German cosmetics retailer Hautbalance, among others, we’re announcing at the show that we’ve added cosmetics brands Clinique and jane iredale, as well as online costume retailer Costume Craze. Our ShopTogether application is also now iPad compatible, and we’ll be rolling the updates out across our customer base over the coming weeks.

If you’re at the show, come by and say hello, and see how we’re bringing the promise of social shopping to reality with our great roster of customers and partners. For more on the announcement we’re making at IRCE, read our press release.

CHICAGO — June 8, 2010 – DecisionStep announced today it added Clinique Laboratories, jane iredale and Costume Craze, one of the world’s largest online costume retailers, as customers of its ShopTogether social commerce solutions. Over the past year, DecisionStep has continued to build relationships with leading e-commerce brands, including Mattel, Charlotte Russe and Buy.com, among others. 

ShopTogether instantly adds a social layer to a retailer’s website, increasing the amount of time shoppers spend there and ultimately increasing order values and sales.  Meanwhile, visitors have a more engaging and fun experience with the ability to get an opinion, either in real time or later through comments on their social networks, like Facebook and Twitter, from the people who matter most in the purchase decision. 

“In just one year since our last visit to IRCE, we’ve witnessed significantly increased demand for enabling social interactions within e-commerce sites,” said John Jackson, President and CEO of DecisionStep. “We appreciate the opportunity to work with some of the most innovative brands, and the new technologies we plan to roll out in the coming months are based in large part on what we’ve learned from them.” 

iPad Compatibility

DecisionStep also announced that ShopTogether will be iPad™ compatible, beginning with Costume Craze and rolling over the coming weeks to its other customers, giving consumers the ability to share a shopping experience with friends and family, no matter where they are or what Internet-capable device they use.  

How ShopTogether Works

ShopTogether combines the fun and social aspects of traditional shopping with the benefits of social networking, turning an otherwise solitary web visit into a dynamic, interactive experience. The ShopTogether product suite consists of three easy-to-implement, customizable toolbar applications:  ShopTogether Friends, Crowd and Concierge.  ShopTogether Friends lets consumers connect with their friends on a retailer’s site through the major social networks like Facebook, Twitter and MySpace, or email or IM to chat, view each other’s products, collect mutual favorites and share ideas that lead to buying decisions. ShopTogether Concierge adds real-time visual collaboration to customer support experts who can encourage purchases and steer shoppers in the right direction. And ShopTogether Crowd lets site visitors track the shopping and buying behavior of everyone else online for a minute-by-minute, real-time look at what’s hot. In addition to these three applications, DecisionStep offers a fully customizable version of its capabilities with an API that lets retailers integrate ShopTogether functionality on their website as they see fit.

To see a demonstration of ShopTogether, speak with DecisionStep company representatives or get a sneak-peek at the DecisionStep’s new mobile capabilities, please stop by booth #424.

About DecisionStep

Headquartered outside of Washington DC, DecisionStep helps online businesses succeed by providing hosted, innovative solutions that let consumers make better decisions faster. DecisionStep’s revolutionary application called ShopTogether provides real-time, social interaction to shoppers so they can be part of each other’s web experience and decision-making process, increasing order value for retailers and giving them the confidence they need to buy.  Visit DecisionStep online at www.decisionstep.com.

We believe these percentages will continue to grow as the number of retailers who recognize the importance of peer opinion in the purchase process become educated about the social tools, like ShopTogether, available to them to facilitate peer communication and opinion sharing.