Bigmouthmedia Sector Experience - Finlay Clark, Senior Retail Stragteist

Finlay Clark, Senior Strategist, Retail

Finlay Clark

About Finlay

Finlay Clark is bigmouthmedia’s online retail expert and with just under 10 years in the industry, he has a wealth of digital experience in co-ordinating campaign activities at a strategic level to deliver a top class service to our retail clients. Working on a diverse range of ecommerce projects across the SEO, PPC, affiliates, social media and display advertising channels has given Finlay a unique perspective on the sector.

Finlay provides retail clients with a clear grasp of the digital marketing issues facing their sector, identifying where the new and future opportunities lie in this highly competitive market, monitoring the latest industry developments and competitor movements to keep clients one step ahead of the game.

Read on for Finlay's thoughts on how the online retail market has changed over recent months, upcoming opportunities and some of the key issues facing retail brands right now.

1) How would you describe the current state of the online retail market?

The current economic climate has obviously had an impact across the online retail world. Paid search campaigns are being even more closely supervised and scrutinised than ever before, and pay on performance channels such as affiliate marketing and pay on performance display advertising are proving popular as campaigns are so easily measurable and can deliver an exact ROI.

Natural search is also at the forefront of many retail brand strategies as it’s the cheapest cost per acquisition channel available.

Competitive pure plays like Amazon, Play.com, ASOS.com etc continue to lead the way in terms of innovation, but the multichannel retailers have certainly caught up in the past 3 or 4 years. The retailers who are winning online are the ones that get the basics right; simple things like having user friendly navigation, good product information, clear delivery options and the giving users the ability to track orders.

2) What are the main challenges for online retailers at the moment?

The question that all retailers are constantly asking is “what else can I do to increase conversion rate?” Retailers know that consumers shop around and do thorough research before making a purchase now. The advanced brands are really trying to hone in on differentiating their offering in order to enable them to get that crucial conversion on their site rather than on their competitor’s.

The driving force behind conversion is not always price related, and this is where the multichannel retailers have really upped their game to offer convenience to the consumer through initiatives such as ‘click& collect’. Empowering the consumer to collect an item at their leisure is much more convenient for many customers rather than waiting at home for the postman to knock.

3) Not everyone can appear above the fold. How tough is it getting for retailers to beat the competition?

There’s no doubt that online retail is a very competitive market, especially if you are just starting out. If you are new to ecommerce start out by finding a niche and try to own the search results for that niche.

Bigger mass market retailers should be thinking about the different types of content they have available to them, as all the search engines are working on improvements to their interfaces which include product search results, images, video content and more.

In an area like consumer electronics having video reviews on sites like YouTube is critical as we know that users research extensively products before they buy.

4) How important is it for retailers to take on board the principles of multi-channel retailing?

It’s extremely important, and users have now come to expect retailers will have an ecommerce website which they can visit (and buy) at any time of the year – day and night. You see this particularly at Christmas time, when on December 25th (the only day when the shops on the high street across the country are universally closed) we see record numbers of people shopping online from their favourite retailers!

Multichannel retailers can offer greater choice to the consumer on how they get their hands on their items, for example Argos has invested heavily in their supply chain to be able to show consumers exactly how many of a certain product they have in stock at their local store. You can imagine how beneficial this is during seasonal peaks when everyone is vying for the same products. More and more of the high street retailers are going to have to invest in this way in order to keep up.

However, the pure plays such as Amazon are also working really hard on their fulfilment capabilities. One of the best examples of this is ASOS.com, which is intending to offer next day delivery on orders processed up to 11pm, which clearly is a compelling proposition. This kind of innovation really benefits the consumer and really impacts on customer satisfaction.

5) What retail opportunities do you see in the realm of social media?

The vast majority of people are not using Facebook, Twitter, YouTube or Bebo to shop, but this is where users are spending more and more of their time, and it does (either directly or indirectly) become an integral part of the research/decision making process. Brands have begun to realise that people are already talking about their products and brand experiences on these sites, so it makes sense for them to participate. The clever ones are harnessing these channels to create loyal brand ambassadors, using social media to offer sneak previews, exclusive content, hold competitions, ask for feedback and engage an audience which is clearly interested.

6) Can you give us some examples of good and bad practice when it comes to retailers’ use of the online channel?

Preparing for ‘hot topic’ keywords before everyone starts searching for them is definitely best practice. For example video game retailer GAME know what are going to be the big titles this festive period and are actively using PPC and SEO techniques on pre-order titles long before they are released.

Another good practice coming from numerous fashion websites is the use of video catwalk clips of models wearing the items of clothing. This dramatically affects conversion rate if consumers can get a feel for how clothes look when worn.

Bad practice includes things like adding on hidden charges at checkout, not allowing customers to designate a separate delivery address and invoice address, displaying poor product information, and not placing enough emphasis on or not embracing UGC, a practice which dramatically increases conversions.

7) What do you see as the biggest upcoming opportunity for retailers?

Expect to see greater personalisation across the online retail sector in the coming years. Amazon have been great at this since the start, but more and more retailers are aiming to have a seamless knowledge of their consumers and their individual needs in order to tailor their offering to them across all channels. Best Buy are coming to the UK market in 2010 and they have some ambitious plans regarding customer service and personalisation which may raise the bar.

Secondly, mobile is finally having the effect that people have long predicted it would. Several retailers have launched iPhone apps that have proved very successful, e.g. Karen Millen, expect to see more use of consumers using mobile technology when they are out shopping on the high street, predominantly to check pricing and this blurs the line of whether the consumer is really online or offline.

8) Who does it better, multichannel retailers or the pure plays? Why is that?

In my opinion the pure plays still have the edge, they have had to make the online channel work for them since day one and have therefore got the experience, resources and willingness to trial and test which often drives innovation.

For many big multichannel retailers their websites still only represent a single figure percentage of total sales, which is why they have been slower to embrace online. However there are areas where multichannel retailers have the edge over pure plays and more and more of them are using this to leverage extra sales and customer satisfaction. I think there has also been a steady sea change where all retailers are recognising the need to constantly evolve their online proposition to keep up, and that can only be good news for consumers.

Click here to return to the main sector experience page, or here to check out what Andrew Girdwood, Head of Search, has to say about the current state of the digital industry.