Boy, That’s Rich
Rich media and applications enhance the online shopping experience
September 2007 By Kate DeBevois
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With all the flashy, albeit annoying, pop-ups vying for e-consumers’ attention, smart companies are focusing instead on using rich media and rich Internet applications (RIAs) to engage potential customers, increase clickthroughs and ROI, and reduce shopping cart abandonment.
Marketers are using merchandising suites for product location, color change and product detail, configuration and catalog browsing. While not all RIAs or rich media options have specific titles because the technology still is evolving, the following are some popular formats.
• Pageless checkouts—Rich-application boxes or drop-down menus record transaction and ordering data without reloading the product description page and help streamline online transactions.
• Video customer reviews—According to Ken Burke, CEO of Petaluma, Calif.-based e-commerce technology provider MarketLive, more merchants are using video-based customer reviews. They then post the reviews to video-sharing sites like YouTube. He notes that video-based customer reviews “are much more believable since you can really see and hear the customer’s review in their voice.” Early results, he says, are showing higher conversion on products with video-based customer reviews.
• Video-casting—Similar to podcasting, some merchants are creating product-demonstration videos for their sites as well as syndicating video and then using the video-casting network it creates to drive traffic.
• Commercials on video-sharing sites—Merchants also are producing their own video content, such as product demos, commercials and how-to videos, and making them available on video-sharing sites as well as posting them to their own sites.
• Rich Internet applications—RIAs are Web applications that have features and functions similar to desktop applications. According to Wikipedia, RIAs “transfer the processing necessary for the user interface to the Web client but keep the bulk of the data on the application server.” Burke says RIAs are sweeping the Internet and provide better user interfaces, more functionality and better displays.
Barrier Breakthroughs
Accessibility barriers to rich media applications are a thing of the past thanks to increased Internet saturation. A July 2007 Pew Internet & American Life Project study, Home Broadband Adoption, reports 70 percent of Americans with home Internet access have a broadband connection.
To capitalize on the more prevalent accessibility, marketers increasingly are turning to rich media and RIAs to meet and exceed customers’ expectations. According to a March 2007 Forrester report, Rich Internet Applications: Not Just For Customers, 26 percent of businesses have implemented RIAs on customer-facing sites, with another 50 percent either currently developing them or considering development in the next year.
Rich media and RIAs have the potential to do more than increase clickthroughs. Because 75 percent of household Internet users shop online, opportunities to boost brand loyalty abound, according to a 2006 Forrester report, The State of Consumers and Technology. Retailers that add rich features “increase conversion as much as 46 percent and revenues by as much 90 percent,” says Sheila Dahlgren, director of product marketing at San Jose, Calif.-based Adobe Systems Inc., a technology and software products provider. “Rich media offer customers enhanced online experiences, leading to increased brand loyalty,” she says.
Forrester also recently commented on the financial side of RIAs in its report, The Business Case for Rich Internet Applications. According to principal analyst Ron Rogowski, Forrester completed two ROI models, one for a PC manufacturer and one for a travel site. For the manufacturer, Forrester estimated, “a rich Internet application can boost conversion 5 to 20 percent, increase order size up to 5 percent and could earn an overall ROI of 185 to 443 percent,” Rogowski says.
Engage, Entertain, Inform
Captivate your customers by allowing them to view a three-dimensional product in different colors, add and remove components, or put together outfits. Combine that with a seamless shopping experience via pageless checkout and, according to the numbers, consumers are more likely to return to your site instead of a competitor’s. So says DoubleClick’s 2006 Ad Serving Study, which reports that rich media and RIAs are at least 50 percent more likely to result in a post-impression sale than static Web applications.
In addition, “Rich media help break down the touch-and-feel barriers of shopping online by better engaging shoppers, guiding them through the entire shopping experience and highlighting a product’s most attractive features and details, as well as improving overall customer satisfaction,” Dahlgren says.
Primarily used by apparel and electronics Web sites, rich applications such as pageless shopping carts, 360-degree product views and interactive video demonstrations engage the consumer, drawing them into an e-commerce site. For example, automotive sites increasingly are using interactive auto-building features that allow consumers to configure vehicles by viewing the interior and choosing add-ons within the application without reloading the page.
Enticing consumers to return to a site between purchases, Burke says, often presents a challenge for merchants. He explains that using video to communicate how-to information, fashion shows for apparel merchants or even interviews with experts is one solution to help increase Web site traffic.
Experts expect to see more video used on e-commerce sites. For example, video clips sometimes are used to run live product demos, show how products are assembled, explain how electronic accessories work or extend a 30-second TV ad into a more engaging story video on the Web.
According to research MarketLive has conducted, rich applications circumvent consumers’ objections to purchasing online. “These benefits directly combat e-commerce obstacles such as being unable to physically try on and touch products—the reason 39 percent of shoppers who prefer to buy offline say they do so—and difficulty with product discovery and checkout. Fifteen percent of those who abandon carts say it’s because checkout is too complicated,” Burke says.
The Branding Angle
Companies using rich applications as a tool to express brand create an association that keeps consumers returning for a simple, fun shopping experience.
For example, Chung says, luxury brands sell a high-end experience. However, if consumers visit a high-end brand’s Web site and it doesn’t deliver functionality or customer service, they may be disappointed with the disparity between “the spending market and what the company actually delivers online,” he says. “Brands are becoming more and more defined by the experience consumers have online with them.”
Keep It Simple
Effective, well-designed applications are more important than ever when working with video and other rich media. Moderation is key; too many flashy details are distracting and don’t add to the experience, experts advise.
A recent Forrester study, Web Users Want Rich Internet Applications, reported that more than 52 percent of Internet consumers have used an RIA. When asked what made RIAs valuable, 63 percent said they were easy to use, 40 percent said they had great content and 35 percent said they helped visualize products.
Evaluations, Evolutions and Change
Experts agree, video is where it’s at right now. Burke expects the increasingly widespread use of video to change e-commerce. “Merchants need to get on the bandwagon or they will be left behind quickly. With the advent of YouTube, the Web has once again dramatically changed the way people communicate,” he says.
RIAs already are changing, and will continue to change e-commerce, Burke adds. “Merchants [will] be able to create easier and much more visually stimulating ways to display and merchandise products,” he says.
But the online scene constantly is evolving and what is popular today may change over the next few weeks and months. By the time this article goes to press, there may even be new applications to improve the consumer experience. Regardless of the application du jour, successful e-tailers always evaluate ways to improve the consumer experience. Experts agree, marketers who approach challenges by asking, “How can I make the online experience better for my customer?” will find solutions to achieve positive results.
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