The Barsley Brief

In this instalment of Etailwatch  Christmas sales stats, Augmented reality comes to etail, hover effects and the best of 2009.

Christmas day sales up by 29%

Econsultancy has commentated on an eDigital research survey which shows that Christmas day sales are up on last year by 29%.  Most interestingly over 75% of the people surveyed were online on Christmas day or Boxing day.  Read the full report and download the survey from Econsultancy here

Internetretailing.net also reported that Boxing day saw the most ever visitors to John Lewis’ site

Augmented Reality in etail

The web moves so quickly etailers are always looking for ways to differentiate their sites from the competition. Ian Jindal’s blog In No Particular order featured Zugara.

Zugara have created  software for a new type of fashion consumer.  “The Webcam Social Shopper.

and here it is in action on a American etailer’s site

When I saw this I really liked how well thought out the software was.  It makes a standard etail site a social shopping experience as the user is able to thumbs up or down a product, post pictures to their facebook, which will could have a viral effect on the site.  I am sceptical whether it would increase conversion, or how the quality of the user experience over a wide varied fashion retailers catalogue but I think it could really drive traffic to a site.

Enhancing your page with hover effects

The Get Elastic eCommerce Blog have posted “12 ways to enhance your online store with Javascript Hover effects.  I think this is an area which many sites are currently developing and can really improve a site’s usability.  Personally I like the use of hover over on product listing pages on swatches to make the thumbnail change colour, out of stock / promotional messaging – as it is a clear call to action to a customer and also obviously drop down menus.

I am a bit wary of using it to provide cross sell information etc as I feel when you hover over something what pops up should be expected by the customer and you don’t want to bombard them with hover overs.

Best of 2009

With the end of the year, and the end of the noughties invariably there are many “Top lists” from etail blogs, some of the ones I picked up on were

Get Elastic – Wrapping up 2009 – By just giving one top post per month this focuses you on some key website topics

Econsultancy – 24 eCommerce sites reviewed – A selection of the Website reviews that Econsultancy have written this year.

Finally

I hope you have found this issue of etail watch interesting, if you have thoughts on any of the above please leave a comment below.  Alternatively if there’s something you have read which I haven’t covered or a blog / news source you think I might enjoy please let me know (leave a comment or use the contact page)

After stumbling upon David Baldacci’s latest novel in Sainsburys I have become hooked and am quickly working my way through his back catalogue.

Split second is the first book in the Sean King and Michelle Maxwell series.  In a split second everything can change, and the King and Maxwell it did in the worst possible way, both secret service agents lost their principles.  King’s was assassinated, Maxwell’s was kidnapped several years later, but is there a connection between the two?

Here’s the blurb from the back of the book

‘He was the only one in the room who could see it. His attention stayed there for one beat, two beats, three beats, far too long. Yet who could blame him for not being able to pull his gaze away from that?’

When something distracts Secret Agent Sean King for a split second, it costs him his career and presidential candidate Clyde Ritter, his life. But what stole his attention? And why was Ritter shot? Eight years later Michelle Maxwell is on the fast track through the ranks of the Secret Service when her career is stopped short: Presidential candidate John Bruno is abducted from a funeral home while under her protection.

The similarity between the two cases drives Michelle to re-open investigations into the Ritter fiasco and join forces with attractive ex-agent King. The pair are determined to get to the bottom of what happened in those critical moments. Meanwhile, high-ranking members of the legal system and key witnesses from both cases are going missing. King is losing friends, colleagues and clients fast and his ex-lover, Joan Dillinger, is playing curious games – she wants Sean back, but she also owes him for something . . .

As with the other Baldacci books I have read I was hooked from the first page, I like the fast paced style of the book.  However while there was an exciting conclusion to the story I felt it was slightly over complicated and implausible, but it was a great read!

Click here to find out more about the book and buy from Amazon.co.uk

I’ve struggled to know what to do with the Barsley Brief, originally started to chronicle my charity cycle to Paris, since then I have lacked direction for the site and “blogged” about a range of different interests and thoughts.  A friend suggested I could use the blog to commentate on my interest of eCommerce / etailing.  I have decided to start ( who knows this could be the end too!) by looking at the etail news stories of the week.

Last Delivery Dates

One of the big stories that most sites have picked up on this week is last order dates.  Last year Christmas Day was on a Thursday, this year a Friday.  Therefore this year the majority of etailers had a “free shipping” closing date of Friday 18th December.  Internet Retailing highlighted several retailers are offering a Christmas eve order and delivery within the M25.   This includes Amazon and Net a Porter who allows orders up to 10am Christmas Eve.  While I am sure these sites have received a fair amount of press for this, how many orders are they actually going to make with delivery charges of up to £19.50.  Neither site is advertising their delivery proposition strongly.  Infact on Net a Porter I struggled to find any mention of their Christmas delivery dates

eBuyer last delivery dates

IMRG was the first I saw mention eBuyer who are offering customers the opportunity to order up until 11pm 23rd December and have the item delivered anywhere in mainland UK next day (Christmas eve).  They are “so” confident that they can fufil this delivery promise that if they don’t they will get your shipping refunded and get shipping free on your next order.  They advertise this message prominently on their homepage, but I can’t help feel that if they did fail to meet this delivery customers would not be placated by free delivery!

The Snow Valley “The Snow Patrol blog” have put together a pie chart of delivery dates, from 155 retailers over half have a Christmas delivery deadline of 21st or 22nd December (Monday / Tuesday).  One interesting fact they note is that a lot of retailers are not putting delivery dates on their homepage or clearly through the site.  The delivery message can be used as a strong call to action and help conversion.

Personalised Greeting Cards

We all know the annoying Moonpig advert on the TV inviting you to log on and send a friend a personalised greetings card.  Moonpig have been very successful taking a turnover of £20.9 million in the year ending 30th April 2009 and profits of 6.7m (source Printweek).   IMRG reported this week that ASDA has taken personalised cards to the logical next step.  ASDA have partnered with Hallmark to offer personalised cards direct on the Asda website -  I think a great idea, buy your greeting card while you do your weekly shop, why go else where?  Currently the personalised cards area has a separate shopping basket to the rest of ASDA, if however in the future they are able to allow greetings cards to work in a common shopping basket this could be a really successful feature, as many customers will be happy to make a impulse purchase.

Top Lists

Coming up to the end of the year we’ll see many top lists on a range of subjects, as my last feature this week I have picked Econsultancy’s top 25 blog posts of 2009.  Econsultancy have given details of their top 25 posts of 2009, many are social media related which I thinks reflects the way that they have taken to social media as one of the first (that I saw) to have a twitterfall on their homepage, and now on each post.  Some articles I found interesting are -

How Amazon made $2.7bn with one small tweak - This post looks at the subject of product reviews and how to use them to increase sales.

12 brilliant 404 pages – This made me chuckle, good to see helpful and informative 404 pages, but perhaps worrying that they could be found!

Until next week

Have a Merry Christmas!  In the next week there are sure to be stories around when etailers Christmas sales start, the sales potential of the web on Christmas day (post turkey of course!).  If you have enjoyed reading this, please leave a comment with your views or feel free to suggest a story I’ve missed that you felt I should have included.

‘I need a war . . .’

Nicolas Creel, a super-rich arms dealer, decides that the best way to boost his business is to start a new cold war – and he won’t let anything or anyone get in his way.

As international tensions rise and the superpowers line up against each other, the lives of three very different people will never be the same again. As intelligence agent Shaw, academic Anna Fischer and ambitious journalist Katie James are all drawn into Creel’s games, can anything stop the world from spiralling out of control?

This terrifying global thriller delivers all the twists and turns, emotional drama, unforgettable characters and can’t-put-it-down pacing that Baldacci fans expect – and still goes beyond anything he’s written before.

Soon after reading my first David Baldacci I have read a second and I wasn’t disappointed!  Whereas First Family was part of a series of books containing the same characters, The Whole Truth is a stand alone book featuring Nicholas Creel an arms dealer who wants to take the world back to the cold war.  The hero of the story is Shaw an intelligence agent working for a shady worldwide group who are able to do what governments can’t!

One great thing I found reading this book was that as the reader you knew everything that was happening from both sides of the story, rather than the “bad guy” being revealed at the end following him through the book made the story more gripping and explained the world of Perception Management.  A great read!

Click here to buy The Whole Truth from Amazon UK

I picked up The Associate in my local Supermarket….

It’s a deadly game of blackmail. And they’re making him play. Kyle McAvoy is one of the outstanding legal students of his generation: he’s good looking, has a brilliant mind and a glittering future ahead of him. But he has a secret from his past, a secret that threatens to destroy his fledgling career and, possibly, his entire life. One night that secret catches up with him in the form of some bad men in a dark alley – they have a deeply compromising video of the incident that haunts him. The men make it clear to Kyle that he no longer owns his own future – that he must do as they tell him, or the video will be made public knowledge, with all the unpleasant consequences. What price do they demand for Kyle’s secret? Strangely, it is for Kyle to do exactly what any ambitious young lawyer would want to do: take a job in New York as an associate at the largest law firm in the world , a job that is incredibly well paid and, with mammoth hours and outrageous billing, could lead to partnership and a fortune. But Kyle won’t be working for the company, but against it – passing on the secrets of the company’s biggest trial to date, a dispute between two defense contractors worth billions of dollars to the victor. Now Kyle is caught between the criminal forces manipulating him and the FBI, who would love to unmask the conspiracy. Will his intellect, cunning and bravery be enough to extricate him from an impossible dilemma? Full of twists and turns and reminiscent of “The Firm”, “The Associate” is vintage John Grisham.

I have read the majority of John Grisham’s books and enjoyed them, The Associate is no exception.  The book starts as Kyle is in the last days of law school, and he becomes forced into a career in a New York law firm as an agent for forces unknown.  My only complaint is the ending, while good after such a build up it is all over too quick.

And now a cheesy YouTube Trailer

Buy The Associate at Amazon UK