Although online shopping has slowed, it has certainly not stopped. Online retail sales in the U.K. grew fourteen percent from April 2008 to April 2009, says trade association the Interactive Media in Retail Group and technology and consulting company Capgemini. While this growth is slower than in the past, it is much better than the rest of the economy. The IMRG Capgemini Index also notes that since the index launched in April 2000, it has recorded five thousand percent growth in online sales. During the same period, offline sales have grown only twenty one percent.

Besides shopping online in general, UK shoppers are getting bolder in their shopping behavior. A new study from ComScore, a leading Internet trends analysis firm, shows that eight in ten UK Internet users make purchases online plus shoppers in the U.K. make some 36 percent of their online retail purchases from work locations!

The study went on to say that while seventy five percent of the time spent online is spent while at home and twenty five percent while at work, work time purchases accounted for thirty five percent of all purchases made.
What does this information tell us about the UK shopper?

Perhaps at work shopping is the natural outgrowth of a pressured life in general or the need to be at work more hours of the day, leaving less time for usual life activities. It may also indicate that it is become easier for people to shop from work, either because employers allow some personal usage or because shoppers are getting better at making their purchases quickly and keeping their activities undercover.

How can you as an online retailer use this information to help your sales? Here are some suggestions.

The data suggests that shoppers are making purchases quickly while at work. You can help by facilitating a very rapid ability to shop on your site. How about:

– Registration so that shopping can be expressed, e.g., demographic, shipping and credit card info retained and shown for confirmation.

– Rapid ordering by catalog number

– Shopping cart that retains items until emptied by the customer so the customer can leave site abruptly, return and resume shopping, a likely scenario in the work setting.

– Shopping list maintenance. If you sell items that are shopped for on a regular basis such as cosmetic, craft supplies, etc, maintain a customer shopping list that displays when they sign in. They can eliminate anything they do not want then click and order.

– Pair products with related products so that when your purchaser buys a blouse, she sees skirts, shorts, slacks and jewelry that match so she can put together an outfit in a hurry.

– Offer to combine orders placed at different times but before the order is shipped, say with ten hours. That gives the work shopper the opportunity to finish shopping at home without worrying about two base shipping fees.

– Watch your sites statistics and if you are seeing this kind of shift, be sure that your customer service offerings are still timed to the right parts of the day.

Staying on top of trends and modifying your approach to meet changing customer needs puts you ahead of the retail pack.

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Category: Internet/Tools and Resources/Online Shopping
Keywords: online shopping, sales, marketing, shopping list, dropshipping, internet trends, wholesale,drop ship