27 Feb 09 Bringing visitors to your site can be more expensive (and make less sense) than going to them

 

By now, the bricks-and-mortar retailers who are performing the best online have moved past the idea of the company website as the sole indicator of a successful Internet presence. Just like having a giant billboard at your store isn’t enough to bring shoppers in store, neither is having an amazing website (Hence catalogue distribution in the real life).

Five years ago, it may have been enough to have a heavily trafficked brand website in order to be considered a successful online advertiser. However in the light of multi-channel shopping – which we can safely accept as the norm in Australian retail today – having one point of contact with your consumer is no longer enough.

Making product and offer information available through third-party sources and websites has the added bonus of giving the appearance of review and verification, which can help attract those consumers who give more weight to information provided independently rather than via traditional advertising channels.

The bottom line is that reducing all the barriers to purchase for a potential customer is name of the game, and these barriers consist of time, money, effort. By leaving your home turf and playing “away” you can reduce the time and effort for consumers, the only real necessity to having an onsite visit is if you are performing trusted e-commerce transactions, otherwise, save the hassle to your users and inform them where they are, when they want and drive them in-store. The only issue with this is that you need to stop using website visits as a KPI and focus on measuring unique eyeballs and sales.