Fathers day shopping ideas

Jun 06 2007

I love shopping online. I have mentioned this before I am sure, but I think that one of the biggest assets the internet has is ecommerce. Now, a lot of pundits in the web 2.0 world will tell you that ecommerce has topped out at around 15% of the retail market, which they will tell you is similar to direct mail order marketing back when everyone thought it was going to be huge, back in its hay day. And if you listen to some people who are trying to sell newspapers or whatever, you might start to believe that the value of ecommerce is smaller than it really is. The fact remains that people are spending more and more time online. And when it comes to shopping more people are making the decision about what they want to purchase as a result of the time they spend online.

For example, take belisi.com, (think top shelf, quality Neckties) they have an outstanding web page that show cases their products to the world. People will spend a little time looking around this site, and it will have a huge impact on what they think about mens clothing.

Some people suggest that people are spending up to 5 hours researching online before making big ticket purchases. Like cars for example.

So, when it comes to fathers day, which is just around the corner, you can bet that most of the nations buying decisions are going to be made well before any person sets foot in a retail store.

If we turn back to my favourite Neckties retailer Belsi (Belsi means beautiful), it is not hard to see why they own that 15% segment of the mens clothing market. The site is easy to get around, you can clearly see the quality and you feel the brand when you are in the store. But, perhaps this is why online retailers have not captured more than a 15% share of the market, because they cannot communicate those ideas as well as a store like Belsi. Or maybe it is that the market is still developing and not near maturity. Either way, the importance of developing your web strategy as a retailer should be clear, whether you want to be a winner this father’s day, or in the future, you need to make sure you get it right, and continue to improve. Otherwise you are just letting sales go by, and you will not survive this subtle but obvious evolution.