Holiday Shopping On The Web
Consumers who shop online this holiday season are expected to spend about $12 billion, and that's double what was spent last year. But sometimes shopping on the Internet isn't as much fun as it should be, especially if you can't find what you're looking for, or if the gifts you've chosen don't arrive in time.
Kelly Mooney, an online shopping expert, stopped by The Early Show to offer some advice.
As managing director of the Resource Intelligence Group, Mooney leads a team that ranks 50 leading online consumer sites to help people decide where to spend their e-dollars. They evaluate the sites by criteria, like how long it takes for them to load, efficiency of the search engine, methods of check-out and payment, and post-purchase communication.
They also interview 3,000 consumers who have shopped at each of these sites (200 per site). Mooney says that after they use the consumers' experiences to see what the most important aspects are for them, and then weigh them against their own analysis, it's about the same most of the time.
According to Mooney, at the end of the day, the two most important aspects of an online merchant's Web site are speed and ease.
The absolute worst problem a customer could encounter when shopping online is ordering something that's out of stock when they tell you it's in stock. Mooney says that was the Toys 'R Us disaster last holiday season. "I think it will be diminished significantly this year, but it does still happen," she adds.
Some of the sites Mooney recommends:
- E-Toys, which has been consistently outstanding, according to Mooney. She gives especially high marks to the site's "wish list," which makes it possible for parents to keep an eye on what their children are asking for, as it's sent out to relatives. ."It's a great way to get parents involved and to let gift givers know what your kids want," adds Mooney. Also, she says, E-Toys makes it easy to find a gift for a child of any age, and also what is recommended for each age group.
Web link: www.etoys.com - 800.com is an interesting site because they're a consumer electronics site and they do comparison shopping, so you can compare three products simultaneously and get good product descriptions. Once you see the product you want you can navigate up and down so you can go to a more sophisticated product or a less sophisticated product. A lot of sites don't categorize that way.
Web link: www.800.com - The Gap does a lot of things well, and one of the things they offer is a one-time price adjustment. That means that if your item is marked down within 14 days, you can bring your receipt back and they'll reimburse you for the difference. Also, if you shop online, it's a universal shopping cart. That means yocan get things from Gap, GapKids or BabyGap and check out all at once, which is a great convenience. And they also take things back in their stores.
Web link: www.gap.com - Victoria's Secret has something that they're calling "wrapped and ready" gifts, so for shoppers who are worried that their choices may not be in stock, it's an added benefit. They've simplified the choice and reassured you that it will actually show up. And they make everything look beautiful with their gift wrapping and a hand-written card. They charge you for it, but, in Mooney's book, it's worth it. They'll also tell you what day you'll get the merchandise, whereas other companies generally will not be very specific about that.
Web link: www.victoriassecret.com - Amazon.com makes it pretty easy to find what you want. They have a great search engine that finds relevant information, as well as consumer reviews. They let you save your address and info in case you're a repeat shopper, and they make it easy so you can check your order status, which makes it easy for the customer to know what's going on.
Web link: www.amazon.com - Personal service sites sell high-end products, so they know they need to deliver great service. That gives them a bit of an edge. Mooney says her team had success with sites including Ashford.com.
Web link: www.ashford.com.
Among the sites that get Mooney's thumbs down:
- Zainybrainy. Mooney calls it a "great store with a great concept and great products but they haven't figured out their online shopping yet. The biggest problem is it's really, really slow and nobody has the patience to sit through it while the other toy sites are zipping along. The bottom line is convenience and it doesn't deliver for the fundamental thing that you go online for."
- Sears. It is a department store with a limited selection of merchandise. For example, says Mooney, "There's no apparel, which is confusing for a customer, because you do expect to have a full range of categories. And it's difficult to search for things online. We searched for T-shirts, and we got dozens of things that weren't even related. I think that what we find with all the sites that suffer is that they don't have checkout processes that work."
- Tower Records. Mooney says this is a cool store with a lot of energy, but it hasn't really translated that to the web. "They're trying to keep up with a category that's ahead of them," she adds. "The site is slow, the reps are either not available or not trained, and their check-out process is confusing and frustrating. It fails to be intuitive or it slaps on charges that you werent expecting."
- Shop at familiar sites or sites that have been recommended to you by a reliable source. If you shop at a site you have never heard of, you are taking a risk.
- Look at the company's policy and see if you agree with them. Some sites offer money back, but some only give credit to their site. And some don't offer returns unless you can prove the merchandise is defective. Also, you want to know what they're going to do with your private information. Amazon just caused an uproar by saying that they changed their private information policy so if they merge, your information could be sold.
- Don't give unnecessary information. Usually, the payment page has required fields and unrequired fields. (Mooney herself says she never fills out the unrequired fields.)
- In following up with your order, many places have online order tracking so you can check the status on your own, which is reassuring because you don't have to wait eight days and wonder. And companies that have those features generally have their act together more than those who don't.
- Availability: Make sure the product you want is available.
- Understand "total delivery time." A company can say the product is available in 3-5 days and then it's shipped in 3-5 days, so you may think it's coming in 3-5 days, but that really means 6-10 days.
- Shop with familiar companies and look for wrapped and ready gifts (like those at Red Envelope) to be sure your gifts will be ready on time.
- Gift certificates are a great thing to get on the web. And it's an awesome last-minute gift because you can either have it sent electronically so it shows up in an email to the recipient, or you can have it sent.
- Apparel is an easy thing to get because it's lightweight in terms of shipping. The personal care companies make it really easy to choose a gift, and they make it look really pretty if you're sending to another location.
- Luxury companies do a good job of picking simple items like a pashmina or bath salts and they make them look really great when they show up.