Rich media and merchandising tools are the most effective online features to attact new customers, according to a new survey.
The Adobe Scene7 2011 Survey: Customer Experience in the Next Digital Decade is the companies fifth annual quantitative study to identify the online enhancements marketers are investing in to raise customer experience and drive conversion.
Retailers, advertising / digital agencies, media and publishing companies and computer hardware, software and services companies were asked to pinpoint things they currently deploy or plan to deploy in these categories: analytics, digital advertising, mobile, personalisation, rich media and merchandising and social media.
They were also polled on the effectiveness of these tactics, including impact on conversion.
1,941 respondents participated in this year’s survey, more than triple last year. Respondents are employed by businesses headquartered primarily in North America, Western Europe and Japan.
Key findings and conclusions:
• Rich media and merchandising enhancements maintain their top effectiveness rankings by the highest number of people rating them “very effective.” For the third year in a row, the features rated “very effective” by the most respondents belong to the rich media category, with multimedia product viewing (integrating images, video, Flash, audio, spin, etc.) taking the top spot, followed by videos and mobile product information.
• 73% of the businesses surveyed say they plan to invest in site redesigns or would otherwise make significant enhancements to improve their site’s ROI. The vast majority (82%) say they plan to deploy those enhancements within the year, up 9% from a year ago.
• Analytics, social media, and rich media/merchandising are the most deployed tactics globally, while mobile apps, social executions and rich media are among the top planned.
• Analytics tools for measuring and optimising online experiences is the most deployed tactic globally, used by 55% of the respondents, and in line with last year’s findings, social media and rich media tactics also rank among the most adopted. At least a quarter of all respondents have applied some executions in analytics, social media and rich media.
• Mobile cracks the top planned deployments for the first time since the survey first began in 2009, suggesting the channel is finally finding its audience after years of hype. This year, iPhone apps are the most planned deployment, cited by 27% of the respondents. It shares the top spot with interactive catalogues, which leads planned deployments for the second year in a row. Just behind are iPad apps, advertising on social networking sites and branded social community pages, cited by 25% of the respondents.
• Of the deployments in the low single digits, mobile registers the highest planned execution rates, particularly apps for the Android smartphones and tablets. With a 4% deployment rate for Android smartphone apps, and 3% for Android tablets, their respective planned deployments are 23% and 18%. Other planned mobile executions with planned rates above 20% include mobile-optimised websites and interactive catalogues.
Below are the features that drew the most “very effective” ratings (actual or expected) by respondents who have deployed or plan to deploy them:
1. Multi-media product viewing (images, video, Flash, audio, spin): 39%
2. Videos for merchandising, advertising and demonstration: 36%
3. Mobile product information: 36%
4. Product tours (combinations of guided spin, zoom imagery, videos or animations with copy): 34%
5. Mobile check inventory status, in-store or web: 34%
6. Visual filtering and advanced search on product features: 34%
7. Interactive catalogues and brochures: 34%
8. Web-to-Print solutions for custom print products and materials: 34%
• Personalisation features continue to be among the least deployed tactics, yet collect some of the highest “very effective” ratings from people who have deployed them or are planning to deploy them. This suggests that while marketers see the value of personalisation techniques to tailor content and offers to their target audiences, they perceive hurdles to implement personalisation. The personalisation tactic with the highest planned rate is geo-targeted site content at 21%, with 30% of respondents rating it “very effective”.
• Social takes root across all the categories measured. In the digital advertising category, serving impressions in social networking sites ranked first as the top planned execution at 25%, while in the analytics category, tools for measuring social ROI is the top planned at 21%.
• EMEA drew the highest proportion of respondents (78%) saying their company planned to invest in site redesigns or would otherwise make significant enhancements to improve site ROI. Japan showed the lowest commitment at 67%, compared to North America at 73%.
• Among deployed tactics, website analytics is the most widely adopted across all regions, with EMEA and Japan reaching penetration rates as high as 60%. Other top North America and EMEA deployed tactics skew social, while Japan’s top deployed tactics are dominated by both rich media and social. Blogs appear to have the most consistent deployment rates worldwide, adopted by about a third of respondents across all regions.
• While the no. 1 planned execution in North America is advertising on social sites (29%) and EMEA is iPhone app (34%), the rest of these regions’ top planned deployments are more biased towards rich media. Interactive catalogues is the second most planned execution in both regions. Among EMEA’s top five planned deployments are 3-D visualization and multi-media product viewing; in North America, quick looks and rollover views also made the top cut. Meanwhile, Japan’s top four planned executions are exclusively mobile, with Android apps ranking no. 1 at 23%.
• Though Japan’s top planned executions are related to mobile, its features rated very effective by the most respondents contains no mobile executions and are instead led by analytics that create differentiated offers based on user data (37%). In contrast, mobile executions drew the most or nearly the most ‘very effective’ ratings for both North America and EMEA. Multimedia product viewing was no. 1 by number of people rating it “very effective”, tied with videos in North America, and mobile check order status in EMEA.
Source: www.adobe.com