Wiggle revamps retail site image system to boost sales

Online sports retailer Wiggle is rolling out ‘360 spin’ imaging across its entire product range after seeing a significant uplift in sales of items featuring the photography.

The technology allows consumers to take control of an image and view a product from many different angles.
The online sports retailer, which sells cycling, swimming and running products, conducted A/B tests over three months using imaging specialist SpinMe’s 360 spin technology on different product categories.
These were measured against categories with static zoom and alternative image options only.
Wiggle has tens of thousands of product lines and originally used 360 spin imaging across bikes, running and cycling shoes and wheels. It will now roll this out to its most popular product lines including running and cycling clothing, cycling helmets, sunglasses and bike components.
“We introduced 360 spin photography to enhance user experience on the site but the business case for it is strong – so much so that we’re building a photographic studio on-site to reflect the healthy increase in sales,” said Thomas Dibley, Cycle Marketing Manager at Wiggle. “360 imaging will also play a big part in our individual brand marketing plans this year, where we work with those featured on the site to enhance their retail space.”
Wiggle previously shot all product photography at SpinMe’s studio in Cheltenham. SpinMe is working with Wiggle to set up a large on-site photography studio which will use SpinMe’s unique hardware – FotoRobot, which allows precision 360 shots to be taken – along with SpinMe Studio Professional imaging software to create all product images for the website.
“Wiggle’s new studio has doubled its capacity to produce 360 imaging,” said David Brint, Marketing Director at SpinMe. “It’s making the process more efficient, while customer experience is significantly improved – users can turn a product round to view it from whatever angle they prefer, stop at any point and zoom in on a chosen feature.”
Wiggle is the UK’s number one online cycle retailer and fifth most popular online sports store. Former Asda CEO Andy Bond is chairman of the company, which was recently sold for £180m to private equity house Bridgepoint. Wiggle sells online in 70 countries, with overseas sales accounting for 60% of its business.
“We’ll be focusing on enhancing our international operations in 2012, and the good thing about the 360 product images we create is that they are internationally understandable – they don’t need to be localised for each website,” Dibley added.
www.spinme.co.uk