Web Bits

Welcome to Web Bits, an occasional column focusing on the issues and trends affecting the online world.

As a compilation of reports, news and user tips, Web Bits is designed to enhance your business by giving you a better understanding of e-commerce and practical advice for improving your overall experience while online.

Here’s what’s happening this month:

Online Drives Offline

Researching first online drives purchases offline. That’s the message behind a study recently conducted by Yahoo! and Channel Force, a training and merchandising consulting company.

Although not specific to the uniform industry, the report offers a glimpse into the habits and tastes of those who surf the net before setting out to a traditional brick and mortar store.

Consumers who research products like televisions and digital cameras online spend an average of 10 percent more in-store than their non-web searching counterparts, the results say.

Key findings include:

• Internet primary research tool: 75 percent of those who researched purchases before visiting a store used the internet as their primary source of information. The leading online resources were retail websites (73 percent), manufacturer websites (68 percent) and search engines (49 percent).
• Internet researchers spend more: Consumers who use search engines to research online spend 10 percent more than non-searchers.
• Internet researchers ready to buy: More than 80 percent of consumers researching before making a purchase end up buying a brand from their original consideration set. The remaining 20 percent said an in-store sales person was highly influential in their decision.
• Demographics skew male, young, higher income: Men (44 percent) are much more likely than women (27 percent) to regularly shop this way. Among age groups, those ages 25 to 34 (41 percent) are the most avid cross-channel shoppers vs. 55 to 64 (31 percent), and 65 and older (23 percent). Consumers with annual incomes of at least $50,000 (44 percent) are more likely to shop in this manner than consumers with lower incomes (28 percent).

E-tail: The Next Generation

Over 50 percent of retailers intend to roll out upgrades of their websites over the next two years, according to the RIS News Retail Technology Study, as they try and create online environments that engage consumers on a deeper level.

The upgrades being made by retailers are part of "the natural evolution of the Web into next-generation technologies, especially in such areas as logical search and navigation, recommendations based on best sellers or previous purchases, product comparisons and reviews, live chat and social communities."

Aerosoles is one retailer identified by RIS News as having gone the upgrade route.

The company has improved the visual presentation of shoes on its site with zoom functions along with imaging capabilities that enable shoppers to see designs in a variety of colors with the click of the mouse.

Aerosoles has also upgraded its search and navigation capabilities. Shoppers can search for shoes by style, color, heel height, and size. Keywords can help to further refine the search.

User Tip: Better Googling:

Sure everybody loves Google. But did you know that it’s more than just a search engine? The following is a small sampling of some of its other very usable features:

Calculator: You can use the regular search box to make certain calculations and conversions. Examples: 2+99= will get you 101; 2*2= will get you 4. To run conversions, use the following format: 100 miles = ? km or 100 pounds = ? kilos. Need to convert US dollars into Indian rupees? 1 USD = ?.

Definitions: If you type uniform into Google, you get a list of uniform companies, not what the word means. But let's say you didn't know what a uniform was and wanted a definition of the word. Typing define:uniform will give you definitions.

Images: Use this feature — click “images” on the front page — to find photographs on the Web. Of course, just because you find a photo doesn’t mean you can reprint it, but that’s another issue.

Phone Directory: Part 1: In the regular search box, type in a person's name (or a business name), followed by city and state and you should get telephone number. Example: Starbucks, New York, NY. To get even more specific results, you can type in the words "rphonebook:" for residential listings or "bphonebook:" for business listings. Example: rphonebook: Smith, New York, NY. It only gives you the first 600 results, so you might need to be more specific.

Part 2: The regular search box also works as a reverse phonebook. Type in a phone number and if the number is listed, you will get back who owns it. Example: 212-854-1754.

Part 3: For its phone listings, not only does Google provide you with a number, but often, with a map as well. Since some people don't want such personal information available on the Web, Google does help you remove it from their database. Removing it from Google does NOT remove it from other parts of the Web, however.

Domain Search: Allows you to restrict a search to a particular domain or website - thus cutting down on the number of results you get. Here's the Google explainer: You can use Google to search only within one specific website by entering the search terms you're looking for, followed by the word site and a colon followed by the domain name. For example, here's how you'd find admission information on the Stanford University site: admission site:www.stanford.edu