Wunderkind Announces Strategic Partnership with Contentsquare to Expand Insights for Brand Marketers and Retailers

Performance marketing platform and experience analytics platform to boost analytics and user understanding for eCommerce customers

NEW YORK, NY – April 5, 2022 – Wunderkind (“the Company”), a leading performance marketing engine that scales one-to-one messages for top retailers, today announced the launch of a strategic partnership with Contentsquare, a digital experience analytics AI-powered platform that provides rich and contextual insight into customer behaviors, feelings and intent — at every touchpoint in their journey.

This strategic integration with Contentsquare allows eCommerce brands to uncover in-depth insights into the behavior of users identified by Wunderkind campaigns. Marketers can leverage Contentsquare to determine the specific shopping behavior of users that engage with Wunderkind campaigns and use that insight to make site changes and optimize the shopping experience, ultimately driving increased revenue. More than 50 mutual eCommerce customers will initially benefit from the collaborative user behavior insights, with even more top retailers expected to benefit from the new partnership in the coming weeks and months.

“Wunderkind’s expertise in helping brands achieve greater customer engagement and revenue, combined with Contentsquare’s proven success in understanding the user experience, will undoubtedly empower brands to make more informed, strategic and data-driven marketing decisions,” said Michael Osborne, President, Wunderkind. “We are excited to deliver an even greater understanding of site traffic and customer behavior to our valued clients through this partnership.”

By leveraging the Wunderkind-Contentsquare partnership, leading retailers such as UrbanStems, Tumi, and Hugo Boss will be able to understand more about their users, and tailor and personalize their customers’ experiences more effectively. 

“Contentsquare’s digital experience analytics platform helps companies better recognize customer preferences to create more human experiences using rich and contextual insight,” said Gilad Zubery, Executive Vice President, Global Business Development & Partnerships, Contentsquare.

“We are thrilled to partner with Wunderkind and combine our respective industry expertise to improve the customer experience, deliver even greater value in personalized messaging, and fuel the understanding, trust, and creativity brand marketers need to win in today’s competitive marketplace.”

The Wunderkind-Contentsquare integration is now live and available for customers to use. To learn more, visit, https://partners.contentsquare.com/technology-partners/wunderkind.

About Wunderkind

Wunderkind is a leading performance marketing engine that scales one-to-one messages for top brands. Digital businesses use Wunderkind to remember who site visitors are better than ever before, allowing them to deliver high-performing, one-to-one messages on websites, through emails and texts, and in ads at a scale that’s not otherwise possible. Wunderkind drives $2.8 billion dollars annually in directly attributable revenue for top eCommerce brands like Uniqlo, Sonos and HelloFresh, often ranking as a top-3 revenue channel in their own analytics. Wunderkind is maniacally obsessed with ROI and aims to be the infrastructural interface between individuals and brands in a world where consumers choose what they want, from whom, and when. Learn more by visiting the Wunderkind site

About Contentsquare

Contentsquare delivers the power to make the digital world more human. Its AI-powered platform provides rich and contextual insight into customer behaviors, feelings and intent — at every touchpoint in their journey — enabling businesses to build empathy and create lasting impact. The global leader in digital experience analytics, Contentsquare helps brands everywhere transform the way they do business, allowing them to take action at enterprise scale and build customer trust with security, privacy and accessibility. More than 850 leading brands use Contentsquare to grow their business, deliver more customer happiness and move with greater agility in a constantly changing world. Its insights power the customer experience on over 1 million websites worldwide. Founded in Paris and with offices around the world, Contentsquare has raised $810m in investment funding from leading investors, including Softbank, BlackRock and others. For more information, visit www.contentsquare.com 

Wunderkind Media Contacts

KCSA Strategic Communications
Wunderkind@kcsa.com 

Contentsquare Media Contacts 

Erica Ashner
Erica.Ashner@Contentsquare.com 

 

Balancing Content and Product Investments for Retail Brands

Though an obvious goal of a business is to sell, the customer experience (CX) expectations that consumers have are not as obvious. Particularly in a landscape that is defined by digital innovation, it can be hard to keep up with shifting CX expectations. Customers place a high amount of interest in value — whether it’s the value of convenience, economy or sustainability — and that’s often on top of the product itself.

A retail brand’s challenge in the digital space hinges on balancing content investments versus product and merchandising decisions. While any marketer can argue in favor of the value of content, businesses are often concerned with the evaluation of its ROI.

When a brand invests in content and pushes a large message, it is not always with a strict “purchase” agenda. The message could be emphasizing a directional change, new mission or in some cases, an explanation to customers. What is difficult to measure is if this content has a positive, long-term halo effect on conversion.

So what is the real value of content & how do you stay find the right balance to drive sales and repeat purchasing?

Three Methods for Approaching Content

Retail brands exhibit three major forms of tackling content:

Approach 1: heavy content with few, but staple, products
Approach 2: very little content, but a vast product inventory and customer reviews
Approach 3: balancing content and product within the same site page to drive engagement

Smaller click-and-mortar, or digitally native brands, are able to master the challenge of approach one, prioritizing content over product. With less inventory to showcase, a strong focus on (often inspirational) content allows a brand to distinguish itself and create a loyal customer base. These brands are able to capitalize off of the staple products they’ve created, and create deep connections with a targeted audience.

For example, Away, a digital luggage company, uses a content heavy approach. This brand positions itself by highlighting lifestyle, with content around everything one might need for traveling and nothing unnecessary. Their content identifies with a variety of travel personas, while also considering travel standards. Their content directly states their product solves real travel pains. By the time a user navigates to the product page, they’ve learned enough about Away to ensure this purchase will improve their travel experience. The sleek and modern designs do not hurt, either.

The second approach, product-first with very little content, is present in larger retailers, those with a seemingly endless inventory. These businesses reap large revenue. Amazon, the world’s largest online marketplace (and seller) caters to a variety of retail sub-verticals without much content, but rather, a reliance on customer reviews.

 

Adob Stock, via kathayut

 

Balancing Product Prioritizations and Content Creation

There are plenty of brands, including our own customers that take the third, middle-of the-road approach. To find the right balance between content and product, there’s a solution; measure the performance of your content. Once you measure content and segment audiences properly, you’ll have a better understanding of what content is driving purchasing across which customer profile.

If you can draw the lines between customer engagement, conversion and revenue, and answer how to measure the ROI of specific content elements, it removes the guesswork and fear of making content investments.

This safety net allows you to go bold when you measure the success of each content element, with the agility to test different versions or remove the content altogether. You will also answer the looming question of yes or no: whether content has a correlation with product sales.

Adobe Stock, via beeboys

 

The Verdict

When making investment decisions for content against product, you need to determine whether your content — or any proposed content — is complementing or detracting from your product. Unfortunately, there’s no single best practice for every brand.

Content is a longer term engagement than promotions, because a sale may lead customers to come to your site once or intermittently. The goal of content is different, with the intention to drive repeat visits, purchases, and ultimate loyalty.

Content can be engaging, but without substantial or trusted product behind it, there are no sales. And yet product is not always standalone — it may involve storytelling, materials, or qualifications to encourage a customer to add-to-cart. In either case, analytics is the connection between content performance and revenue objectives.

How bold can you go to allow your brand to shine? That’s something only granular behavior analytics can answer.

 

Hero image: Adobe Stock, va jeler

Phygital CX: The Changing Face of Omnichannel Retail

Not to be outdone by the wordsmiths of this world, the retail industry recently came up with its own neologism, coining the term “phygital” to describe a new form of commerce — one that blends the best of offline and online experiences for an elevated customer experience (CX). 

It may be early days in the world of phygital CX, but brands are experimenting away, and coming up with innovative solutions to fit the needs of today’s omnichannel customer.

But how do you build links between a digital platform and physical store? What experience transfers are already proving successful in terms of engagement and conversions? And how do you make digital features work in the physical world, and vice versa?

What’s certain is that the line between eCommerce and brick-and-mortar is more blurry than ever. The reality is that digital has transformed everyday life. Many of our daily activities — work, communication and of course, consumption — play out in the digital realm. 

In fact, we have fully become phygital beings, and retailers are racing to adapt the customer experience to reflect our evolving needs and expectations. 

THE CUSTOMER IS KING

Consumers today expect seamless omnichannel journeys. But that’s not all they are looking for — they also want choice, and they want to feel special. And VIPs love nothing more than customized product or services!  

Digital has unlocked new opportunities for retailers, but has also made things slightly more complicated. Consumers are no longer looking for the cheapest product or best customer assistance — they seek excellence throughout the customer experience.

“Today we’re seeing a real convergence between online and offline, with many advantages for consumers,” explains Jérôme Malzac, Innovation Officer at Wide Agency. 

“On the eCommerce front: easy search, time-saving, the ability to order wherever, whenever… When it comes to local shopping, the human and physical dimensions are incredibly important, as well as contact between the retailer and the customer — advice, service, getting more info on a product and how quickly it can be purchased.”

 

LEVERAGING CUSTOMER INTELLIGENCE FOR A SUPERIOR CX

One of the main challenges for brands today is delivering intelligent customer journeys that are adapted to every customer. Collecting and aggregating customer behavior data can help brands identify pain points along the customer journey (both online and offline). But it doesn’t stop there, as a granular data collection allows brands to effectively personalize the experience and services. 

“Thanks to data, we can follow our customers along their journey both on and offline, and suggest relevant products to them. For example, a woman who has just purchased newborn clothes will get suggestions for baby shoes,” explains Vanessa Guignoux, head of digital and eCommerce at Gémo.

Integrating mobile app localization can also help brands deliver useful information to customers at the right time, and make their store visit more efficient. Brands can optimize a store visit based on a digital shopping list, for example. And understanding app behavior allows teams to maximize the role of smartphones in facilitating a great CX at every touchpoint.

“Digital makes omnichannel possible, and allows access to things that were only possible in the physical world, removing obstacles to purchase, understanding, sharing and knowledge. In the other direction, from digital to physical, we see gains on the human, emotional front,” explains Yann Carré, head of the marketing communication cycle for Decathlon. 

“But you need to maximize this potential. The most important thing is to have a completely responsive website, one that can be browsed and visited from any device, be it desktop, tablet or smartphone. To illustrate this, for over a year now, more people visit the Decathlon site on a smartphone than a desktop. All of our content (image, text, video, comparison tools, 3D) are conceived to be accessible digitally and to complete the offline and in-store experience.”

With consumer needs and expectations evolving fast, agility and continuous monitoring of customer behavior have never been more important. Digital teams need to analyze the way customers interact with their digital properties as part of their daily workflow. And adopting a design thinking approach and test & learn strategy allows teams to react quickly and keep up with customer expectations.

THE BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

Armed with a better understanding of their customers, digital retailers and brick-and-mortar stores have started to adopt a phygital CX strategy. Drive-throughs, in-store lockers, click & collect and online reservation are just some of the ways brands have integrated offline and online to improve omnichannel CX. 

Brands have also been exploring the benefits of expanding the reliance on digital in-store, removing typical customer frustrations prevalent in physical stores such as: low inventory, or a certain size not being available. Sales assistants now use tablets to help customers complete an in-store purchase online. Some brands even mix in-store help with added online services to offer product personalization, for example.

“Our sales assistants and department managers have access to the same information as our customers via smartphone, tablet or interactive in-store touch-screens. But they’re also able to analyze buyer behavior from a mobile number or email address. By checking their information system, they can view the purchase history and searches, and engage Mr. D with advice, product suggestions, etc,” said Yann Carré. 

“And each department manager also has all the information that will allow them to make pricing, inventory and merchandising decisions. For example, if a competitor is offering a more competitive price on a particular item, they are empowered to change the price of this particular model to match or to offer a more competitive price. They can predict how this will impact sales either positively or negatively. They have all the intelligence they need to make important decisions completely autonomously.” 

Phygital logic also drives a store’s merchandising strategy. For example, if an item gets anything less than a 3 out of 5 customer score, it is removed from both the online and offline store in order to be improved.

There are many other innovations on the horizon. Monoprix, for example, is hoping to speed up in-store checkout with its Monop’Easy solution. It’s simple: customers scan their items via the mobile app, pay, and receive their receipt by email. 

Sephora also offers a mobile app that blends digital and physical realities, allowing users to test out makeup thanks to AR, and delivering info and advice to in-store customers as they are browsing the physical aisles. And beauty brand Passion Beauté has been inviting social media influencers into their stores.

Pure players have also been playing the phygital game, coming up with concept stores that allow them to get closer to their customers. In New York, you can rent pajamas and a book a bed for a 45-minute nap at Casper’s Dreamery. 

Sezane, which started off as a pure player, has opened showrooms it calls “apartments,” where shoppers can browse exclusive designs and new releases in a cozy, trendy setting. 

Brands are constantly coming up with unique ways to explore the transitions between digital and physical, and elevate the click-and-mortar experience. “We want to be (to sports) what Airbnb is to accommodation and travel,” says Yann Carré. “We want to offer more than just the value of the product and create value around sports, too. 

The more people do sports, the more opportunities there will be for us to connect with them, and sometimes, even if not always, that will transform into a purchase.”

 

What Not to Do on the Homepage: UX Advice for Fashion Retail 

The homepage is often a key webpage for direct and organic search channels for players in the retail fashion industry. In addition to being a crucial step in the browsing process for users, it’s also an opportunity for businesses to introduce and showcase their brand identity through editorials and fashion trends.

However, according to the data we collected in Q1 of 2019, fashion retail homepage bounce rates were as high as 40% across all devices. Users also still spend an average session time of 7min on desktop and 3min 41s on mobile. (Remember, Contentsquare measures bounce rate as having only seen the single page and leaving the site). 

It can be difficult to know what kinds of design iterations will help prevent users from exiting without having viewed at least a few product pages. It’s also impossible to create the perfect homepage, but we have some great tips to follow if you’re looking to improve the design of your fashion eCommerce homepage. 

Don’t place text on cluttered areas of images

Although images and photography are crucial for communicating brand identity and editorial content, make sure you choose images that are text-friendly. Place text over emptier areas of the image, change the image, or place text on an overlay. Always use white text unless brand guidelines say otherwise. Users tend to skip over text that is too long, too small, or just difficult to read. Keep in mind: any information must be easy to digest at a fast pace, especially for mobile users.

Don’t make the hero image the full length of the page

If you’re showcasing your Fall/Winter looks, consider using a static banner —a prominent, single banner on the page that does not have rotating content, one that allows other content to be seen above the fold. We often find the exposure rate — how far down the page visitors scroll — drops drastically below the fold line. 

A hero image that spans the full length of the page could mislead users into thinking there is no other content. Because the average length of mobile pages is around 3,400px, we need to encourage users as much as possible to scroll past the fold line.

Don’t automate carousels

If you’re showcasing new collections or promoting sitewide discounts, avoid automatically rotating slides within the carousel. Instead, use static carousels that do not include more than three slides to allow users an opportunity to digest both the image and information in each slide. Users should be able to use arrows to easily move from one slide to another. 

Although there is a big debate in the design world over whether carousels are effective, we see much less exposure and engagement on the second and third slides. Automating carousels can rob users of control over the experience and as a result, they are more likely to ignore it if the slide moves too quickly for them to read.

Don’t hide primary CTAs or category links below the fold

Instead, make sure they are clearly above the fold line; try placing them on an uncluttered area of the image. You want to encourage users to immediately begin browsing, whether it leads them to a category page or list page for product catalogs that are currently being prioritized. 

Try placing a horizontal category slider at the top of the page and evaluate whether that improves your users’ browsing process. 

 

 

Showcase editorial content that is space-conscious and easy to interact with

Make sure that any editorial images on the homepage lead the users to specific categories, seasonal collections, or product pages. Giving them a purpose beyond aesthetics encourages users to explore beyond just the homepage and can help increase session time.

Here is a great example from Ralph Lauren:

 

 

The above image on the left showcases the bag as both aesthetic and functional, enticing users with beautiful photography, while leading them to the product page. The text is succinct, easy-to-read, and placed on an uncluttered area of the image. 

The carousel placed on the right provides even more options for the user to view additional products for the upcoming season. Both the image and carousel do not extend past the screen, making it easy to view. Part of the content of the next section is viewable, avoiding the false bottom and encouraging users to scroll further.

Making design iterations to your site never ends. As user behaviors continue to evolve faster than ever, it’s important to continuously evaluate and reassess the performance of individual elements on your pages. It’s important to make design changes based on the needs of your user base, not the general users of the industry. 

Don’t forget to regularly check on other players in your industry for inspiration, as there is much to learn from the digital experiences and websites you enjoy. But remember, just because a competitor does it, doesn’t mean they are improving the experience of their users. So be inspired, yes, but consult your own customer data before implementing changes.

 

Hero Image Via: Rawpixel.com, Adobe Stock

Fall/Winter Fashion Campaigns: How Brands Are Capitalizing On High Interest in New Collections

With fashion month in full bloom in the world’s four most glamorous cities, retailers and luxury brands are capitalizing on the collective excitement for all things sartorial to showcase their new Fall/Winter looks online. And judging by our findings, consumers are more than ready to give their wardrobes a makeover and explore new styles…

In this article, we examine the effects of Fall/Winter apparel campaigns on digital customer behavior and their impact on revenue. 

Methodology 

To paint a clear picture of how US consumers respond to Fall/Winter collections campaigns, we analyzed data from 24 global fashion brands (including luxury and mainstream brands), focusing on their US sites. Our analysis runs through a month and a half worth of data, representing 98 million user sessions, spread out over 510 pages.

As part of our analysis, we compared the performance of Fall/Winter campaigns (or “new collections”) with that of the end-of-Summer 2019 campaigns (or “old collections”). 

Let’s learn more.

Fall/Winter 2019 Launches Increase Overall Revenue

The happy news for retailers is that the recently-launched Fall/Winter collections reaped larger average carts across all 3 devices. In fact, overall revenue was up 6.74% from the end of the summer campaigns, with the most impressive leap observed on tablet (+6.56%).

Conversion rates, however, did not follow the same upward trend — not on two device types, that is. . Desktop conversions on new fall collections stagnated at 2.19%, signaling no change in the conversion rate between the old and new collections. Tablet conversions lessened by 3%, further handing the victory torch to the end-of-summer collection in terms of conversion rates.

On the contrary, new collections on mobile outperformed old ones, with a 4.43% rise in conversions.

While the mobile conversion rate increase is slight, it nonetheless signals a significant opportunity for retailers, and a clear indication that consumers are willing to shop for new looks on their smartphone. Brands should thus not neglect capitalizing on their mobile UX

In fact, they should design with a mobile-first approach to digital. Aside from holding stock in revenue, mobile continued its high traffic trend. It was the most-trafficked device in BOTH old and new collections, hovering at around 72%, dwarfing desktop and tablet usage, which came in at 22.5% and 6%, respectively. 

Increased Acquisition Spend Leads to Higher Traffic

Now that we shined light on what is arguably the most important impact of Fashion Week, let’s veer into the beginning of the user journey: how visitors entered the websites we surveyed. 

According to our data, paid acquisition campaigns around the new collections paid off (pun intended). Brands primarily relied on paid sources to draw more users into Fall/Winter looks, including paid search campaigns (display ads) and paid social campaigns.

These paid acquisition campaigns resulted in traffic increases across all devices, with a whopping 289% growth in traffic from display ads and a sturdy 178% growth from paid social ads. It seems that if a brand is willing to put money behind ads for Winter/Fall fashions, customers are more than willing to click. 

Visitors Seek Fall/Winter Inspiration On The Homepage 

A high-level view of the digital customer behavior on the homepage reveals that, by the time the new collections roll in, visitors are eager to discover new trends and styles. 

The new styles drive a peak in customer interactions, with a higher click rate on the homepage slideshow (64% up from clicks on Summer items) and on the product tiles right below (+17%). 

There are fewer clicks on the search bar, which figures, as most consumers appear to be in a discovery/inspiration phase, accessing the new styles through the more visual, inspirational elements of the homepage. The click rate on the cart also goes down around the new season launch, corroborating the idea that consumers are primarily window-shopping.

It’s a good time for brands to make sure they’re getting the most ROI from the inspirational elements on the homepage, since the excitement for new season looks translates to heavier engagement with these areas of the site. Optimizing product pages to capitalize on this heightened interest is also key: if visitors are clicking on your Fall sweaters tile, make sure you follow through with a relevant selection of items and an easy path to conversion.

Inspirational Content Shouldn’t Slow Down The UX 

But with all this inspirational and visual content showcasing the season’s must-have items, some brands are running into speed issues.

On desktop, for example, homepage loading times were up 50% after the launch of the Fall/Winter collection — from 2.09 to 3.14 seconds. With a 4% increase on mobile, it seems brands have overall made some effort to keep load times down on smartphones.

It’s a delicate balance to achieve— on the one hand, you want to give consumers all the inspiration they are willing to consume, but not at the cost of stalling the customer journey. Analyzing customer interactions around each element of the page will help teams determine which content is truly driving conversions and which underperforming elements can be optimized, or altogether removed.

Fashion Week Campaigns Don’t Stimulate Store Locator Use 

Customers shopping for Fall looks seem less inclined to continue their journey offline than those looking for end-of-summer bargains. On mobile, the reach rate on the store locator was down -6% for consumers browsing the Fall/Winter collection. Desktop was hit the hardest with a -14% dip in the store locator reach rate.

It could be that with back-to-school, back-to-work, and general September busy-ness, many shoppers don’t have time to go to the stores. Then again, conversions are down too, so it could be that this is a time for window shopping and eyeing up what’s on offer for the months to come.

Optimizing New Collections Campaigns

The unveiling of Fall/Winter collections is a potent engagement driver, and consumers are not shy about clicking on ads and images to be educated about the new season’s looks. With higher engagement and revenue, these campaigns have plenty of potential. 

From post-click optimization to ongoing analysis of your key homepage areas, a granular read of your customers’ experience will uncover any areas of opportunity and help you refine underperforming content.

Remember to reduce your page loading times (long loading times are a major UX offense) and create seamless mobile experiences to reel in the most profit from this short-lived yet critical shopping season.

 

Retailers with Effective Back-to-School Campaigns: A College Student’s Review

Class is in Session

As the school year approaches you’ll notice a new back-to-school campaign with each day — emails, ads, pop-ups, there has never been more encouragement to stock up for September. If back-to-school shopping is on your to-do list, you probably have a favorite spot you go to for all those needs, but have you ever considered what other options you have? 

I was actually asked to write this article because I am the most recent employee in the New York office to go back to school shopping, and it’s crazy to see all the new changes and additions that have been made lately. When I was going back to school shopping for high school, my school would send a general list to everyone and something would always be missing from that list. Growing up in New York City, my go-to spot was always Staples because it was closest to my school, and it was really my only option in the area I was living in. 

Something I noticed this year is that Staples has teacher lists so that you can find your specific school supply list without wondering if you’re missing something; this is a great offer considering that me and my classmates would always find ourselves back at Staples a few days after school began in order to pick up that extra binder that we didn’t know we needed.

Back-to-School Sales

Staples also offers 20% off school supplies when you purchase a backpack, which I wish they offered when I was a student, especially considering the combined cost of backpacks and supplies. One thing I really like about Dollar General is that it provides discounts to teachers on stationery items because educators never stop school shopping. In fact, I remember teachers offering extra credit to students who would bring in reams of paper. The costs of all these supplies add up just that one time a year when families go back-to-school shopping… now imagine facing those costs year-round. 

As a current college student, I will take any opportunity to shop, especially if a sale is involved. As the fashion and, mainly, sneaker-obsessed member of my family, I am always looking for cheaper options so that I can continue to fund my shoe habit without breaking the bank. On that note, Rack Room Shoes offers $10 off purchases of $75 and above, and to top it off they are offering a BOGO 50% off the second pair of shoes you buy. 

Another great shoe store that I frequent is DSW, and I love that DSW has afterpay so that you can make smaller payments over time and still get your product right away. It’s this kind of feature that is pre-set with the number of payments you make; for example, you’ll see the retail price online and directly below it’ll suggest four smaller payments over time while giving you the product after the first payment. As a college student with a limited budget for shopping, it is a tool that myself and my friends at school all use. The feature really makes a difference for me because it means I can make my payments in smaller amounts rather than going in completely and breaking the bank. This also helps me because while I enjoy products for the value I think they have, I love when a sale or promotion comes around because it’ll make me more inclined to shop for the things that I need and at a lower price. 

Cool Features from Retailers

I’ve already mentioned that a great place for back-to-school shopping is Dollar General — they also have a similar system to Staples’ teacher lists, and you can search for your supplies list by entering your school’s zip code. But everyone knows back-to-school shopping is not just about notebooks and pens, and many students (myself included) will spend a good part of their budget on clothing. 

One problem for me as a student was that although my school had a dress code, it was not clear-cut. This was great for me and other students, as it allowed us an outlet to be expressive… however, it was not so great when the principal roamed the halls shaming people for not following the unwritten guidelines for attire. DSW offers a good solution with its Uniform Shop, which allows you to browse for the coolest shoes in school without breaking the dress code. 

Back-to-School Campaigns Set on Giving Back

Aside from offering great deals on back to school shopping, another thing that attracts me to one store over another is when the brand partners with nonprofit organizations. Something that I’ve noticed in myself and my peers as shoppers is that they’re more likely to shop more within a brand if there is a way to give back involved. For example, Burlington has partnered with AdoptAClassroom.org so that customers can nominate schools for a chance to win 1 of 10 $10,000 grants for school supplies. 

I think this is a great way to bring attention to the fact that not all schools are created equally, and when schools are underfunded, it’s ultimately the students that pay the cost. DSW has partnered with Be Strong with the goal of raising $150,000. Be Strong is a student-led movement that empowers students to rise up against bullying. This is a great cause for DSW to be paired up with because bullying is an ever-present problem within schools, so much so that it has come to be considered normal. 

Lastly, Rack Room Shoes has partnered with Shoes That Fit, and is matching each donation up to $300,000. Shoes that Fit is an organization that provides new shoes for children in need. In my opinion, if you can afford to go buy new shoes, why not go to a store that is raising funds to provide shoes to others? 

CLASS DISMISSED

As I finish writing this post, I ask myself if this was written with enough lead time to the start of the back-to-school shopping season. If you’ve already started shopping, I’m impressed by how far ahead you plan… now let’s see if you can plan further — you can! 

We spent some time understanding the mindset of the early-bird back-to-school shopper by analyzing the digital journeys of shoppers stocking up on stationery supplies and backpacks. Take a look at our Back-to-School Report for a holistic view on how shoppers maneuver through websites for common back-to-school purchases. 

If you haven’t started back to school shopping, don’t fret, you’re not the only one! I haven’t looked at what textbooks I need to buy or even thought about how many notebooks and folders I’m going to need.

Are Mother’s Day Campaigns Worth It? What 53 Million Sessions Reveal About Digital Gifting For Moms

Mother’s Day is right around the corner (May 12th, 2019) and many brands are making the most of the gift-giving occasion, giving special campaigns pride of place on their homepage and across their website.

But how do Mother’s Day campaigns impact conversions? Are visitors clicking on these special promotions? In short, is producing all this Mother’s Day-related content really worth it?

We analyzed 53 million visitor sessions on fashion, luxury, beauty, technology and jewelry sites to see how digital consumers browse for gifts during the Mother’s Day shopping season.

We paid particular consideration to elements like homepage carousels and category pages to paint a clear picture of how Mother’s Day campaigns contribute to traffic, conversions and other KPIs.

Mother’s Day Campaigns Defined

What exactly constitutes a Mother’s Day campaign? We’re glad you asked. For the purpose of our research, it is defined as a specific site element (think slideshows, sliders, etc.) or landing pages that highlight Mother’s Day and lead visitors to a product list page with specialized gifts for the holiday.

Here are 4 findings we’ve culled from our arsenal of original data in the retail space during the Mother’s Day shopping season.

An example of a Mother’s Day campaign from Avon, wherein clicking on the slideshow leads visitors to a product list page.

Websites with Mother’s Day Campaigns Convert Better

Conversions. The raison dêtre of any brand, digital or otherwise. Our data shows that brands that implement Mother’s Day campaigns yield higher conversion rates and generate more revenue than brands that don’t.

In the lead-up to the special day, brands advertising Mother’s Day gifts saw a 211% boost to conversions. This increase in sales also hiked up the revenue for these brands by 22%. Meanwhile, the average visitor shopping cart was 1.28% higher for those browsing sites that made a special effort for Mother’s Day.

So far, so good. So how do you get visitors to consume and act on all this specially-created content?

Mother’s Day Campaign Carousel: Higher Click Rates, Lower Conversions Per Click

We looked at how visitors were interacting with homepage carousels to see whether giving this prime website real estate a Mother’s Day makeover was a winning strategy for brands. With a 3.02% click rate, Mother’s Day banner images drive higher interaction than other carousel images at a 1.94% click rate — that’s 54.87% more clicks for Mother’s Day content.

While Mother’s Day carousel images may reel in interest and curiosity among site visitors, they do not always drive more sales. With a 10.4% conversion rate per click, non-Mother’s Day banner images have a bigger impact on conversions than Mother’s Day banners, which carry an 8.3% conversion rate per click.

So with visitors clicking on Mother’s Day carousels, but not necessarily converting, what kind of data do you need to look at next?

Mother’s Day Product Category Pages Get Less Traffic But Driver Higher Carts

Next, we peered at the pages where conversions occur: product list pages. A comparison of Mother’s Day product list pages with regular category pages reveals that consumers are more likely to reach the latter. Regular product list pages get 7 times the traffic of Mother’s Day product list pages on desktop and 10 times the traffic on mobile.

But while Mother’s Day list pages may get fewer views, visitors who browse these pages have deeper pockets than regular shoppers, resulting in higher than average carts for these pages.  Average carts for shoppers who reached the Mother’s Day category page on desktop were 84.28% higher than those who didn’t, while average carts on mobile increased by 63.82%.

Additionally, higher carts have reached higher conversions — on mobile at least. Mobile visitors who reach the Mother’s Day product list pages are 4.2% more likely to convert than those who reach the regular category pages. However, desktop conversions on other list pages beat out Mother’s Day list page conversions by over 20%.

Gift recommendations and products in packages generally make for a good strategy to increase average cart increases for Mother’s Day.

Mother’s Day Campaigns Have Higher Page Attractiveness

Overall, visitors displayed higher engagement with Mother’s Day content than with non-holiday content, and were more likely to click, hover and scroll on these pages. The scroll rate alone was 6% higher on mobile and 4% higher on desktop.

In fact, the overall activity rate for Mother’s Day category pages was 12% higher than on regular category pages, showing that inspirational content does have the ability to captivate visitors’ attention.

The only KPI these pages did not outperform their non-holiday counterparts on was the average time spent on page on desktop, with visitors spending 6% less time on them. Mobile visitors, however, were willing to spend 9% more time browsing gifts for their mothers than other items.

Pro Tip: Make The Most of Higher-Than-Average Carts With Gift Sets

According to the National Retail Federation (NRF), the world’s leading retail association, which hosted its Big Show in 2019 that Contentsquare took part in, US customers are predicted to spend $25 billion on Mother’s Day in 2019. In short, Mother’s Day campaigns are not to be missed.

Per our research, brands featuring dedicated Mother’s Day campaigns fared better than those without them in several regards: increasing conversions, driving more revenue and recording higher-than-average carts. Revenue alone was 1.95% higher in April for sites with Mother’s Day promotions, presenting a retail opportunity to uplift conversions through new campaigns.

An increase in scroll and activity rates shows that consumers are willing to engage with Mother’s Day campaigns, and brands should see the holiday as an opportunity to highlight unknown products and push inspirational content.

Mother’s Day shoppers have twice the average cart of those browsing regular category pages and are clearly willing to spend money on their moms. This audience will gladly splurge on a gift set so make sure you have those options available.

3 Things Revealed at Adobe Summit 2019

Adobe Summit was bigger and better than ever with over 17,000 attendees, including the Magento crowd. Adobe treats its partners right and we’ve long valued being a part of their community. Throughout the show, we were energized by Adobe’s customers: they are some of the savviest, most engaged, and down-to-earth people we know.  

We also got to reconnect with some of our best customers at the best restaurants (SW Steakhouse, I’m calling you out here) and concerts (yep, the Killers killed it) in town.

It is impossible for one person — or even one team — to experience everything a large event has to offer. So it is always good to compare notes. In that spirit, here are 3 of the big ideas that stuck with me. Here’s to happier digital experiences for all.  

Omni-Channel Isn’t a Retail Strategy

Our research has shown that pure player e-commerce companies are overperforming on conversion rates in comparison to click and mortar brands. Pure players yield a conversion rate of 3.5%, while their click and mortar counterparts draw in the conversion rate of 2.8% on desktop and 2.6% and 1.9% on mobile, respectively.

However, click and mortar brands perform better in their page views on both desktop and mobile, beating out pure players by 2 views on mobile and 3 views on desktop. So there are things to be learned across the aisle for sure. But beware of copycatting best practices without a holistic strategy. At Adobe Summit 2019, we brought three different retailers on stage to share how they are breaking down the silos and increasing sales based on holistic strategies tailored to each of their brands.

We quickly learned that a true omni-channel strategy is not a one-size-fits-all approach. While some brands use their websites as a kind of showroom to get customers into their brick-and-mortar stores, others are moving in the other direction. Sam Edelman for example, is helping its sales associates in stores stay in touch with customers once they are home, increasing follow-on sales online and providing an overall experience that fosters customer loyalty.

On the flip side, Ralph Lauren live-streamed its Fashion Week runway show as a stimulus to bring people into its highly-curated flagship stores. MatchesFashion, a luxury retailer, is turning its website homepage into the digital version of a flagship store with lifestyle content while its app is your “personal shopper,” helping you complete purchases on the go.

Our own Chief Strategy and Partnership Officer
Jean-Marc Bellaiche cheerily posing with our employees near our booth at the 2019 Adobe Summit.

Break Down Silos

Nicolas Pickaerts, the E-commerce Director at MatchesFashion, shared that the retailer’s culture is to talk about the company’s different digital platforms – from the app to the website to its Instagram feed – as “touchpoints” rather than “channels.” It sounds simple but I keep thinking about how genius this is. “Channels” has the historical baggage of being separate and even competing businesses.

“Touchpoints” makes it clear there is one customer interacting with your company in multiple ways and sets up your teams to understand the best way to use those touchpoints to collectively improve revenue and loyalty. This takes you from a zero-sum game to a scenario where you increase your total pie — and your market share.  

Implement a System of Insight to Drive Up Your Analytics

James McCormick, the Principal Analyst at Forrester Research highlighted the need for businesses to use data and insights as a strategic foundation for growth, which is supported by the fact that insight-driven businesses are annually growing at 27- 40%, which significantly outpaces the total market. Despite this obvious advantage, less than 1 in 10 businesses are advanced with insights.

The Forrester Research, customer speakers and other discussions made it clear that gaining significant value from analytics means making it available across the company in a common and consumable way. A unified approach to your digital strategy and a way to measure how it is progressing is what gives your digital journey scale and impact.

See You Soon

Everyone here at Contentsquare loves exploring these insights and putting them to work for our customers so if you missed us at Adobe Summit, we’ll be at different events every month. Talk to you soon!

Contentsquare team members speak with Adobe Summit attendees.