2012 looked set to be an optimistic one for SME online retailers despite economic uncertainty, with a survey conducted by Actinic reporting a 1.5% increase in online retail sales for SMEs in the fourth quarter of 2011, when compared to Q4 of 2010. Further encouragement for e-tailers has come in the form of the latest figures from the IMRG Capgemini e-Retail Sales Index, reporting that British shoppers have spent £34.9 billion online in the first half of 2012, compared to £31 billion spent in the first six months of 2011.

However, despite the widely reported success for online retailers, many SMEs are still not embracing the opportunities that e-commerce has to offer. The European Commission’s Digital Agenda revealed that, over the last year, only 14% of UK SMEs sold their products online – a staggering figure considering that 71% of British people shop online.

Affordable investment in online channels can enable SMEs to compete

While e-commerce giants such as eBay and Amazon can afford to invest heavily in their online channels, some household brands are still failing to retain customers as a result of simple processes such as deliveries and website efficiencies, exemplified in Global Freight Solutions’ (GFS) report. Online retail success, therefore, is not the reserve of established brands and SME retailers can compete if they adopt online channels and ensure that their websites are geared toward the customer’s needs.

Intelligent, modest investment in technologies can still enable SMEs to offer an e-tail site with greater efficiencies and exemplary levels of service. GS1 UK, the UK supply chain standards organisation, has reported an increase in its membership and GS1 standardised system of barcodes. GS1 identify the reason behind the increase as SME retailers looking to streamline their online supply chain using the standardised system of barcodes, which can be used to identify products more easily.

Creating efficiencies within an e-tail site is also crucial to success, as lengthy and complicated processes can result in customers becoming frustrated and abandoning their baskets. Technologies such as postcode or zipcode lookup in the check-out process to speed up data input; tokenisation to store regular customer’s data securely; and integrating the website with back end processes, can create a sleek website that is thought to only be accessible to those with enterprise-scale budgets.

Using social media to engage customers

Social media can also play a significant role in online success. Play.com recently revealed that Facebook accounted for over £2m of direct sales last year. Play.com calculated that those who had ‘liked’ the brand on Facebook would spend 24% more than those customers who had not engaged with the social media site. US fashion brand, Free People, also conducted a social media campaign to engage with its customers and increase conversions by inviting them to post Instagram images of themselves wearing its clothing on the Free People website. Evidently social media is not a tool to be underestimated and is a valuable means by which SMEs can engage with customers and deliver a personalised service.

And don’t forget mobile

Sales via mobile devices also continue to rise dramatically, with a 356% year-on-year sales increase for the first half of 2012.This therefore begs the question of whether SMEs are also neglecting the mobile channel at their peril? As recent research shows that 76% of SME retailers haven’t adopted m-commerce.

It is clear that online, and arguably mobile, is a crucial channel for SMEs to adopt and invest in to generate new business and maximise potential profits. Modest investments are sufficient in making websites function smoothly – a key component for customer retention.

Do you have any other top tips for easy and affordable ways to engage customers and improve online sales? We’d love to hear them – share your thoughts below!

E-commerce has fast become a core component of virtually every business model but the reality is that many still fall down on the essential features required to deliver ease of use. This month we are looking in detail at the threats and opportunities SME online retailers are facing in the second half of 2012. Our Managing Director, Emma Gooderham, highlights some key features for organisations, both SMEs and larger enterprises, to consider if they want to boost conversion rates and improve customer loyalty.

Click and Collect

- Growing numbers of companies are using the ‘click and collect’ model and key to making this process work effectively is the ability to offer customers fast access to the location of the nearest store and its opening hours. By integrating ‘find my nearest’ technology into the website, a company can offer customers a number of search options – such as postcode – and display results in nearest order.

Postcode Lookup

- Getting the right customer address is critical to successful e-commerce but companies also need to consider the way address information is collected to make it as easy as possible and minimise rekeying and the risk of problems caused by inaccurate information. It is also important to consider the international customer – a simple, easy-to-use international address lookup via postcode or zip code can provide the full address as used in each specific country and deliver rapid, low cost access to new markets.

Tokenisation

- Tokenization helps sites store sensitive data, removing the need to enter this information at each visit whilst maintaining security. This speeds up the purchase process, driving customer loyalty and repeat purchase whilst also minimising the cost and compliance with industry standards.

End to End Integration

- Many websites are still not integrated which causes problems as soon as customers attempt to make a purchase. With customers increasingly looking at online reviews and comments, this is a major issue and one that no serious e-commerce operation can afford to ignore.

Emma has recently been speaking to eSellerMedia, offering further advice – why don’t you have a read!

Royal Mail’s Address Management Unit is currently reviewing the licence of the Postcode Address File (PAF), and when it should be launched.

Back in the spring, they began reviewing the current PAF licence internally and started gathering feedback from Solution Providers and the PAF Advisory Board (PAB). From this, a PAB Sub-Working Group has been established to advise the Address Management Unit on possible PAF licensing arrangements moving forward.

On 4th July, the PAB Sub-working Group held its first meeting to consider a number of alternative licensing models and how the licence review should move forward.

At this meeting, specific licencing options were discussed, such as equal access for the public and private sectors, and to remove licence anomalies such as the differences in internal and external transaction pricing.

On a more general level though, two approaches for the next PAF licence were defined, namely:

Stream A: To tweak the existing licence terms
Stream B: To adopt a fundamentally new approach to licencing

What do you think?

Are you a PAF solution provider, a company that uses the licence from a provider, or just involved in the data industry? We’d love to know what you think about the revision of the current PAF Licence – does it require only a few minor changes, or should it be fundamentally changed? Leave us your answer – Stream A or Stream B – below.

For the latest updates and minutes from all meetings related to the licencing discussions, visit the PAF Advisory Board website.

Emma Gooderham, Managing Director of Allies Computing Ltd, yesterday confirmed to customers the relationship between Allies Computing Ltd, PostCoder and World Addresses. Some changes to support this were also highlighted.

Confirmation of company structure

In the announcement to customers, Emma states: “Allies Computing Ltd continues to be our legal company name. We are currently supporting and developing two product brands – PostCoder and World Addresses. With our product development progressing at great speed and new offerings coming up in the near future, we wanted to re-confirm Allies Computing Ltd as our company name so that further product lines and brands could be launched in their own right with no risk of confusion.”

Launch of new Allies website

It was also announced that to support this re-confirmation, on 3rd September 2012 a new Allies website will go live and will contain all company information, as well as the blog. The PostCoder and World Addresses websites will continue to contain everything that’s relevant about the products, with all three being linked intrinsically.

What does this mean for customers?

For PostCoder and World Addresses customers, there will be a few simple changes taking place from 3rd September 2012. Email addresses will be changing to ‘alliescomputing.com’, however all postcoder.com and worldaddresses.com emails will be diverted to the usual inboxes so no customer communication will be missed.

Company communications (e.g. news and announcements) will be from Allies, and the phones will be answered as ‘Allies’. Product news and marketing will use the PostCoder or World Addresses branding.

Still the same company, with the same values

In her message, Emma Gooderham was keen to emphasise that the company’s core values continue to be at the centre of how business is conducted. As she states: “Throughout the company’s 25 year history Allies has acted according to its very strong ethical values. These values continue to be at the heart of everything we do. For example our employees decide which charities we contribute to and our employees speak openly and honestly with our customers in a timely manner to help you run your businesses as efficiently as possible”.

If you have any questions or would like further information, please contact us on +44 (0) 1508 494488 or sales@postcoder.com. Alternatively, leave us a comment below.

Over recent months, news of growth for e-commerce giants, such as eBay and Amazon, through investment in their online channels, has been heavily reported. This news made us consider the effect this would have on SME online retailers. This month we will look in detail at the threats and opportunities SME online retailers are facing in the second half of 2012 and in the testing years ahead as the UK economy pulls itself out of recession.

Amazon recently announced future developments to increase its network of US-based warehouses. This investment will potentially enable the e-tailing-superpower to offer same-day deliveries and represents yet another step forward in its pursuit of e-tailing domination. Same-day delivery would make Amazon’s offering ever more appealing to customers and present a greater challenge for competing SMEs.

In order to not only keep pace but to prevent Amazon monopolising the market, SME online retailers must heed the warning and implement technology that will enable them to compete with the services provided by Amazon. The advice is clear, as the article referenced above says: “if you don’t very soon make your products discoverable and extremely easy to purchase, Amazon is ready to swoop in to take even more of your business away”.

With competition for internet customers higher now than ever before, customers can afford to be increasingly selective when it comes to choosing which online retailer to use and their preference is clear – the statistics speak for themselves. Amazon exemplifies what a superior customer checkout process can achieve and if SMEs want to compete, then they should learn from their example.

Small but significant investments can be the difference, as our customer Find Me A Gift discovered. As part of its online payment redevelopment, Find Me A Gift implemented address look up software and have since experienced a 17% increase in conversion rates. Our Address look up technology streamlines the payment process whilst ensuring that customer details are correct – resulting in a successful delivery first time, every time.

Are you an SME online retailer? How much of a threat have you found e-tailer super-giants like Amazon and eBay to be? Share your top tips to beat the competition below!

It is with some disbelief that customers still find themselves confronted with a series of hurdles during the online check-out process. In an age of technological advancement that has given us QR codes and customer tracking technology, customers should not be experiencing difficulties with a process as simple as an online checkout. But, alas, as many customers lament, this process often leaves them feeling aggravated and more crucially, causes them to abandon the process altogether.

A recent blog from Econsultancy demonstrates the continued frustrations that customers experience during the checkout process, in particular with data entry. Despite all the advanced technological resources available, leading retailers such as Tesco are still not exploiting the full potential of such software.

As the blog and the numerous commentators point out, the failings are often as simple as not providing clear instructions on how a customer should enter their postcode. This seems like an oversight on the part of retailers – surely it is in their greatest interest to clearly explain what is required in order to ensure the sales they so fervently seek. With millions of pounds spent on national television campaigns, perhaps retailers should consider these elementary processes more closely, which have the potential to significantly increase their bottom line.

Retailers need to heed the warnings prevalent in the comments on customer satisfaction sites such as these and utilise the plethora of technologies available to them in order to avoid frustrating customers, which is the cause of so many dropped baskets. This blog is in fact a retailers dream – customer feedback that is voluntary and tells them exactly how to rectify the issues that are preventing sales. Essentially their customers are doing their job for them – all they have to do is implement it!

Have you had any customer feedback that you’ve used to improve your online checkout, or service in general? What’s your top ‘quick-win’ tip for improving customer satisfaction through your website? Share your successes below!

Royal Mail yesterday informed customers in the East of England of an initiative they are piloting across the region, to map the precise co-ordinates of homes and businesses in the area. This is part of an effort by Royal Mail to expand its service offering, which becomes crucial as mail volumes decline.

The purpose of this scheme is to collect location data that is much more precise than Royal Mail’s current location-based tool, the postcode. They are mapping address information which is accurate to the front door of every home and business in the area.

According to the leaflet delivered to properties, Royal Mail’s Operations Director Rob Jenson says “For individuals and companies, many everyday activities involve using information which is based on the location of an address…Location-based information is used by the emergency services, satellite navigation systems and Smartphone applications. We want to help improve the accuracy of this information…This could, for example, help the satellite navigation systems in the cars of friends and families find your address more easily.”

With other major companies already offering similar data, such as Ordnance Survey’s address and location data, and TomTom’s location and navigation products, the Royal Mail will be up against tough competition. They are confident in the market need for precise GPS co-ordinates of properties however, with Rob Jenson stating in the letter that they are “undertaking this initiative in response to a need by businesses and consumers for more accurate local information”.

The pilot began yesterday in the East of England, and will be rolled out across the UK later the year if it is successful.

Emma Gooderham, Managing Director of World Addresses and PostCoder, says “We are interested in reviewing the data when it’s released, to see if it complements our current offerings”.

Royal Mail is keen to emphasise that there will be no impact on the postal service delivered by Royal Mail, and no personal or confidential information will be collected as part of the initiative.

For more information visit Royal Mail’s website.

In what other ways do you think this data of precise co-ordinates could be used by businesses and residents? We’d love to hear your ideas – leave your thoughts below!

The Royal Mail-sponsored annual International Delivery Report published its 2012 findings in May, having put 83 UK retailers to the test. The report is conducted with a view to provide a benchmark of the online shopping experience that UK retailers offer their overseas customers. The report’s findings suggest that while some retailers have demonstrated improvements in their overseas delivery proposition, the experience for international customers is still very different to that of UK customers.

The report includes recommendations for best practice e-commerce – one of which is to support international address lookup and accurate address capture, as some 24% of international deliveries from e-commerce sites were found to arrive later than expected and a further 14% failed to provide a timescale at all.

While we acknowledge that accurate address capture is a valid and valuable recommendation, individual countries’ addresses are typically not structured uniformly, meaning that importing and exporting goods to multiple countries becomes next to impossible to co-ordinate simply, as a single address database cannot be constructed.

However, by converting raw address data from individual countries into the widely recognised Universal Postal Union’s international addressing templates – the Standard S42 format – UKretailers are given access to a standardised central database with multiple address datasets. With almost a quarter of international online retail deliveries failing to be delivered on time – largely due to inaccurate delivery details – harnessing this technology through the use of address look-up software is essential in meeting the international demand and bringing the international rate of successful, timely deliveries in line with that of the UK. With WorldAddresses.com’s flexible purchase scheme of the World Addresses Web look-up service, the provision of such a tool becomes nothing short of an affordable necessity.

Click here to find out more about the business benefits of implementing an international address lookup service and to download your free trial.

We are pleased to announce that the leading gift purchasing website, Find Me A Gift, has implemented our World Addresses Web as part of a recent redevelopment of the online retailer’s payment processes, resulting in an enhanced online experience and a 17% increase in customer conversion rates.

Before bringing us on board, users of the Find Me A Gift checkout process had to manually enter their full address details into a number of fields. This process often led to incorrect information being entered, creating the unnecessary risk of undelivered mail.

Find Me A Gift strive to offer complete customer satisfaction and therefore looked at redesigning all of its checkout processes to improve overall site usability. As Adam Cadman, Developer at Find Me A Gift, explained, “We recognised that customer satisfaction starts at the point of reaching our site and does not end until the goods are delivered on time and to the correct address, and so ensuring that the delivery process was not only simple to use but also less prone to error was a fundamental requirement for our website refresh. We are delighted with the results of a more streamlined check-out process and increase of 17% in customer conversion rates since we implemented World Addresses Web”

In addition to improving its payment process, we have continued to work alongside Find Me A Gift to tailor the system to its ever evolving needs. The development team has been on hand throughout the entire process to ensure the software meets Find Me A Gift’s requirements.

The increase in conversion rates is a great example of how implementing simple tools can create efficiencies that deliver considerable and measureable results.

Royal Mail has recently announced that the majority of its annual 15 billion letters and parcels are to be printed with the words “Delivered by” together with the Royal Mail cruciform.

By marking deliveries in this way, Royal Mail is making itself more accountable for its deliveries and therefore opens itself up to criticism if the service they provide is not up to scratch. To avoid any negative repercussions from this new system, it is essential that Royal Mail execute successful deliveries, which will depend largely on the accuracy of their Postcode Address File (PAF) database.  It is vitally important, therefore, for Royal Mail to ensure that it continues to keep its address database complete and up-to-date.

Consequently, businesses using the Royal Mail’s PAF database directly or via tools that rely upon the data, will have the confidence to rely upon the information for their own delivery needs as the Royal Mail itself risks damaging its reputation as a reliable postage holder if the database is inaccurate.

As a partner of Royal Mail this is good news for us at WorldAddresses.com. We receive monthly updates from Royal Mail and apply them to our database and as a result, provide our customers with the most up to date information available.

Ultimately, this is a very positive step as it is indicative of the confidence Royal Mail has in the service it provides and the new marking system is a means by which Royal Mail’s excellent level of service can be recognised.