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INTELLIGENTRETAILER
WAITROSE TESTING... TESTING... 1, 2, 3...
UPDATES
CABINET
N
igel Atkinson or web consultancy,
Neoworks wants to know if
you have a hunch that your
INSTALLATIONS e-commerce website navigation is not
working very well for your customers, and
that it may be affecting your sales conversion
rate. “So you would like to make some
changes to the website and see if they bring
any improvement,” he suggested.
“You have some ideas; maybe changing
the order of links, the colours, the location of
the navigation on the page, or adding some
descriptive copy might help. How do you
know which changes to try, and if you make
more than one change how do you know he continued. “MVT testing is a method
which is responsible for the results (good or of testing multiple groups of changes to
bad)? website content, known as experiments,
“What if the changes reduce sales instead on populations of your website visitors.
of increasing them? Not a great prospect,” The results of MVT testing indicate not
Waitrose has bought 15 of Verco’s he said. only the effect of individual changes, but
recently launched integral open-chill ‘Inline Atkinson, who worked with health the combinations of changes that give the
Merchandiser’ cabinets. foods supplier HealthyDirect to improve best results. Results are based on the actual
The cabinets, which were initially search engine performance, campaigns behaviour of your visitors and so they are a
developed on behalf of Waitrose and and promotion support and usability very reliable indicator of content strategies
are designed to ¼ t within the 1.2-metre (HealthyDirect revamps web channel, that will be successful.
module of an ambient shelving system, The Back Of½ ce issue, Retail Technology, “There is an upfront investment required
are being used to display chilled beers September 2008), said a common question to integrate a testing framework, such as
and wines in all new and refurbished he hears is how to remove the guesswork Google’s Website Optimizer, into your
Waitrose stores throughout the UK. from making changes and move to a more website. Once you have the framework in
Commenting on the installations, a scienti½ c improvement process? place though, you will wonder how you ever
spokesman for Waitrose said: “We had no “The use of multivariant (MVT) testing managed an e-commerce website without
hesitation in approaching Verco to work would be my initial recommendation,” using MVT testing.”
with us on this new project. They have
been one of our preferred refrigeration
suppliers for many years as their cabinets
PC WORLD SIGNS UP REEVOO
are attractive, offer good value for money
and are produced in the UK, thereby PC World, the UK’s largest chain of specialist computer superstores has introduced a
supporting UK industry.” new online service for customers resulting from a partnership with Reevoo, the UK
The new cabinet offers high ef¼ ciency independent publisher of genuine customer reviews.
with low running costs and low noise The deal will provide PC World customers with impartial review content to help them
output thanks to its use of the latest make better-informed purchasing decisions and builds on its existing success on sister
compact, horizontal rotary compressor. companies, Dixons and Curry’s websites. The bene½ ts to PC World include increased
Heat rejection is also considerably customer satisfaction, increased conversion and reduced product returns as customers
reduced due to the refrigeration are more likely to ½ nd the right product the ½ rst time.
system’s use of heat to re-evaporate the Pat Foley, head of e-commerce operations for PC World parent, DSG international
condensate. (DSGi) said: “We are committed to improving the quality of content published on our
To maximise visual merchandising for website. By making impartial reviews from an independent company available to our
supermarkets, convenience stores and customers, we are providing a tool that helps them select the product that’s right for
forecourt shops, the Inline Merchandiser them.”
offers three shelves plus the base for He added: “Increasing consumer con½ dence in our reviews has bene½ ted other brands
BWS, and ¼ ve shelves plus base for dairy across DSGi, with increased customer engagement and improved conversion. The success
merchandising. It is available initially in a that we have seen on Dixons and Currys has led us to extend the relationship across
width to suit 1.2-metre ambient modules, other DGSi brands, including PC World. We are continuing to respond to our customers,
with a 1-metre format to follow. who tell us they want impartial opinion from an independent source.”
RETAIL TECHNOLOGY NOVEMBER 2008
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