Testing Interactive Ecommerce Features
Social ecommerce technology has lifted sales and turned one-way websites into two-way conversations. Ratings and reviews, for example, have tremendously improved the consumers’ shopping experience, as well as many marketers’ conversion rates.
Frank Malsbenden, VP and General Manager, Shoeline.com and his team are already looking for the next winning interactive ecommerce feature. The team maintains several footwear ecommerce sites, including SuperShoes.com, which Maslbenden calls “the perfect sandbox.”
The team often tests new ideas on this smaller site, giving it a unique feature set that’s worth browsing for ideas. Features include:
– One-click voting and tagging
On product pages, visitors can click to declare they “like” or “hate” a product. A score is tallied on the page. They can also tag products, similar to how blog posts are tagged. Visitors can view the most “liked” or “hated” products, or products bearing the same user-generated tag.
– Drag-and-drop sharing
On product category pages, visitors can click product images and drag them onto icons to share their links on Facebook, Twitter or via email.
– Profile and live feed
Customers are given profile pages, where they can track all the shoes they’ve “liked,” “hated,” tagged and shared. They can create a vanity URL and have their profile’s page views tallied and displayed. The profile also shows a live feed of all activity on the site, such as:
o Products recently viewed
o Products recently liked, hated, shared or emailed
Malsbenden’s team is testing these features and others, such as a possible live feed integration on the homepage. Features they deem as winners will be incorporated into the fall redesign of the team’s flagship website, Shoeline.com.
