While many industries are declining, some even disappearing, this excerpt from the Kiplinger Letter forecasts a bright future for online retail sales.

“Online retail sales will soar 16% in 2008, to about $200 billion. Then, growth will slow, leveling off at 10% per year by 2012. The number of shoppers will rise only 2% a year, but they’ll buy more… some, much more. Half of online shoppers account for two-thirds of sales.

Big gainers in the next few years: luxury goods, such as jewelry.

Competition will get tougher as retailers dress up web sites to improve presentation and create a distinctive shopping experience.  More will feature demonstration videos and three-dimensional photos.

One way to boost your online sales: focus on abandoned carts.

It’s a big issue for retailers that do a good job of luring customers and getting them to fill their carts but then fail to complete the sale.

Fewer than 3% of online shoppers actually buy when they visit. The majority put products into their carts but then leave them there.

Experts say better web design can quadruple the closing rate.

Some helpful moves: use software that takes shoppers to product reviews and gives shipping info… pop-ups offering discounts when the shopper is taking too long to commit…and instant messaging to answer questions.

Small firms may want to get help from ready-made analytic tools, such as Google Analytics, Ion Interactive, Coremetrics, or WebTrends.”

This entry was posted on Monday, October 20th, 2008 at 2:36 pm and is filed under E-commerce. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.