Tag Archives: amazon

How a crap online experience cost Millets one sale (and probably many more…)

Posted by alanduncan1980 on

Over the past few couple of weeks I’ve been buying items to prepare me for my Ultra marathon training however in the last week it only occurred to me that maybe I should probably buy something with which to carry life or death essentials, just in case I run into trouble along the way. I hate hate hate running with a rucksack on my back however I was sure that with the wonders of modern technology, someone would have devised an ultra light pack for the long long distance runner. So, I went to the Ultra Marathon running store and found exactly what I was looking for… for £129.

It was a little bit out of my price range so I went to Amazon to search for it there, only to discover it was more expensive. Frustrated I decided to search on Amazon for running backpacks and I found the perfect item – for about £35. It ticked all the boxes; lightweight, liquid pouch, iPod holder, so I clicked ‘buy’.

Prior to finalising the order I realised I was about to be stiffed for an extra fiver on delivery as the bag was being sold by Millets rather than Amazon. ‘Hmmm’, I thought, ‘I wonder if there’s a Millets near by that I could buy this in?’. Hell, even if it’s a couple of quid more than the online price, I’d rather pay it to get it right now that pay a fiver extra to get it in a week.

A quick Google of ‘Millets Holborn’ confirmed that there was a store five minutes walk from the office. So, lunch time on Wednesday I took a wander down High Holborn to their shop underneath Westgate House. Only to discover that there was no Millets there. There was a Blacks (we’re coming to this ok) but no Millets. So I walked down a bit further without success. Frustrated I walked back to the Blacks and decided to have a look to see if they had the bag anyway. No dice!

Thinking that I must have made a mistake, I headed back to the office and Googled Millets again however I was proved right – the store in question listed on the website as a Millets was the Blacks. Out of curiosity I had a look at the Blacks website, which, bar a logo change aside, is the same website! Only with slightly different products. But the same store locator system. Now, I’m sure there are very good brand reasons why they have decided not to align the Millets and Blacks brands but they should be aligned if they are going to claim that Millets stores are Blacks and vice versa.

Feeling really frustrated by my whole experience, I decided to search for the bag on both the Millets and Blacks site. Guess what? It wasn’t there!  Fed up by the whole process, I just bit the bullet and paid a fiver more for the bag in Cotswolds.

So what should they do?

They could have started by having a bit of transparency between the brands. They are in effect the same market, and whilst I appreciate that both stores may have a particularly loyal customer base, making it clear that the product line was similar and that a store listed on the Millets website as a Millets was in fact a Blacks, would have caused a lot less frustration.

There should be a greater synergy between their online site and their Amazon marketplace site. You have to be prepared for a customer finding your product in a multitude of places, however where they find it may not necessarily be the most convenient place for them to buy it. Offer purchasing options. 

 

Their mobile site is crap. They should invest in a better mobile site, with improved store locator and possibly even click and collect. I wouldn’t be surprised if the market for Millets/Blacks consisted of a lot of emergency purchases. Check online and reserve instore. It’s worked wonders for Argos. 

Blame the internet!

Posted by alanduncan1980 on

We’re not even 3 weeks into 2013 and we’ve already seen Jessops go bust and HMV fall into administration. And that’s on top of Comet collapsing in the run up to Christmas, and other high street brands such as Zavvi and Woolworths fall by the wayside since 2008.

What caused these businesses to fail? Isn’t it obvious?

Clearly it’s all the internet’s fault!

Or at least that’s what the music industry would like you to think. There’s an editorial piece on the NME website that blames Amazon for the downfall of HMV. Really? Really really?  The downfall of HMV, and in fact Zavvi,EMI and the music industry as a whole is not down to the rise of the internet behemoth Amazon. Nor is it the fault of Apple and iTunes. No, the blame lies squarely at their own door. They became too big, too bloated and so stuck in their ways that they were not flexible or adaptable to change.

Who remembers the 90′s? Do you remember what music used to cost? As a quick refresher, a CD single used to cost £3.99. A standard CD release would cost between £11.99 and £15.99! Seriously! When was the last time you paid more than £10 for a non special edition version of an album? Yes, these were the glory days for the music industry. More and more people had disposable income and record sales boomed… with record profits. And obviously the artists profited spectacularly through this period. Erm… well some did. So, who made the money? The record labels and the stores of course. And they were all powerful!

So what did they do? Absolutely nothing. By the late 90′s the internet was on the rise and flexible online retailers with less overheads, such as Play and Amazon were starting to emerge. Rather than embrace and invest in digital channels and platforms, they just stuck their head in the sand and dismissed online retailers as a dot.com fad that would eventually burst. When HMV entered the online retail space they were so far behind, with an inconsistent pricing model, and, wait for this, postage charges, they were never going to catch up.

And then they slit their own throats. Look at all those nostalgic photos of HMV doing the rounds? People browsing record stores? People listening to music at listening stations? People at instore performances and signing sessions? Clearly there is an experiential element to visiting a record store. Consumers are happy to buy music in a shop like Rough Trade, not because it’s more expensive than the internet, but because it’s such a great experience to shop in Rough Trade. So, what did HMV do? They hauled out those  A-Z CD racks, moved them upstairs or to the back of the shop, put discounts and promotions at the front of the shop and filled the free space with DVD’s, t-shirts, electronic goods and games… and effectively killing the record store experience that consumers craved. And not only had the killed the experience, they had replaced the experience with products that were also dying out thanks to online channels.

I read the other day that the founders of Play were terrified of the day that HMV turned its guns on them. But the day never came. Play went from strength to strength and just days before HMV fell into administration, Play announced that they were winding down their entertainment retail offering, not because they are in trouble, but because the business is changing and Play is moving into  delivering product to its customers via digital channels.

I feel incredibly sorry for the staff at HMV, and also for those who have vouchers that cannot be exchanged, but let’s face it, HMV has had this coming for a long time. If your business does not adapt to the market and the needs and requirements of your customers, your business is doomed to fail. It’s no coincidence that traditional high street retailers such as Dixons Group and Argos had a good 2012, considering the way that they were able to blend an online offering into their offline brand. The Argos click and collect model where you can pay and reserve purchases online would have been perfect for HMV. I remember browsing the HMV website about 10 years ago, looking to buy  Kill Bill vol 1. It was advertised on a special offer of £10.99. Wow! I thought. I’ll just pop along to HMV and pick it up tonight. Only to discover that it was £4 more instore. Did I buy it? No, of course I didn’t. In fact, I went home and bought it on Play.com…

 

Mr Luddite and Dr Digital

Posted by alanduncan1980 on

Throughout my career, I’ve lost count of the number of times that I’ve had people referred to me to help them with a digital problem. ‘Talk to Alan, he’s the digital/social/SEO/LinkedIn/Twitter guru’. Or ‘Alan, I’ve got a problem with my privacy settings on X/Y/Z social network’. And yes, I can solve the majority of problems that come my way (or I’ll figure out how to fix it). Add in that I had an iPad before they were even on sale in the UK, had a digital camera in the 90′s and am constantly on the look out for new technology to make my life easier, I’ve created an image of a digital native who consumes all content on a lightweight slimline shiny piece of kit. But you know what? And this may come to you as a bit of a shock – I’m a complete luddite.

Ok, maybe that’s a slight exaggeration. But it’s true when it comes music and books. Yes, I’ve downloaded music and books to my devices in the past but I’ve always felt that there was something missing with my purchase.

I pre-ordered the new Quantic and Alice Russell album on iTunes a few weeks ago and as soon as it passed midnight on the day of release, the album uploaded itself automatically to all my devices via iCloud. Amazing! What an age we live in! Now, this week, Spiritualized released their first album in four years. If you’re not familiar with Spiritualized, I’d advice you check them out on Spotify however one thing noteworthy about Spiritualized in a non music sense is that their albums are always beautifully designed. Ladies and Gentlemen we are floating in space came packaged as a giant pill, Songs in A & E was a medical notebook. To say that there’s love put into the package is an understatement. So, there was not a hope in hell that I was going to just download this record as I knew I’d feel like I’d missed something. But I know what you’re thinking. Why don’t I just order the album from an online retailer and have it delivered to my door? Yes, I also buy albums via Amazon but for this release in particular, I really wanted to get the record store experience. So, I went to Fopp in Bloomsbury after work on Monday and spent a good 30 minutes or so just browsing. Obviously the Spiritualized album was the first thing I picked up (what if they sell out??? I imagine that there’s huge demand for this release ;) It came in a white box with slipcase if you’re interested in the packaging) but I spent the rest of the time, looking at the new releases, staff recommendations, speaking to the staff about new stuff they’d heard and what they were looking forward to. In the end, I bought a few extra CD’s, and some cheap DVD’s and despite the fact that I spent more than I’d have paid either downloading the albums or even buying them from Amazon, I had a shopping experience that was worth so much more than just ‘adding to my basket’ and using ‘one click payment’.

The same applies with books. I’m reading a book called Responsive Web Design which is a gripping thriller about a renegade cop with a heart of gold who infiltrates a thai drug ring (It isn’t. It’s a very technical non fiction manual). Anyway, point is, the book is on a digital subject. It’s just screaming out to be read on an iPad or Kindle. But you know what? I bought the paper copy. Yes it cost me more and I got stiffed on postage (thanks international orders!) but the book is part of a series that looks absolutely gorgeous. I worked in publishing for three years which was the logical conclusion for a lifelong love of books and whilst I have some books on my iPad (last download – I am Zlatan by Zlatan Ibrahimovic) I can’t think of anything worse than reading a book on a Kindle or iPad on the tube. I love the physical experience of reading, turning the page on a novel, which I’ll read and re-read to the point that I’ll break the spine.

Now, as I mentioned at the start, I’m not a complete luddite. I’m listening to Frank Ocean’s Nostalgia/Ultra right now, procured through ‘digital means’ (figure than one out) and am going to read an e-book on SEO shortly but the one thing that the music and publishing industries cannot do in a digital world is replicate the experience, look, feel and smell of their products in their non digital forms.