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Don’t overestimate your shopping cart
February 8, 2008
Recently we discussed how the web to print shopping cart feature will not insure more sales. First lets recognize that asking a customer to use a web interface in most cases is a different way of doing business then they are used to. And
for many customers different = bad.
And don’t fall into the trap of thinking, “Yes but I created this really great product or solution. People will flock to it”. We have heard this before. Its not unlike the complaint we heard for years from those how bought digital presses. They used the “if they build it, they will come” business model which was flawed then and flawed today too.
According to my old GATF friend Julie Shaffer coauthor of the book “Web-to-Print Primer”, “If the company just slapped up a site - bought it from a vendor and thought just putting it out there would turn them into Vistaprint I could see why they would be disappointed. And this perception is going around. It's like digital printing, buying the press didn't bring in the work. Branded solutions have to be sold, and they're very different from ad hoc storefronts. Two different business enablers for two diff types of business. In any case, they have to solve a business problem for the client. If they don't they won't be used.”
Ok so sales may not increase but what about profitability. I’m sad to say but simply adding a shopping cart feature will most likely not increase your profitability. Because although there may be less time required for sales staff and customer service there is a financial burden from the initial capital investment as well as the new overhead created by new monthly fees, charges for transactions and cost associated with new staff or new infrastructure (hard disk mirroring, back up power supplies, etc.).
So if you do think that simply “slapping up a site” will increase sales or profitability, then you too will be disappointed.
Posted by Howie Fenton on February 8, 2008 | Comments (0)
