As CEO of ChannelAdvisor, Scot Wingo leads the company in its mission to provide retailers and manufacturers with the software and services needed to sell their products via online sales channels. In this eMarketer interview, Mr. Wingo gives his outlook for the 2009 holiday shopping season and talks about how retailers must be present in the online sales channels where consumers shop.
eMarketer: What is your outlook for this year’s online holiday shopping season?
Scot Wingo: It’s a little hard to call. The only year that’s been harder was last year because all we could see was a cliff coming and no one knew how far it was to the bottom. So, “muted optimism” are the words I would use, where we think things are better than last year. It’s the new normal. We’re tracking right now 8% [sales growth] for our e-commerce metrics year over year, and we think that will carry through the holidays, which is certainly better than last year, which was -20%.
eMarketer: What lessons are online retailers drawing from last year that are changing their approach to this holiday season?
“One trend we’re seeing this year is a lot of retailers on eBay that previously would not consider it.”
Mr. Wingo: There are a lot of different buckets there. There’s the core bucket, which is make sure you have good selection, good pricing, that you roll out that kind of stuff early and that your products are where consumers are. So we’re seeing a lot of retailers make sure they have a really good strategy about paid search, comparison shopping engines and marketplaces. One trend we’re seeing this year is a lot of retailers on eBay that previously would not consider it.
Coming out one circle from that, a lot of retailers are starting to think through their affiliate programs. We’re seeing them trim down their programs, because they have started to get some data that show those can be cannibalistic. And then a lot of folks are really looking and evaluating their cash back, which is being driven by Bing, the new Microsoft search engine. They’re getting a lot of traction in the market with their cash-back service and coupons. So retailers are spending a fair amount of what I would call tactical time getting those programs set for this Q4.
eMarketer: Do you think either mobile commerce or social commerce will step into the spotlight this holiday season?
“I don’t know many retailers who are saying, ‘Man, I’ve got to get my social strategy together.’”
Mr. Wingo: I would put the whole bucket of social and mobile into more long-range thinking. I don’t know many retailers who are saying, “Man, I’ve got to get my social strategy together.” But it’s definitely something they’re talking about and, I think, if we were to flash forward a year, we’ll be talking a lot more about people launching a Twitter strategy or doing something on the iPhone.
If you look at the growth of those platforms, they tend to become more gradual over time, and I think that this will be a year of dabbling. And I’m sure there will be some headlines that are interesting—but next year is when retailers will start to adopt these tactics en masse.
eMarketer: At the annual 2009 Shop.org Summit, social commerce and mobile commerce were the two big themes.
Mr. Wingo: Certainly retailers are doing a lot with user-generated content reviews on their sites. But that’s, again, just tactical, versus social as, for example, using Facebook and leveraging that broader social activity to drive more sales.
eMarketer: Do you think this is going to be another year where retailers rely heavily on price-slashing and free shipping promotions?
Mr. Wingo: It’s going to be interesting because you have a lot of factors. A positive is there aren’t as many big-box retailers as there used to be. So that will be a net positive to drive people online. And in this area, the retailer to keep an eye on is Amazon, which sets the tone. They have Prime which they’ve been promoting heavily, and they have Super Saver Shipping, which is essentially free shipping on anything over $25. So I do think it’s going to get promotional pretty quickly, and consumers are definitely addicted to coupons, so we’ll start seeing coupon madness start probably by November 1.