Much Ado About eCommerce

With brick & mortar retail sales demonstrating a paltry 0.1% growth in June, artificially supported by rising gas and food prices, there is a concerted move among big box retailers to enhance their online sales presence.



Comscore reported last week that ecommerce sales continue to refuse to succumb completely to the weakness of the American consumer. The rate of growth has fallen by 50% year over year, but ecommerce spending continues to demonstrate growth in the low double-digits. There is faint hope that the stimulus checks will continue to provide further boost to online retail spending.

Retailers are demonstrating that the lesson of this divergence between the growth prospects of online and offline sales is not being lost on them. Internet Retailer notes that, "At Sears Holdings Corp., same-store sales at Sears and Kmart retail chains declined 8.6% for the quarter that ended May 3, the company lost $56 million and shuttered 62 stores, yet the company increased investment in its online and multi-channel operations by $10 million."

Shop.org, the online arm of the National Retail Federation & the e-tailing group have each published white papers concerning the focus of those eCommerce investments in "The State of Retailing Online 2008" and "Investing in eCommerce, Despite the Times", respectively. Universally, there is a great deal of focus on improving on-site merchandising tools, including search, personalization, and integration of product presentation for the online and internet spaces. From the e-tailing group's document:



Opportunity for Mpayy

According to Shop.org, which conducted the research in conjunction with Forrester Research, more than 75% of retailers cite the Checkout Process as a tactic and investment priority. Of that group, 80% want to improve their shopping cart page; 79% want to improve their checkout process; and, 57% want to include "Third-party Email Payment" capabilities.

Mpayy is in finishing stages of launching its Lightbox Checkout Window that will streamline the checkout process for its online retail partners. (Check back for sneak peeks.) Mpayy's offer for online retailers enables them to reduce cart abandonment and growth their sales online.

Mpayy is a secure online & mobile payment processing system that processes payments from shoppers' checking accounts at a 50+% discount to credit cards. Mpayy provides 0% fraud liability for retailers, and guarantees payments. The application is developed by and housed at US Bank (NYSE:USB) in an environment that meets PCI DSS standards, and is compliant with USA Patriot Act, OFAC, Reg E and Reg Z.

Financial Times Cites Online Sales Growth #'s

As we work to deliver our online and mobile payment processing system we take heart in numbers like those cited by the Financial Times in a recent article.

According to the article:

"Raul Vazquez, chief executive of Walmart.com, said the retailer had seen sales on the Friday after Thanksgiving holiday “exceed our expectations” of 40-60 per cent annual growth.

Ron LaPierre, president of PriceGrabber, a comparison shopping site, said sales through its site had been running “at or above expectations” so far."

The article goes on to state that WalMart is expecting 30 million visitors this week, and the top ecommerce sites are running similar promotions to the "door busters" run in brick and mortar stores. They are adding, this season, free delivery offers to drive more online sales.

More to come...

Holiday Shopping Paves the Way for Mpayy

Mpayy headquarters remains very focused on putting the finishing touches on the application and web and mobile sites for launch in late January. So, we will sit through the period in which traditional retailers generate up to 80% of their annual sales - the timeframe between Thanksgiving and New Year's. Today we review holiday spending predictions and a new retailer effort that is ahead of the curve.

Predictions for Holiday Spending

Internet Retailer just reviewed a recent Forrester Research article entitled “Outlook for U.S. Online Retail: Holiday 2007.”

In it, Forrester's predicts that ONLINE spending will grow $6 billion to $33 billion this holiday season. IR goes on to cite Burst Media arguing that more than half (50.7%) of consumers will do some holiday shopping online, up from the mid-30%'s last year.

The Internet Retailer closes with some interesting customer sentiments that pave the way for Mpayy.

— 70.7% of online shoppers cite credit card security as the biggest impediment to buying online. Other concerns are the privacy of personal information online, cited by 60.8%; shipping costs

Mpayy will be PCI Compliant and utilize 128-bit TDES encryption technology to protect customer data vs. the retailers doing it themselves.

Mobile Touchpoints

Both the Internet Retailer and the Wall Street Journal point to concerns about the economy, housing market and gas prices as influences that will constrain consumer spending this holiday season. In order to combat those factors, the Wall Street Journal (subscription required) notes several high-flying retailers are taking specific steps:

"Shoppers who sign up with Nordstrom or Wal-Mart, for example, will receive text messages with information on discounted merchandise and special sales. Best Buy is offering gift suggestions on its mobile Web site. J.C. Penney is going further, offering to make wake-up calls to early-bird shoppers eager to get a head start on Black Friday, the traditional kickoff to the frenzied holiday retail season. (This year, many J.C. Penney stores will open at 4 a.m. on the day after Thanksgiving.)"

These retailers are looking to open up the mobile marketing channel. Currently, most efforts are just informative, or include a coupon system that can be redeemed for discounts in the store. However, little to no mobile action is, well... actionable. Mpayy will drive mobile commerce through actionable text messaging. We look forward to rolling out pilots with close friends of the company at Interactive Mediums.