Dan Parker, Chief executive of Sponge, shares his view of good and bad websites.
Good site: New Look mobile site
This is a decent entry-level site that takes care of the basics. M-commerce sites need to follow three rules: keep it simple; seamlessly integrate with your desktop site; and use design, functionality and personalisation to minimise journey to checkout. The site must employ product filtering, one-click checkout and a store locator.
IBM’s Coremetrics Benchmark data tells us that 18.9% of UK online retail traffic is via mobile, and it’s set to grow. There are few opportunities for rapid growth at relatively low cost in these tough economic times but by doing the basics well, New Look has increased its mobile sales by more than 500%.
Bad site: H&M iPhone app
Would you open a store that had a slow checkout? It would be madness, but apparently that’s OK on mobile. The shop on this app is buried in the sub-navigation and simply launches the desktop site. It is an awkward and slow user experience.
No doubt H&M faced complex challenges to deliver a fully optimised m-commerce experience but it’s been almost two years since launch. Surely those issues should have been resolved by now. With 1.4 million people downloading the app in the first eight weeks, all would have seen the appalling feedback: “disappointing”, “waste of time”. Surely this PR disaster alone demands more effort.
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