Web stress loses online sales
Stressful online experiences drive consumers to competitors
PR agency Nelson Bostock commissioned Vanson Bourne to undertake research on behalf of software provider CA Technologies. 1000 UK consumers were interviewed using Vanson Bourne’s Consumer Technology Omnibus service. The research investigated consumer experiences of purchasing products or services online.
The research results revealed that shopping online often causes what CA Technologies defined as “web stress”. Although 95% of consumers shopped online, over half (54%) had difficulty in completing their purchase, resulting in “web stress”. The research findings also enabled CA Technologies to point to 5 causes of “web stress” - slow loading website pages (69%), pages which are hard to navigate (61%), a lack of contact details (57%), a lack of useful information (55%) and having to repeat billing details (44%).
Having experienced poor online services or underperforming websites, over half of respondents have aborted their attempts and visited a competitor’s website instead. This issue is further highlighted by the quarter of respondents who indicated that they have actually stopped using a company following a poor online experience.
Nelson Bostock and CA Technologies released the results of the survey in November 2010, during the run up to the busiest online shopping period of the year. The results were published on a number of news websites profiling the problems that many consumers face and the importance to retailers of providing a good online experience to their visitors and shoppers. The timely research lead to quite extensive media coverage.
CA Technologies press release:
http://www.ca.com/gb/news/Press-Releases/emea/2010/Dreaming-of-a-Web-Stress-free-Christmas-en-gb.aspx
Example media coverage:
http://blogit.realwire.com/Dreaming-of-a-Web-Stress-free-Christmas
http://www.itnewsonline.com/showrwstory.php?storyid=4240
http://www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com/netimperative/news/2010/11/top_5_causes_of_web_stress.php
