10 Golden Rules for Online Shopping Players

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Since 1997, e-commerce consultancy the E-Tailing Group has been buying products from 100 web sites a year. The Chicago-based firm records and tabulates the results of its shopping experience, using the data to help them advise clients and set e-commerce benchmarks.

Each year, the firm's so-called "Mystery Shopping" project investigates many aspects of 100 top e-tailers. The sites themselves don't know they're being tested; yet they get a complete diagnostic check-up. "We're just an average customer. We use the shopping cart, we order the product, we e-mail the site, and we return the product," explains Lauren Freedman, the firm's president.

The test e-mail, for instance, discovers how quickly and accurately a site responds to customer queries. The return process, too, is checked for glitches. "We also test live chat — as things evolve on the Net, we add things," Freedman notes.

To take a look at the firm's research, go here.
For example, among the sites put to the test, here what's the company found:

• 93 percent offered free shipping with a price barrier
• 68 percent offered real-time inventory updates
• 70 percent answered their e-mail correctly
• 16 percent required authorization for a return
• 8 percent offered the capability to shop in a second language
  

(Final results for the 2004 holiday season will be posted by the end of January.)

Above was the statstical observation, on top of it, analyst came up with fantastic guidelines which is published as "10 golden Rules for Online Shopping players".

It's result of the experiences, they had of purchasing hundreds of products online and visting the sites and recording the interaction experience.

Visit for the complete coverage of these golder Rules.

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