According to the Nielsen//NetRatings MegaView Online Retail report (that’s a mouthful), here are the top 10 online retailers by June conversion rates:
| 1-800-Flowers | 19.4% |
| Lands’ End | 18.4% |
| Victoria’s Secret | 14.5% |
| L.L. Bean | 14.1% |
| QVC | 13.7% |
| eBay | 13.6% |
| Amazon | 12.2% |
| Proflowers | 11.9% |
| Barnes & Noble | 11.1% |
| Crate and Barrel | 11.0% |
These seem low to me. After all, people are going to these sites to buy things, right? They might be doing some comparison shopping, but I doubt that’s the bulk of the visitors. So over 80% of the visitors, who don’t have many reasons for visiting the site in the first place, are leaving without buying anything.
Maybe they’re looking for this week’s specials? Browsing the latest offerings? Reading the site’s privacy policy? The analysis here would be useful.
Hey Bob,
They seem good to me. If these conversion rates are calculated on a visit basis, then if, for whatever reason, it takes me two visits before I make the purchase, my conversion rate would be 50%. One more visit, and it’s down to 33%. Sprinkle the inevitable browsers and, to me, it seems like they’re not terribly out of line.
I just bought from a site and visited with IE and Firefox. I wanted to see what the shipping rates were going to before I gave them all my *REAL* personal information, so I used IE and faked the name and address. I then bought with Firefox.