Groupon, Sephora Named Leaders In The Mobile Charge
By Anna Rose Welch, Editorial & Community Director, Advancing RNA
Internet Retailer identifies 2013’s ten hottest mobile e-commerce innovators
Internet Retailer recently released its list of the 2013 top 10 best mobile commerce e-tailers, and that list might come as a surprise, especially considering goliath Amazon isn’t on it. So, who is? Perhaps some unexpected names: One Kings Lane (furniture and home décor), Jacketthreads (menswear), Coastal Contacts (contacts and eyeglasses), Skinny Ties (neck ties), and Sephora (beauty supplies), among others. But this year, the winner in the number one spot is daily deals provider, Groupon. This ranking should be important for the company considering it has been working on its turn around since it lost 80 percent of its value in 2011 after going public. This company in particular has been working tirelessly to expand its business model from a “flash sale e-mail model to a mobile commerce market place,” CEO Eric Lefkofsky says. Recently, these moves have included entering into the online restaurant-booking services arena and completing an acquisition of South Korea’s Ticket Monster, making South Korea the company’s second-largest market after the U.S.
However, it is the company’s recent mobile initiatives that make it stand out on IR’s list. According to IR, 50 percent of transactions at Groupon occur on mobile devices. In November, the company celebrated its fifth birthday, and in celebration of this event and the impending holiday season, the company redesigned its apps to pull in Cyber Weekend customers. These apps, IR argues, are key to the company’s success: “50 million people worldwide have downloaded Groupon apps, the third-most in retail, Arbitron says. Even Groupon’s m-commerce site looks like an app. The iPad has a clean, easy two-column layout. Touch a product image and up pops a window with HD images, specs galore, a button to go social, and more.” The new homepage is also personalized for the viewer, boasting curated collections of deals based on the customer’s interests, past purchases, and current location.
How to manage it all: retailer-focused retail management systems
And the company’s success doesn’t end there this holiday season. Not only did the company see record sales on Cyber Monday and beat Amazon in IR’s ranking as the top mobile retailer, but its “Groupon Goods” helped the company earn the No. 2 spot on IR’s Top 100 Mass Merchant category, once again coming in above Amazon, which ranked No. 4.
Also on the top ten m-commerce innovators list this year is (perhaps not surprisingly) beauty retailer Sephora, which has often been regarded as a leader in mobile retail. In 2012, the company equipped its stores with iPads to provide customers with access to several of its services, including Color IQ, Beauty Studio Lookbook, and Beauty Studio Reservations apps. In addition, 800,000 of the company’s Beauty Insider Members have embraced digital loyalty by adding their Sephora loyalty cards to Apple’s mobile wallet, Passbook. And the company has done its best to encourage customers to do so especially earlier this year when it implemented in-store signage. These signs not only informed customers about the existing program, but also let them know they could also download a digital copy of their loyalty cards on their smartphones.
These two companies, along with the other eight, are “leading the mobile charge” this year as more and more shoppers and retailers are turning to mobile shopping and looking to invest in mobile. While one Motley Fool writer, AnnaLisa Kraft, says that Amazon will remain “the e-gorilla…by sticking to their niches, these…surprising names can maintain or even gain share from Amazon.”
Want to publish your opinion?
Contact us to become part of our Editorial Community.