Archive for April, 2012

Retailers demand clearer view of online shopping

Monday, April 9th, 2012

The Australian Retailers Association has recommended the Australian Bureau of Statistics disclose more detail on the ‘other’ retail sales category to show the speed in growth of online sales.

The ABS current splits retailing into a number of different categories, such as clothing and household goods. However it does not specifically categorise online sales with the existing groups.

“Online retailing is in the ‘other’ retailing area, so you don’t know what percentage of that ‘other’ retailing is the online,” said Australian Retailers Association executive director Russell Zimmerman.

You can read more at smh.com.au

Online shopping shift picks up speed

Monday, April 9th, 2012

Online sales in the retail sector increased in the month of February indicating growth in consumers willingness to spend online.

Figures showed the National Australia Bank Online retail sales index jumped 26 per cent in the year to February, increasing from the 19 per cent pace in the year to January.

“This increase was particularly notable given that February 2010 and 2011 recorded little to no growth when compared with the preceding month of January,” said NAB chief economist Alan Oster.

You can read more at smh.com.au

Selling products online

Friday, April 6th, 2012

Gerry Harvey of Harvey Norman said last month that people will not buy furniture online.

SmartCompany spoke to two entries from the Smart50 who disagree with Gerry, Milan Direct and Fidarsi Furniture. Both have revenue in the millions of dollars.

“speaking to these two companies, it’s obvious people are buying furniture online and they’re doing so because the sites go out of their way to show as much of the product as possible.

This is where high quality photography, demonstration video and interactive features are critical. Shoppers want to take away as many variables as they can. High quality photography and other features go a long way to ensuring the purchase is a successful one.”

One common critcism of buying bulky products online from consumers is that they can’t touch or feel, for instance. However if you put a lot of effort in to your product as described above you can certainly sell bulky products online.

You can read more over at smartcompany.com.au

 

Online travel start-up raises $US2.1 million, merges with European site

Friday, April 6th, 2012

Roomorama.com has announced a merger with lofty.com, a short-term rental website. Roomorama has secured US$2.1 million in seed funding to assist with growth.

The online travel start-up was launched in 2009, offering a service to handle short-term rental transactions.

With an average gross booking of $1330 in 2011 and present booking numbers at approximately 200,000 nights to date it’s yet another case of the success of launching a business online.

Featuring more than 2000 Australian properties, Australia was it’s second most frequent user base in 2011.

You can read more over at smartcompany.com.au