
E-Commerce

Every website has it. That small box in the header with the picture of a magnifying glass to the right. We call it the search box, and it's kind of the unsung hero of your e-commerce site. And maybe it isn't the sexiest topic in the world, but it doesn't have to be because site search has a return on investment story that speaks for itself. Retailers typically report two or three times the amount of conversions for site search users.
Frederick's of Hollywood Group Inc., a Los Angeles lingerie brand that struggled to compete with rival Victoria's Secret, has closed all of its stores and will do business only online. "We no longer have store locations," the retailer said on its website, but added that its online store offered the same selection of merchandise.
TJ Maxx has long been praised for offering discounted designer duds and luxe beauty products, among many other things. Now, if possible, the store just got even better. The brand launched its first ever online plus-size section on Thursday, giving "Maxxinistas" of all shapes and sizes an opportunity to find a bargain from the comfort of their own homes.
Online crafts marketplace Etsy priced its initial public offering at $16 a share on Wednesday, at the high end of its expected range of $14 to $16 a share.
The retail industry is in the midst of an omnichannel revolution, led by increased consumer confidence in web and mobile shopping, said John Kalinich, senior vice president of omnichannel and e-commerce at Deckers Brands, parent company of brands such as UGG and Teva, in his keynote address at the Demandware XChange conference in Las Vegas yesterday.
Business-to-business online retailing has been witnessing strong growth due to the rapid migration of manufacturers and wholesalers from legacy systems to open, online platforms. As legacy systems involve the use of electronic data interchange, which is expensive and cumbersome to handle, B-to-B models will continue to move towards ubiquitous online platforms that allow buyers and sellers from anywhere in the world to transact goods and services with ease.
As widely expected, Europe's antitrust chief, Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, has issued a formal Statement of Objections (SO) regarding the operation of Google's shopping search comparison service — marking the latest step in a five-year long antitrust investigation and an escalation of European anti-competition action against Mountain View.
On April 1, super-luxury brand Chanel announced that it would be opening an e-commerce store this fall. It wasn't an April Fool's joke, and legions of fashion-forward Frenchwomen would have been forgiven for gasping in shock, since it was only in 2013 that Chanel's global director of fashion Bruno Pavlovsky said that "fashion is about clothing, and clothing you need to see, to feel, to understand."
Looks like Delia*s isn't dead after all. The (formerly) bankrupt retailer's homepage now features a "coming soon..." message complete with a #DeliasForever hashtag. A corresponding Delia*s Instagram post reads: "News flash! Delia*s will be coming back-to-school with you! Best part? Online only = ALWAYS OPEN!" Another post reveals that the shop will be back up and running online in August.
Beware peddlers of lies. Amazon is officially cracking down on phony product reviews. The e-commerce juggernaut not only forbids them on its site, it contends that they're illegal, too. Case in point: The company filed a lawsuit on Wednesday in Seattle's King County Superior Court against four websites it alleges publish fraudulent reviews that distort its product ratings.