Quality Product Content Can Accelerate Sales, Enhance Brand Loyalty

CHICAGO, Oct. 28, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- The quality and completeness of product information across industries and retail channels can significantly impact online sales and brand trust, according to a newly released study by Shotfarm, a centralized platform for the management and exchange of product information.

According to the 2015/2016 Shotfarm Product Information Report, online consumers seek out the best and most complete product information available prior to making purchase decisions and will readily move between manufacturer and retailer websites to find it. Those offering the most compelling, engaging, and complete content are viewed as the most trustworthy by shoppers and will be rewarded by repeat purchases, lower levels of returns, and long-term loyalty.

"Until now, the importance of product content on buying behavior has been largely theoretical," said Mike Lapchick, CEO of Shotfarm. "We're now able to see a direct correlation between the quality of product information and conversion, abandonment, returns, and more. What's so valuable about this study is that the findings are actionable. Poor product content is such an easy and affordable problem to correct and the now-documented benefits of doing so are overwhelming."

The report, which surveyed 1,542 consumers about their online shopping habits and product information preferences, found the impact of poor product content on digital sales is most readily apparent in three areas:

• Returns: Forty percent of consumers have returned an online purchase in the past year specifically because of poor product content. The most returns come in the clothing and apparel category, where one in four consumers has returned an item due to inaccurate product information.
• Shopping cart abandonment: More than 90 percent of consumers have abandoned an online shopping cart, with cost (61 percent), delivery time (33 percent), and poor product descriptions (30 percent) the top three reasons for doing so. In addition, more than a quarter of consumers have left their purchases behind in the absence of quality images and product reviews.
• Brand trust: Eighty-six percent of those surveyed said they would be unlikely or very unlikely to make a repeat purchase with a retailer that provided inaccurate product information. Only 13 percent of consumers would likely shop with that same retailer again.

"Improving how product information moves from manufacturer to retailer will have an immediate impact on the online shopping experience," added Lapchick, "since it will allow trading partners to focus on the quality and completeness of their content instead of how it is managed and distributed."

To download the full report, visit http://www.shotfarm.com/product-information-report/

About Shotfarm

Shotfarm's Product Content Network is the first end-to-end solution for the management and exchange of product information that meets the demands of the entire ecommerce industry. Free and simple core functionality, combined with a suite of affordable and powerful upgrade options, make Shotfarm instantly useful and infinitely scalable. One system, any format, thousands of retailers and manufacturers. Shotfarm just makes sense.

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SOURCE Shotfarm