New Rackspace study reveals it’s a cloud-powered Christmas with 74% of Australian consumers doing their shopping online

December 2 2013, 9:52 am | BY Ricki Green | No Comments

rackspacestudychristmasshopping.jpgThe average individual budget in Australia for Christmas presents and related items this year is $375, according to a new study from Rackspace Hosting, the open cloud company.

With almost three-quarters (74 per cent) of the 1,000 Australian adults surveyed planning to do some or most of their Christmas shopping online, Australian retailers stand to gain an enormous amount from this channel.

The Rackspace study shows, however, that almost 70 per cent of shoppers experienced online frustrations last Christmas, with over 40 per cent of this group either abandoning their purchase completely or trying a different website. The top frustrations were cited as complicated check-out procedures (27 per cent), followed by slow-loading websites (12 per cent). This indicates that the share of the colossal Christmas purchase pudding each retailer will get is dependent on the online experience they provide customers.

Says Albert Woo, managing director Intershop APAC: “It is extremely important to provide the best user experience to your end customers.  To deliver on the core essentials and to back that with a top shelf customer care unit could be the difference between success and failure.

 

“There’s no excuse for not having a website fully optimised for the Christmas rush. Many of the frustrations cited by respondents are easily foreseen and can be planned and tested for in advance of any traffic spikes. Not planning for the festive crowds is a missed opportunity when you consider how much business can be lost simply because you didn’t take the time to test your site and provide a great online customer experience.”

 

Cloud-powered Christmas traditions

The Rackspace study also reveals that a massive 75 per cent of respondents intend to buy at least some element of their Christmas online – from gifts (59 per cent) to Christmas drinks (11 per cent) and travel tickets to see family or friends (17 per cent). This is often an evening pursuit for most users, with 52 per cent planning to shop at home in the evenings.

Yet, going online this festive season is not just about shopping: it’s now a firm part of people’s Christmas traditions. Even on Christmas Day, 53 per cent of respondents intend to send season’s greetings to friends and family and post pictures of their celebrations using cloud-powered social media channels. Others will be playing online games (16 per cent), surfing the web (14 per cent) and watching on demand TV (7 per cent). It’s a similar picture on Boxing Day, with 58 per cent going online.

A merry mobile Christmas

This year 13 per cent of those surveyed will be shopping online using a tablet. This is a substantial increase from the 7 per cent who shopped in this way last year. Similarly, smartphone usage for online purchases is up from 7 per cent last year to almost 11 per cent this year.

Over a third of Australian adults (34 per cent) are planning to give someone a connected device – such as a tablet or smartphone – for Christmas, and the same again (34 per cent) are expecting to receive a connected device. Just over half (51 per cent) will be giving a digital gift, with shopping vouchers most popular (30 per cent).

Says Angus Dorney, director and general manager at Rackspace Australia: “The results from this study suggest strongly that all businesses with an online presence – not just retailers – must be more prepared than ever before for the Christmas rush. With an increasing trend towards increased connectivity, it is vital that online companies have the hosting infrastructure and support in place to deal with spikes in traffic over the entire festive season.

“Load testing your site and ensuring it is capable of handling increased traffic can mean the difference between keeping and losing customers. This is customer service for the internet. In the same way you wouldn’t leave your bricks and mortar store under-staffed at Christmas. It is essential that your website is optimised for peak season performance.”

Vital preparations for retailers and other businesses to undertake now include:

  • Check and test capacity: To avoid website slowdown, e-tailers in particular should do a full audit of their web hosting environment to check if there is enough network connections and server space available to handle a high influx of web traffic.  They should also ‘load’ test websites by flooding them with a large volume and variety of requests, from simpler tasks like landing on the home page to key word searches, filling up baskets and checking-out. With over 40 per cent of shoppers abandoning a purchase if they cannot quickly and easily use the website, e-tailers can’t afford for any system lag or unavailability.
  • Get support: Peak traffic demands over the Christmas shopping period and beyond will probably not happen during a 9 to 5 working day. The study found that 52 per cent of respondents will be shopping in the evenings, and 65 per cent will be online on Christmas day. Retailers need to have appropriate support to keep their website up and running whenever it’s needed.
  • Use a hybrid cloud: Testing may show that additional web capacity is required during high-traffic times. The public cloud is the ideal hosting environment for this as it offers unmatched scalability on a pay-as-you-go basis. Use it in combination with dedicated servers or private cloud in a ‘hybrid cloud’ to deliver optimal security, reliability and overall infrastructure performance.
  • Keep improving: After peak season dies down, review the performance of your website, analyse any downtime or other performance issues, and use this to fix any issues. Over a quarter (26 per cent) of Australian adults say that their main reason for shopping online is the convenience, so keeping it that way is crucial.