What are you trying to accomplish with this page?
This post's title became the topic of an interesting discussion in our Marketing Team in which we were discussing the concept of providing a better template for Product Managers to submit their creative briefs for traditional and interactive media requests.
However, a template won't fix a fundamental misunderstanding of the commercialization process.
The Purpose of Commercialization
Commercialization is about transforming the value proposition of your brand or product in bite-sized chunks that are tailored for the end-user at the appropriate stage in their shopping process.
Commercialization is NOT about picking items from a menu of capabilities from your marketing communications department and web teams to randomly fit as many tactics as possible into your available budget. Remember, just because you can, doesn't mean you should.
1 Simple Tip to Factor User Experience into Commercialization
A general rule of thumb I use is asking one simple question: What is the next step you want the consumer to take?
If you can't answer this question, put your work on pause and honestly map out the context in which the consumer is arriving at this point in the shopping process and how your message is going to help them proceed to the next step.
Ask this question frequently throughout your commercialization plan and you will find yourself building a mental map of how your target end-user is navigating your product category. This will help you frame up the user experience across multiple tactics in-store and online in digestible chunks.
Still fascinated by how easy it is to spend money online
Before the internet, the following scenario could not have existed, and an online business of affiliate dollars and music sales like this was not possible. I still find the ease and convenience fascinating.
1.) While watching the Vikings vs. Packers NFL game this evening, a commercial for HTC's new "You" campaign came on.
2.) Feeling so connected to it, I tweeted about it while on the couch with my laptop.
3.) Prior to tweeting about it, I had to find the video on YouTube to link to it in the tweet. I found it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-QhxjJFl7E
4.) In the YouTube comments, I saw the name of the artist that created the song used in the commercial. (It should be noted that I wasn't really looking to buy this song initially.)
5.) I copied & pasted the artist & song name into Google (search results here).
6.) Found the song on Last.fm. Was able to play it directly on Last.fm to verify that it was the correct song. It was.
7.) Clicked the "buy" button on Last.fm. That brought me to Amazon.com for a 1-click purchase.
$0.99 later and after couple minutes of my time, I now have the song.
The above scenario will only get easier.
The above scenario will only get easier and faster with fewer steps to the point of purchase. Convenience is key. If your industry or market hasn't been impacted by this, it will be. There may be technical limitations or generational preferences, but either way, both will catch up, align, and make buying your product as easy as it was for me to buy this song (even for someone not necessarily in the market).
Product configurator interview for Internet Retailer
I was recently interviewed for a series of articles published both online and in print for Internet Retailer. I always find it interesting to see which quotes are chosen by the writer and how comments are represented when an article is finally published. The two articles in which my comments were featured were:
Rich media wows shoppers, boosts sales and builds brands—if e-retailers build it right.
Consumer insights refine early version of Levolor.com product configurator
This article is specific to our site in which more of my comments about launching a product configurator were used from the original interview below.
Original Interview
The article was published as a result of the effort of Adobe Scene7's PR firm which is why you'll see a few of the questions below specific to Adobe's Scene7 product which we use for the interactive imagery in our product configurator.
In the spirit of full disclosure, and because I think the information in the answers below provides good background for companies considering product configurators, here is the full Q&A from the interview with additional links:
Q: When was the site launched? How long has the product configurator been on the site?
The product configurator was launched in June 2007.
Q: Please describe the product configuration capacity on your site and the underlying technology that powers it.
The product configurator is designed specifically for window treatments and supports 100s of billions of product combinations that are unique to the window covering industry. Technology used: PHP for the application layer, MySQL for the database layer, and Ajax for much of the real-time calls to the server throughout the configuration process. Scene7’s dynamic imaging component is used to visualize window treatments as they are built throughout the configuration process.
Q: Why is rich media and this tool in particular important to selling at Levolor.com? What does this interactive capacity add to the proposition that text and static images can’t accomplish?
Since we deal with a home décor product, the ability to visualize the custom-order product prior to ordering is important to our customers. The interactive capability allows for the many billions of combinations of our product to be visualized on-the-fly without having to individually create the accompanying static images. Scene7’s dynamic imaging technology enables us to dynamically call the visual components of a configured product.
Q: In choosing across the standard and custom options – and the different product categories (blinds, drapes, etc.) – how many combinations are possible? If that number isn’t available, how many options are there to choose from?
There are over 100 billion combinations for ordering our custom blinds and shades. This doesn’t mean there are 100 billion questions to answer in a single configuration, but rather the combination of product options, colors, and sizes equate to over 100 billion different ways our products can be ordered. For a consumer, custom blinds and shades are an investment in their home and the ability to see a visual representation of the product before it is ordered adds peace of mind.
Q: What were the challenges associated with getting this many images up online? How did you resolve the challenges?
The need for dynamic imaging was obvious. There was no way it was financially feasible to maintain billions of image combinations. By leveraging Scene7’s dynamic imaging technology, we were able to resolve this product data challenge.
Q: What are the challenges associated with making sure this many images are served in a timely way in response to site visitor requests? Could you have handled this on your own servers, do you use a content delivery network, or is this something Scene7 provides?
Scene7 provides the necessary capacity and delivery requirements to meet the needs of our end-users. Scene7’s technology was more of a foregone conclusion than it was for us to try and solve the “challenges associated with making sure this many images are served in a timely way in response to site visitor requests.”
Q: As you prepared to implement the product configurator, was there anything you learned in the process that caused you to adjust your initial plans in any way? How did you resolve that?
Assembling a team of product experts, web development experts, interactive experts, and usability experts proved to be the most challenging. Each functional expert approaches a product configurator from their own point of view and it made identifying the ideal user interface for our end-users a very time-intensive initiative. Having the ability to deliver dynamic imaging is only a fraction of the equation to a successful configurator. For Levolor, the product configurator is an ongoing product which is updated and improved on a daily basis based on changing consumer insights, trends, and technological enhancements.
Q: What advice would you have for other online retailers considering adding this much rich media to their site, from an operational perspective? Is there any different way you would approach this, based on what you learned from you initial experience?
A product configurator is an ongoing commitment and should be treated as a part of your organization’s product offering. It’s easy to launch a functionally-sound configurator online but very difficult to achieve consistently positive customer satisfaction without continuous improvement; particularly if your configurable products change on a yearly basis. All too often we see organizations invest in a product configurator but neglect to plan post-launch improvements. The end result is a product configurator plagued by costly & massive one-time updates because the budgets align with advertising & promotion rather than research & development. A&P budgets fluctuate considerably and having the budget significantly reduced one year (due to economic conditions or otherwise) can single-handedly cripple your product configurator’s effectiveness on your website. With interactive technology changing as quickly as it does, it’s important to stay on top of interactive and usability trends so you can stay ahead of the curve when it comes to customers interacting with your product configurator.
Q: What does it cost you to have the product configurator up on your site? Has the return been worth it?
No comment.
Google Site Search – Affordable website search
A couple weeks back we rolled more changes out on Levolor.com, one in particular included the implementation of Google's hosted Site Search product: http://www.google.com/sitesearch/.
Considering we had never offered site-based search before and nearly every day we heard from our feedback tool that visitors wanted to be able to search, this was a really straight-forward, quick, and easy implementation that I wish we had done it sooner.
Search can help reveal visitor intent
Google Site Search offers several customization options within their interface. Perhaps the biggest thing we've learned thus far is what people are wanting to find on the site based on keyword reports. This offers another slice of valuable data to layer on top of navigation/pathing and conversion analytics to better understand the wants and needs for your visitors.
While search will certainly help search-savvy visitors find the products and content that already exist on your site, perhaps the more interesting piece of data is what they're searching for that doesn't exist on your site. This data can assist in providing you the necessary insights on what additional products and features to add to your site.
At a minimum of $100/year, the barrier to entry for site search is extremely low
Google's pricing methodology is very smart -- starting out at just $100/year for indexing up to 5,000 pages and offering 250,000 queries. That is very impressive technology and search sophistication that can be added to virtually any site on a budget. This really lowers the barrier to entry for smart, savvy search tools for websites thereby making it almost completely inexcusable to not have search on your site.
What Google Site Search is not
Google Site Search is not a search merchandising tool like the Fast Search and Omniture Site Searches of the industry. One can only hope that over time Google will integrate new merchandising-related features that make it a viable competitor to give these other industry players good competition. What Google Analytics has done for web analytics I imagine it will do for merchandise-based search optimization as their engineers continue to improve the product features and functionality.
Another Levolor.com Launch – Custom Draperies
After many months of site development and many years of new product development, I'm very happy to announce that we've launched the new features & product on Levolor.com. Here are a few screen shots:
The updated homepage featuring new custom draperies and all of our product lines:
Preview of the inspirational pages:
Virtual Decoration: choose wall colors, trim colors, and drapery fabrics
Full product configurator: custom draperies at the convenience of your computer screen
Free samples. It doesn't get any easier than this page.
And of course, drop-down menus for easier/quicker site navigation. What a concept!
And as with any major product or site re-launch, these few screen shots don't come close to capturing the amount of "behind the scenes" work that went into the site -- you know, the stuff that only the development team truly appreciates! 
Now it's time to start digging into the analytics to see how online visitors navigate this product category. It's a much different process than custom blinds & shades, so the online insights will be interesting to learn from.
Blog by Eric Long
I'm an experienced online marketer, information architect, digital strategist, and social media enthusiast. I'm passionate about providing outstanding cross-channel experiences for considered purchases (with a focus on mass customization).
About Eric Long
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