L2 Report Ranks the Digital Winners & Losers among UK's Specialty Retailers
LONDON, Nov. 10, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Digital benchmarking firm L2 Inc. recently released its annual Digital IQ Index®: Specialty Retail UK.
The Index benchmarks and ranks the digital performance of 92 Specialty Retail brands operating in the UK market across four segments: Apparel, Beauty & Skincare, Homeware, and Shoes & Accessories. The Digital IQ Index® methodology evaluates brands' performance across the consumer journey (Site and E-commerce, Digital Marketing, Social Media, and Mobile) and classifies each brand as "Genius," "Gifted," "Average," "Challenged," or "Feeble." The report also provides data-driven analysis and insights into digital trends and best practices among UK Specialty Retailers.
"UK-born brands JD Sports and River Island have performed in parallel with global heavy-hitters H&M and MAC Cosmetics, thanks to strong mobile advertising investments and competitive organic search performances," said Simon Birkenhead, European Managing Director at L2. "Local retailers in search of a model for improving their digital strategies should also look to Fast Fashion. This retail category has adapted well to the digital world by creating flexible multichannel shopping experiences that employ competitive fulfillment options, while also maintaining highly popular social media accounts."
Key findings from L2's report include:
- Over half of Index brands have adopted content integration tactics on brand sites by offering video (58 percent), style guides or look-books (54 percent), and blog and editorial content (53 percent). However, the degree to which brands connect their content to a purchase channel varies: although more than half of brands have invested in video content on their brand sites, only 13 percent provide a link to a product page, and only three percent have attached a quick-shop feature to their videos.
- The next wave of product page feature innovation is trending toward crowd-sourced content like sortable, detailed ratings and reviews, and user generated content: 46 percent of Index brands include either ratings or reviews on their product pages.
- Despite changes to Instagram's algorithm, brands continue to find enhanced engagement on the platform. It accounts for the lion's share of social interactions, responsible for 96 percent of the total combined 277 million interactions across Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter (in Q3 of 2016).
- Although various quick-pay options have been introduced--like Visa checkout, Amazon Payments, MasterPass, Android Pay, and Apple Pay--Paypal remains the only expedited payment method available on mobile with double digit adoption (80 percent).
The report features case studies on brands including but not limited to: Hugo Boss, KIKO Milano, Mango, Missguided, Miss Selfridge, Oasis, Pull & Bear, Ted Baker, Tommy Hilfiger, and Warehouse.
Download a complete media-only copy of L2's Digital IQ Index®: Specialty Retail UK here.
View the associated L2 video here.
About L2
L2 benchmarks the digital performance of over 2,200 brands across 14 industries globally. Our proprietary Digital IQ Index® is the global standard for measuring digital competence. With offices in London and New York, L2 provides its member brands with actionable data-driven insight to inform capital allocation decisions and improve the return on their digital investments.
Contact:
Elizabeth Cooke
1-646-902-4897
elizabeth.cooke@l2inc.com
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