Online Retailers Are Running Out Of Time To Get Their Sites In Order, Says NCC Group Website Performance

• Crucial online shopping period kicks off November 28th
• 2011 performance trends suggest many e-tailers are underprepared
• Time is running out - efficiency and reliability are paramount

'Cyber Monday', one of the biggest online shopping days of the year, is fast approaching on November 28th, and e-tailers will be hoping for bumper sales to kickstart the crucial Christmas shopping period.
 
However, NCC Group Website Performance, specialising in website performance optimisation, has observed trends throughout 2011 suggesting that many companies are not as well-prepared at they need to be.
 
The company's quarterly Online Retail Reports, which analyse the performance of the UK's top 50 e-tailers over three-month periods, have observed increasing periods of website downtime throughout 2011. This culminated with the sites averaging a massive 15 hours 44 minutes of downtime in the third quarter. Some sites recorded over ten days of downtime - even with these results removed, average outages of 3 hours 42 minutes showed a decline on Q2.
 
Download speeds also showed inconsistency, with average speeds of 12.47 seconds in Q2 and 6.08 seconds in Q3, using a 2 Mbps connection speed.
 
"E-tailers operate in an extremely crowded marketplace, and if they're selling the same branded products as a competitor, the efficiency and reliability of the site becomes a major differentiator," comments Bob Dowson, director of NCC Group Website Performance.

"Our results suggest that retailers may be neglecting the efficiency of their sites as a whole, and that's a real concern.
 
"Surveys showing that people abandon slow websites are an important reminder of the necessity for sophisticated monitoring and improving of download speeds - there's a direct link to revenue loss if it's neglected. On top of that, a website that simply doesn't work sends customers into competitors' open arms in an instant.
 
"Outages can be caused by a site being unable to take the strain during periods of peak traffic, and for an e-tailer those are obviously the times when being online matters most. The Christmas shopping period can bring in a huge proportion of a retailer's annual revenue, and driving customers away then could be hugely damaging.
 
"Even within busy times it's impossible to absolutely predict periods of peak traffic, which is why it's important for testing and monitoring to be an ongoing exercise. Erratic download speeds and functionality need to become a thing of the past if e-tailers are to keep their customers."