The research, commissioned by retail outsourcing and
technology specialist Xansa and global service provider Akamai,
questioned 52 leading UK retailers to establish the cost to
individual retailers of ineffective websites in the run up to
Christmas.
It found that 17% suffered some form of website downtime, with
nearly 10% of those experiencing several hours of outage. Fifteen
percent of those surveyed admitted to slow site performance over
the festive season, with 7% of these lasting for up to a week.
Of those surveyed, around 30% admitted that they had no backup
infrastructure in place to cope with peak demands.
“Despite increasing numbers of shoppers using the online
channel, retailers are failing to support and integrate this
important part of the retail experience,” said Mark Collyer, market
development director at Xansa.
“Whilst some retailers have addressed outdated approaches to
infrastructure, website development, service management and
back-office integration, others continue to plaster over the cracks
and hope that the problem will go away. As an increasing number of
shoppers turn to the online channel, this situation will only get
worse for retailers who fail to act now," he added.
Collyer warned that ineffective websites could also hit firms by
impacting on their brand image.
