The conventional wisdom has been that comparison shopping engines (”CSEs”) are at best neutral in terms of brand building. At worst it is thought that CSEs diminish the value of retail branding and tilt the balance of power in the buying cycle in favor of the consumer and the unbranded direct marketer.
I think the truth is that the CSEs do help build a brand and reinforce consumer brand perceptions.
In the absence of solid empirical data I’ll resort to observation and common sense to make this case.
Here are some observations…
CSE usage is growing: Comparison shopping engines as a group, including Google Product Search, are growing in reach much faster than the organic growth in online commerce.
Merchant ratings are considered: Merchant ratings by consumers along with product reviews and ratings are a key part of online comparison shopping. These ratings are the new factors in a ‘considered’ retail purchase.
Offline purchases still happen: Consumers not only use CSEs to make online purchases but to research offline purchases as well. Having an offline retail brand online at the points of highest purchase intent is a really really smart idea. This is one of the biggest reasons why branded merchants need to have a well managed presence on the shopping comparison sites.
Text ads brand: Google Adwords has demonstrated that a lack of graphics doesn’t mean a lack of brand association.
URL as the new brand: Even for large brick and mortar retailers, the URL is new brand. Bestbuy.com, GAP.com, they all brand the consumer especially the under 30 demographic.
Understated logos still brand: Have you heard of the favicon? It’s the tiny 16×16 pixel icon that shows up in your web browser address line and represents the brand of that site. If you drag that icon to your desktop or bookmark it… the favicon branding may come along with it. Amazing.
On comparison shopping sites companies that want to highlight their brand may purchase logo placement in search results listings and featured or sponsored merchant status. This is real branding that is charged per click!! Think of that. The company’s brand is getting 20x - 50X more impressions than clicks on those high purchase intent shopping search results pages… and the company only pays for the impressions where users actually clicked in the brand.
Ubiquity and cross channel branding matters: URL, text or icon your brand needs to be everywhere your target consumers are.
Branded retailers have an advantage: What a branded retailer can expect is that their brand will increase their click through rate (or conversion rate if you’re on a self-contained marketplace like Amazon or SHOP.com) independent of the strength of their offer. It gives the merchant an opportunity to merchandise to the consumer on their web site even if they don’t necessarily have the best ‘published offer’ on the CSE.
The success formula: The most consistently successful marketing formula I’ve seen on the CSE’s is: Strong Retail Brand + Strong Merchant Ratings + Best Offer. This provides a solid basis on which to further optimize shopping channel marketing with CSEO, CPC bidding and merchandising promotions.
So, in summary, what we observe is that branded merchants thrive alongside unbranded merchants on these CSE sites. In fact they thrive in a way and to a level that is not found on eBay but appears to be unique to comparison shopping engines, including Amazon.com and SHOP.com
What are your thoughts? What have you or your clients observed?