New Look tops eRetail benchmark study

Fashion retailer New Look has topped the latest eRetail Benchmark study from eDigitalResearch, joining the likes of John Lewis and Amazon, who have both traditionally lead the multichannel customer experience over the past few years.

The study which measures and assesses the entire end-to-end digital experience and covers multiple customer touch points including web, mobile, and app, found that New Look topped the table for its digital customer experience thanks in part to an extensive development of its mobile site, when conducting the research over the Christmas 2014 trading period.

New Look has been praised in the report for its “seamless and consistent homepage”, as well as its search and shopping basket functions across all three digital channels. The research found New Look’s homepage to be littered with clear, vibrant navigational links, especially on mobile, making it easy for users to “delve straight into their product pages”.

Department store John Lewis continues to maintain its leading multichannel position, it topped the eRetail Benchmark over Christmas 2013, and continuing to scoring particularly well on its website and its mobile site. Users liked the retailer's consistent navigational links, as well as their clear focus on security and customer support when it comes to making a purchase.

Chris Russell, joint CEO at eDigitalResearch, said: "The digital customer experience has never been so important - and with a growing number of consumers now shopping online, we're seeing retailers continually investing in their digital experience. However, as more resource is ploughed into online channels, we'll soon reach a point where digital customer experiences are on a par with one another - we're already seeing minimal differences between leaders of the eRetail Benchmark.

"A great digital customer experience is therefore becoming a key fundamental - or brilliant basic if you will. But unless brands are able to replicate their digital customer experience across the entire customer journey, including delivery and customer contact, then a great digital experience will mean nothing. Service and fulfilment will become vital in the next few months and years and will increasingly be what sets apart brands in the retail sphere."