With short-term ROI as the current call-to-action in Retail, eCommerce and customer experience teams have redeployed their budgets (and new funding requests) around projects that have the best chance of being approved.  As such, an emerging list of “likely-to-be-approved” site enhancement projects has risen to the top.  For clarity, when I refer to tactical site enhancements I am highlighting a focus on new features that can best be described as additive in nature.     

To be clear, these items can have a nominally positive impact on conversion rates.  Look for example at better SEO execution.  This is a  “level-the-playing field” type of initiative which can help lesser known brands compete with the biggest of the big.  Another safe bet is using customer analytics, A/B Testing, etc to simplify navigation.  Reducing ‘browse-to buy-clicks’ can make your site simpler to navigate and improve the shopping experience.  Another good example is leveraging site analytics to drive product recommendations (i.e. “Customers who bought this item also bought…” or “Welcome back John Doe, here are some recommended products…”.

The items above represent just a few of many examples of incremental site improvements which won’t break the bank, do support a short-term ROI, and don’t require fundamental technology upgrades.  In addition, they are even more enticing because there are matching 3rd party software solutions that can be purchased and deployed (typically as a service) in a minimally invasive way. 

Don’t lose sight of the big picture however.  While tactical upgrades can lead to some benefits, the longer, more strategic investments still deliver the strategic benefits.  Delivering coordinated strategies for product information management, Web merchandising, Web marketing, user experience design, integrated enterprise fulfillment, cross-channel experience, and more will transform eCommerce businesses into competitive advantages over the long term.