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Hitwise Intelligence - Heather Dougherty - North America

Analyst Weblog

Category Archives: Retail

Hunt is on for Retailer Promo Codes

November 11, 2009

Almost everyone loves a bargain and during the cost conscious holiday shopping season last year, discounts were more popular than ever. This year looks to be no exception for the discount hungry consumer with searches up 19% last week as... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 11:35 PM | (1) | (0)
In Categories Coupons | Cyber Monday | Retail

Black Friday and Cyber Monday Predictions

November 02, 2009

Holiday projections are out and many are predicting a gloomy holiday season for retailers. The NRF forecasts a 1% decline growth in total retail sales for the 2009 holiday season, totaling $437.6 billion. The online channel is poised to fare... Continue reading...

Resurgence of layaway programs continues

August 20, 2009

With many consumers remaining cautious with spending, retailers are turning to layaway programs again this holiday season to offer shoppers a payment plan to buy gifts. In 2008, layaway programs made a comeback as retailers hoped to encourage shoppers to... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 03:33 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Holiday | Retail | Shopping and Classifieds

Bing Shopping takes off

August 14, 2009

Microsoft recently announced a promotion to receive Double Cashback when consumers use Bing Shopping for searches and online purchases. Back in October of last year, I wrote about the initial success of the Cashback program to capture visits, so this... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 11:37 AM | (2) | (2)
In Categories Bing | Retail | Shopping and Classifieds

Amazon acquires Zappos.com

July 22, 2009

Amazon announced a deal today to acquire apparel and footwear retailer Zappos.com. The popular online retailer ranked 3rd last week among online retailers within the Apparel and Accessories category behind Victoria’s Secret and Old Navy. Both Amazon and Zappos.com are... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 06:51 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Retail | Shopping and Classifieds

Online Sample Sales

June 12, 2009

Far safer than in the physical world where one can be easily bludgeoned by an elbow or shoe, online sample sales have continued to grow in popularity over the past year. Despite the poor economy, shoppers are flocking to the... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 04:43 PM | (1) | (0)
In Categories Retail | Shopping and Classifieds | fashion

CircuitCity.com Returns

June 03, 2009

After shutting down operations in January, CircuitCity.com is back after Systemax purchased the brand and domain at bankruptcy auction for $14 million. Systemax also owns TigerDirect.com and acquired CompUSA last year. CircuitCity.com was quickly relaunched last week to capitalize on... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 10:41 AM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Email | Retail

Michelle Obama’s Impact on Fashion

May 07, 2009

Ever since First Lady Michelle Obama hit the press circuit, there has been a fascination with her clothing choices. Mrs. Obama’s selections from retailers like J Crew, White House Black Market and Talbots, that are affordable and obtainable by many... Continue reading...

Last Minute Mother’s Day Planning

April 30, 2009

The countdown is on for retailers looking to capture Mother’s Day spending with 10 shopping days left (11 if you are the same-day delivery type, if so – buy online, pick-up in-store is for you). According to the National Retail... Continue reading...

Who Benefits from Circuit City Closure Online

April 09, 2009

Back in January, Circuit City announced ceasing all operations, so we thought it would be interesting to analyze which retailers have benefited from their exit in the market. The brand Circuit City is very well known and drove a significant... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 05:40 PM | (2) | (1)
In Categories Retail | Search Strategies | Shopping and Classifieds

Retail traffic still down

February 26, 2009

Not much good news is comes out of the retail industry lately, consumer confidence is at an all-time low and retailers have reported steep declines in revenue. The economic downturn also continues to impact overall visits to online retailers, which... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 06:03 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Economy | Retail | Shopping and Classifieds

Guest Post - Opportunities with Coupon Promotional Terms

February 17, 2009

At Hitwise our clients are always discovering new trends within our data and then applying them to their own businesses. From those findings we frequently get asked by clients to let them post their findings to our research blog to... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 10:32 AM | (2) | (0)
In Categories Retail | Shopping and Classifieds

Snuggie slays the Slanket online

January 28, 2009

An article about the success of the Snuggie in AdAge on Monday prompted me to compare the popularity of the two competing 'blankets with arms' - the Snuggie and the Slanket. I’m sure everyone has been plagued with the problem... Continue reading...

Circuit City to close all operations

January 19, 2009

On Friday, Circuit City announced that the company is closing 567 stores and will be laying off more than 30,000 workers. During the holiday season, despite being one the top visited websites among the Retail 500 on Thanksgiving (#5), Black... Continue reading...

Holiday Search Referral Growth

January 16, 2009

Search engines accounted for the largest share of upstream traffic to the Retail 500 ahead of cross-shopping on other retail websites and email during the holiday months of November and December. An integral part of every retailer’s marketing strategy; the... Continue reading...

The Season of Online Coupons

January 15, 2009

We all knew heading into the holiday season that consumers were going to be highly sensitive to price due to the economic conditions, paving the way for an increase in online deal seeking. Coupon websites experienced growth in visits throughout... Continue reading...

Retailers still keen on search

December 23, 2008

Search remains king for retailers during this holiday season, with referrals from search engines responsible for driving the largest share of visits to the Retail 500. Last week, 30% of the upstream traffic to the Retail 500 was from search... Continue reading...

Hot Products - Toys and Electronics Categories

December 19, 2008

The short holiday season is rapidly coming to an end, but shoppers have not given up on looking for the hot products online. The Wii Fit continues to dominate the fast moving search terms list, when comparing the top searches... Continue reading...

Free shipping searches abound

December 18, 2008

Yesterday I posted about the uptick in traffic and searches related to coupons during this holiday season, but I would be remiss not to give special attention to one of the most popular online promotions of all – free shipping.... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 07:05 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Holiday | Retail | Shopping and Classifieds

Coupon traffic and searches continue to grow

December 17, 2008

Amid the trying financial climate, consumers are still doing some holiday shopping, although in more moderation than last year. For the week ending Dec. 13, 2008, the market share of visits to the Retail 500 represented 4.28% of all internet... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 12:52 PM | (1) | (0)
In Categories Holiday | Retail | Shopping and Classifieds

Holiday comparison - Brick & mortar vs. online-only retailers

December 12, 2008

One popular topic that comes up each year during the holiday season is comparing the amount of traffic to the websites of brick & mortar retailers to the online-only players. In order to perform the analysis, we created 2 custom... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 07:22 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Holiday | Retail | Shopping and Classifieds

Race is on for hot holiday products

December 05, 2008

Every holiday season we comb through our search data to find the season’s most popular products. Some are recurring favorites – like Ugg boots (much to my chagrin) and the Wii, but to help mix up the wish lists some... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 06:41 PM | (1) | (0)
In Categories Holiday | Hot Products | Retail

Traffic to Web-only retailers increases on Thanksgiving and Black Friday

December 01, 2008

The holiday shopping season is officially upon us and for some online retailers, prospects may be rosier than expected thanks to heavy promotional activity to encourage spending (and unfortunately also erode profit margins). On Thanksgiving, which has been the heaviest... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 07:51 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Black Friday | Retail | Shopping and Classifieds

Retail traffic flat from 2007

November 25, 2008

Thanksgiving is almost here, time for turkey, pumpkin pie – and online shopping. Each year Thanksgiving is the peak traffic day to the Retail 500, particularly among many of the brick & mortar players, who use the online channel to... Continue reading...

Black Friday countdown is on

November 21, 2008

With one week left to go, Black Friday (aka the day after Thanksgiving) is almost upon us. Historically, Black Friday sales were typically called After-Thanksgiving sales, but thanks to a growing number of websites leaking retailer promotions, Black Friday has... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 06:55 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Black Friday | Retail | Shopping and Classifieds

Which product categories can weather the economic storm

October 23, 2008

Last week I wrote about the decline in visits to the websites of the top 500 retailers (ranked by traffic), a trend that continued for the week ending October 18, 2008 with a 5% year-over-year decline. This was the seventh... Continue reading...

Posted by Heather Dougherty at 04:48 PM | (0) | (0)
In Categories Economy | Retail

Heather Dougherty

Director, Research at Hitwise.