“Can I try on that (e)sweater please?”

Quick, guess what generated more online revenue last year: computers or clothes? Believe it or not, online clothing revenue actually exceeded online computer revenue for the first time ever last year. Potential explanations of this shift often relate to new technologies such as rich imaging capabilities, more liberal shipping policies, and people’s generally increased comfort level with e-shopping.

Unlike buying a computer online where the priorities are comparing specs and pricing, clothing is very much a “touch and feel” purchase; the ramifications of this are that online shopping has to replicate the in-store environment as much as possible while at the same time capitalizing on the efficiencies that internet retailing puts at the forefront.

So the real question to ask here is what do online clothing shoppers want? Like we’ve said many times before in this blog, the best way to find out is to actually ask them. Attitudinal analytics has come a long way over the years in terms of market penetration over many different verticals, and sites that sell clothing online should be no exception.

If shoppers want to feel as though they’re perusing clothes on the shelves of a store, the etailer needs to know. Similarly, if they want to feel as though they have complete access to whatever equivalent the website can provide to an actual customer service employee, that should be known as well.

This milestone for online clothing shopping is important in that there companies are doing something right, but there is still much more growth opportunity out there. Currently, online clothing sales only make up less than 10% of all clothing revenue. While this number is impressive compared to what it was as recently as even two years ago, imagine how high it could be if clothing shoppers could seamlessly shop online? Avoiding real-world shopping drawbacks such as parking annoyances, over-zealous salespeople and line-ups would be music to many people’s ears.

So how does an online clothing store exploit on this opportunity for growth through this emerging channel? Well, I can think of two easy steps to kick start the process: step #1 is to ask your customers what would give them incentive to shop for clothing online, and #2 is to listen to what they have to say and make changes accordingly. Pretty simple, right? Now let’s just hope they have that sweater in blue.