IO1 A2: QUESTIONNAIRE REPORT (CIVIC) (UK)O1/A2 - Needs Validation Phase: Questionnaire Results for...

[This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be

held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained herein.]

IO1 – A2: QUESTIONNAIRE

REPORT

(CIVIC)

(UK)

PUBLIC

CIVIC Deliverable: O1/A2

BOOST4SHOES Version: 1.0

O1/A2 - Needs Validation Phase: Questionnaire Results for UK Issue Date: 22/04/2018

2017-1-UK01-KA202-036733

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Revision History

Version Date Author Description Action Pages

1.0 22/04/2018 CIVIC Creation of the document C 30

(*) Action: C = Creation, I = Insert, U = Update, R = Replace, D = Delete

Referenced Documents

ID Reference Title

1 2017-1-UK01-KA202-036733 BOOST4Shoes Proposal

2 2017-1-UK01-KA202-036733 Evaluation Comments

3 2017-1-UK01-KA202-036733 O1/A1 Rationalisation Phase v1.1

Applicable Documents

ID Reference Title

1 CRE.THI.DEV Quality Management Procedures

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1. Contents 2. Introduction .......................................................................................................................................... 4

2.1 Description of the Project ............................................................................................................. 4

2.2 Questionnaire Objectives .............................................................................................................. 5

3. Summary of Questionnaire Results ...................................................................................................... 6

3.1 Initial Information ......................................................................................................................... 6

3.2 Skills and Knowledge ................................................................................................................... 11

3.3 Payment Tools ............................................................................................................................. 15

3.4 Data Analysis ............................................................................................................................... 16

3.5 Communications and Media ....................................................................................................... 18

3.6 Graphic Design ............................................................................................................................ 25

3.7 Marketing Tools .......................................................................................................................... 26

3.8 English language.......................................................................................................................... 27

3.9 Training on e-commerce ............................................................................................................. 28

4. Conclusions ......................................................................................................................................... 29

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2. Introduction CIVIC is a digital agency which works closely with the Scottish Qualifications Authority to provide online

tools for the SQA’s community of educators and parents. A main area of expertise is digital strategy which

together with compliance are the two most important business areas of CIVIC. Based on its experience in

digital tools and its strategy to become more active in corporate training CIVIC aims to develop in the

context of the project a personalized training tool for SMEs which will deliver targeted action based

training. The present outputs is part of the inception phase, during which the specifications of the tool

and the training content to be developed will be elaborated in order to be developed in subsequent steps

of the project.

2.1 Description of the Project Boost4Shoes aims to use the Internet as a sales channel to increase revenues from cross-border sales both

within the EU and outside. This includes changing sales and marketing strategies by delivering training to

footwear SMEs on how to penetrate foreign markets by upgrading their online presence in order to

increase cross-border sales revenues from the Internet as a sales channel.

Boost4Shoes target group includes Footwear SMEs. More specifically:

Footwear sector professionals dealing with management and sales

VET providers

SME Chambers

shoe industry representation bodies

IT companies

e-Commerce/Digital marketing trainers/coaches

young individuals who can benefit from additional skills which can help them obtain work and

mobility

Business Innovation Centres

business incubation clusters

entrepreneurship associations

public officials responsible for entrepreneurship/growth/VET

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2.2 Questionnaire Objectives The objective is to identify the practices carried out by the e-commerce retailers of the footwear industry

in the countries of the partnership (Poland, Greece, UK, Germany, Portugal, Romania) with focus also in

cross-border online sales. The conclusions to be drawn from the national phase will be compared to the

best practices carried out by the e-commerce retailers in these sectors in the countries previously

identified as leaders [Italy, Netherlands, Ireland, Austria and Lithuania] with focus also in cross-border

online sales in the European Union.

The comparative analysis of the Transnational Phase with the National Phase will reveal the gap between

the desired situation ("TO-BE") and the present situation ("AS-IS), which will further drive the inception of

the perceived needs that will be presented to targeted beneficiaries for validation in the context of O1/A2.

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3. Summary of Questionnaire Results

3.1 Initial Information

There were 28 participants in the survey for the UK. The vast majority didn’t note their position, except

for 2, who identified themselves as manager and shop retailer respectively. Almost half of the participants

(48%) were between 36-50 years old, 32% 20-35 years old and 20% 51-65, therefore representing a range

of different age opinions and experiences with the field, with the majority (69%) operating in the shoes

retail (B2C), 21% in the manufacturing sector, and only 7% and 3% respectively in the design and supply

of shoes industry activities.

The huge majority of the participants (86%) claimed that they already use a channel for online sales. 84%

of them declared that they use an external either cloud-based, open source or a custom development

solution, while only 16% use their own solution (market place or SaaS). The vast majority of the

participants (80%) operate a fully automated system down to an online order and only a minor

percentage of 20% use either an adhoc purchase via email (10%) or through telephone enquiry (10%).

Q5: Does your company have a channel for online sales?

86%

14%

Does your company have a channel for online sales?

Yes

No

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Q5a: If "YES", what kind of channel?

Q5b: What level of e-commerce do you operate?

57% asserted that have expanded their online sales across borders whereas 43% being active only in the

national market. The countries mostly traded in the past 3 years by the participants is the national market

in UK that comes first (11), with Germany and outside Europe markets (Canada and USA) being the

second targeted markets on their operation (7). Other European countries, such as Cyprus, Poland,

Portugal, Greece and Romania are almost evenly distributed as target online markets for the UK-based

businesses.

16%

84%

Kind of channel for online sales

Own solution (marketplace/SaaS)

80%

10%10%

Level of e-commerce

A fully automatedsystem down to anon line order

An ad-hoc purchasevia email request

Telephone enquiry

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Q6: Does your organization sell online across borders?

Q7: Which of the following EU countries have you traded online with in the past 3 years?

None of the participants provided specific numbers for their sales performance in terms of shoes pairs

sold per year. Only one participant, operating in the shoes retail sector, provided figures for their annual

turnover, which amounts approximately to 115 million pounds. Domestic sales percentage accounts for

43%

57%

Does your organization sell online across borders?

Yes

No

0123456789

1011

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51-75% and 75% of the domestic total sales whereas export sales percentages in the majority account for

10% of the total sales with other higher percentages ranging from 11% -75% being the case for only 3

companies in total. Less than 1/3 of respondents (6 out of 28) claimed that both domestic and export sales

correspond to a worth noticing percentage of the total sales, with this being distributed evenly between

10%, 31-50% and 75%, with domestic sales being proved slightly higher along the 51%-75% percentages.

Q10: What percentage of your total sales do you consider domestic sales and what export sales?

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

3

3.5

<10% 11-30% 31-50% 51-75% >75%

Domestic vs. export total sale percentage

a. Domestic Sales

b. Export Sales

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Q11: What percentage of your sales corresponds to online sales?

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

3

3.5

<10% 11-30% 31-50% 51-75% >75%

Domestic vs. export online sales percentage

a. Domestic Sales

b. Export Sales

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3.2 Skills and Knowledge

Among the most important features for online selling are considered the safe payment costs (26), flexible

returns (23), study of the competitors’ offers (23), delivery methods and tools (22) as well as product

visualization options (22). It’s worth noting that more than half of participants considered also very

important “Other” features, without any further specifications.

The huge majority of the participants noted that the most important communication instrument for cross-border purchases is the email (26), followed by the traditional normal telephone number (21) and the contact form (21). The rest of the communication means were considered of much less importance, while Skype flagged completely inappropriate by almost all participants. Most of the skills related to e-commerce sales management included in the survey noted as very or fairly important by the participants with Payment tools (28), English language (25) and Customer and personal services (25) topping the chart. Surprisingly, of medium importance were emerged the Communication and media skills by 1/3 of the participants.

Q12: Which of the following features do you consider important for selling products/services online?

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

5

4

3

2

1

0

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Q13: When communicating with a cross-border purchaser, which means of communication do you consider important?

Q14: Sort in order of importance from 0-5, the following skills you consider to be important on an ecommerce sales manager tool.

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

Important Communication Means

5

4

3

2

1

0

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

E-commerce skills sales

5

4

3

2

1

0

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The majority of the participants identified as very important components of the e-commerce website

those that ensure security of transactions, i.e. Trust Seals (27), communication through Social media (25),

Clear and quick navigation (25), Customer reviews (24), and online reward schemes to ensure Customer

loyalty (24). Of medium importance identified elements dealing with offering Various payment options

to customers, Legal information and Sales alerts. Less important were considered Newsletter and

Discussion forums. A few participants opted for Other website elements as very important without any

further specifications.

The topping chart concern about online sales of the UK-based companies is the lack of expertise of

different legal systems (23), followed by the worry about exchange rates (18), language problems (17),

and worry about online frauds (15).

Half of the participants’ concerns include International regulation (13), Uncertainty for demand (13) and

Credit card payment costs (12).

Less than 1/3 of participants concerned about Unknown payment services (11), Inexperience with other

cultures (11), IT Skills (10) and Distribution issues (10).

The majority of the participants concerned about their ICT skills assessed as very important new

knowledge about Mobile technologies, Online security and Social media Skills. It seems, however, that

there are different needs about ICT empowering across UK-businesses ranging from ICT basic core skills,

and further enhanced ICT skills to Internet consumer intelligence.

Q15: What elements of the website do you consider important?

0

5

10

15

20

25

30

Important website elements

5

4

3

2

1

0

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Q16: What concerns do you have when it comes to cross border sales?

Q17: As you have indicated ICT skills as a potential concern, please indicate what you consider your

weaknesses are or what would benefit you?

0

5

10

15

20

25

Major concerns in cross border sales

0 2 4 6 8

0

1

2

3

4

5

Major IT weaknesses

Mobile technologies

Online / ComputerSecurity

Social Networking

Internet consumerintelligence

Basic/core skills

Skills enhancement

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3.3 Payment Tools

95% of the participants claimed that entrust payment system’s security, with 70% already offering both

online and offline payments, and only 10% being confined to offline payments.

Q18: Do you consider that online payment systems have the appropriate security?

Q19: What kind of payment do you offer?

95%

5%

Online payment systems' security

Yes

No

10%

20%

70%

Kind of payment offered by UK businesses

Offline

Online

Both

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3.4 Data Analysis

The majority of participants (74%) considered themselves with no sufficient or necessary knowledge for

data analysis, including data mining and big data, while the vast majority (84%) use neither a data analysis

software nor any database with information of clients and products. Google analytics seems to be the

most common information used for data analysis by participants (16%) that already use data analysis for

their online business.

Q21: Do you consider yourself with the necessary knowledge for data analysis (data mining and/or big

data)?

Q22: Do you use any specific data analysis software?

26%

74%

Level of required knowledge for data analysis

Yes

No

16%

84%

Use of data analysis software

Yes

No

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Q23: Do you use a database to keep the information of your clients and products?

16%

84%

Use of database for products and clients

Yes

No

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3.5 Communications and Media

A minority of users claimed that they feel very confident with both Integration processes of online and

offline activities and Promotional strategies, while less participants noted that they have a very good

knowledge about data requirements and basic presentation skills.

The bulk of participants rated their level of confidence as medium (rate 3) or less advanced (rate 2)

regarding Data requirements, Integration with offline promotional activities and promotional

strategies. Even more participants considered themselves less confident even with basic presentation on

their web system using searches, filters, sorting orders and promotion.

71% of companies have already a person in charge of communication and social media in their company.

Q24: Indicate how confident you are when you get your services/products to the web through the

following:

0 2 4 6

0

1

2

3

4

5

Rate confidence with certain web acitivities during e-commerce

Integration with offlinepromotional activity

Promotional strategies

Data requirements(product informationmanagement, imagery,attributes, metadata)

Basic presentation(searches, filters, sortorders, promotions)

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Q25. Has your organization a person in charge of communications and Social Media (Community Manager)?

UK-based businesses claimed that they are familiar with 3 of the most common place e-Commerce

concepts: Pay Per Click (PPC) (15), Search Engine Optimisation (12) and Search engine placement (10).

However, they still miss familiarization with concepts such as Search engine ads (8), E-commerce

templates (7), Open-source merchant server software (5), Web usability (5) and Local e-Commerce (5).

Participants are not familiar at all with concepts related to Conversion rate, Hosted e-Commerce sites,

Data Mapping, Site building tools, Personalization, User modeling and Personalized recommended

systems.

In regards to social media, the huge majority them claimed use Facebook. Half of participants already use

Twitter and Instagram and very few use also LinkedIn; however almost all participants don’t make any

use of other social media, blogging and micro blogging tools (such as Flickr and Thumblr). Only two

participants noted that they use also snap chat.

Tasks most commonly carried out through social media aiming at the publicity of products, promoting

the company and launching special offers. Less often instant messaging is employed and scarcely contests

are organized. Tasks particularly addressing the needs for customer’s loyalty and personalization of

services are totally absent from social media practices adopted by the participating companies.

Although only 1/3 (25%) of the UK-based businesses are aware of either free (SEO) or paid internet

marketing tools (PPC), to get traffic to their site from the “organic” search results or paid ads, the majority

(76%) declared that they are familiar with personalization tools such as cookies and 59% that they

currently use metrics or performance indicators to measure sales performance.

71%

29%

Communications & Social Media Manager

Yes

No

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Q26. Which of the following e-Commerce concepts are you familiar with?

Q27: Mark the social media tools that your organization uses.

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16Familiarisation with e-commerce concepts

0

5

10

15

20

25

Social media tools used

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Q28: Which of the following tasks do you carry out through social media?

Q29: Do you know how to make your online offerings interact with SEO and/or PPC?

0

5

10

15

20

Tasks through social media

25%

75%

Do you know how to make your online offerings interact with SEO and/or PPC?

Yes

No

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Q30: Are you familiar with the use of Cookies for personalisation?

Q31: Are you currently using any metrics or performance indicators to measure your sales

performance?

Only a minority of users claimed that they feel very confident with Key principles which encourage visitors

to buy and Key usability & persuasion principles for search, navigation & browsing, and fairly confident

with principles on how shopping bag design can be improved to increase click through to checkout.

The bulk of participants rated their level of confidence as medium (rate 3) or less advanced (rate 2)

regarding Key principles which encourage visitors to buy and Key usability & persuation principles for

search and browsing.

Even more participants considered themselves very unconfident with most key principles concerning

advance of design, browsing, and persuasion of customers to increase buys and visits back to the online

shop. The vast majority of them noted (89%) that already employ policies on sales and returns.

76%

24%

Familiarisation with cookies for personalisation

Yes

No

59%

41%

Use of indicators for sales performance measurement

Yes

No

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The barriers in expanding e-commerce provision of UK-based companies topping the chart are the Global

or European market uncertainty (17), Financial restrictions (13) and Lack of skills/knowledge (9).

Half of the participants claimed that language can be sometimes (39%) or definitely (11%) a barrier to

cross-border e-commerce.

Q32: Please indicate how confident you are with your understanding of the following:

Q33: Do you have policies on sales or returns?

0 1 2 3 4 5

0

1

2

3

4

5

Rate level of understanding of communication principles applying on e-commerce systems

How shopping bag design can beimproved to increaseclickthrough to checkout

Essential usability & persuasiontechniques for delivering anintuitive checkout process

Key usability & persuasionprinciples fro product pagedesign

Key usability & persuasionprinciples for search, navigation& browsing

Key principles which encouragevisitors to buy

89%

11%

Policies on sales or returns

Yes

No

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Q34: What are the barriers to you in expanding your e-commerce provision?

Q5: Is language a barrier to cross-border e-commerce?

0

5

10

15

20

Barriers in expanding e-commerce provision

11%

50%

39%

Language barrier to cross-border e-commerce

Yes

No

Sometimes

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3.6 Graphic Design

The majority claimed that they use specific software tools for graphics and photo imaging, half of

participants use also specific software for 3D design and only 1/3 for video creation and editing. New

tools, such as AR and VR, that boost products promotion and purchase via advancing customers’

experience and thus customers’ loyalty, are not used at all by the UK-based participants.

Q36: Do you use specific software tools for the following tasks when implementing changes to your

online store, website or social media?

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

Graphics orphoto

imaging

3D design Videocreation

and editing

Music orsoundediting

Augmentedreality (AR)

Virtualreality (VR)

Other(s)

Software tools used for implementing changes to online store, website, social media

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3.7 Marketing Tools

The majority (71%) has never participated in any training course on marketing for online sales and a huge

majority (88%) don’t make use of any sales or marketing software to increase website or online shop

traffic. However, 76% have already a trademark identifying their products.

Q37: Have you ever participated in a training course on marketing strategies for online sales?

Q38: Do you use a sales and marketing software, such as AdWords, to increase the rate of visits to your

website?

Q39. Do you have a trademark?

29%

71%

Training courses on marketing for online sales

Yes

No

12%

88%

Use of software to increase website visits

Yes

No

76%

24%

Use of a trademark

Yes

No

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3.8 English language

All the UK-based companies’ online stores are available only in English language, which, even if reasonable

due to the globalization and dominance of English in the global market, indicates that UK participants

based on this fact are not aware and/or neglect that penetration to foreign markets can benefit from

language localization of the online shops, particularly for outside Europe e-commerce activities.

Q40: In which languages is your online store available?

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

English French German Arabic Chinese Other(s)

Language used in online stores

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3.9 Training on e-commerce

UK-based participants noted that by far the most suitable assistance for their business to be more active

both in the domestic market and cross border market is to get enhanced knowledge on e-commerce

strategies and technologies.

Q41. Considering all your responses what information/assistance would best suit your business to be more e-commerce active DOMESTICALLY?

Q42. Considering all your responses what information/assistance would best suit your business to be more e-commerce active CROSS BORDER (EXPORT)?

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

GreaterInformation onhow to succeed

by using e-commerce

Marketintelligence

Retail / vendorconfidence

Economicassistance

Other

Assistance needed for domestic e-commerce

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

GreaterInformation onhow to succeed

by using e-commerce

Marketintelligence

Retail / vendorconfidence

Economicassistance

Other

Assistance needed for cross border e-commerce

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4. Conclusions The UK-based participants in the survey represent a range of different age opinions and experiences with

the field, with the majority being operated in the shoes retail and the manufacturing sector. The huge

majority is active in online sales using an external fully automated system down to an online order and

only a minor percentage of them use either an adhoc purchase via email or through telephone enquiry

system. The majority already offers both online and offline payments.

More than half participants are also active in cross border e-commerce mostly targeting Germany from

European countries, and Canada and USA outside Europe. However, their domestic sales percentage

accounts for the largest piece of the domestic total sales whereas export sale account for 10% of the total

sales.

The huge majority of the participants considered email, traditional normal telephone number and contact form as the most important communication instruments for their cross-border purchases, thus indicating that either they ignore or neglect more advanced technologies for communication such as …… Payment tools, English language and Customer and personal services were identified by them as the most important skills related to e-commerce sales management. In addition, they identified as very important components of the e-commerce website those that ensure security of transactions, communication through Social media, navigation, customer reviews, and online reward schemes.

Their topping chart concerns about online sales include lack of expertise of different legal systems,

exchange rates, language problems and online frauds.

The majority of the participants concerned about their ICT skills and assessed as very important new

knowledge about Mobile technologies, Online security and Social media Skills. They were identified with

no sufficient or necessary knowledge for data analysis, including data mining and big data, while the vast

majority uses neither a data analysis software nor any database with information of clients and

products. Google analytics seems to be the most common information used for data analysis.

A minority of users claimed that they feel very confident with both Integration processes of online and

offline activities and Promotional strategies, while less participants noted that they have a very good

knowledge about data requirements and basic presentation skills. Even more participants considered

themselves less confident even with basic presentation on their web system using searches, filters,

sorting orders and promotion.

Although they claimed that they are familiar with 3 of the most common place e-Commerce concepts:

Pay Per Click (PPC), Search Engine Optimisation and Search engine placement, they still miss

familiarization with concepts such as Search engine ads, E-commerce templates and Open-source

merchant server software

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Participants are not familiar at all with concepts related to Conversion rate, Hosted e-Commerce sites,

Data Mapping, Site building tools, Personalization, User modeling and Personalized recommended

systems.

In regards to social media, the huge majority uses Facebook. Half of participants already use Twitter and

Instagram and very few use also LinkedIn; however almost all participants don’t make any use of other

social media, blogging and micro blogging tools (such as Flickr and Thumblr). Tasks most commonly carried

out through social media aiming at the publicity of products, promoting the company and launching

special offers. However, tasks particularly addressing the needs for customer’s loyalty and

personalization of services are totally absent from social media practices adopted by the participating

companies.

The barriers in expanding e-commerce provision of UK-based companies topping the chart are the Global

or European market uncertainty, Financial restrictions and Lack of skills/knowledge.

Although half of the participants admit that language can be a barrier to cross-border e-commerce, the

majority of them have not been employed any language localization component to their cross- border e-

commerce system.

In regards to their knowledge and practices carried out on the graphics design of their online system, it

seems that they use specific software tools only for graphics and photo imaging, or even for video

creation and editing, but none of them uses new tools, such as AR and VR, that boost products promotion

and purchase via advancing customers’ experience and thus customers’ loyalty.

The majority has never participated in any training course on marketing for online sales and a huge

majority don’t make use of any sales or marketing software to increase website or online shop traffic.

They noted that by far the most suitable assistance for their business to be more active both in the

domestic market and cross border market is to get enhanced knowledge on e-commerce strategies and

technologies.

IO1 A2: QUESTIONNAIRE REPORT (CIVIC) (UK)O1/A2 - Needs Validation Phase: Questionnaire Results for...

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