Thursday February 9, 2006

Survey Reveals Poor Web Site Performance Can Take the Romance Out of Last-Minute Valentine's Day Shopping Online

Seventy Percent of Valentine's Day Shoppers Will Stop Trying to Access a Site After Two Attempts

COCONUT CREEK, Fla., Feb. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- More than 50 percent of online shoppers will make a Valentine's Day purchase within six days of the holiday, according to a survey conducted by TNS and sponsored by AlertSite.com. With the rush of last-minute online shopping already underway, retailers risk losing valuable business if their sites experience any errors that might delay or prevent potential customers from making a purchase.

The survey, which polled 2,500 respondents online, shows that 70 percent of those who are planning a Valentine's Day purchase online will try no more than two times to access a Web site before choosing another site, or not buying online at all. Web site monitoring technology can help online merchants immediately identify any problems that might interfere with a customer's shopping experience by monitoring uptime, load time and key site applications, and providing notification about performance issues.

This year, flowers, candy/chocolate and e-cards topped shoppers' lists, suggesting that these traditional gifts remain popular online Valentine's Day purchases. About 15 percent of survey respondents said they would buy flowers; 13 percent planned to buy candy or chocolate; and 12 percent intended to send e-cards to loved ones.

A list of 25 of the top Valentine's Day retailers, categorized by home page response time and availability, is available at http://www.alertsite.com/holiday_tracking.shtml and will be updated daily through February 14. Current results show that the top three sites with the fastest response times are See's Candies, Hershey's Chocolates and Victoria's Secret.

"By the time online merchants realize their site is slow, or not responding, they may have already lost significant sales volumes, as would-be customers look elsewhere to make a purchase," said Ken Gross, CEO, AlertSite. "For this reason, it is critical to constantly monitor how an online retail site is performing, particularly during a busy shopping season such as Valentine's Day. AlertSite provides detailed performance metrics to enhance e- business availability and to help merchants deliver exceptional customer service -- and a happy Valentine's Day."

In addition to providing Web site performance monitoring, AlertSite also offers its Security Vulnerability Scan service to evaluate the security of an online merchant's IT system that stores cardholder account information.

Complete results of the 2006 Valentine's Day survey are available upon request.