The New York Times this morning reports that e-commerce companies are once again embracing the notion of “sticky” content – celebrated during the online boom, derided during the bust – as a way of keeping customers on websites longer and getting them to spend more money.
“Editorial content is one leg of the so-called three C's theory of Internet business success that pervaded the dot-com boom,” the NYT reports. “Alongside content and commerce, sites were also encouraged to add ‘community’ features, for users who liked to interact with other consumers via chat rooms, message boards or customer reviews.”
And while all three elements are once again being considered as elements of the successful website, the difference now seems to be that companies are showing fiscal restraint when considering their options, and are being more responsible in deciding which features which will relevant to which customers – as opposed to spending a fortune and offering a plethora of services that may not be desired or appropriate.
“Editorial content is one leg of the so-called three C's theory of Internet business success that pervaded the dot-com boom,” the NYT reports. “Alongside content and commerce, sites were also encouraged to add ‘community’ features, for users who liked to interact with other consumers via chat rooms, message boards or customer reviews.”
And while all three elements are once again being considered as elements of the successful website, the difference now seems to be that companies are showing fiscal restraint when considering their options, and are being more responsible in deciding which features which will relevant to which customers – as opposed to spending a fortune and offering a plethora of services that may not be desired or appropriate.
- KC's View:
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We’re involved in a couple of projects right now which would have us helping to provide consumer-oriented content for websites, and we would agree with both the impulse to provide “stickiness” and the desire to do so in a more targeted and appropriate way.
But the relatively simple notion is that if you give people more compelling reasons to stay on your site, they’ll do so and maybe even spend more. Doesn’t that make sense?
