As the retailer’s CEO Colin Watts mentioned during its Q1 2018 earnings call: “The digital experience we're creating is more engaging, more inspiring, and gives us the capability to deliver more personalized content intended to convey the expertise of our health enthusiasts.”
According to GroupBy’s CEO Roland Gossage, The Vitamin Shoppe customers will see a much more “shopper-friendly” online retail experience.
Under GroupBy’s guidance, the retailer will improve website features such as search result relevancy and the product detail page, in addition to leveraging recommendations and personalization capabilities to create more targeted and relevant product suggestions.
“Vitamin Shoppe will see more intuitive, rich and simplified navigation, more personalized experiences per shopper, faster page load times, improved predictive search, and improved relevancy,” Gossage told NutraIngredients-USA.
“Vitamin Shoppe will also leverage GroupBy’s recommendations and personalization capability, providing all website visitors more targeted and relevant product suggestions.”
Vitamins and dietary supplements are a natural fit for e-commerce
The vitamin and dietary supplement industry has seen a greater adoption among consumers making online purchases compared to other consumer goods categories such as packaged food, beauty and personal care, and pet care, according to Euromonitor.
Online purchases of vitamins and dietary supplements accounted for 14% of total consumer health category sales compared to 2% of packaged food in 2016, Euromonitor research showed.
In order to become a formidable opponent in the e-commerce space and hold its own against the likes of online giants such as Amazon, retailers must emphasize personalization in their online retail approach, said Euromonitor's head of consumer health, Matthew Oster.
“Personalization will be necessary in upcoming fights against the biggest e-dog of all, Amazon, which also has access to an immense database of purchasing history that it can use to push personalized consumer health options,” Oster said.
According to Gossage, “Ensuring that retailers have a fundamentally superior and personalized user experience can significantly improve their competitive advantage by allowing the customer to quickly identify the product that is best suited for their individualized needs.”
Gossage added that vitamins and dietary supplements enjoy a few advantages in the online environment compared to other consumer goods categories.
“Vitamins, dietary supplements and herbs are great e-commerce products as they can be easily shipped and are non-tactile,” Gossage said.
“Often with other products, such as clothing, shoppers lose out on a few of the key elements that drive them to make a purchase, such as touch and feel, and the additional value of getting to try a product before they buy it.”
However, because of this, it is even more crucial for the retailer to provide the online shopper with all the relevant product details and information they need to encourage a purchase.
“With the dietary supplement category, shoppers don’t need a tactile experience, so as long as online sellers provide complete and extensive product data, many consumers will make it their go-to for purchase,” Gossage added.