Online fashion retail is becoming ‘fashionable’ and more big name retailers are debuting with transactional websites. These newcomers follow in the footsteps of the bold that braved the sceptics of this predominantly cautious web market which cites the tangible nature of the product as a barrier to online sales.

Apparel and footwear online sales have quadrupled in the past 5 years reaching £1.2m and expected to triple again by 2011 (Verdict on UK eRetail 2007) so Zendor GSI Commerce, the Manchester-based multi-channel retail expert that works with fashion brands such as Peacocks and Reiss, offers tips on developing a proposition to optimise your e-commerce potential .

Optimise your product range for online. Simply replicating your retail product offer online won’t work. An average fashion e-commerce site should achieve a minimum Average Item Value of £12-£15; items under £5 (which are profitable in-store) will not have the same result online once fulfilment costs are considered. This does not mean those at the lower price end cannot go online, but will instead have to work their product range harder at achieving higher than standard Items Per Order to compensate. Look to maximise up-selling and cross-selling, in order to push outfits rather than single items.

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