1.  Can you COPE? COPE, as in Create Once Publish Everywhere. Originally this phrase was simply a sell for clever publishing software. It’s now become shorthand for planning and creating content that can be published and re-used across many platforms, ideally cutting the cost of creation, production and (especially) translation and localisation. Lately we’ve heard it bandied about a lot in editorial meetings. Obviously if you are going to publish the same content (or elements of the same content) across many platforms, you’ll need to indulge in some pretty sophisticated content planning work first. If your company operates in a series of content silos, with one team ‘doing email’ and another responsible for ‘social’, you’ll struggle to get this off the ground. But if you can join your internal content owners up to develop a truly inclusive content strategy, then COPE may well prove efficient for you. On a practical level, for written content, this will usually mean coming up with highly adaptive modular copy formats that everyone signs off on and subscribes to. Cue stakeholder pistols at dawn…  2. Post-Panda SEO for peanuts? You can’t stuff your content with keywords any more. So what now? Those whose businesses stand or fall on their search results are out there trying to source content that will both keep customers engaged and satisfy a Google algorithm that rewards content quality. But how much are they willing to invest in it really? As far as we can see, the SEO copywriting market has polarised. While we can report a recent large influx of clients prepared to invest in quality copywriting, along with the editorial planning, format work and quality control that requires, we also notice a proliferation of extremely low-cost content providers. There will always be people prepared to churn out repurposed gobbledegook for buttons (£6.50 for 700 words, anyone?) and also those who insist that software could “seriously, like, replace Shakespeare”. But the truth is that anyone who is prepared to write you an on-brand, optimised, customer-facing, usable piece of content, mapped to your business objectives, legally compliant, sub-edited and proofread for a fiver, is either living in a country where that’s a day’s wages, living off a trust fund or has repurposed it from someone else’s work. Really good content costs. Sorry. 3. Micro-content fixes The rise of the copy nudge. The double-dip has forced companies to focus even more on the bottom line. So what content gives the greatest return on investment? Last year we started suggesting that budget-strapped content owners identified quick copy fixes with high ROI. After all, if your conversions increase as a result of your emails, then why not focus on a more compelling email sign-up, or on messages which dissuade customers from unsubscribing? Re-working a key call to action, a button, or split-testing the benefits on a product page is quick to do, requires minimal design input and can produce instant results. The king of all quick copy fixes is the online form. We have case studies showing up to a 35% increase in conversions from fixing the reassurance and instructional text in transactional areas. So maybe instead of that big ambitious content migration, you should simply ‘sweat the small stuff’ instead? 4.  Mobile, tablet and yet more mobile Making content mobile and tablet friendly is definitely what’s keeping content owners up at night. Last year, Jakob Nielsen revealed that content is twice as hard to understand on a mobile device. "When reading from an iPhone-sized screen, comprehension scores for complex web content were 48% of desktop monitor scores," he reported. So what is the answer? In short: write short, clear sentences. What’s the problem? This is very hard to do well, especially when summarising the terms and conditions of a home contents insurance policy. And what about tablet? While we’re still in learning mode as to what works best, certain content issues are already pretty clear. Overly-long lists and menus, information ‘too small to tap’ and serving up splash screens are all out. It appears you do need a distinct content approach for tablet after all… 5. Govern or be damned "Quality is doing it right when no one is looking," said Henry Ford. Unfortunately, all the best editorial set-ups rely on lots of people looking. Looking, editing, checking, and then looking again in fact. While most content teams weren’t initially set up with anything like this kind of QA process in place, we are seeing a rise in demand for content training and guidelines which support governance and help benchmark content quality. For many clients this is ensuring that (a) best-practice samples and execution guidelines exist for each content typeand (b) someone is making sure they actually get followed. For others, this means regular content auditing followed up by training and mentoring. It’s fantastic to finally see the old-school rigour of print publishing being embraced by the digital world. Better content should come of it. 6. Content ideas brainstorm boom The trend to embrace content marketing as a discipline in itself continues apace. But this is primarily an editorial endeavour. And great editorial depends on an ongoing flow of high-quality ideas. When the ideas run out, it’s all over. As original ideas can be hard to find (especially for the more complex B2B brands), the ability to brainstorm clever content ideas, formats and executions has become powerful content-marketing currency. What marketers are after is ‘ideas with legs’, workable series of content that can be replicated week after week without flagging. Content mapped to customer needs and interests that is truly useful, usable and builds long-tail relationships. In his post-Panda blog post  Google fellow Amit Singhal advises content owners to avoid ‘mass produced’ content that is ‘shallow in nature’, and to strive for high-quality ‘original content’. He urges us to produce articles full of ‘interesting information that is beyond obvious’ and remove low-quality content from our websites. And this is the biggest content trend of all: the culling of poor-quality content is finally beginning to happen. And we can’t wait to see the results...  

At the time, it was clear that Johnson was taking some cues from Apple. Make things simple, and the market will reward you. What wasn't clear was whether or not Johnson's strategy would work. Some liked it, while others suggested it could be disastrous. Unfortunately for J.C Penney and its shareholders, the new approach isn't producing the expected result. Last Wednesday, the company reported its earnings for Q1 2012 and the numbers were ugly. Same-store sales dropped nearly 19%. Online sales plummeted 28%. All told, J.C. Penney reported a net loss of $163 million, or 75 cents per share; analysts had expected a net loss of just 8 cents per share. Not surprisingly, the results have sent J.C. Penney shares reeling. They're down more than 20% in the past week, and the company has suspended its dividend to save cash. And it appears things might get worse as reports say that the retailer is looking to wholesalers for steep discounts. The cause of J.C. Penney's disastrous quarter isn't hard to identify: shoppers aren't liking its new pricing. As C. Britt Beemer, chairman of consumer research firm America's Research Group, told the AP, "Consumers want deals, and they're willing to wait for them...When you train customers to shop at big discounts, that customer is not going to change". In other words, J.C. Penney might be offering merchandise to customers at great prices, but they simply won't recognize that they're getting a good deal because, for better or worse, there's no, well, "deal." The result: they don't buy. For his part, Johnson believes he made the right move, and is confident that in time, J.C. Penney customers (or, more accurately, former customers) will come to their senses. Clearly, Wall Street's reaction to the early results indicate that investors aren't so sure about that. There's a timely lesson here for companies using the internet to acquire new customers or reward existing customers. Whether you're promoting a daily deal on Groupon or offering a coupon for a Facebook 'Like', discounts usually carry a cost. When customers come to expect those discounts, the cost is easy to significantly underestimate. This, of course, doesn't mean that all discounting is bad. Coupons and deals are valuable tools when applied appropriately. But when a brand becomes known for its discounts, as was the case with J.C. Penney, it can be very, very painful to separate The Brand from The Deal.

Make your returns policy easy to understand Whether they are checking before purchase, or finding out how to return an item they've just received, the policy should be clear and easy to understand.  Compare and contrast these two returns pages. The first, from Sports Direct, seems designed to deter returns and contains lots of scary language about legal obligations: Lovehoney, on the other hand, explains its policy clearly: Make your returns policy easy to see The returns policy is often a link in the footer, which is fine to a certain extent as people will expect to see it there.  However, the returns policy can influence a purchase decision, particularly in cases where customers aren't 100% certain about a product.  Therefore, a prominent link to the returns policy on product pages can offer customers reassurance that they can return an item easily if they find it's not right for them, and push them towards the purchase.    Don't charge for returns Of course, there are costs involved if you allow free returns, but these costs need to be weighed against the extra conversions it brings, and the potential boost to retention rates.  I bought a £40 lampshade from one retailer a year ago, and had to pay a hefty £10 return fee when I found it didn't fit. I appreciate the retailer has costs to cover, but this charge put me off looking for another on that site, and would make me think twice about ordering from them again.  Also, as Zappos has found, people who regularly return items can be some of your best customers. It says that clients buying its most expensive shoes have a 50% return rate.  According to Craig Adkins of Zappos: Our best customers have the highest returns rates,but they are also the ones that spend the most money with us and are our most profitable customers. Zappos' modus operandi is not to give its purchasers the cheapest footwear on the block, but to give them the best service: hence, a 365-day returns policy, and free two-way shipping. Include clear returns instructions in packaging This is about not annoying customers too much. I get the sense with some retailers that they think making returns harder will reduce overall rates, and help increase profits.  If this is the case, it's short-sighted thinking. It simply means that customers will get so annoyed that they are unlikely to shop with you again. Even worse, they may tell their friends about it, online and offline.  Make it easy for customers. Provide clear instructions and even include a returns envelope to make sure no mistakes are made with the address.  If you offer free returns, shout about it Offering free returns is great, but you should, as with free delivery, shout about it so that customers know about this when they buy: Help shoppers with great product images and video One reason for returned goods is that customers haven't been able to get a decent idea of the product before they place the order. Thus, when it arrives, and isn't as expected, it has to go back.  Retailers can address this issue on product pages, by ensuring that customers get as much visual information as possible.  Simply Group found that using 360 views and instructional videos of its ski products not only increased conversions, but also reduced returns rates, as customers were able to see exactly how each product worked.  Provide detailed product information As above, if customers are armed with all the information they need, they are less likely to return items. So, for items like computers, sites should be clear about the specs, as well as the accessories and leads which are required.  Combining this detail with excellent imagery and video can reduce the need for returns.  User reviews Of course, user reviews are great for boosting sales, but they can also help to reduce returns rates.  They can allow customers to avoid potential issues with products, or to find the product that is best suited to its intended use.  Kiddicare is a great example of this. It gets plenty of detail from it user reviews, such as pros and cons, the type of person using it, and best uses.  Here, in a search for car seats for babies, customers can use feedback to find the best car seat for newborns, for everyday use, for grandparents, and so on:  Fitting tools and virtual wardrobes  This is something that has been adopted by fashion sites, as they attempt to get around the fact that customers cannot try before they buy.  One such example, the Shoefitr app, helped an online footwear retailer to reduce fit-related returns by 23%. Others are variable in quality, but anything which can help customers to find the right fit, or to find outfits that match has the potential to reduce returns.  It's not just fashion either, MyDeco's 3D room planner tool helps shoppers to try out room looks before buying furniture:  Offer free home trials Glasses Direct offers shoppers the option of a free home trial. Customers can select up to four pairs of glasses and try them on at home before making a selection.  This neatly gets around one of the major problems of buying glasses online, and the fact that Glasses Direct trusts the customer enough to send frames out creates a great first impression.  Don't quibble over returns Customers will return items for spurious reasons, or will call something a fault when in fact they have broken it.  If a particular customer does this again and again, this can be dealt with on an individual basis, but it's best not to be too strict when customers are returning items.  If retailers do drag their heels on returns, it can be infuriating. I once returned a stairgate which didn't fit to Toys R Us. The member of staff initially refused to accept the return since the box had been opened, and then begrudgingly offered a refund of one third of its value.  As a result, none of my kids' Christmas and birthday presents are bought in that store, and the company has lost sales far greater than the value of that item.  Again, Lovehoney is a great example of this. All manner of returned items, which may or may not have been used, are refunded without question. Many have to be thrown away, for obvious reasons.  It takes the view, that for long term customer retention, it's better not to argue with customers over this.  Ask for feedback when customers return products This is simple, but makes sense. A quick question or two on the return slip can help retailers to uncover problems or trends in returns and enable them to address these issues.   Provide multichannel returns If you're a multichannel retailer, allowing people to return items bought online to local stores is a must.  This is often due to the separation of web and offline channels, and there are organisational issues which many brands are now dealing with.  I've had this experience in the past with Orange, as my father was unable to return a faulty phone ordered online to his local store.  It seems that, while competitors like O2 allow multichannel returns, Orange has yet to change this policy, instead insisting that returns requests are routed through its telesales team. This is a mistake in my book.  For the brand refusing the return, it's a missed opportunity to educate customers about a complex product, or to upsell or cross-sell while the customer is in the store.  Snow Valley's 2011 Online Returns Report found that just half of the mulitchannel retailers it studied allowed in store returns for online purchases.  Customers appreciate the flexibility and convenience of multichannel returns, and will be far more likely to shop with such a retailer in future.  Keep customers informed Let them know when you've received the returned item, and when the refund is being processed.  This will save customers from chasing this information through your customer services team, and they will appreciate the effort. 

The e-Privacy Directive Before I go any further, I must point out that the Directive covers more tracking than just cookies. In fact, it includes most types of tracking that track the individual at a personal level. The regulations (and the need for them) show marketers that there is a perceived lack of transparency and trust surrounding tracking used on the internet and what data is used for. It is this lack of transparency that needs to be addressed, regardless of the technology used to track the individual.  Modern internet marketing can be a sophisticated beast, focused on delivering the most relevant content and best experience for the user. The problem is, the majority of the general public may not realise this, in fact some might view marketing tracking as some sort of dangerous spy software, poised to sell you something, when you are least expecting it. And even if they don’t see the way they are tracked as particularly intrusive, do they understand how tracking is benefiting them and helping to improve their experience on the web? Information is the key. The clearer you are about how you plan to use data and the more accessible you make this information; the easier it will be to educate the internet user, and the more “informed consent” could be implied. What about email? For almost as long as email marketing has been around, marketers have been tracking the opens and clicks of the campaign recipients. They have also more recently been using post click tracking to inform the success of the campaign, either using third party solutions such as Google Analytics or solutions served directly from the website domain. Because of this, some of the tracking used in email marketing may be affected by the directive.     That said, email is different from web visits, as the recipient has requested the email communication from the marketer. However, this “difference” does not exclude email tracking from the regulations, and give the marketer “carte blanche” to use the data for all forms of use. It’s fairly safe to say that most people, who sign up for marketing emails, will have some expectation that what they open or click will be tracked by the organisation sending them. It would also be safe to say that they would expect you to be doing this to track campaign performance, as well as to ensure the campaign delivery.  This can all be taken as a given, as long as the information required by the recipient, is readily accessible from the data collection point, and written in a clear manner. It also follows that if the use to which the tracking and data is being put goes beyond that which the recipient is likely to expect or understand, a higher level of information and consent would be required. This is not quite as onerous as it sounds. As email marketers we always obtain consent before we send marketing emails anyway. The initial sign up process is an ideal place to engage with the potential recipient and offer information on data use and tracking. The DMA, in conjunction with the IAB, have recently issued guidance that sets out a number of opportunities to comply with the regulations. Various studies recently indicated a clear link to the privacy policy and transparent disclosure actually makes people feel better about signing up for marketing emails. So, for the email marketer, the new regulations should be seen as another opportunity to build trust with customers, not a barrier to business. For consumers there has always been a love/hate relationship with direct marketing. When we get it right, and deliver relevant and timely material, they love us; when we spam, they don’t. It’s up to the marketers now to inform their customers about the efforts they go to deliver more of what the customer wants, and less of what they don’t.

Rakuten Ichiba is the largest e-commerce site in Japan and among the world's largest by sales. The compaby has recently acquired Buy.com in the US, Priceminister in France, as well as Play.com. According to Raukten CEO, Hiroshi Mikitani: While some may see e-commerce as a straightforward vending machine-like experience, we believe it is a living process where both retailers and consumers can communicate, discover, and curate to make the experience more entertaining. We see tremendous synergies between Pinterest’s vision and Rakuten’s model for e-commerce. Rakuten looks forward to introducing Pinterest to the Japanese market as well as other markets around the world. Although Pinterest is one of the hottest new social media players to emerge in recent years, and is, according to Experian, the third largest social network in the United States, some will naturally point to a $1bn valuation for Pinterest as further evidence that we're in the midst of a huge bubble. Yes, such a valuation would appear to be frothy, but if there's one hot startup that everyone agrees has the potential to develop a solid revenue model, it just might be Pinterest. Many of the images that Pinterest's users are pinterested in are products, and the company has built an audience with a very appealing demographic. For online retailers, that's apparently translating into more than just potential. According to a recent report, Pinterest revenue per first click beats Facebook and Twitter by 27% and 400%, respectively, making Pinterest a potential game-changer for social commerce. The big question for Pinterest is how well it can execute a monetization strategy. The company must take care in adding commercial aspects to the service, lest it upset users. And the social media darling will want to ensure that the backing doesn't limit its potential to work directly with all retailers. If it can do all this, the future would appear to be bright for Pinterest. Whether the company's possible trajectory justifies a $1bn-plus valuation is another matter altogether but for the Pinterest team, taking advantage of the current market conditions to obtain such a valuation is probably pretty cool.

A search for “voucher codes” presents a paid ad for a well known UK voucher code company and below the ad the consumer is presented with a pre-filled email data capture field with an accompanying “Get Offers” button. Yes, that’s right the email field is pre-filled so no extra heavy lifting for the casual browser that can’t quite manage to find the energy to click through onto the site to look for any specific offers! Once you hit the “Get offers” button you then see a simple confirmation appear in the same place on the ad.   For anybody that might be concerned about privacy and how your data might be used by an advertiser or Google themselves then don’t worry because Google of course has this covered off with a handy “privacy link” in the ad. When clicked a pop up box appears helpfully informing the cautious form filler that “When you submit this form, your email address will be sent to the advertiser”. Phew, thanks Google! If this is something that is going to be rolled out across the UK it raises some very interesting questions. Is Google really planning to charge per lead for these enquiries? If so, is it really sacrificing clicks for leads? How much are leads likely to cost? Will more data fields be captured in the future? How do these site extensions affect click through rates? Is the consumer contact opt-in for the advertiser only or for Google as well? There are also more prosaic lead gen specific questions such as is there any validation on the leads? Do lead buyers pay for all leads or just valid ones? Are the leads time-stamped and sent to the advertiser in real-time (as recommended by IAB best practice) or are they batched up and sent sporadically? Whatever the answers to these questions, it seems like yet more evidence that Google are getting very serious about online lead generation. As they increasingly go head-to-head with Facebook for precious advertising dollars, moving down the funnel from clicks to leads might help to consolidate their place as the real online advertising super power.

What is different about your business model that has allowed you to succeed where others have failed? It’s a combination of three things really. Boohoo.com was established on an existing wholesale business, so we had a solid supply chain in place.  Part of the success has been down to the fact that we are still able to buy in relatively low volumes with very short lead times of about four to six weeks from source to live on the site. The second factor has been the way in which we bought media to promote the brand. We were founded when traditional above the line media was struggling to get billboards filled, so we were able to grab some good opportunities to buy ad space above the line. And I think the third aspect is a focus on styling and trend information. Because we sell our own brand, we can’t use the collateral of a better-known brand to do some of that work for us so we’ve had to design the product in and around trends. We spend a huge amount of time creating editorial and engaging pieces on the site to get that across. Which digital marketing channels do you see as being most important for your particular industry? For us, I think PPC still plays an important part and affiliates is still a huge part of the business, but the nature of the relationship with affiliates has changed. When you want to establish yourself within a market, the types of affiliates who are very fashionable within a market are hugely important. However, your dependence on them wains over time as your own brand gains recognition. Do you run blogger outreach or community management programmes? We probably hold three or four blogging events each year. We bring them in and give sneak peaks and previews of where we’re going with the ranges. So, where we might be doing a complete change for our seasonal collections we’ll always engage with the blogging community. The original content you have on your site must be good for search rankings. How much is the content about improving the brand versus the SEO benefits? To be honest, we concentrate on the content being right first and then we build the SEO strategy around it. There are obviously other parts to the SEO strategy, such as link building, etc. It’s more about being customer-centric, and we would never sacrifice customer experience to improve rankings. In terms of customer experience, what tactics do you use to engage shoppers on the landing page and make sure they don’t bounce off? Perhaps unlike our competitors, we do spend an awful lot of time and space on splash images. Because again, I think when you’re not a clothing brand with instant recognition, like a Levis for example, we rely very heavily on selling desire, and we do that by using emotive splash images. So, rather than being seduced by including hero products or offers that naturally create journeys through the site, we prefer to have a really strong image, but also we make it easy for people to locate and browse the editorial content. Shopping online these days is as much about entertainment as it is something that’s practical and required. It’s something that people do in their downtime. We’re not worried about the site being almost magazine-like in its structure. If people do bounce off the site, how much re-targeting do you do to encourage people to come back and complete the purchase? We do it, but it’s not our favourite form of marketing. Display re-targeting has a place, because there’s so many websites you can go to today that you can easily lose track of which ones you have seen, so a gentle reminder is ok.  I think when it starts to chase you round the internet and gets a little bit spooky, that’s where we draw the line. I would say we use it sparingly, and we’re always careful that we don’t re-target ads for a product that has then gone out of stock in the customer’s size. We spend a great deal of time making sure that doesn’t happen as it just creates disappointment. Abandoned basket re-targeting is another area we are sceptical about, such as begging the question: “Are you sure?”, because I’m pretty sure that there is always a valid reason for abandoning the basket in the first place. Do you require customers to register or create an account before they can checkout? Up until last week we didn’t, we allowed guest registration instead, but the problem with guest registration is that you don’t have an identity if you decide to return a product. That means you can’t do an online return, and the great thing about online returns is that it expedites the whole process. So, when it arrives back in the warehouse we already know there’s an inbound product and can speed the whole thing through and turn the refund around quicker. Guest registration means there’s a lot more investigation to do to process a refund so when we looked at it, we had to decide what we were gaining by giving our customers anonymity and allowing them to shop without feeling we were tracking them. When you look at it, most of our competitors don’t offer guest registration and the whole returns process was upsetting customers so it was something we had to address. So we decided to make everyone register. How important are customer reviews and do you have any ways of encouraging them on your site? Absolutely. We have probably spent about 18 months building up a good customer review database. Now we want to take it a few steps further, as we like our customers to tell their friends about us because the most influential people are your peers. Every email we send out requesting a customer review offers a discount if they complete the feedback form, and every so often we select one review and offer that customer a credit to go shopping on the site. We also want to move towards video reviews, which we’ll place halfway between the haulers you see on YouTube and a simple straightforward textual review. So it improves engagement as people get to appear on the site, but it also validates the whole process as you can see the customer endorsing the product. At the moment you don’t have a mobile site. Is that something you’re looking to address? We’ve actually decided to split our mobile strategy into three pieces, but we’ve been holding back to make sure we get it right and at the moment our mobile site is the main priority. We didn’t want to go down the scraper site, which is the nice easy way to get your site converted, but it causes issues with the product catalogue and merchandising, which is hugely important to us. The second part of our strategy will be our app. It won’t be about buying products, it is a magazine app that offers style and fashion information. We don’t see any value in simply creating a shopping app when you can cater to that need with your mobile site. And the third solution will be to put a new app out there every few months that is just for fun. So it could be that you go to a festival and download a boohoo app that allows you to win a pair of wellies at the event. It’s a bit of fun for a few weeks, but it’s also a simple marketing device that keeps the brand alive and hopefully should drive traffic to the magazine app and the mobile site.

One of Homebase’s key multichannel tools is reserve and collect, which allows customers to buy online and pick up in-store. McWilliams said this was essential for destination stores, as consumers expect to know if their chosen product is in stock otherwise they will look for a more convenient place to shop. It also allows multichannel retailers to stay ahead of pure play e-tailers like Amazon. The challenge for Amazon is that they don’t have a store network. People often aren’t at home, so home delivery is ok for small things like books but for bigger purchases I want in-store pick up. McWilliams’ approach to multichannel retailing stems from his experience as a founder of Ocado. When we built Ocado, one of the key ideas was that every touch point counted – so whether that was with the vans or the call centre or online. He said that retailers needed to be aware that the old days of simply “shouting at customers” through TV ads and direct mail are gone. Digital has changed the landscape as consumers are now exposed to marketing messages from a number of different touch points, and they expect a consistent experience.  Supermarkets used to be all about driving customers to the store, then they could ignore us and take our money.We probably still do a bit of shouting at our customers, but we now also have conversations with them using social media.” He said that while social media can be a retailer’s friend, it also leaves brands exposed and can come back to haunt them. Customers can get quite noisy and angry. They know where you are and they can find you, so you have to be ready to engage with them in the right way.

Previously, around 65% of the retailer returns were due to size related issues, but now 20% of orders come in from customers that have used the app.  According to Running Warehouse CEO Joe Rubio:  Anything that improves the shopping experience for the customer is a huge bonus. Shoefitr increases the confidence customers have in ordering a product correctly, thus making the buying decision easier. It also has helped decrease our return rate which positively affects our bottom line. The Shoefitr app uses a database of internal shoe measurements, acquired using 3D imaging technology, which allow it to compare the size and shape of a shoe a shopper is currently wearing, to one she wants to buy. The app is embedded into Running Warehouse's product pages:  It then asks shoppers to enter details about their current running shoe, so the app can compare the fit: The results the recommend the best size, and the customer can then see more detail about the fit, and compare it with other sizes: Buying shoes and clothes online can never quite match the in-store experience, and one of the main issues with this is that it can be hard to gauge the fit and feel of products.  According to stats, the average returns rate for online fashion retailers ranges from 17% to 25%. For Zappos, with an easy returns policy it's 25%. One of the major factors is sizing.  There is plenty retailers can do to minimise the problem, such as offering detailed images, videos and information which allow shoppers to form a better picture of the fit.  Online 'fitting room' tools are one way to do this, such as the one used by sojeans, though they aren't always successful. 

When Facebook goes public on Friday, it will be selling 50.6m shares more than it originally planned to, and at $34 to $38 per share, the company's stock will debut in a higher-than-anticipated price range. All told, Facebook could raise nearly $15bn in its offering and hit the much-talked-about $100bn IPO valuation it looked as if it might not achieve. So much for a lack of demand for the company's shares, which will trade under the ticker symbol FB. Facebook's IPO will be the richest ever, and it could even be the most interesting ever. Why? Because for all of the apparent investor demand Facebook and its army of bankers have been able to drum up, there's a general skepticism about the company's future. Take Bloomberg's investor poll last week, which asked more than 1,200 investors, analysts and traders who subscribe to Bloomberg what they thought of Facebook's valuation. 79% of them thought the company would be overvalued at $96bn. Just 7% believed it was valued correctly at that figure, and a paltry 3% suggested it was undervalued. An AP-CNBC poll found similar numbers, with half of respondents, which include Facebook users and investors, saying the company would be overvalued at $100bn. Active investors were even more skeptical, with 62% believing the $100bn figure to represent an excessive valuation. As in the Bloomberg poll, just 3% of those surveyed thought Facebook would be undervalued at $100bn. There may be good reason for this. Over half of the Facebook users in the AP-CNBC poll indicated that they never click on ads or sponsored stories, and another 26% said they "hardly ever" do so. As for the company's potential to turn its vast social network into a commerce juggernaut, over half of those surveyed said they wouldn't trust Facebook for financial transactions (as compared to some 8% who would). Facebook's future, of course, may rely on mobile, and area it admittedly hasn't yet cracked but where it is focusing a lot of attention. Given the demand for Facebook's stock, it would appear that investors and speculators who have ponied up for shares in the IPO aren't too concerned about mobile being a drag on the company, at least in the short-term. But the company's mobile problems may not just be related to monetization. Facebook has a reputation as being home to some of Silicon Valley's top engineers, but a post looking at how Facebook's iOS app has been built raises questions about the social network's mobile chops. Interestingly, it's not the first time techies have criticized the social networking giant on technical grounds. Put all this together and you have what could be better-than-television drama. Right now, there are enough investors are willing to hand Facebook and shareholders billions at a $100bn valuation, but their apparent exuberance is tempered by the fact that so many people are also skeptical about the company's valuation and prospects. Which group is right? It's worth noting that those putting their money into the IPO may have a wide range of motivations, from short-term speculation to a desire to be involved in one of the most historic IPOs ever, and some of these motivations won't necessarily lend themselves to long-term shareholder loyalty. At the same time, Facebook has -- thus far at least -- managed to overcome its greatest obstacles, which include more than a few high-profile user backlashes. Which hints at why the Facebook IPO may be so compelling even to those who aren't buying shares: for all of Facebook's undeniable, astonishing success, it appears remarkably -- perhaps almost unbelievably -- vulnerable.