Sur La Table Turns to WebTrends to Drive Shopping Cart Optimization; WebTrends Consultants Quickly Prove Conversion Lift and Identify Follow-on Opportunities to Increase Successful Checkouts by an Additional 50 Percent

Business Wire, June 5, 2006

CHICAGO -- WebTrends Inc., the market leader for web analytics and Marketing Performance Management solutions, today at Internet Retailer 2006 Conference & Exhibition announced that Sur La Table, a national multi-channel kitchenware retailer, utilized WebTrends(R) Analytics(TM) 8 On Demand and WebTrends strategic business analyst services to provide deep analysis and recommendations before and after a recent shopping cart redesign, including third-party proof of improvements achieved and identification and prioritization of additional optimization opportunities for a planned site-wide redesign later this year.

Sur La Table engaged WebTrends analysts in the midst of the shopping cart optimization project to help accelerate its efforts with focused best practice expertise. Analyzing information including WebTrends 5-Point Scenario Analysis and advanced navigation analysis, WebTrends analysts studied visitors' checkout behavior to determine what could be done to improve the success of the scenario, evaluating entry pages, fall-out between steps, and exit pages and abandonment paths.

One of WebTrends first recommendations was to advise against plans to eliminate a featured products section that provided cross-sell capabilities within the shopping cart. WebTrends was able to prove that 10 percent of cart visitors used this functionality and that they were 15 percent more likely to buy than the average cart visitor. Additionally, visitors who used this cross-sell feature spent an average of 22 percent more per order than those who did not; meaning that eliminating this feature would lead to a substantial loss of revenue.

After analyzing results from Sur La Table's shopping cart redesign, WebTrends analysts focused on identifying other changes that could be made to further increase revenue driven by both analytics information and several online retail best practices that were documented for the kitchenware retailer. For example, by further streamlining the checkout process, condensing the Payment and Shipping steps, WebTrends consultants determined that Sur La Table could achieve an additional 50 percent lift in conversion rates for incremental revenue of $2M annually.

"One of the biggest benefits of working with WebTrends analysts was that it helped us leverage their best practice experience to know exactly which changes would make the biggest difference," said Sue Ghilarducci, Director of Internet Marketing, Sur La Table. "We knew from WebTrends On Demand that there were several opportunities for improvement, but since this was an optimization project versus a full redesign, we needed to focus our efforts. The whole experience of working with WebTrends analysts has provided us a stronger framework to better manage and improve marketing performance and achieve our sales goals."

"Web site data is only valuable when companies act on it, and over the past few years we've built out our strategic business analyst practice to offer customers exactly the level of service they need," said Greg Drew, CEO and president, WebTrends. "From helping customers define key performance indicators and build metrics scorecards, to optimizing conversion processes and modeling testing strategies, our customers can count on our consultants to devise specific recommendations that accelerate their business results."

About WebTrends Services

As the web analytics industry's leading global strategic business analyst practice, WebTrends Services works with customers' marketing and site design teams to assess their needs, identify the best solutions and optimize site and marketing initiatives to accelerate their results. Having consulted for more than 1400 enterprise companies worldwide in over 20 industries ranging from financial services to retail, media to consumer packaged goods, WebTrends Services provides the deepest and broadest vertical expertise available, delivered through both its Best Practices Analysts and Marketing Experts Group.

About WebTrends Inc.

As the acknowledged global web analytics market leader for more than twelve years, WebTrends is now leading the category into Marketing Performance Management. With an uncompromising focus on delivering the most accurate and actionable metrics, WebTrends enables thousands of web-smart organizations to easily improve campaign performance and web site conversion as well as build stronger relationships with their customers. With WebTrends Marketing Lab, the company stands alone in offering comprehensive, flexible and scalable web analytics as well as sophisticated, on-the-fly data exploration and customer targeting solutions for relationship marketing. Companies such as Ticketmaster, IKEA, Reuters, General Mills, US Bank and more than half of the Fortune and Global 500 rely on WebTrends as their trusted standard, not only for the award-winning technology, but also for a full range of consulting services and unmatched industry expertise across the broadest range of vertical markets. Through software and on-demand options and a full range of data collection methods, WebTrends is unique in its ability to meet any analysis objective with leading data integrity, privacy and security best practices. For more information, visit www.WebTrends.com.