October 10 2008

IR's Weekend Web Crawl: Shopzilla's award winners

A departure this week from our usual Friday afternoon tour of the latest redesigns and launches as we instead take the chance to learn from the sometimes surprising winners of last night's Shopzilla Circle of Excellence Awards

Comparison shopping website Shopzilla.co.uk named the sites that its users voted as offering the best shopping experience on the web at its first Circle of Excellence Awards ceremony in London last night.

Winners of Platinum Circle of Excellence Awards, the scheme's highest honour given across eight shopping categories, were:

• Exotic petfood site livefoodsdirect.co.uk
• Clothing and accessories retailer tiewarehouse.co.uk
• Electric razor supplier shavers.co.uk
• mature retailer lovehoney.co.uk
• computer memory specialist crucial.com
• duty-free perfume outlet CheapSmells.com
• sports and outdoor supplier outdoormegastore.co.uk
• online art and craft shop artymiss.co.uk.

Shopzilla users are asked to rate their online experience after transactions complete, giving measurements for product selection, ease of finding products, the degree to which the product met expectations, on time delivery, customer support, repurchase intent and overall satisfaction. Platinum winners scored highest overall in their categories, while gold winners scored above their category average in at least six of the criteria. Crucially, retailers must participate in the Shopzilla programme to take part.

As well as the eight Platinum winners, Gold awards were also presented to retailers who were deemed to have achieved excellence in their respective shopping categories.

Clothing and accessories retailers headed the list achieving that standard with four retailers — shoe outlets shoe-shop.com and wynsors.com, sunglasses supplier shadestation.co.uk and online lingerie shop figleaves.com — all picking up Gold awards.

Computers and software suppliers svp.co.uk and cartridgesave.co.uk also struck gold, as did battery outlet budgetbatteries.co.uk, health and beauty goods supplier salonskincare.co.uk, pet supplies retailer Paws247.com and outdoor gear outlets cybercheckout.co.uk and outdoorgear.co.uk.

Congratulating the award winners, Scott Macon, managing director for Shopzilla Europe, said: "People in the UK are among the most avid online shoppers in the world and they rightly demand excellence. These awards not only show where that excellence is being achieved but set the benchmark for the future."

by Sarah Clark (Web Editor)