So I’m back to blogging about the Fortune #100. Instead of hitting the entire 100 companies, which has become pretty boring, I’ve decided to hit the highlights.
And since I’ve had some recent retail experience, I’ve tackled Macys website.
When the web came along, established retail stores had a real challenge: Accept the new medium or continue with business as usual. Naturally, most developed a “wait-and-see attitude and waited until many web-based retailers had a big head start.
If you look at the first 100 domains ever registered, not one was a retailer.
Even today, More than 20 years after those first domains were registed, few of the really big retailers are clearing a billion a year. That may seem exhorbitant until you start looking at retail numbers.
Some of those doing it right include Staples at 3.1 billion, Office Depot at 3 billion and Sears at 1.7 billion. Sears in the only department store in that list.
So how did Sears become so successful? By embracing new technlogy and dimissing the old business model. Way back in 1993, it closed down its catalogue division. Can you imagine closing down the oldest catalog retailer in 1993? That probably seemed insane, and yet, a few billion dollars later, it seems to have worked out. It also the reason Sears is one of the top 35 Fortune companies.
What about our friend Macy’s – one of the oldest retailers in the land, established in 1858?
Well, to start, it’s sitting at #91 in the Fortune 100 list. To Finish, Macys.com wasn’t registered until 1993 – about the time AOL had millions of subscribers. That’s just one sign it just wasn’t ready to embrace the web.
If you look at the design, you’ll see a practical but outdated deisgn. The offers are right out front, the navigation is clean and clearly visible. But the design is lacking. Many reatailers have developed a compartmentalized style that allows for easy updates. While it’s a good idea for keeping your site up to date, it limits design, reminding us of the eternal web questions of a a customized CMS over a convenient one.
Macys.com does its job but little else. In the world of online retail, you have to offer more. For an example, see amazon.com.