Optaros Announces 2009 Social Ecommerce Planning Guide to Help Retailers Select & Implement Social Shopping Concepts

    strong> /24-7PressRelease/ - BOSTON, MA, August 15, 2008 — Optaros Inc., an advisor on ecommerce solutions, today introduced "The 2009 Social Ecommerce Planning Guide" that details 32 social ecommerce options to consider, with specific deployment examples and adoption rates, to assist retailers as they plan for 2009.

Social ecommerce is a top agenda item for retailers in 2009, but there is sufficient lack of clarity about what exactly to do beyond ratings and reviews. The 2009 Social Ecommerce Planning Guide catalogs social ecommerce options and provides a framework to help retailers make the appropriate choices for their business based on key metrics they wish to improve such as traffic, conversion, average order size, shopping cart abandonment, loyalty, brand awareness and customer service.

Optaros' guide outlines and provides real-world examples for ecommerce features ranging from "basic" (low competitive differentiation and high industry adoption), "strategic" (higher competitive differentiation and lower industry adoption) or "visionary" (highest competitive differentiation and lowest industry adoption). Depending on what metrics the retailer wants to improve and their commitment to competitive differentiation, retailers can scroll through the guide's options to determine what best fits their needs.

"Nearly all of our clients are asking us what they should do about social ecommerce in 2009. This planning guide is the result of significant research and catalogs the best of what retailers are doing with social ecommerce to help our clients answer that question," said Adam Michelson, director of Ecommerce for Optaros.

About the Optaros Ecommerce Practice
The Optaros Ecommerce Practice helps retail clients improve their online performance with:
• New retail concept development and deployment on ANY existing platform
• Enhanced user experience design and implementation on ANY platform
• Collaborative approach with Marketing, Ecommerce and IT

Ecommerce clients include Smart Bargains, Rue la la, MCCA, Wonderbox, McKesson and many more.

Optaros designs and assembles fully supported, Next Generation Internet (NGI) solutions that deliver superior business performance. The unique Optaros Assembly Methodology (OptAM) leverages pen ource, Service Oriented Architectures, and rich interface design to assemble solutions faster and more flexibly than traditional build, buy or rent options. Optaros serves over 120 clients including ABB, Biogen Idec, IDG, McKesson, Merck/Serono, Nespresso, The New York Times, NXP, Sony Pictures, Swisscom, and many others. For more about Optaros, go to www.optaros.com.

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