ROI Direct.com Enables Seamless Integration of Customer Information Across Multiple Commerce and Content Sites

New Registrant Data Integration (RDI) Offers Persistent Shopping Cart for Shoppers Roaming Between Commerce and Content Sites, while Providing Shared Customer Data Across Multiple Sites

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Michael Tinkler
Director, Public Relations
415-439-6690
mtinkler@roidirect.com

San Francisco – December 17, 1999 – ROI Direct.com, a leading Internet application service provider (ASP) of eCommerce, relationship marketing, and online customer care solutions, today announced its solution for sharing customer registration and log-in data, as well as shopping cart status management between commerce and content sites. Sharing such information between sites is a common challenge for Internet companies whose e-commerce sites are hosted by application service providers, as visitors often are linked across multiple sites and servers during the course of a single Internet session. In addition, businesses frequently lose sales due to cart abandonment issues that can occur when a shopper who roams or is linked outside a hosted commerce site loses visibility to the status of an active shopping cart.

The latest resource in ROI Direct’s eCommerce service offerings, RDI enables the integration of visitor information between two or more related sites, while obviating the need for shoppers to undertake the tedious process of multiple registrations. The RDI feature captures registered visitor information gathered from one site and transfers that data to connected sites in real-time, allowing related sites to share a unified view of the consumer.

The registration information provided at a content site can be passed through to the commerce site to facilitate personalization of the product offers presented to the shopper. In turn, shopping cart information gathered at the commerce site, such as product descriptions, quantity of products contained in the cart, and total expenditures can be preserved as a persistent page element as the user roams or links to related sites, thereby increasing shopping convenience and reducing cart abandonment.

"A feature such as registrant data integration not only improves the user experience on our sites, but also helps us learn more about our visitors," says Arie Grossman, Director of Technology at CaregiverZone.com, an ROI Direct.com client. "If you’re using an ASP for your e-commerce back-end, you have to be able to support a single registration and persistent cart from one site to the other. Otherwise, you risk frustrating your visitors and potentially losing sales. With RDI, our sites offer more convenience to our visitors, while providing us with a higher level of data consistency."

How Registrant Data Integration works and its Benefits

Seamless Site Integration – Using RDI, the ROI eCommerce system seamlessly incorporates the registration data transferred by the connecting site, creating the look, feel and experience of a singular site to the end user. Information registered by the consumer on the content site is transported between sites to simplify the shopping experience for the user.

Information Gathering – Visitors can create registration or login at one site and have the information consistently available and maintained at the hosted commerce site. For example, a user’s registration information at a content site can be combined with billing and shipping information from the commerce site to enable a simplified check-out process at the commerce site, enhancing convenience for the user.

Persistent Shopping Cart – Consumers can browse among selections and add goods to their shopping cart at an e-commerce site, then return to related content sites to gather additional information on products, while the cart itself, and the goods in it, remain preserved as a page element for the user. A key benefit to this feature is a reduction in cart abandonment, enabling visitors to roam or link to associated sites without having to re-access the commerce site to complete their transactions.

Stored Information – The consumer’s registration information and cart contents are maintained on the site and can be accessed at any time through the owner’s database, creating a simplified means by which to manage visitor data on a single database. Consumer information such as personal data, billing, and shipping information is also stored by the system for the consumer’s convenience, and is repeatedly accessible upon return visits by use of a password, enabling such features as one-click ordering and streamlined checkout.

Automatic Updates – The RDI process automatically updates a shopper’s profile at the commerce site whenever the user enters a change at a related, connecting site, eliminating the need for re-keying and assuring consistent information across multiple Web properties.

"RDI is a feature that can benefit any dot-com company using a hosted e-commerce solution," said Rick Pugh, Chief Technology Officer at ROI Direct.com. "RDI benefits both the consumer and our clients by allowing a single registration, login, or update to be shared across multiple sites, either during the course of a single session or on return visits. This simplifies site access and allows for a quicker checkout process. It also allows owners of multiple sites to maintain consistent visitor information across their sites, which is an important issue for those with large numbers of customers online."

About the ROI eCommerce Solution

ROI Direct provides a fully hosted, best-in-class eCommerce solution to catalog, retail, direct marketing, and dot-com companies, at a fraction of the cost of developing comparable sites in-house. ROI eCommerce is a scalable, extensible system, maintained by ROI Direct 24x7x365, which can grow as a company’s online business grows. ROI Direct.com provides all the hardware, application software, and services required to operate an online business, along with hosting these sites on its high-performance infrastructure for a low, monthly cost. By working with ROI Direct.com, clients avoid the expenses of hardware and software purchases, the hassles of integration, and the worries of ongoing development and support costs.

ROI eCommerce allows a business to:

  • Maintain consistent design and branding throughout an e-commerce site
  • Dramatically shorten time-to-market
  • Significantly reduce costs of deployment
  • Build online business on a secure, high-performance infrastructure
  • Support advanced features like one-click ordering, wish lists, and affiliate programs

eCommerce functionality includes:

  • Advanced Shopping Cart and Transaction System
  • Customer Registration and Sign-in
  • Account Management
  • Attribute Search
  • Back-Office Integration
  • Customer Product Reviews, Ratings, and Testimonials
  • Automatic Email Confirmations
  • Affiliate Program Management
  • Wish List
  • One-click Ordering
  • Suggestive Ordering
  • Refer to a Friend
  • Gift Finder
  • On-Demand Inventory Status
  • Customer Specific Content and Pricing

About ROI Direct.com

Headquartered in San Francisco with offices in Denver and New York, ROI Direct.com is an Internet application services provider (ASP), developing and integrating Web, messaging, and database technologies to assist client companies in eCommerce, relationship marketing, and customer care applications. Founded in 1994, ROI Direct.com is a privately held company with investment support from Crosspoint Venture Partners, Accel Partners, Vanguard Venture Partners, and HarbourVest Partners.

For more information about ROI Direct.com, visit www.roidirect.com;
e-mail info@roidirect.com; or call 1-800-420-4224.

© Copyright 2000 ROI Direct, All rights reserved.