In the six weeks after independent book store The Duck Store implemented a mobile checkout tool, it saw daily sales from mobile devices grow 184 percent and the average mobile order value increase by 21 percent.

The retailer also saw the average mobile cart conversion grow by 9 percent. With a better mobile checkout experience enabled, the retailer was able to direct email recipients directly to the mobile experience, helping to drive the results.

“A large segment of our customer base is students ages 18-28 and they expect our brand to stay consistent through all channels—in store, online and via our mobile interface,” said Alex Lyons, Web team leader at The Duck Store. “We need to offer an easy-to-use mobile option that offers our customers the convenience of omni-channel shopping and allows our operations team to focus on our core mission of speed of fulfillment, order accuracy and customer service.

“We also rely heavily on our daily email sends to targeted interest groups and one of the key upgrades to the mobile enhancement was the ability to link customers directly to featured product or category,” she said. “Prior to the upgrade, the platform detected a mobile device and sent all traffic directly to the home page of our mobile interface by default.

“With this direct marketing strategy, customers were able to more conveniently and quickly shop products that interest them most, which meant more mobile conversions.”

The Duck Store is an independent, non-profit bookstore that serves the students, faculty, alumni and fans of the University of Oregon. It has stores in Eugene, Portland and Bend, OR, and worked with Volusion on the mobile upgrades.

Deep linking
The Duck Store launched its mobile optimized site in 2011, helping to drive mobile conversions.

With mobile traffic continuing to grow, the retailer took advantage of Volusion’s mobile checkout tool when it was introduced in 2013, enabling shoppers to fully complete a transaction via their mobile device.

With the new mobile capabilities, The Duck Store saw an opportunity to better blend email marketing with mobile commerce. With the team able to link to individual product pages on its mobile site for the first time, it began including links to specific product pages within the company’s email messages.

As a result, The Duck Store is able to target customers it knows are on mobile devices and send them to a targeted product page as opposed to forcing them to browse through a Web site on their smartphone.

Such deep linking paired with the mobile checkout tool has helped The Duck Store boost its mobile sales and performance.

Single mobile interface
Going forward, the retailer is looking to incorporate textbook sales into its mobile site.

“We are already looking ahead to another mobile redesign,” Ms. Lyons said. “We currently host our home page, information, and blog content on a WordPress site which is blended with our Volusion ecommerce site.

“In addition, we host a second shopping cart for our student course materials,” she said. “We’re hoping to find a seamless integration to sell textbooks (a process which includes programming complexities such as rentals, digital content, and used and new titles) on a single shopping cart with our sportswear, technology, and art and school supplies.

“We are hoping to have a single mobile interface for all divisions to provide a cohesive shopping experience for our customer base.”