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October 21, 2016
2 min read time

Varnish CEO guest piece on Retail Times: Web performance - More important than ever

Erika Wolfe
  • e-commerce
  • web performance
  • web scalability
  • intelligent caching
  • Black Friday
  • mobile shopping
  • optimizing mobile for e-commerce
  • retail web performance
  • e-commerce customer expectations
  • web traffic spikes
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    We're only about two months away from the Christmas holiday, and one month from the long Black Friday/Cyber Monday weekend, long celebrated as a shopping extravaganza.

    As many media outlets report, and many retailers confirm, this year will be a little bit different.

    After many years of ratcheting up the high-stakes, limited-quantity bargains that sent shoppers into frenzies and forced stores to compete by staying open on Thanksgiving Day itself, many stores decided to scale back. Maybe this is because retailers decided to give their employees the gift of celebrating the holiday weekend themselves (Nordstrom and Nordstrom Rack stores across the US put up posters reading, “Well, we just like the idea of celebrating one holiday at a time"). Maybe the stores, too, recognize that the nature of holiday shopping is shifting away from a one-weekend, in-store event. The change is already afoot, from major retailers, like Nordstrom, Costco, TJ Maxx, and Marshalls, to massive institutions like the venerable Mall of America - all closed on Thanksgiving. 

    Why web performance in retail is important (now more than ever)

    A big part of the shift, too, is the growing importance of online shopping, which has changed shopping habits in real and permanent ways. And given the growing dominance and convenience of e-commerce channels in the holiday shopping landscape, web performance across platforms and devices is more important than ever. 

    Our CEO, Lars Larsson, recently opinioned on the topic in a guest article on Retail Times; take a look. Here, Lars shares insights about how new technologies, changing economic realities, convenience and changing shopping habits have fuelled customer demand for anywhere-anytime shopping - and how these demands can be met by preparing for the inevitable web traffic peaks that accompany big holiday sales. How? To start, with intelligent web caching, optimizing for mobile and being responsive - both to technical concerns and customer needs.

    Not only is ensuring web performance essential - not optimizing web performance is costly. We invite you to learn more - download our white paper, "The high cost of poor performance". 

    download white paper

    Photo (c) 2013 Powhusku used under Creative Commons license.