The Gap eliminates clicks to gain retail differentiation

Tags: Gap, Web Design, Marketing, Retail, Marketing Measurement, eCommerce

Today's New York Times features a great article on how The Gap's radical simplification of its eCommerce site is delighting customers. One of the fascinating bits: this is a home-grown solution, not a modification of an off-the-shelf software product.

But Mr. Lenk said the company had little choice. "We looked at the things we wanted to do, and the scale at which we wanted to do them, and quickly came to the conclusion that the only way to ensure success was to go custom," he said. "We could go with software packages and try to customize them, but that usually gets you into trouble."

This is a great example of marketing driving technology instead of the other way around. Further, because this is a custom application, the Gap should achieve real differentiation in the market longer than if they had used an off-the-shelf product. When you can get similar products from twenty different retailers, delivering a differentiated on-line experience is worth its weight in gold. We expect the Gap's investment in building a better experience to deliver benefits for years to come. This is just another example of how less is more in today's tyranny of too much.