Consumer Demand for Ask & Answer

• Consumers say not being able to speak to anyone to answer questions is their number one frustration with online shopping (Opinion Research Point, April 2009)

• Researchers led by Jim Jansen, associate professor of information science and technology, and Twitter chief scientist Abdur Chowdhury looked at half a million tweets. 20% of them were apparently people 'asking and providing' product information. (Penn State study via Social Media Today, September 2009)

• Representatives from the e-tailing group and Ripple6 believe research results point to consumers' desires for more online communities where they can share recommendations and opinions about their purchases. (Manage Smarter, September 2009)

• 92% shoppers have more confidence in info sought online vs. anything from a salesclerk or other source. (Wall Street Journal, January 2009)

• 77% of eCommerce shoppers want help from real people online (Retail Customer Experience, August 2009)

• Of the $13.8 billion worth of returned products in 2007, only 5 percent were because gadgets were actually broken, according to a 2008 study. (Gadget Stats, June 2008)

• 42% of consumers said they prefer being able to find the answers they need online on their own if they had a question or wanted help while shopping online. (Harris Interactive, May 2007)

• The share of traffic to question-and-answer Web sites has more than doubled from 2007 to 2008 (HitWise, 2008)

• Yahoo Answers had 25.3 million visits in February 2008 (comScore Media Metrix, March 2008)

• Online businesses lose as many as 67% of consumers due to a lack of online product information. (Allurent, January 2008)

• 83% of online shoppers would make purchases if sites offered increased interactive elements. (Allurent, January 2008

• 76% of online shoppers surveyed report that content is insufficient to complete research or purchase online "always, most often or some of the time." (eTailing Group, June 2007)

• 90% of UK shoppers surveyed said they wish they could communicate directly with businesses - using live chat, forums or call-me-back facilities - via their websites; one in three require it from the UK businesses they currently use. (1&1, October 2007)

• 42% of 1,179 online consumers surveyed have left a site without purchasing multiple products because they couldn't get a question answered about one of the products in their shopping cart; 41% decided not to make a planned purchase because they couldn't readily find a piece of information about the product or service. (JupiterResearch, September 2007)