Just in time for the rollout of the new & improved MSN Shopping (featuring more powerful product comparison tools, RSS feeds with category refinements and a whole bunch of other good stuff) comes the SearchViews interview with Chris Jolley, Group Programming Manager of MSN Shopping.
We talked to Chris about the Pricegrabber deal, verticalization and consumer adoption of RSS.
Dig in.
1. It’s clear that Microsoft is aggressively entering the search space from the eventual launch of a search advertising network to the recent beta release of MSN Shopping. How do you plan to move beyond the clutter in the comparison shopping space? Beyond jump-starting your efforts, what was the motivation behind choosing to partner with PriceGrabber?
We have found that there are two major components that consumers demand with comparison shopping sites. The first is choice. The second is the ability to quickly find and compare products and offers across multiple merchants. With our new entry into this space, MSN Shopping is very well positioned to rise above the clutter because of our focus on the consumer experience – in this case that means the combination of great Microsoft technology that powers our comparison shopping tools coupled with one of the broadest selections of products and offers on the Web.
The addition of PriceGrabber’s products from a broad assortment of merchants (as well as the product and merchant ratings) helps us expand our selection for MSN customers while providing information that helps our shoppers feel more confident about their purchase decisions.
2. MSN Shopping’s inclusion of RSS feeds for site searches is pretty groundbreaking. Tell us how this decision came about and whether there was any internal resistance. Have you had a chance to look at new eMiniMalls banner ads by Chitika?
The addition of user defined RSS feeds to the MSN Shopping site was an interesting discussion internally. Because of the significant work we were doing with enhancing our taxonomy refinements and category attributes, the decision to add the RSS functionality was a relatively easy one. In addition to the fact that we would be taking a leadership position in the Comparison Shopping space with this new technology, the ability to utilize RSS and present user-defined, detailed e-commerce search results that expand across multiple merchants is not only cool, but a valuable consumer feature.
The outstanding question, and something we discussed internally quite a bit, was how quickly RSS will be adopted by consumers. This remains to be seen, but we feel good about our offering and believe consumers will find that our RSS feeds give them another way to shop more efficiently.
I haven’t seen the Chitika ads, but if it’s an example of integrated RSS feeds into banners ads, that’s a very interesting implementation.
3. Do you believe that the shopping channel will continue to become more verticalized as it has in recent months, or will the more generalized sites hold on to their dominance?
There’s no doubt this is an incredibly exciting and interesting time for the e-commerce industry, with many changes ahead of us. I believe consumers will continue to spend a significant amount of their overall time online at the major portals, like MSN and Yahoo, because they like the ability to find information and products, communicate with others through email and instant messaging, read the news, manage their money, etc. all in one place. The deep investment we’ve made in the MSN Shopping site and the focus we’ve applied to the “search and find” and “browse” scenarios is something we believe will ultimately determine the long-term players.
4. Can you think of any companies or examples of merchandising efforts that you think have created a great consumer experience? Name a few and tell us why.
I’ll give this some more thought. 
5. You recently started a MSN Shopping Blog. Do you subscribe to Microsoft blogger Robert Scoble’s thesis that “…companies that have lots of bloggers will end up making better products, will end up having better marketing and PR, will end up making more profit at the end of the day, and will be more likely to have more than one “hit product” and will be more likely to last 100s of years”?
I do agree with Scoble’s thesis, because it is based on the simple premise of the importance of listening to your customers. This has become a mantra at Microsoft. I’ve been here for almost ten years now, and it’s rare we ever hear Steve Ballmer speak internally without stressing the importance of always, always, ALWAYS listening to what our customers…be they consumers or partners, are saying to us. Blogging provides a more efficient way for us to do that with an influential set of customers, and is a great way for us to open that initial dialogue, obtain feedback and share information quickly.
