As a category, specialty retailers provide the fastest site access

Specialty retailers provide customers with high broadband connections the fastest access to e-commerce sites, according to Gomez Inc.

Gomez’s index of the 50 largest web retailers notes that customers with a high broadband connection can visit a specialty retail site in about 4.9 seconds, compared to consumer products (5.1 seconds), apparel (5.1 seconds) computers/electronics (6.2 seconds) and mass merchants (6.4 seconds). When their site is accessed by a low broadband connection, consumer products sites provide the fastest average access at 11.3 seconds, Gomez says. The next fastest web retailing category is specialty (11.5 seconds), followed by computers/electronics (14.2 seconds) and mass merchants (14.9 seconds).

Web site performance, specifically how often a retailing site remains online despite frequent heavy traffic, also remains a key benchmark of how successful retailers are in meeting customer expectations. With a high broadband connection, shoppers could on average connect to a consumer products site 98.8% of the time, compared with 98.6% for specialty sites, 98.3% for computers/electronics, 98.2% for mass merchants and 96.5% for consumer electronics.