Valentine's Day Web Sites Failed to Meet Performance
Wed. February 16, 2000 12:00 AM by Business Wire
San Mateo, CA -
Many popular Valentine's Day web sites strained to meet the performance and fulfillment demands of online shoppers ordering for their sweethearts, according to measurements taken by Keynote (Nasdaq:KEYN), the Internet performance authority(TM). The availability of popular greeting-card sites on February 14 ranged from 43.4 percent to 73.0 percent. The performance and availability of popular chocolate and flower sites did not degrade on February 14 as shoppers had placed their orders the previous week. However, only 67 percent of all chocolate and flower orders placed by Keynote were delivered by Valentine's Day.
Keynote measured the performance and availability of 12 major chocolate, flower and greeting-card web sites from February 7 through Valentine's Day, and also measured the ability of the chocolate and flower sites to deliver online orders by February 14. Keynote measured the performance and availability of major Valentine's Day web sites every 15 minutes between 5:00 AM and 9:00 PM Pacific time from 66 Internet access points in 25 metropolitan areas in the United States, a subset of Keynote's global network of measurement computers in over 120 locations around the world. To measure fulfillment, Keynote ordered 3 items from each of four top chocolate and four top flower web sites on Wednesday, February 9 following the recommendations of each site for delivery in time for Valentine's Day, with deliveries requested to three separate addresses in California.
"The greeting-card sites could not serve their web pages effectively on February 14 when everyone wanted to receive their Valentine's Day cards ON that day," said Daniel Todd, Director of Public Services at Keynote. "Valentine's Day is a stricter test of performance and fulfillment than were the Christmas holidays because the target delivery date for an electronic greeting card is only a single day."
The following table lists the web sites measured, their average performance and availability in the week before Valentine's Day compared to February 14, and the results of Keynote's fulfillment measurements of chocolate and flower sites. 67-percent fulfillment indicates two out of three on-time deliveries; 33-percent indicates one out of three on-time deliveries. E-Greetings is the only greeting-card web site that posted a page on February 14 apologizing for its inaccessibility due to high traffic.
Keynote measured the performance and availability of 12 major chocolate, flower and greeting-card web sites from February 7 through Valentine's Day, and also measured the ability of the chocolate and flower sites to deliver online orders by February 14. Keynote measured the performance and availability of major Valentine's Day web sites every 15 minutes between 5:00 AM and 9:00 PM Pacific time from 66 Internet access points in 25 metropolitan areas in the United States, a subset of Keynote's global network of measurement computers in over 120 locations around the world. To measure fulfillment, Keynote ordered 3 items from each of four top chocolate and four top flower web sites on Wednesday, February 9 following the recommendations of each site for delivery in time for Valentine's Day, with deliveries requested to three separate addresses in California.
"The greeting-card sites could not serve their web pages effectively on February 14 when everyone wanted to receive their Valentine's Day cards ON that day," said Daniel Todd, Director of Public Services at Keynote. "Valentine's Day is a stricter test of performance and fulfillment than were the Christmas holidays because the target delivery date for an electronic greeting card is only a single day."
The following table lists the web sites measured, their average performance and availability in the week before Valentine's Day compared to February 14, and the results of Keynote's fulfillment measurements of chocolate and flower sites. 67-percent fulfillment indicates two out of three on-time deliveries; 33-percent indicates one out of three on-time deliveries. E-Greetings is the only greeting-card web site that posted a page on February 14 apologizing for its inaccessibility due to high traffic.
News, photos provided by Business Wire.