River Island is working with Maxymiser to understand the cross-channel behaviour of its shoppers, particularly the growing numbers in EMEA and Asia, to improve conversion across web, mobile, social and email.

Maxymiser offers services like A/B testing, segmentation, behavioural targeting and product recommendations. River Islands eCommerce development manager Helen Colclough said that while surveys and analytics give a certain amount of insight, this is the only real way to understand customer behaviour.

River Island has quite a comprehensive transactional mobile website, with deliveries from the fashion brand made to more than 100 countries at present. It launched its first Android app in November 2013, adding to existing iPhone and iPad apps.

“Even if we make no ROI from the initial campaigns that we conduct, there is huge value in validating, or indeed disproving certain business hypotheses,” Colclough said. “We will still be closer to understanding what our customers are doing, how they behave across different devices and channels, and in different geographies. Fundamentally, it’s about understanding what different types of customer want from their online experience and using that to inform business strategy.”

Maxymiser was listed in the Sunday Times2013 Tech Track 100. It also works with brands like Mothercare, easyJet and Homebase.