Shop! unveils Web link with home shopping TV channel

Shop!, the home shopping TV channel backed by Granada Media and Littlewoods, has launched a Website designed to complement the TV service and extend both company’s drive into e-commerce.

Shop! managing director John Ellis played down any comparison with QVC, which has also attempted to migrate its TV-based home shopping service to the Internet.

But he insists the eventual integration of both distribution channels is central to the venture’s long-term success.

“The Website opens us up to a bigger audience, while issues of integration get sorted out,” says Ellis. “When bandwidth opens up on the Internet, you should be able to access more detailed information on a product, promoted by what you might have seen on the TV channel, allowing for more considered searching for product information from what might have initially been an impulse enquiry.”

The Website is planning unique offers for its online customers, as well as up-to-the-minute programming details of Shop!. Customers will be given an additional chance to browse for products featured on the channel over several days.

Ellis says: “We are driving our e-commerce proposition from the television to the Web, as opposed to the other way around.

“We believe the new Website not only provides our existing customers with an additional way to shop, but extends our current customer base to a whole new audience of online shoppers.”