• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, February 4, 2013

In a move intended to remodel the online shopping experience, SellPoint, which publishes interactive video product tours, has acquired ShowUhow, a producer of video-information guides, in an effort to support sales, generate leads and entertain consumers. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The combined services will give consumers a more compelling way to engage with product and services through instructional, interactive and 360-degree videos from Nikon, Canon and Kimberly-Clark and others various retail Web sites.

The acquisition aims to support global ecommerce sales that Morgan Stanley estimates will reach $1 trillion by 2016.

Brian O'Keefe, SellPoint president and CEO, said the buy reaches out to the connected consumer to support their need for a multichannel attribution path. If a consumer likes a brand on Facebook, they are 40% more likely to buy. Referrals that come from Pinterest have the highest conversion, compared with any other source, he said.

Brands also need to consider how many people buy a product, and the percentage returning it for one reason or another. Some return the item because they don't know how to use it or the features aren't what they expect. Videos that explain how to use the product and its features can save the sale. "It's the first 20- to 30-minutes of ownership, when we un-box and configure it that determines the return," O'Keefe said, explaining the acquisition.

SellPoint works with more than 200 consumer brands in the United States serving content on about 10,000 unique products and nearly 100,000 product pages. The company supports a dashboard, so brands and retailers can see the impact of their product content in real-time, combining custom reporting with analytics to reveal shopper interest and behavior across the Web.