Target hires Razorfish to optimize e-commerce

Target has selected digital agency Razorfish to work on its lackluster e-commerce business, according to a report from Ad Age.

Insiders say the Minneapolis-based mass retailer has been reviewing pitches from as many as 10 agencies hoping to get the assignment since August and the Seattle office of Razorfish won the bid.

Target confirmed that Razorfish has been added to the firm’s roster of digital companies working on website strategies as well as other digital platforms.

The retailer said Razorfish does not replace any of existing partners, which includes Deloitte Digital, IBM, Olson and SapientNitro.

In 2011, Target relaunched www.Target.com but users quickly began criticizing the site for inefficiencies and an embarrassing crash in September 2011 immediately after a widely publicized designer collection for the retailer went up.

It’s been two years since Target regained control of its online sales from Amazon but the results have been described as “maligned and glitchy” by industry insiders.

Carol Spieckerman, CEO of New Market Buillders, has said Target still has lots of work to do in terms of e-commerce and omnichanneling — something competitor Wal-Mart has gotten a headstart on thanks to @WalmartLabs.

Target says it has doubled its server capacity to handle more than three times as many orders as last year, which also increases the speed of processing each order. In recent months the retailer has worked with Google to enhance search accuracy, relevancy and speed on Target.com. It has also enhanced its mobile app in addition to the new use of QR codes in Target stores.