The growth of online shoppers has already been predicted to increase year after year, but the global pandemic sped up the shift towards digital shopping. The United Nations Trade and Development (UNCTAD) estimates global eCommerce sales jumped to a record $26.7 trillion amid Covid-19.
Experts say the growth of online shopping will continue to boom.
To meet the demands of the consumers, eCommerce companies are focusing on improving their customer experience both online and offline.
With an estimated $6 trillion worth of global retail sales coming from eCommerce, businesses aggressively invest in product innovation, operations, marketing, and technology to stay ahead of the competition.
These are some of the significant trends that will drive growth by 2022:
Diverse Payment Methods
Once an afterthought, offering digital payment options has become integral to attracting and keeping customers in a post-pandemic world.
While card payments remain the dominant payment method in North America and Europe, expect contactless payment and digital wallet providers, such as Google Wallet and Apple Pay, to become more widely adopted.
It’s been a while coming for the West since Asia has been leading the trend since 2003.
Cashless is king in China. In fact, don’t even try paying cash in China, as I’ve learned the hard way. I had to use Alipay to hail a taxi in Shanghai.
And South Koreans are so well-accustomed to using mobile wallets that it’s common to see unmanned digital payment kiosks outside convenience stores in Seoul.
Livestream Shopping
Also known as Video Shopping or Live Commerce, it is a unique blend of entertainment, instant purchasing of a featured product, and audience participation through a chat function or reaction buttons.
Are you still confused?
Think of it as the online live stream version of a Home Shopping Network show.
Imagine your favorite HSN host, for example, Bobbi Ray Carter. As the on-air host, she explains the values and features of the product being showcased. Livestream shopping is done the same, except it has the added thrill of real-time social interactivity.
Recent statistics from China show just how popular live shopping has become and what this rise in popularity could mean for markets in other parts of the world.
The leading model in North America and Europe involves adding video commerce to popular e-commerce brands or social apps to tap their audiences and influencers.
Walmart saw massive success with their ‘Shop Along’ live stream shopping events, and Nordstrom has its virtual shopping events called ‘Nordstrom Now’ where shoppers can watch tutorials and buy exact products in seconds.
Even retail giant Amazon has joined the trend by hosting over 1,200 live streams during their annual Prime Day sale in October, proving to brands that this new technology needs to be pursued.
Mobile Commerce
Mobile commerce largely drove eCommerce’s exponential growth this year.
According to Statista, mobile commerce will account for 73 percent of all eCommerce sales in the United States by the end of 2021. This means that almost three out of every four dollars spent on online purchases are coming from mobile, and that rate is accelerating.
If your eCommerce store isn’t on mobile yet, you are missing out.
With mobile commerce sales of $3.5 trillion in 2021, the growth of mobile commerce shows no signs of slowing down soon. The global mobile eCommerce market share will grow further in 2022 as more users embrace making online payments and purchases using mobile devices.
Omnichannel
Omni-channel retail (or omnichannel commerce) is a multichannel strategy to sales that focuses on offering a consistent customer experience whether the client is purchasing online, on a mobile device, on a laptop, or in a physical store.
Simply put, it’s when a consumer selects products or services through eCommerce and then completes their purchase at a physical store.
Harvard Business Review estimates 73 percent of shoppers conduct research over different channels and eCommerce sites, allowing them to find and purchase new products.
Experts predict that physical retail stores will keep their importance in the purchasing process for many consumers in the coming years. Still, it will need to be supplemented with many technological advances such as augmented and virtual reality, drone delivery, new payment methods, and others that complete and improve the customer experience.
According to a consumer survey, 61 percent of customers rely on physical businesses to get the goods they and their families require.
Customers who use omnichannel commerce spent 4% more in physical stores and 10% more online than single-channel customers. This shows that shoppers made more in-store purchases because they did their homework ahead of time. Customers who used four or more channels, for example, spent 9 percent more in the shop than those who used only one.
Omnichannel is also beneficial to client loyalty.
Online buyers visit physical stores 23 percent more often and are more likely to suggest the brand to relatives and friends.
Voice Assisted Shopping
Voice assistants in smart devices are becoming more and more accessible to users as their technology improves. Adult ownership of smart speakers in the United States is expected to reach 66.3 million households by 2022.
A smart speaker’s primary purpose is to allow customers to search for stores and items and write notes, get news, and do other things.
According to Google, 42 percent of Europeans use voice search regularly, and voice shopping in the United States will reach $40 billion by 2022.
And there’s a reason for that: a person can only write 40 words a minute, but they can speak 150 words in the same period.
Voice-assist devices such as Alexa, the Amazon Dot, and Google Home are gaining popularity.
And, while Amazon continues to dominate the market with Alexa, with a 75% market share, personal voice assistants will be a crucial component in the future of digital trends.
Not to mention that having a voice assistant needs online businesses to spend extra attention to three areas: content, SEO strategy, and UX because voice assistants still scan Google to generate consumer recommendations.
Last note…
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Resources
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Loesche, Dyfed, and Felix Richter. 2018. “Infographic: Mobile e-Commerce Is up and Poised for Further Growth.” Statista Infographics. March 6. https://www.statista.com/chart/13139/estimated-worldwide-mobile-e-commerce-sales/.
Ma, Yihan. 2021. “China: GMV of Live Streaming Commerce on Taobao 2021.” Statista. November 22. http://fr.statista.com/statistics/1174832/china-gmv-of-live-streaming-commerce-on-taobao/.
Shay, Matthew. 2021. “Retail Resiliency in 2020 and Beyond.” NRF. January 8. https://nrf.com/blog/retail-resiliency-2020-and-beyond.
Shykolovych, Oleksandr. 2021. “12 Ecommerce Trends for 2022: Will the Growth Keep Slowing down?” Improvado. Accessed December 21. https://improvado.io/blog/ecommerce-trends.
Sopadjieva, Emma, Utpal M. Dholakia, and Beth Benjamin. 2017. “A Study of 46,000 Shoppers Shows That Omnichannel Retailing Works.” Harvard Business Review. January 3. https://hbr.org/2017/01/a-study-of-46000-shoppers-shows-that-omnichannel-retailing-works.
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United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. n.d. Rep. United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). https://unctad.org/system/files/official-document/dtlstictinf2020d1_en.pdf.
Vailshery, Lionel Sujay. 2021. “Forecast: US Smart Home Devices and Smart Speaker Ownership 2022.” Statista. January 22. https://www.statista.com/statistics/794624/us-smart-home-devices-smart-speaker-ownership-forecast/#:~:text=The%20statistic%20shows%20the%20ownership,to%20own%20a%20smart%20speaker.
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