The holiday season is conducive to the rapid passage of time - so we come to you in a blink of an eye with another eCommerce Press Release. In today's edition, we'll look at changes in the social commerce market and TikTok's failed expansion plans. We'll also talk numbers, presenting the most important findings from recently published reports - check out in which ways 2023 will turn out to be a breakthrough year for eCommerce. We encourage you to read today's Press Release to stay up to date, and maybe even one step ahead!
Next year, one in five products will be bought online
Eighty-one percent of Europeans say that speed and ease of transaction are crucial to them when shopping. These very changes in consumer behavior patterns have been recognized by PayPal, which, together with TrendWatching, one of the largest market research companies, has developed a report, "The future of European groceries: 6 trends defining the evolution of grocery retail." The study focuses on grocery stores, but the truth is that the habits developed can be successfully transferred to all other markets.
What is shaping the future of eCommerce? Paypal highlights 6 major trends:
- personalizing the consumer shopping experience with artificial intelligence-based solutions,
- striving to best integrate stationary shopping with sales in online form,
- improving the convenience and comfort of shopping,
- introducing facilities for green purchasing,
- the spread of the store-to-door sales model,
- speeding up the shopping process in stationary stores.
We also learn from the report that eCommerce is projected to account for more than 20% of the total commerce market in 2023. The creators point out, however, that as this segment's share of the market grows, customer expectations will also grow proportionally. In order to meet customers' needs, therefore, special attention should be paid to such aspects as refining the shopping cart, shortening the ordering process and implementing attractive payment methods.
And if you want to learn more, the full report can be found here.
Oppressed TikTok abandons plans to launch live commerce in Europe
Social commerce, or selling via social media, is becoming an increasingly popular and well-liked form of sales. The last few weeks have been fruitful with an impressive number of new shopping proposals from the major social media platforms. However, not all of them turned out to be successful.
The rapid development of TikTok has led to the fact that discussions about it are almost always heated. Many people are critical of the solutions proposed by the app's developers, and this time the skeptics are right. Bytedance - the company that operates TikTok - has abandoned plans to expand TikTok Shop with live sales capabilities in Europe and the United States. The form has been an unquestionable success in Indonesia, Thailand and China, among other countries, and the sales live shows there could be compared to influencer-led broadcasts with a combination of teleshopping specifics.
However, as it turns out, this form of sales has not proved attractive to Western cultural circles, as confirmed by research in the UK. Despite additional subsidies and numerous incentives for employees and testers, the measures are not having the intended effect. Brands that have agreed to sell their products in the tested form are not satisfied with the results and have to face budget burdens caused by exorbitant discounts.
European audiences are definitely more responsive to the introduction of a dedicated store tab, which resembles current solutions in the social commerce market. Perhaps it is into its perfection that the developers of the site should direct their full efforts?
For more details, see this article.
Salesforce with a prescription for inflation
If we were to single out one word that we use most often when discussing the economy this year, it would probably be "inflation." Rising prices with each passing day, dynamically changing interest rates, and increasingly widespread inventory shortages are fueling fears about the near future. What's more, they are also prompting us to develop the most likely scenarios to minimize the risk of losing money. This is what Salesforce has done with its 5 predictions for pricing strategies.
- Customers will start buying more to avoid future increases.
Salesforce suggests that, in many cases, customers will be more likely to opt for "stock-up" purchases. We will see such reactions, for example, during the holiday season. However, this does not mean that we will buy more - higher prices will simultaneously result in fewer gifts being purchased globally.
- Shoppers will abandon their loyalty to trusted brands.
No longer loyalty to a favorite company, but price and the real value of a product will prove to be the deciding factors in buying an item. This means that 2.5 billion shoppers worldwide may abandon their favorite brand for a competitor offering lower prices. Luxury brands are the most susceptible to customer exodus, but we can expect buyer migration in all sectors.
- Online sales will be driven by traditional channels.
Stationary stores are now in full operation, and experts are outdoing themselves with ideas on how to entice potential shoppers to visit their establishment. At the same time, it should be pointed out that more than half of eCommerce users get acquainted with a product in real life before ordering it online. The above trend is therefore also an opportunity for eCommerce store owners to increase their conversions.
- In harmony with the environment.
We will continue to focus on sustainability. Nearly 90% of consumers expect businesses to act in harmony with nature. Respect towards employees and the values by which a company operates are also becoming equally important.
- NFT to the rescue from inflation.
We're going to get more and more bold with the latest technologies. NFT, which until recently was considered a "toy" for cryptocurrency investors, today turns out to be a product whose purchase is becoming more common. Representatives of Generation Z are primarily interested in this form - almost 50% of them are considering such a transaction. Most often they go for the purchase of so-called "digital twins," i.e. unique NFTs sold together with their tangible reproduction.
Which of the listed predictions seems most realistic to you?
You can read about the details of the forecasts here.
