Table of Contents
What is E-commerce?
“The sooner we drop the ‘e’ out of ‘e-commerce’ and just call it commerce, the better”. By Bob Willett draws our attention towards electronic business. E-commerce or Electronic commerce is an online process of selling and buying products over the internet. It is considered as one of the largest businesses in the world of the internet.
E-commerce basically deals with online retail, online auctions, Digital Products and other services we can sell online. It includes retail, Dropshipping, wholesale, physical products etc
Importance of E-commerce Trends
There is a sudden rise in competition in the world of E-commerce. In order to beat the competition one persistently needs to outsmart others in various areas, for which there arises demand of new trends. One needs to update E-commerce stores continuously to match new trends for survival in the market. To understand this, we should remember the case of Nokia which was the best mobile phone brand in the world in october 1998 and by 2013 was sold to Microsoft.
Two main reasons for downfall of Nokia:
- When other major brands like Samsung, Sony, HTC were switching to an android platform, Nokia did not make a change.
- When brands like Apple, Samsung, Sony, HTC were switching to touch screen. Nokia sticks with QWERTY keypads.
Hence loses battle by not changing with trends.
Taking into account, need for trends, we are discussing top E-commerce trends that will impact buyers in 2020
Unbeatable Rise in Sales
E-commerce sales are extending rapidly towards new horizons and has achieved a status of one of the most popular online activities. It is stated by Statista that the figure is going to rise up to 4.5 trillion in 2021. With surge in trust and comfort online shopping is steadily expanding. Further with elevation in user experience and easy return policies, growth in this sector is certain.
Broadening of Mobile Shopping
Today vast population owns a Smartphone; hence the majority of this population is using smart phones for online shopping too. As per Statista it is stated that by the end of 2021 almost 73% of sales will be made through smart phones. This is the reason behind the expansion of online shopping mobile apps. As these apps will be accessed easily anytime from anywhere.
Voice Commerce
This term may sound new, but is nothing rather than making shopping by using voice over smart speakers. There is a surge in this sector. As per study conducted by OC&C strategy consultants it is predicted that voice commerce will grow up to 55% by 2022. Although it is non-visual, which means here reliability is only upon voice, hence only selected options are at one’s disposal in this field.
Visual Commerce
E-commerce is not an easy task to perform as sounds to be, inducement is there is no involvement of physical interaction. In order to sort out this issue visual commerce comes into play in which an enormous amount of photos and videos are used to satisfy customers in making an online purchase. As stated by MarketWatch image recognition market is about to grow to $81.88 billion by 2026.
Introduction of Augmented Reality
Although online shopping provides huge primacy but one cannot feel the reality until it is seen and felt by naked eyes. In order to clinch this need augmented reality comes into play which provides users an augmented 3D experience. With induction of this technology users can experience a full virtual view of the product at a place where it has to be stationed. In a prediction by Gartner AR is going to expand by 100 million by 2020.
Introduction of Artificial Intelligence, Big Data
Artificial Intelligence has made a significant impact by making things easy and rapid. Haven’t you shown heed in some product and the ad for the same starts emerging on your screen while surfing on the internet. Yes! This is the power of technology and as by businesswire spending of global retailers on AI is going to touch $7.3billion per annum by 2022.
Impact of Social Media
Social media ever remains a business enhancing platform. Now with availability of “buy” on social media sites like Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, etc a huge bump is noticed in sales. This is the reason behind the investments on these platforms to enrich user experience. Moreover with the induction of platforms like Shopify, online stores can be linked with social media. Social media no longer remains a communication tool but has evolved as a business tool.
Payment Options
Payments always remain a colossal concern to the users due to leakage of important data linked to account. Moreover when shopping is made from overseas, preference of local payment results in further complexity. As per suggestion by Joe Chilson, Head Writer and Accounts Manager at 1Digital Agency purposes a concept of unique ID which makes no hazards during checkouts as all information will be securely saved.
WordPress -WooCommerce Push Notifications
WooCommerce Push Notifications are special messages which pop up on your device’s screen by a website or app urging you to take action. These are composed of media like GIF, image or video. The real benefit of these push notifications is, they can be timed and customized as per requirement.
Coming to WordPress Woocommerce, it is a plugin and sends automated push notifications. These notifications carry information like new products, price drop alerts, offers, reminders to complete purchases for items in cart. These notifications work on desktop, mobile, tablet, etc. they play a crucial role in E-commerce by proliferating sales.
In a recent report by PushPushGo 2019.
- 85% of online stores and E-commerce operations are using web push notifications to enhance their business.
- Web push notifications give rise to 9% increase in traffic to publishers.
- 4% of Travel industry is using web push notifications for their business.
The sign-up rate amid site visitors for web push notifications is from 5%-25%. 60% of subscribers go for sign up from the browser in their phones instead of desktop. After the implementation of single opt-in, sign-ups grow up to about 600%. Moreover CTR increases by 15% using web push notifications. Not only this, the market reach of web push notifications was estimated to be about 80%.
Conclusion
E-commerce trends are liable to change every other day. One cannot have complete hold on these as they will change with change in technology. But a general idea can be marked about 2020. Some of these ideas are presented to provide an outline of what future holds for us. One cannot predict everything, but can calculate the impact of the present on the future. And then can take measured steps.
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