COVID-19 Pandemic Transformed Digital Commerce Sector

By 2021, traditional consumer habits are being crushed and online shopping has become the standard purchasing method. US retailers are being buried by online consumers, and digital sales are up $ 183 billion through 2021, up 42 percent from 2019. Just a few years ago, it would be difficult to predict a retail environment in which more than a third (34.3%) of retailers sold the bulk their products and services online.

In response to this fundamental change in the way people shop, companies in all industries are innovating at an incredible rate. They add new web stores, adopt new technologies, and test new strategies. Most importantly, they learn a lot from getting involved in digital selling and finding out what their customers really need when shopping online.

Based on these trends, as well as feedback from Magento Commerce customers, we’ve identified seven key lessons businesses need to learn from 2021 onwards. We believe that if you haven’t already, it’s imperative that your company responds.

Lesson 1: Time it takes to load a page can lead to breakthroughs in your sales

Now that customers spend more time online, their tolerance for slow web page loading has decreased. Performance issues can cause potential buyers to leave your site before it even loads. However, this problem can also have other effects. Slow page loading speed can affect your Google search rankings. This can lead to less organic traffic and lower sales. If your web page takes three seconds or more to load, speeding it up can quickly increase your total winnings. As a rule of thumb, Google targets load times to be less than half a second.

Lesson 2: Earn Curbs and Stay in the Store

The rapid growth of pickups has been one of the defining topics for e-commerce since 2021. Wholesale stores are adapting quickly to the new system and enjoying great popularity in almost all retail stores with stationary locations. A year later, the restriction service was expanded to include the return of goods.

It is clear that customers like to take sidewalks and shops and don’t want to leave. As of August 2021, 43.7% of 245 Digital Commerce 360 ​​Top 500 retailers offered pick-up, up from 6.9% at the end of 2019. Adobe research shows that 23% of online shoppers prefer some form of online purchase, pick-up in the shop (BOPIS) to get delivery to their home.

Lesson 3: Cellular Shopping Trends Are on the Rise

Many of us imagine people shopping at home from their desktops or laptops and perhaps lying on the couch with their legs up. In fact, the opposite is happening as the mobile revolution continues to show its strength and consumers start spending more and more time on their phones. The increasing use of mobile phones also has an impact on increasing sales of mobile devices. By September 2022, cell phone costs are estimated to account for more than 50% of online sales.

However, online retailers are not keeping up with the growth in mobile traffic volume. While mobile devices account for 60 percent of ecommerce website visits, they only generate 40 percent of sales. The problem is, mobile web stores may not offer very good shopping opportunities. Some of the common problems are:

• Website speed

• Small text and images that buyers need to enlarge and reduce

• Limited functionality that requires mobile users to switch to desktop mode

• Insufficient product information

Lesson 4: B2B who don’t sell online will be left out

Like its B2C counterparts, companies focused on B2B models have also been recruited by COVID-19. In response, they turned to digital models for success. This change is dramatic. Of those who have taken this step, 89% say they are likely to continue using the new B2B digital selling method in the future.

This trend is accelerating in 2021 as the traditional direct selling model, where salespeople call customers’ locations and place orders on their behalf, have been overturned. B2B companies that have added online sales benefit from higher sales.

Lesson 5: Direct Selling and Shipping Can Bridge the Retail Void

Online sales accounted for 101% of all retail profits by 2021, which suggests that sales across all other channels — stores, catalogs and call centers — have actually declined. This dichotomy hurts other B2B producers and sellers who rely on retailers to move their products.

Manufacturers who are faced with decreasing wholesale orders and increasing inventories have two main strategies. The first is to create your own website directly for users. If your e-commerce platform supports B2C and B2B web shops and sells multiple websites, starting a new, consumer-facing web store can be a fairly straightforward process.

The second strategy is dropshipping, where you order products on the retailer’s website. This strategy allows you to take advantage of a merchant’s online success without having to sell directly to consumers. However, to make money, you need an e-commerce portal to manage your relationships with your delivery partners. This is also useful if your retailer is using Magento Commerce as it allows the business to actively manage all sources of inventory, including shippers.

Summary:

Well, what e-commerce companies have learned over the past year will resonate well in the future. By tackling the seven lessons outlined in this post, you’ll be in a good position to grow your business and connect with your customers in a more personal and fluid way, no matter what 2021 comes up.

Katalyst Technologies offers advance ecommerce website development, which helps our clients to bring their ideas to life.

Contact us today!