E-Commerce Marketing trends in future
E-Commerce
Marketing trends in future
The
number of Internet users
in the country is expected to cross the 450 million mark by June 2017. As technology continues at a rapid
pace, pioneering ecommerce stores harness new techniques and facilities to make
online selling and online shopping a lot more efficient and fun. In the last
few years we have seen most online retailers make a beeline for guest
blogging, website optimization for higher click through rate &
conversation rates, responsive design, and general improvement in site
performance. There have been many developments in the field of technology since
then, most notably in the field of mobile, social networking, big data,
analytics and personalization. These changes have begun to give rise to new
trends in the world of ecommerce marketing. The changes that might be seen most
likely in ecommerce marketing in the future are:
1.
Compelling
Content
A visually alluring website and an
interesting array of products are not just enough to stand out among the crowd
in consumers’ memory. There is requirement of compelling content, which is
presented in unique ways that not only manages to grab the customer’s
attention, but that also helps in engaging them and forges an emotional
connection with the brand. So, it’s not just the product and service
descriptions that need creative content, but also social media posts, blogs,
press releases, advertisements, and more.
Interesting content is
one of the major reasons why people follow brands on social media, as it helps
them by being informative, educational, and motivational, which then
reflects significantly on sales and brand loyalty. As a marketing strategy,
too, it’s also one of the most cost-effective, efficient, and impactful
solutions to generate ROI. That being said, content should not be restricted to
just the written word, in fact, multiple forms must be targeted to suit varying
consumer preferences. For example, videos, info-graphics, tutorials, podcasts,
are some of the interesting ways to create a stronger connect with the
audience.
2.
Consumer
Fragmentation - Turning Challenge into Opportunity
Owing to the greater convenience digital
media brings, consumers today have access to more buying opportunities than
ever before. Our smart-phones, which are an integral part of our daily
“decision making” lives, provide us instant access to a plethora of retailers
where the good and the bad get sifted by a ruthless competition in a matter of
just one swipe. So, giants find this fragmentation a Herculean challenge to
deal with because niche boutiques are well positioned to gain market share. On
the flip side, smaller firms plug this challenge quite easily as there are
lower barriers to market entry and growth.
3. Same-Day Delivery- The Evolutionary
"Express" Era
As the title suggests, the
easiest explanation of this service is: an order can be placed for a product or
a group of goods and have them delivered within a 24-hour time frame on any day
of the week. Why does the concept have the potential to fundamentally
revolutionize the industry? For starters, the introduction of same-day
delivery will take the online shopping experience of
customers to a new level of convenience. Consumers clearly attach value to the
meticulous integration of convenience of online retail with the immediacy of
bricks-and-mortar stores, which same-day delivery concept brings in. Reduced
delivery time, improved access to products, higher convenience, and lower
prices of online shopping are some of the key factors that can be attributed to
the said concept.
Secondly, for online retailers, the
option of same-day delivery helps in increasing purchase conversion while
limiting cancellations and consumer switch to a large scale and as the
fast-tracked model provides little to no time-window for consumers to explore
further and have a subsequent change of heart on their purchase.
Finally, the model also offers
immense opportunity for business development and job creation across logistics
providers- who are the natural partner for same-day delivery on a broad scale
due to their existing network strength.
4. Measuring Connected Devices
Most often, consumers don’t stick
to a single device when buying. In fact, they switch between devices, from the
web to mobile to apps, before turning into paying customers. Device-driven
analytics not only provide e-commerce ventures with a deeper insight into
assessing their audiences better, but also assist in leveraging this
information to predict subsequent purchases and personalize the consumer
shopping experience. So, businesses that want to gain a competitive edge and
have a more methodological approach to fresh conversions are now looking at
multiple devices to collect data and draw consumer insights.
5. Social Commerce
Social media is now an integral
part of almost every consumer’s online habits. Statistics abound about its
popularity and potential as a means of driving new visitors. Perhaps one of the
biggest trends last year was the inclusion of e-commerce in social
networks, such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram and Pinterest. One of
the major reasons for inclusion of commerce in social media platforms is strong
internet penetration across tier-I, tier-II and tier-III audience, where
availability of low-cost smart-phones and low rates of data plans have played a
pivotal role in expanding the markets.
An old marketing adage says, “Go
where your customers are!” For e-commerce ventures, effective social media
engagement represents real value. These platforms offer innovative methods to
reach first-time and
new generation customers, engage and reward existing customers, and showcase
the best that brand has to offer. Without doubt, the social network profiles
and the content shared are as important as a business’ storefront signage and
product displays in today’s connected era.
But businesses must realize that
leveraging the complete potential of social media requires a more focused
approach and a broader understanding of the medium. The concept of commerce
using social media tool box, in many ways, take us back to the origins of
retail, one where merchants were familiar with their clients, and
correspondingly shoppers established deep relationships with the merchants they
buy from. This return to small commerce, with the help of social platforms,
will continue to play an important role for both- the networks and the retail
industry. Staying ahead of the curve, however, will clearly be defined by how
e-commerce ventures experiment and innovate to interact and connect with their
customers.
The opportunities created by various
social media platforms, the rise of analytics studies of devices and multiple
payment options, and the challenges of consumer fragmentation are some of the
major trends we expect to play out in 2017 and beyond. They represent both big
opportunities for those that move fast, and enormous risks for those that fail
to address them. For retailers, our message is simple: engage, stay focused and
move fast.
6.
Mobile Optimized not just Mobile Friendly
Mobile shopping is becoming more and more important. While 2013 saw
responsive web design spread like wildfire, going forward we are bound to
see an improvement in mobile shopping experiences. The first step was to create
sites that worked decently on mobile – now we will see online store
owners scrambling to build sites that positively blossom on smart-phones and
tablets.
7.
Mobile Advertising
Not only will ecommerce websites
render a lot better on mobiles, but a larger number of mobile store owners will
also start advertising their products and services on mobiles. Mobile advertising is getting more popular day by day, and branded
ecommerce store owners are going to be among the first big spenders on mobile
ads. While smaller store owners may not jump on the bandwagon yet, larger
stores will make an attempt to get reach as many mobile users as possible. We
will also see rise in video mobile ads that have the potential go viral on
social networks.
8.
Targeting Wearable Devices
While Google
Glasses, smart watches and other wearable devices are yet to take off in a big way,
many more such products are set to enter the market in the future. If such
devices become widely popular, we can expect retailers as well as ecommerce
stores to shower discounts, promotions, offers and updates to their
customers through wearable devices.
9.
Rise of Long-form
Content
Google’s red
eye at link-building using guest blogging will push ecommerce marketers to
create better and more targeted content. We will see the rise of long-form content that is more closely related
to the products and services offered by the stores. In addition to articles and
blog posts, the length of videos and podcast will also see more takers. The
easy availability of analytics and data will lead to creation of more
data-based content.
10.
More Social and Search Ads
With Google
making it more difficult for content marketers to benefit from link building
through guest blogging, more will turn towards social media and search ads for revenue. Targeted social
media ads are getting more effective, and this will drive a large PPC and CPC
ads experiment in small and large ecommerce companies.
11.
Brand and Author Identity will Become More Important
While Google Authorship’s branding opportunities for smaller
business were well understood even last year, the death of large-scale guest
blogging suggests that a digital brand – both for authors and businesses – is
imperative in the coming years. Traditional, anonymous SEO won’t work that
well. Ecommerce stores and marketers will try to create high-quality
communities and blogs to further their marketing efforts. A brand blog plus a
team of well-known bloggers will become invaluable for ecommerce businesses.
12.
Personalized
Experiences
Online
stores have been serving personalized ads to prospective users since years.
Many online stores also use personalized product displays and suggestion for registered users. As
users become more comfortable with sharing some personal information with
brands and trusted online stores, we will see store owners make more efforts to
offer a more meaningful personalization to users.
13.
Better Delivery
Amazon’s
sci-fi sounding drone
delivery project
is a step towards improving the delivery cycle. The biggest annoyance of
ordering online is that one has to wait for 2 days to 2 weeks for the product
to arrive. It is possible for users to go to a store and get with right there
and then. We have continued to see the large online stores do more to reduce
delivery times and offer more shipping options. We have already seen the
next-day-delivery options in shipping options for local stores and larger
ecommerce stores and reducing delivery times is a priority for all
ecommerce websites. The rollout of Amazon Prime Now is just the latest attempt to make online shopping
easier.
14.
Local Branding and Marketing
As
larger ecommerce websites offer newer facilities and features and try
out new ways of attracting customers, smaller stores will turn to local base to
survive. Smaller ecommerce store owners will use traditional SEO to target
customers in a limited geographic area and combine it with social media
engagement to personalize relations with local customers. Their branding and
marketing strategy will revolve around points that differentiate them from
large vendors.
15.
Marketing Automation
Online
shoppers are notorious for browsing around for a long time and leaving the
store without buying. Personalized and targeted marketing can help turn them
into paying customers. Marketing automation has been around for a long time,
and the trend of using such solutions will continue to rise. More and more
steps of lead nurturing, remarketing, email personalization and analytics will be
automated, helping even small online store owners get better insights and
convert more customers. These are some of the most important trends that will
have a huge impact on ecommerce marketing in the future.
As it can be seen, some of the
trends have been gaining steam for years: mobile, paid ads,
personalization and marketing automation. While other trends like speedy
delivery, wearable tech and importance of brand identity are just beginning to
gain traction.
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