Top 10 eCommerce Trends Executives Must Know in 2024

In 2021, eCommerce generated around 4 trillion USD which indicates a greater economic activity than the entirety of California, UK or Germany. The high potential of the eCommerce market is why many firms aim to jump on its bandwagon.  

But to take advantage of the eCommerce market, executives must be aware of its trends to develop strategies to take advantage of the industry and increase their organization’s sales volume.

To help executives achieve their purposes, in this article, we are listing the top 10 eCommerce trends 

Note: To facilitate  readability, we have categorized trends into the following categories:

1. Market trends,
2. Technology trends,
3. Customer trends. 

Market trends

1. eCommerce market keeps growing

Despite its vast market size, the eCommerce market is still expected to grow at around 11.5% compounded annual rate (see Figure 2). 

This growth more or less positively affects all subcategories within the eCommerce market. 

Figure 2: Rise of eCommerce sales

Source: Statista

Another statistic executives should be aware of is the top countries for eCommerce sales. Because executives might want to expand their eCommerce activities in well-established regions or some cases they might want to take risky actions in the name of dominating a non-established market. Figure 3 shows that 10 nations account for about 90% of eCommerce sales, with China accounting for 50% of dollar-valued transactions. 

Figure 3: Countries’ % share of global online sales in 2021.

Source: Business Insider

2. Asia is the fastest growing eCommerce market

CEOs’ investment decisions may benefit from knowing which eCommerce markets are expanding the fastest. In this perspective, Asian nations like Singapore, Indonesia, and the Philippines may be alluring targets for penetration (see Figure 4).  

Figure 4: Fastest growing eCommerce markets.

Source: Statista

3. Costs of advertising and competition are increasing

The amount eCommerce companies pay for their ads can be more than the sales they bring in, because, unless you are a purple cow, it is difficult for customers to recognize smaller companies from their ads. This is an important eCommerce trend that marketing executives should be aware of while they are planning their budgets.

Ecommerce market is growing rapidly which indicates that more and more players enter the market, thus there is increasing competition between eCommerce companies.

This situation calls for standing out from the pack, via advertising. And as conventional economic theory states, the more a good/service (advertising) is in demand, the more will be its price. And that has been the case, for Facebook is charging roughly 50% more for advertisements in 2022 than it did in 2021.

Technology trends

4. Chatbots enhance online sales

Sales chatbots can be effective tools for eCommerce companies since they are:

• Decreasing sales/customer service costs up to 75% for some specific cases.
• Increasing sales and generating leads.
• Supporting conversational commerce strategies of companies.

Chatbots are one of the most significant eCommerce technologies because of these advantages, and more businesses are beginning to implement them. 

Chatbots are used to supplement sales efforts by nearly 60% of B2B and 45% of B2C businesses. Moreover, because their capabilities continue to advance thanks to NLU and NLP developments, judging by that, and the general market trends, it is safe to assume adoption rates will keep rising.

If you want to implement conversational commerce but do not know where to start, you can read our articles on: 

• Conversational commerce use cases .
• Conversational commerce case studies.
• WhatsApp chatbots.
• And conversational commerce platforms benchmarking.

5. Mobile apps’ weight increases in eCommerce

Before deciding to invest in either websites or on mobile apps, eCommerce executives must know that:

•  People tend to buy products more via mobile apps,
•  And that the importance of mobile applications has been increasing since 2017 and is expected to do so until 2025 (see Figure 6).

In general, mobile apps are associated and have been designed, to be more customer friendly since people use their phones on-the-go. Therefore, we recommend eCommerce companies to build a mobile application, deploy a chatbot on it, and constantly improve it. 

Figure 6: Mobile vs desktop for sales

Source: Statista

6. Augmented reality

Augmented reality (AR) technology lets people experience products on digital platforms. It is another trending eCommerce technology. 

The inability of consumers to test, or otherwise interact with, products before buying them is one drawback of eCommerce in comparison to conventional commerce. 

In theory, AR aims to resolve this challenge. And customers believe so too: more than 70% of customers want eCommerce companies to adopt AR.

But we shouldn’t get ahead of ourselves, since, as of 2022, the adoption rate of AR by online retailers is still around 1%. Nevertheless, due to demand, we expect that the technology will be used more frequently in the near future.

7. Payment options are on the rise

It began with debit and credit cards. Later, tools like PayPal appeared. But nowadays, Internet shoppers have a variety of payment options. According to PwC, a convenient payment process enhances eCommerce sales. Thus, we recommend companies to adopt additional options besides credit cards and PayPal. 

For instance, digital wallets like Venmo, which allow consumers to pay through the Venmo app or using a QR code specific to their business, are one new trend.

Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) is another payment trend that is rapidly gaining popularity and has become a 100 billion-dollar industry. These let clients pay in installments for expensive items without wasting time with traditional credit checks.

Customer trends

8. Customers demand personalized marketing

According to a PwC report, 30% of consumers are willing to spend more for products that are recommended to them. Additionally, consumers are inclined to value personalized recommendations highly, since behavioral analytics suggest products according to customers’ tastes. 

Thus, enhanced sales and increased engagement rates are the overall benefits of recommendation systems. For instance, according to McKinsey, more than one-third of Amazon’s revenues are attributable to its recommendation engine.

9. Images and voice searches are on the rise

According to SemRush, Google image searches account for more than 22% of all inquiries. Since Google images are one of the most popular internet search engines, successfully using them is crucial for businesses to succeed in e-commerce.

To assist Google in interpreting photos for successful indexing, we urge businesses to upload product photographs and provide alt texts and image titles. 

In addition, in the US alone, there were over 120 million voice assistants in 2021, and this number is steadily increasing. Judging by the growing numbers, we believe that the share of voice searches in online transactions will also rise. In terms of keywords and content, the rise of voice search presents an opportunity for ecommerce businesses and an important eCommerce trend marketers should be aware of.

10. ESG posture of companies is matters for consumers

PwC’s study shows that customers demand companies to conduct sustainable businesses. 

However, what eCommerce companies should understand about sustainability is beyond just calculating their carbon footprint. 

As seen in Figure 7, customers take companies’ environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance before they make online purchases. Therefore, fair and inclusive trade are other trending factors eCommerce companies must take into consideration. 

For instance:

• 75% of customers care about the working conditions of workers.

• 73% of customers care about supply chain related environmental impacts.
• 72% of customers care about the non-discriminatory practices of retailers. 

Figure 7: Customers demand companies to reduce externalities.

Source: PwC 

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