As a small business owner, you will be aware that the eCommerce scenario is changing rapidly. The need to adapt to this change is becoming more crucial than ever. You will surely have come across instances wherein you capacity to supply online has been far overwhelmed by the demand. In recent times, instances such as Black Friday and last minute Christmas shopping have posed many significant challenges to several online business operators. Amongst the significant changes that are happening in the online world, one thing is for sure – Online shopping is expected to hit the roof in the coming years.
Thus, going forward, you need to be extra prepared to handle such issues and implement appropriate strategies to adapt to such trends and changes. In this article, we have detailed a few current trends that will help you decide on the most appropriate strategies for the coming times.
According to a reliable eCommerce growth index, the 2013 Black Friday witnessed almost 40% of all shopping done on mobile devices. Expect this trend to continue in 2014 as more and more consumers will become empowered to use their phones and tablets to shop any time and anywhere. As a small business owner, it is high time that you ensure that your web-shop is optimized for small screens, so that your customers can view them on any hand-held mobile devices. Ensure that you equip yourself for the next-in-line trends such as seamless browsing and shopping across platforms.
In the coming future, most eCommerce stores will be more and more innovative when it comes to delivering their products or services. eCommerce merchants will vouch for the fact that it has become nearly compulsory for them to offer free or faster shipping options. More and more businesses today are seeking out partner companies that can work with them to offer free or faster shipping. This comes as a wake up call for small businesses who cannot offer free and fast shipping to look forward to more and more creative ways to deliver their products and services. Given the fact that major companies are pushing for delivery by drones or robots, this is the right opportunity for you to offer product or service delivery on a caring and personal note.
Small businesses are increasingly awakening to the fact that business is expanding beyond borders and they need to look beyond conventional geographical borders to fetch more business. According to reliable research conducted in this field, eCommerce will grow exponentially in the near future. It is a well-known fact that more and more successful online retailers are going global by expanding their online business operations to other countries. This has proved to be a wake-up call for many small businesses at home, which entails that you take the necessary steps to be abreast of such a change.
Small businesses will be aware how content marketing is one of the ways major online players establish their authority online while simultaneously gaining trust of their online shoppers. Content marketing is currently a popular eCommerce strategy and is expected to grow in the future. According to many estimates, more than 80% of eCommerce digital marketing services are planning to increase their content marketing budget within a short interval. This is proving to be extremely challenging for small businesses, which have limited operating and marketing budgets. Thus, rather than writing articles with SEO in mind, focus on points such as providing useful tips, professional information and advice about your products or service in mind, and information about a larger cause that you may support such as charity or environmental issues as part of your broad effort. This will go a long way in improving the rapport with your customers besides providing unique as well as informational content they can use.
A significant percentage of customers today have embraced online shopping as part of their lifestyle. Many customers still need appropriate guidance to help them what they actually require from your online store. As a small business owner, you can provide them this guidance, which actually involves using targeted but friendly suggestions to help the customer pick the right purchases. You can delve in to past user data, which could be already available to you in order to help you formulate relevant as well as well-thought-out recommendations to help your customers get about their orders.
Today, customers look forward to meeting their demands via unique and original products and services. Larger online businesses have the capability to implement measures such as 3D technology to cater to the increasing requests for customization of their customers. As a small business owner, you can offer more personalized products to the extent possible and going forward, constantly improve on this aspect.
Always bear in mind that a strong brand is the foundation of a successful online business. It is not possible for any eCommerce trend to survive long enough if it is not backed up by a strong brand. Hence, as a small business owner, you need to understand the basics over and over again – that you need to build a strong brand by delivering even better products, reshaping your business mission, as well as influencing your target audience by suitable means to hold up your brand image at all times regardless of what ever you do and whatever techniques you may utilize to market your products online.
To summarize, the coming eCommerce boom is expected to benefit buyers and sellers alike. Small business owners can expect to do better in this scenario by adapting to better means and ways of improving the shopping experience for customers via better options, better service, and competitive prices. This is also a big boost for your business, in the form of better growth opportunities stemming from happy and satisfied customers. Besides, you might have thought about better and more eCommerce trends that you would like to implement to ride the eCommerce boom wave. Why not begin now!
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Shivi Rao is a content marketer with Krish. She has worked in various industries spanning technology, science, rural marketing, startups & unicorns, eCommerce business, and digital marketing, believing that content is the foundation to facilitate the visibility of any organization and ensuring her words do the same. In her free time, you can either find her lifting weights in the gym or feeding the strays.
21 December, 2022 After WooCommerce, Shopify is the 2nd most loved and used eCommerce platform worldwide. Shopify is an entirely feature-rich eCommerce platform. It offers many drag-and-drop options, and its apps work tremendously for store owners. In addition, Shopify is easy to use as it doesn't require depth coding.
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