Video content material and free delivery will assist to gasoline progress in ecommerce gross sales general and cellular commerce particularly through the 2016 vacation season, which begins now and runs via Christmas Eve.
Since 2013, I have been making a number of vacation purchasing season predictions for the ecommerce business. These usually are not dangerous or provocative. They are estimates meant to remind us of the tendencies in our business.
This time, two of my predictions (numbers M and A) actually need to do with marketing — one is a suggestion the opposite is a medium. The different two should do with ecommerce gross sales progress. I have additionally included a recap to let you understand how my predictions turned out final yr.
M. 60 Percent of Online Orders Will Include Free Shipping
Target, like many retailers promoting on-line, provides free delivery with a minimal buy.
Offering some type of free delivery has, to a big extent, turn out to be a part of doing enterprise for on-line retailers. Shipping prices, in line with a number of sources, are nonetheless the only biggest contributor to buying cart abandonment.
Although about half of buyers are prepared to pay for comparatively quicker delivery, in response to comScore and UPS, those self same consumers don’t need to pay for normal, floor delivery.
Bottom line, in case your on-line retailer isn’t providing free delivery, you’ll probably lose enterprise, since I am predicting that a minimum of 60 % of vacation ecommerce orders this yr will embrace a free delivery supply.
P. Mobile Commerce Will Grow 60 Percent
To help my declare that cellular commerce gross sales will develop about 60 % through the 2016 vacation purchasing season, I will supply an anecdote and two details. First the anecdote.
Recently, I spoke with the digital marketing supervisor for a brick-and-click on retail chain. I talked about that fifty eight.N % of the visitors for one on-line retailer I assist handle got here from cellular units. He thought that sounded low.
Keep this anecdote in thoughts when you think about that sixty three % of Millennials and forty one % of Gen Xers have made purchases from a smartphone, once more based on UPS and comScore.
Millennial and Gen-X buyers, particularly, are prepared to make cellular commerce purchases, in line with UPS and comScore.
Finally, comScore reported that cellular commerce for the 2105 vacation season grew fifty nine %, from about $S.ninety eight billion in 2014 to about $12.sixty five billion in 2015, excluding journey and enormous company purchases. So my prediction is mostly a continuation of this kind of explosive progress.
O. Ecommerce Sales Will Grow thirteen Percent
Last yr, I predicted thirteen.N % progress in on-line retail gross sales for the vacation season. Depending on which report you consider, I was off by maybe half a proportion level. While I do consider complete ecommerce vacation gross sales progress is slowing a bit as a result of it now represents such a big quantity, on-line gross sales are nonetheless going to hit it out of the proverbial park in 2016.
In distinction, I predict that complete retail gross sales, together with brick-and-mortar gross sales, will solely develop about A % in the course of the 2016 vacation buying season. This makes ecommerce look even higher.
A. Video Advertising on the Rise
This prediction is a bit obscure and can, frankly, be onerous to measure when I report again to you subsequent yr. But nonetheless, I predict that video promoting will play a extra vital position in vacation ecommerce marketing, and in vacation retail marketing usually.
By some estimates, greater than ninety % of American buyers analysis vacation presents on-line. When it involves vacation present guides, video is one of the simplest ways to point out merchandise. Well-produced video might subsequently affect what buyers buy as presents and from which shops they make these purchases.
Last Year’s Predictions
In 2015, for the third consecutive yr, I made a set of predictions concerning the upcoming vacation season. It would appear that I obtained two out of 4 right. I solely missed my on-line gross sales progress estimate by one thing like a half a proportion level, relying on which set of outcomes you consider.
- “Many Shoppers Will Purchase earlier than Halloween.” About a month after I made my not-so-earth-shattering prediction that at the very least 25 % of American buyers would begin making Christmas purchases earlier than Halloween, the National Retail Federation launched a survey estimating that forty % of vacation buyers began earlier than Halloween.
- “Online Retail Sales Will Grow thirteen.N Percent.” Trend monitoring agency comScore reported in January 2016 that complete American digital commerce gross sales had risen thirteen % from 2014 to 2015, reaching about $sixty nine billion, excluding journey and enormous company purchases. eMarketer reported a thirteen.A % improve.
- “Email Marketing Is the Best Promotional Tool.” Technology agency Magnetic reported that 70 % of vacation consumers discovered about vacation promotions from e mail. By comparability, some sixty four % of buyers discovered about promotions from on-line search, fifty six % discovered about promotions from on-line advertisements, and 38 % discovered about promotions from social media.
- “Mobile Commerce Will Reach 25 Percent of Total.” According to comScore, about 18 % of ecommerce gross sales got here from cellular units.