As the digital world evolves, there are a lot of new trends to look forward to. What will be the next big thing in e-commerce businesses? With Artificial Intelligence (AI) changing the world so quickly, there are lots of new technologies to look forward to.
The current e-commerce industry market value is around $3.56 billion and is expected to grow to more than $5 billion by 2028. While the e-commerce market grows, there are plenty of new trends to look forward to.
Let’s dive deeper in this article to learn more about what you can expect to impact your e-commerce business this year.
1. Retail POS Systems
A Point-of-Sale System (POS) is a cash register that allows retailers to track their transactions closely. Modern setups feature receipt printers, customer displays, cash drawers, and more.
eCommerce POS integration is mandatory since it creates a communication bridge between two business channels: Your POS system and eCommerce platform. Customers who interact with your store via multiple channels will spend much more in retail stores.
Retail POS systems are becoming popular in the e-commerce industry and it’s important for improving the buying journey from offline to online in order to meet customers expectations. Let’s take a deeper look at why so many e-commerce stores are integrating retail POS systems:
- Optimal real-time inventory management and avoiding overselling: The retail POS systems allow you to view your inventory in real-time and across offline and online channels.
- Eliminates manual data entry: Manual data entries are old and traditional ways of doing things, but they are always error-prone and time-consuming. POS retail systems don’t need to update information and reconcile data between multiple channels, they can manage customer information all in-one-place and synchronise order information from online orders and in-store ones.
- Can leverage customer insights and data: Integrating eCommerce solutions and POS systems means that you are gathering information all in one place. Customers love to have a consistent positive experience and once this is done, it improves customer relationships by personalising their promotions.
- Improves the customer experience: Integrated eCommerce POS solutions can solve different real-time business needs and improve customer satisfaction. It connects your e-commerce store to the POS systems and offers different payment methods, a good experience in online ordering, and can integrate loyalty programs.
Stating all of this clearly shows that POS systems are responsible for improving your customer experience and this is something you heavily need when running an online store.
2. Augmented Reality (AR)
Augmented reality (AR) has been a game changer for the e-commerce industry. AR allows customers to see what they’re shopping for and helps make a better buying decision. AR can change the shopping experience in many industries, and many people can get a real feel of the item without having to physically be there. How cool is that?
Currently, more than 30% of customers are shopping by using AR. AR not only allows someone to see a 3D model of a product but also allows the customer to see how it is while wearing it.
The world is heading towards a digital landscape, and don’t be surprised if everyone starts to only shop online in the future.
3. Spare parts inventory
You may sound surprised but with an increase of vehicles on the road and fleets, parts inventory is becoming a common trend in the e-commerce world. When parts aren’t properly organised, they become less valuable and disturb stock quantities.
It’s important to optimise your spare parts inventory to allow fleets to complete service tasks without exceeding shipping costs during the ordering process. This is essential for meeting customer demands and gives you a significant advantage over competitors.
An effective well-optimised spare parts management will provide the following benefits:
- Reduced vehicle downtime
- Less time consumption
- Increased visibility regarding over parts related expenses
- Reduction of excessive inventory and unnecessary purchases
To better your spare parts inventory for your fleet, it’s always best to use a fleet management software. This way, users can update stock levels by updating stock levels either by bulk, or by scanning part labels with their mobile phones. High-quality fleet management software allows users to print their QR and barcodes, helping fleets perfectly organise their parts much more effectively.
Once the required inventory becomes excessive, the software will inform you of it in order to quickly take care of it.
4. Chatbots
Chatbots are becoming the main tool you initially interact with when you visit an e-commerce store. Shoppers nowadays don’t want to wait, but would rather instantly find a product and purchase it in the least time possible. This is where chatbots come to save the day and the sale!
Statistics show that chatbots are saving businesses up to 2.5 billion work hours. More and more businesses are starting to use chatbots and guess what? It’s helping them save lots of time and making purchases available 24/7.
Humans can’t be available 24/7, and this was a common issue in the past. Somebody may go through a problem while making a purchase, and considering that time zones differ, the person responsible for customer support won’t be there after working hours.
Moreover, let’s not forget that chatbots are evolving, so through time, their interactions with us will become much more real than they currently are.
5. Voice search
Lots of online shoppers are relying on voice assistants to complete their everyday tasks. 27% of people are currently using voice search on mobile where the average voice search result is 29 words in length.
As more online shoppers start to use smart speakers, it is allowing them to utilise voice search for ordering food, shopping online, and better organising their personal lives. The increased usage of voice search is beneficial for eCommerce businesses in terms of content and keywords.
Many people nowadays are pulling out their mobile devices and talking to their voice assistants to help them find what they need. This is becoming common for completing purchases as well.
6. On-site personalisation for individual experiences
Regardless if they are B2B or B2C buyers, they are all looking for a personalised experience, and customer shopping experiences online. All of the data you gather from the AI makes it possible to create a personalised product experience and provide detailed customer services.
Giving customers personalised experiences on-site makes a difference. In fact, Studies show that marketers see an average 20% increase in sales when they are promoting personalised experiences.
As brands start to take advantage of the data they are collecting, it’s creating an interesting experience for shoppers and making them feel valued during their shopping experiences. Many customers already know that their data is being collected by e-commerce sites to provide more personalised experiences. Due to this, experts have different feelings regarding big data and how it affects their personal shopping experience.
As tech giants continue to expand and play important roles in e-commerce, it’s also going to find its way to the Internet of Things (IoT).
7. Remote work
You may not believe it, but remote work is more important than you think. It offers flexible schedules and allows employees to work during their most productive hours. The WFH research shows that even workers that have a hybrid schedule, have remote work days. 30% of respondents claimed that they want their jobs to be fully remote.
This trend started to grow after the pandemic, but it has been continuing and it is related to the e-commerce industry as well.
You may ask why?
Well, workers who work from home have much more freedom, so this allows them to order online whenever they need to.
Moreover, it also benefits e-commerce store managers from a hiring perspective. This means that they have no geographical boundaries of who they want to hire. For this reason, you’ll see many recent job postings stating that they offer hybrid or remote working schedules.
8. Data privacy
You might be surprised, but data privacy is actually becoming more important than you may think. Worldwide data privacy regulators like the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA) are continuously updating regulations and whoever doesn’t comply with them, will most likely face penalties.
Therefore, it’s highly important to make sure customers accept that you are collecting their data and that they agree on which type of data they want to share. However, on top of everything, brands that lose a customer’s trust will most likely never get it back.
As companies continue to learn new AI capabilities and personalization strategies, it’s important to keep your brand reputation safe and not risk customer trust.
Don’t forget to ask for feedback
Don’t be afraid to ask customers what they need or want. Getting feedback is important in giving you more insights into trends, and creating specific plans for your future. Moreover, you need to realize that your customers are the ones that can help you stay ahead of competitors.
After all, it’s important to know what your customers want so you can better analyze their purchasing behaviors and make sure that you are fulfilling their needs better than your competitors do.
Tony Ademi is a freelance SEO content and copywriter. For roughly four years, Tony has managed to write more than 500 SEO-optimized articles and most of them have ranked #1 on Google. When writing, Tony’s main focus is to carefully do research and make sure that his content is high-quality.
