5 Awesome eCommerce Trends You Need to Know for 2020

With the rise and rise of social media, brand image and personalisation, eCommerce trends are definitely taking off in new directions in 2020.

Adapting to these trends not only means higher ROI for your eCommerce store. They produce satisfied customers who are connected and engaged with your brand and will happily support your business in the future.

Join in on the fun and give your eCommerce website a makeover using these trends to stay ahead of the game for 2020 and beyond. We’d love to help you along the way, why not reach out here for more information?

5 eCommerce Trends to Get You Ahead in 2020

1. Moving from Products to Experiences

The online buying experience is becoming personalised. Higher expectations are placed on both marketers and sellers within the business to provide timely engagements to customers.

Buyers in the B2B world are reaching out to business representatives to gather information before they do their own research.

What you can do

48% of consumers said they would rather connect with a company via live chat. What better way to implement these connections than invest in chatbot technology to provide your customers with a live experience? Chatbots allow you to answer long and complex questions and satisfy the customer’s urgency of needing the answers right now. Otherwise, if a customer can’t find what they’re looking for they will quickly jump ship.

Butlers Chocolates provide their visitors with an accessible chatbot to ask a question.

2. Subscription-Based Business Models

Customisation and experience…. These buzzwords are here to stay for 2020, as we expect eCommerce websites to step up their content to keep millennials happy!

This new generation of buyers is now looking for “experiences” over material things.

Weekly food deliveries or monthly vegan makeup packages such as Kinder Beauty are now desirable purchases made by younger buyers.

What you can do

If you run a software company, you can offer subscription-based plans through different payment options and packages.

If you’re online store sells clothing or jewellery, it’s possible to offer monthly gift sets to members.

Customers love these because every month they can expect a gift online or through the post box. If you manage goods, it’s easy for you to control stock because you know there’s a fixed amount going out every month. This leads to “retainer” customers, which guarantees a monthly income for your company.

Birchbox is an example of monthly subscription gifts, delivering makeup products to your door.

3. mCommerce

49% of consumers use mobile phones for shopping, so optimising for mobile is a must. eCommerce SMEs in Ireland are struggling to develop their website for sales, so get ahead and enhance your site for mobile.

What you can do

Optimising your eCommerce site for mobile in 2020 is easy peasy:

• Compress images on your site for faster page speed. Large images can slow your site speed by a few seconds, which is enough time for your visitors to bounce to another site;
• Use high-resolution images for your products. High-res image results in €1 more per order, use this guide to help boost your images;
• The aim is to get your web visitors to buy from you, so make it a simple experience. Use clear navigation, don’t overload the homepage with imagery, use legible fonts and eliminate pop-ups that slow page loading.

Here at Matrix, we can assess your website speed and point you in the right direction with your website; reducing bounce rates and keeping your customers scrolling!

The Irish-owned retailer Avoca has a mobile-optimised site. Their top navigation menu makes it easier to select where you want to go. The “Back-to-home” arrow allows you to jump to the top of the page.

4. Tackling Cart Abandonment

Cart abandonment is one of the great eCommerce frustrations. There was a whopping cart rate abandonment of 79% in 2019! This new eCommerce trend in 2020 is going to tackle those dismal rates head-on.

There are three reasons for high cart abandonment rates:

• The extra product costs are too high (VAT, services, shipping);
• Creating a new account to continue the purchase;
• The checkout process was long or complex.

If customers aren’t satisfied with your checkout process, they will look elsewhere!

What you can do

To reduce the shock of extra costs, place the delivery costs, VAT and service costs next to the product. You can provide a calculator next to the product to add on these costs. They’ll know the total cost before they click checkout;

OptinMonster conducted cart abandonment research, showing the highest abandonment occurs on mobiles… (remember, mobile optimisation!)

• Although getting the customer to create an account with you is a great way to collect new emails, it can slow the buying process. Allow the customer to buy through a guest account, with the option of creating a new account after they buy from you;

• Follow the rule of three for the number of clicks to checkout:

1. Click on a product image/link;
2. Add the product to the cart;
3. Click the “Go to checkout” button.

When the number of clicks is reduced for customers, they’ll be less likely to abandon their cart because the navigation process is easy.

Irish online retailer Coffee Perfection uses a simplistic layout with a simple description and displays a big “Add to cart” button.

Reducing friction during the checkout process and enabling swift navigation to keep busy customers who are shopping on their lunch break happy and satisfied.

5. In-Real-Life Pop-Up Shops and Multi-Journey Platforms.

The demand for fast delivery is higher than ever.

As mentioned above, customers, particularly millennials, are vying for personable brands and approaches to shopping.

eCommerce companies are now expected to deliver their message through Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and Twitter; providing consistent email updates and offers… the list goes on.

Delivering a multichannel approach to your eCommerce store and knowing who is using what platform and WHEN is essential to delivering the right message. 

Adding to this, younger generations are now wanting to meet the creators of their favourite products and experience the brand on a different level: IRL (In real life!).

What you can do

Think pop-up shops and sponsored events to bring your customers into a physical setting to talk about your brand. Grace Beverley (22-year-old British online entrepreneur), set up the online store TALA for sustainable and ethically-resourced gym clothing. She recently held a pop-up store in London to meet her supporters and show them their values and team.

Grace has amassed a huge online following through her Instagram, YouTube and Twitter. Tapping into these networks and building a community is where it’s headed for 2020, as younger generations look to build core connections through their online communities.

Appassionata, a Dublin-based flower shop, are well-connected on social platforms. They even have their own hashtag; #AppassionataLovesFlowers!

The trends you need to know for eCommerce in 2020 are easily implementable with a little time and effort. Here at Matrix Internet, we can help you manage your social media platforms to reach new communities.

We’re not only happy to delve into the eCommerce trends for the future but to steer your business in the right direction. Our services range from creating and designing your website or app, increasing your brand awareness and improving your online sales or using our Digital Marketing solutions.

If you want to get ahead of the crowd, contact us today to propel your eCommerce website into 2020 and beyond!