In E-commerce web design and development are of utmost importance as it is the primary factor that pulls the customers to the website and while developing the sites this year the E-commerce website designers need to be aware of the 10 important E-commerce trends that will help to increase sales in 2019.
With E-commerce shopping being the trendy thing and on the steady rise it has become harder to please the customers. More so because the customers are raising their expectations and online shopping is no longer only about convenience.
Hence a business owner cannot have an online version of their physical shop rather do everything in their capacity to give online shoppers an experience that should be interactive, immersive and enjoyable.
For that purpose, a business owner should get help from E-commerce web design services who are aware of E-commerce trends of 2019 and provide a customized E-commerce site.
There are many custom E-commerce development companies that are aware of the trends in the E-commerce industry and can guide you in the right direction to have an optimized site.
These trends are going to be followed by E-commerce web design and development companies as they get ready themselves to give their client the edge over the others in the market.
Ethical E-commerce Solutions:
In these coming years consumer values are going to determine the purchasing and merchant behavior.
With the consumers becoming aware of the carbon footprint, environmental issues their purchasing methods and the things they are purchasing are being influenced immensely, this includes their digital purchases.
As a result, the way the E-commerce sites are going to market themselves will and should be influenced.
Consumers are now looking for merchants who resonate their core values like:
- Are merchants using sustainable products?
- Where the product was made?
- Is the brand socially responsible and aware?
- Did they need to use so many boxes and materials for packing the product?
Consumers are rewarding merchants that are aware of these factors. Both societal and environmental impact is dictating the choices of the consumers.
With the millennials in the rise who are digitally savvy group while trying to be ethical and aware of the society and environment, they are influencing the brands.
E-commerce sites need to leverage on these factors to create their visibility while giving the transparency that customers are seeking.
Read more: 10 Simple eCommerce Development tips Helped you Succeed
Free Return Policy is Being Questioned:
Compared to physical stores E-commerce retailers are witnessing 2 to 4 times higher return rates.
With the generous return policies that customers have come to expect in online shopping has resulted in merchants to reach an expensive tipping point.
It is estimated that the return policy amount has reached $400 billion in E-commerce, which is about a month’s sales amount encompassing all of the U.S. retail.
While the generous return policy has been there to woe the customers and reduces the consumer uncertainty but over the years the growth in E-commerce, the free shipping, and free returns have developed into a dangerous side-effect.
The costs of managing the returns have impacted the merchants’ profit margins heavily.
Amazon has already announced in 2018 that from the next year it will issue a lifetime ban on ‘serial returners’.
A survey states that 61% of E-commerce retailers want to do the same if they have can or have the technology to identify the ‘serial returners’. Free return policy will be put under the scanner in 2019 and E-commerce web design and development service providers will have initiatives with better trackers for the consumers will be put into place that can identify the returners.
Also, more complex and conditional return policies will be enforced with encouragement for store pickups.
Interactive Product Visualisation:
To reduce the returns it is important that the E-commerce websites developed by E-commerce website designers give the customers the illuminating visualization.
It is best for both the merchants to present their products to the customers while the later can make an informed purchase decision after studying every detail.
As part of this process, the seamless zoom feature has already become quite popular. In this, the customer can zoom into the product to get a better visual and study the product’s detail without touching it.
But for the consumer’s this not enough anymore mainly for high-end products, so the merchants are providing demo videos of the product. A survey states that such videos make about 52% of the consumers confident about the product.
However, in the coming year consumers are looking to be wooed to buy a product from merchants that will offer better visualization than these.
For Custom E-commerce Development Companies the challenge lies in providing the customers the satisfaction of viewing products online.
This can be done with 3D imaging option, providing virtual assistance for better customer experience, giving Augmented Reality. AR allows customers to choose products in a created environment giving them a more realistic buying experience and the option to try the products virtually.
PWA is the New Thing:
Progressive Web App (PWA) is changing the way that E-commerce operates. No longer are sites the sole place to view the brands for online purchases, rather retailers and brands are moving from sites to mobile apps.
PWA is a hybrid of sites and apps that bring the benefits of each while removing the limitations.
The reason PWA is going to be the next trend in E-commerce is that of the following:
- It loads 2 to 10 times faster than mobile sites
- Can work offline efficiently
- In the home screen of the mobile or tablet, it can be added without any requirement for updates.
- Push notifications are enabled.
Surveys suggest that in the coming years the downloading of mobile apps will reach zero since PWAs can give a better mobile experience at E-commerce compared to the older mobile apps. Furthermore, it does not require Apple Store or the Google Play Store rather via the mobile web it can be accessed.
For the customers, the experience of the online store is the same irrespective of the browser, device type, and connectivity.
This is possible because PWA transfers the workload to the device rather than relying on the web server for the page layout, image, and click.
Transactions in Social Media:
Social media is going to be the next big trend in 2019 in the E-commerce sector hence the E-commerce development companies need to bridge the gap between the two.
Social media will no longer be restricted to the selling of leads and traffics to the E-commerce sites. Instead, the social media sites will give the users the provision to complete the purchase from an E-commerce site without leaving the social media platform.
China has already started using the social media platform to sell online products.
About 55% of the social media users have said they buy goods and services directly from the social media app instead of going to the E-commerce site.
Even private messaging services are gaining popularity and are going to become transactional as well.
Read more: Tips you must need to consider while developing a full-fledged and interactive e-commerce website
AI Will Be Hired By Retailers:
Merchants are able to now carry between 2 and 10 or more SKUs that was not possible even a few years back. But this many SKUs can be available to customers only if there are related products that would support them.
But with the rise among the consumers the retailers are finding it difficult to keep up with the product descriptions, images, category, and stock availability about the SKUs.
Maintaining and updating all this information from the supplier is quite time to consume, when it has to be done manually. These issues, however, can be resolved with AI (Artificial Intelligence) based solutions.
AI will provide automate creation, optimization, classification, and syndication of product content. These are mandatory to keep up with since the consumers’ demands to know more about the products.
E.g. Consumers using the AWS console can access AI based real-time product recommendations in Amazon.
QR Code Is Trendy:
To get the full information about the products consumers will no longer require an app rather scanning the QR code will fulfill all the queries.
So the E-commerce Web Design and Development have to be aware of this trend and incorporate it when designing E-commerce sites for their clients.
To know the product details all one has to do is scan the QR codes with the latest mobile phone camera. A prompt will automatically appear on the screen after the QR code is recognized and a link will be provided to click on so the consumer can get all the details of the product. This provides a direct brand-to-consumer relationship.
With both Apple and Google making QR code detection native to their devices they have enhanced the QR code usage. The use of QR codes also helps in providing shoppers with an in-store experience.
Hence the developers of E-commerce sites need to bring in QR codes in their development so give an edge to their clients over their competitors because with the millennials QR code in the trendy in-thing.
Beating Amazon with Amzonification:
Well, there is literally no term as Amazonification in the dictionary but it is referred to the situation when E-commerce sites work exactly the same way that Amazon does and that is becoming a digital marketplace.
Retailers with considerable traffic inflow will use the advantages of the marketplace to test a product, understand the resonance of a category by commissioning on sales before sourcing the SKUs directly.
The upcoming E-commerce sites will follow the footsteps of Amazon by providing a marketplace to its customers. The reason behind is that unless the customers are looking for a certain brand or a high-end product they want the luxury of finding all items in a single place.
So whether to beat Amazon or giants like them in the marketplace or to be part of the action retailers are selecting the marketplace model. They are integrating it with their digital commerce toolkit to broaden their reach.
Shopping on the Go:
A huge chunk of commuters while driving and waiting in traffic engages in some kind of online shopping though, they should not shop while driving the car.
As a result, a study has revealed that if the option of shopping on the go or in-car commerce option is provided almost 83% would go for the option.
As a result of these geolocalisation technologies will be used to understand the user and advertise the local E-commerce stores. Also, there is a drive to integrate commerce into the car with voice searches and GPS.
It is already established that 80% of users of mobile phones use voice search engines to search nearby stores. Out of them, 50% will visit the store and of them, 18% will do a purchase.
So if E-commerce is integrated the retailers will be benefited a lot while customers can get good service.
Reclaiming the Control of the Product Content:
To provide consistent experience product content plays a huge role in E-commerce such as descriptions, specifications, attributes, and images and all these are of vital importance because without these information the consumer will not only be able to find the product but also purchase it.
A customer requires this information so they can compare and make an informed purchase decision.
While retailers and brands will priorities the content of the product. The digital retailers do the product content syndication. It enables the E-commerce retailers to provide a consistent, relevant, and complete shopping experience to the buyers across all channels.
Furthermore, product content syndication has the ability to push the content of the products automatically in multiple sites and channels from a central point.
Therefore, this broadens visibility and reaches while ensuring there is consistency.
The Final Upshot:
Apart from these there are other E-commerce trends of 2019 that will surely take the E-commerce market by storm like using cryptocurrency as payment method, same-day delivery, pay monthly models, pop up shops, advanced product search, machine learning, personalisation, internet-based ads, research online purchase offline, chatbot, video in hero carousel, B2B = B2C and less browser use.
A good E-commerce development company will know the pulse of the customer, what fuels them and what they desire and their tastes are and these will continue to determine the E-commerce trends of 2019 while E-commerce web design and development companies continue to cater to those demands.