Top 5 Upcoming Ecommerce Trends for 2022

E-commerce is an ever-evolving field. Even during the COVID pandemic, when the entire world was expecting the E-commerce sector to take a hit, it managed to grow by $183 billion.

Now, as 2021 is about to end, everyone has only one question in mind: “What’s the future of E-commerce in 2022 and what are the ongoing eCommerce trends?”

For starters, experts have predicted that the E-commerce industry will reach a $1Trillion market in 2022. Apart from this, there are a few trends that will emerge and change the E-commerce landscape. In this blog, we’ll talk about five such upcoming E-commerce trends. Let’s begin:

5 Trends that will Shape the Future of E-commerce in 2022

1. Voice Shopping Taking a Center Stage

The trend of voice shopping has been around for a while now. It has been seven years since Amazon introduced it with the launch of its smart speaker Echo. Despite this, a small percentage of buyers have been using voice assistants for online shopping and e-commerce transactions.

But this year, things are about to change. Voice shopping is going to be mainstream or at least we can expect the same from the stats we gathered from a recent market forecast:

Is “Buy Now, Pay Later” a Great Move for E-commerce Businesses?

If we go by the numbers, BNPL appears to be a wise move for retail and E-commerce businesses. They have seen their sales going up after implementing it. BNPL provider Klara says that the addition of the feature resulted in a 33% increase in the sales at its client Gyms hark. Similarly, Quad pay claims that merchants who implement its BNPL product saw a 20% increase in conversions and a 60% increase in average checkout value. Here are some other benefits that businesses have noticed:

• Increase in trust and consumer relationships
• New customers as people are no longer hesitant to buy because of budget concerns
• Increased loyalty as people are most likely to come and buy again

Overall, if we go by the claims of BNPL providers, the trend will surely plummet into popularity and replace credit cards one day. Still, time will tell what’s in store for us.

3. Omnichannel E-commerce Strategy

We will also see the distinction among E-commerce channels diminishing this year, leading to a unified experience where retailers can promote their brand and sell products across multiple channels. The approach is called omnichannel E-commerce, and while it is already popular, we will see it becoming an essential part of the digital marketing strategy of E-commerce brands.

What do the Stats Say?

Here are some interesting stats we found while researching the increasing influence of online shopping:

• 51% of units sold on Amazon come from third-party sellers. (Big Commerce, 2021)
• 37% of users use social media to research products and brands. (Global Web Index)

So, you can see omnichannel E-commerce is already becoming mainstream. It’s a matter of time before it represents a significant segment of the E-commerce market & eCommerce trends.

How Omnichannel E-commerce Helps Businesses?

• According to a report, Companies with omnichannel E-commerce strategies retain around 89% of their employees on average. The figure is only 33% for businesses with single or non-existent retail channels.
• Another report states that using three or more channels results in an 18.46% engagement rate as compared to single channels that only get a 5.4% engagement rate.
• Businesses with omnichannel E-commerce initiatives are likely to see a 9.5% boost in their revenue compared to 3.4% for single E-commerce channels.

So, you can see Omnichannel E-commerce yields results for businesses. Hence, more and more of them are showing interest in it. Even in 2022, we’ll see more e-commerce brands adopting it. If you have plans to implement this initiative in your E-commerce business, there is no better time. 

4. More Focus on Green Consumerism

Believe it or not, being environment-friendly will heavily influence online retail and your sales in 2022 and beyond. Here’s what we found in our research:

• Many consumers admit to being influenced by environmental concerns during a purchase.
• Being environment friendly has resulted in some brands boosting their sales.
• With the increasing number of millennial buyers who are keen on using environment-friendly products, green consumerism is picking up pace.

So, it has become crucial for E-commerce businesses and product suppliers to jump the green consumerism bandwagon and observe environment-friendly practices. They can do so by ensuring products are only sourced from fair-trade organizations.

5. Rethinking the Loyalty Programs

Loyalty programs are not new. They have been around for a while now and have even come a long way. However, the problem is that they are oversaturated and hardly offer anything new. According to a research report by Capgemini, 90% of customers view loyalty programs in a negative light.

Here are some other shocking stats:

• 70% of consumers believe that their loyalty is difficult to maintain.
• 28% of consumers leave loyalty programs without even redeeming their points.
•  80% of consumers believe that instead of accumulating points, they want immediate benefits.

So, keeping in mind the consumer demand, brands must rethink their loyalty programs and offer something new instead of following the same traditional approach on their E-commerce platforms.

How can E-commerce brands rethink loyalty programs?

• Personalize the loyalty programs. A study has shown 68% of US adults find loyalty programs that send personalized offers & discounts based on their purchase history appealing.
• Support the causes your consumers believe in. 70% of consumers say they look for brand values like social responsibility and environment-friendliness before deciding their loyalty.
• You can also leverage future trends like NFT to foster customer loyalty.
• Even paid loyalty is a thing as is evident from the success of Amazon Prime.

In a Nutshell

Every year we get to see new E-commerce business trends emerging and old ones going more mainstream. 2022 will be no different. The purpose of mentioning this Ecommerce future trend was to offer you an insight into what the future holds for the E-commerce industry. Hopefully, it solved your purpose.

Next, you need to put this knowledge into action, learn more about these trends, and see how you can integrate them into your business. You’ll witness results for sure.

Also, if there is any other Ecommerce trends that you feel can go mainstream in 2022, please let us know in the comments.