A version of this post originally appeared in MarketingDive sponsored by imre
“10 years’ growth in 3 months.” That was McKinsey’s analysis of how COVID-19 changed ecommerce behavior in the U.S. in early 2020. The sea change of behavior hasn’t slowed down since with the U.S. ecommerce market expected to grow 13.7% to $908.73 billion this year. Notably, this trend is not only domestic, but happening globally with $4.2 trillion projected in ecommerce sales. With this eye-popping growth, it would be fair to ask “will this continue?”
The data and signals suggest that the answer is a resounding “yes.” Although many suspected these ecommerce spend levels were a byproduct of the COVID-19 era and that we may see a decline once we get past the pandemic, it appears that this may only be the start of ecommerce’s ascent. Across consumer product categories 15-30% growth is expected after COVID-19 is defeated and eMarketer forecasts that global eCommerce will reach $6 trillion by 2024. Clearly, consumers are more digitally fluent and ready to adapt this behavior than many believed.
However, many brands have been caught under-prepared for this evolution and are now playing catch-up to support this wave of new ecommerce behavior - it has also created a competitive advantage for digitally-native brands. Unfortunately, it’s not just one channel or website update that’s needed to compete. Nearly every touchpoint a brand has access to, from their owned website to social media channels to retailer product pages to influencer campaigns and more is quickly being made shoppable. For most brands, it can be hard to solidify and support one channel effectively let alone all of them. Making matters more stressful for marketers is the fact that the landscape is evolving rapidly to incorporate wholly new channels like shoppable livestreams and AR experiences.
With all this fragmentation and innovation swirling within the ecommerce space, it can feel overwhelming as a brand trying to navigate it. Instead of jumping on every new commerce-enabled digital feature, brands would be well served to slow down and identify where best they can activate to drive the most value. This will require a considered assessment of their current digital ecosystem and a deep understanding of their audience’s behaviors and motivations.
For brands confronting their ecommerce strategy, there are three key actions that can help shape the approach.
Identify Channel Opportunities. As you evaluate the broad and varied landscape of opportunities for ecommerce, it’s first and foremost important to know where your audience is today. This will inform where you have the best chance at capturing attention and interest. For some brands, social channels may be a hotbed of activity and engagement whereas others may find their website being the most important owned channel. Understanding where you have already attracted an audience can be a helpful first step in prioritizing where you want to enable or enhance ecommerce efforts. However, it’s important not to neglect channels you haven’t yet explored or developed a presence on. If you are confident your audience is spending time there and would be receptive to your brand’s presence (via advertising or organic channel development), it’s worth testing. Although some channels are seen as unproven, those are often the best opportunities to experiment and learn what works before competitors do.
Determine a Selling Strategy. Once you have a sense of where to sell, you will need to identify how to sell. Depending on the state of your business and your brand objectives you will put different emphasis on different sales channels. For brands prioritizing reach and awareness with consumers, a strong retailer strategy could be a critical element of your digital strategy. In this case, maximizing product page content and developing an owned channel strategy focused on driving consumers to priority retailer listings will be key. For others focused on developing 1st party data capability or protecting the brand experience, a strong DTC purchase experience and technology stack should be the focus. These decisions will shape how you go-to-market with consumers and dictate what experience they will have with your brand. Over time, your approach may shift and that’s OK. There’s nothing wrong with trying multiple avenues to see what drives your business, but be prepared to shift course depending on results - just ask Nike. As long as your approach is aligned with your business objectives, you should be on the right path.
Build a Roadmap. Finally, brands should be thinking with a long-term vision in mind. As the previous assessments get completed, it’s important to keep track of areas or channels where there are clear gaps that need to be addressed. With ecommerce, the name of the game is building a holistic, accessible experience for your audiences. Anywhere you are not present is an opportunity for someone else to be. With that in mind, brands should begin to populate their one, three and five-year roadmaps with initiatives that will continue enhancing their ecommerce facility, expanding their capabilities, and growing their channel presences.
The Shift From Journey Support to Experience Development
Regardless of which channels, tactics and approaches you prioritize, it’s important to remember that your consumer has no regard for your strategy. While this can be harsh to hear, too often marketers like to imagine consumers will fit into desired behavior loops and take actions in a logical way. Unfortunately, reality has proven to be much more complex and difficult to predict. Coming out of deep consumer decision-making research, Google dubbed the consumer purchase process as “the messy middle” - an apt descriptor for the way the traditional funnel has evolved. Beyond initial brand discovery, consumers are essentially in a constant state of consideration where any aspect of a brand’s marketing may help influence consideration.
Successful strategies require a shift in mindset from journey-based models to experience development. Ecommerce experiences may happen on any channel at any time, but to be effective they must be seamless and engaging for an audience. While every brand is going to execute their ecommerce strategies differently, the following four elements are helpful guiding principles to bear in mind.
Make It Easy. When someone is ready to purchase a product online, it needs to be simple and intuitive for them to do. Overcomplicating processes, asking for too much information or even just having too many clicks can lead to cart abandonment or, worse, consumer resentment.
Make It Fast. In addition to making purchasing convenient, speed is a key factor. Everything from page speed to social ad CTAs to landing page strategy is important to make sure you are getting prospects to a destination where they can take action immediately, even if that is within a single channel, like social.
Make It Contextual. Being contextually relevant has proven itself as an effective tool to drive engagement and sales when it comes to marketing, as well as improving LTV. Leveraging data to bring this edge to ecommerce experiences can be a powerful yet subtle way to trim time from the consumer path to purchase while bolstering conversion rates. Whether it’s deployed via ad targeting on social media or on an owned website to capture a user’s location and automatically estimate shipping costs, a touch of personalization can go a long way toward improving performance.
Make It Relevant. Ensuring your brand experience reflects the audience you are marketing to should always be top of mind. This is easier said than done and can take many shapes. Your web and product design, purpose messaging, and creative platform are just a few areas that need to be used in conjunction with ecommerce touchpoints to build connection with consumers and buoy their purchase confidence.
Although ecommerce presents a complex landscape for brands to get their arms around right now, it’s an exciting and critical time to dive in. With unknown territory comes significant opportunity. Brands that meet the moment quick enough will not only develop long lasting competitive advantages, but gain an invaluable head start on the next decade (at least) of their marketing.
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